"Who would name their son Heathcliff and Rhett in this day and age"

The twenty-five finalists of So You Think You Can Write can be helpfully separated into ill-fitting categories. This allows Bewildered Heart to deal with them in groups, and the first group will be known as Women-in-Peril, due to their thriller overtures. There are two from the Harlequin Intrigue subgenre, Remembrance by Tanya M. Burnstad and Wanting the Detective by Leah Maser. There are two Historicals, Agent of Desire by Katherine Dane and Fire and Iron by Autumn Shelley. Representing Harlequin Romantic Suspense are Violation of Innocence by Jeannie Hall and In Desperate Search of Peace by Analiesa Adams. Finally, there is Impulse, by Ison Hill and for the Kimani™ imprint.

Where better to begin than with Remembrance, a mystery thriller featuring a hunted heroine suffering from amnesia, a retired Special Forces soldier and their mutual attraction that might just save both of them for reasons that aren't initially apparent. The first chapter begins with several unnecessary adjectives and the introduction of the psychopath who wants Sarah Morgan dead, much against her own wishes. After an opening light on plot but heavy on words, the story switches to something else entirely, and the reader is left to guess at what might be happening, thus fulfilling the secondmost important duty of the Intrigue subgenre. To call Remembrance somewhat incoherent would be too straightforward a sentence, and therefore would not do justice to Burnstad's prose.

Wanting the Detective, meanwhile, sounds suspiciously similar to every other mystery thriller ever written or filmed. This time, however, it is the heroine with special in her job title, as Lucy Reynolds is a Special Agent visiting Atlanta to track down her missing sister. Her personal investigation only brings her into conflict with Kurt Milton, the sexy police detective already on the case. Lucy will do whatever it takes to bring her sister home, but Kurt doesn't play by the rules when lives are at stake. She's enigmatic. He's untamed. Together they sound objectionable. Will sparks fly? Will a human trafficking ring be burned to the ground? Will that leave any evidence with which to prosecute? The first chapter begins promisingly enough in the location all romance novels should start in, a sleazy strip club, where the feisty heroine accidentally arrests her future husband, a cop claiming to be there working undercover. Still, at least they have a charming anecdote about how they first met to tell the grandchildren.

The woman-in-peril subgenre works well in the Historical imprint, as those were the days of damsels, where distress lurked around every corner. We begin with Fire and Iron, set in the classic Midwest, not far from John Wayne country. Incomprehensible sentences aren't the only thing troubling US Marshall Brit Tracey. There is too much murder going on in the town of Jennings, Wyoming and he is directly responsible for much of it. He shoots first, as half the saying goes, and the second half of the saying doesn't really apply to him. After what seems like a great deal of scrolling down the reader is introduced to both the plot and the heroine. "Crazy Mollie", otherwise known as 'Irish' Margaret Shannon O'Shea, is a cattle thief and convicted killer. Brit must transport her across country, all the while falling in love with her and bringing them both closer to the man who framed her for murder. Fire and Iron is not your typical romance. It is told from the hero's perspective and the opening chapter features many more references to urine than readers will be accustomed to. Still, completely ignoring the structural instructions the publisher suggested and making references to urine has never hurt an aspiring author previously.

Katherine Dane begins her pitch in confident mood. 'Perfect for the Harlequin Historical Series, Agent of Desire is a sexy historical romance filled with intrigue.' If only Harlequin Historical Intrigue Romance was a genre, then this would be just right. Agent of Desire may sound like a perfume you wouldn't buy for your grandmother, but if this competition has taught us anything it is that titles can be deceiving. Hampstead Heath, London. The year 1817. Lord Crayle meets Sari Trevor. Trevor, known for wearing a distinctive Asian drape, is not your standard historical heroine, according to the pitch. She robs carriages, and as the story begins, she is about to rob the carriage of Lord Crayle for all its jewels, money and the Lord's mother's ability to tactfully approach difficult subject matter. When judging the quality of writing, a prospective novel must pass the opening line test. Does, for example, the opening line make sense? Agent of Desire begins, 'Sari rubbed her gloved but frozen hands together painfully as hid among the beeches lining the London road.' Next.

From Harlequin Romantic Suspense comes Violation of Innocence. 'Raised in a cult and forced at twelve to marry its leader,' the pitch begins, pessimistically. Things improve, however, as some years later Lynea Kreig escapes to a college town and falls for her professor, an accident-prone expert on cults. Working together love is kindled, but somewhere lurks her husband, with homicidal vengeance on his mind. Violation of Innocence is either a retread of Sleeping with the Enemy or a powerful redemptive tale of a husband sacrificing everything to win back the beautiful woman he has loved since she was a child. The first chapter gives little away, too busy introducing numerous characters who may or may not be important and who may or may not soon be murdered.

Speaking of thinly-veiled retreads of Sleeping with the Enemy, In Desperate Search of Peace sees Lisa Hill flee her crazy ex-fiance, who has turned his back on engagement to focus on his new passion, drug addiction. Much like Lynea, Lisa finds love in an idealised small town, Lake Duchess, on the Washington coastline, but still adjacent to a lake named Duchess. Sheriff Ryan Jacobs takes a shine to the mysterious newcomer, but his work is, 'complicated by his growing feelings her.' In a world where not even sentences make sense, how are emotions supposed to? Still, author Analiesa Adams should earn credit for the most unexpectedly romantic line of dialogue thus far. 'Don’t hide from me. You fucking whore, get out here. Stop this shit.' What has happened to our once sweet and innocent romance genre?

Impulse imagines the greatest obstacle any hero faces when attempting to win the heart of the heroine, a restraining order. Payton Jordan may be unable to spell her first name, but she has a successful career as a news anchor for Channel 6 Detroit. She has good looks, a trademark smile, the ability to read, skin and hair, everything a television personality requires. Still, nothing says celebrity more like a demented stalker, and Payton has one of those to boot. The opening chapter splits its time between Payton at the police station, and the stalker watching his favourite show, the news. Where is the hero, as mentioned in the pitch as criminal psychologist Sterling Hughes? As it happens, he doesn't appear to be anywhere, unless he turns out to be the stalker, and that seems unlikely. The pitch says Payton will escape to the relative safety of Atlanta, apparently the human trafficking centre of the United States.

All of these seven first chapters appear suitable for Harlequin, given their complete indifference towards editing. If they make it through to the final ten and their full manuscripts are offered to the public there are pitfalls each will have to avoid. Women-in-peril, as plot devices, appeal to author, publisher and reader. For the writer it affords them more than just the woman-meets-man formula of Romance to inform their structure. The case brings the hero and heroine together, gives them something to talk about and pushes the story-line forward even while the romantic plot inevitably sags. While providing momentum, the thriller aspect breaks up the scenes of feeling-having and family history-sharing with sequences of possible excitement.

The challenge for the writer is in finding a balance between high-octane thrills and saccharine sentiment. Romance comes before intrigue, after all, as there are plenty of other bookshop shelves for readers seeking action and adventure. The tonal shifts require a nuanced touch to give credibility to complex emotional responses to life and death danger and candlelit dinner in an Atlantan restaurant. Given the stakes of the subplot, attempts at levity and romance can display a flippancy that is not consistent with the severity of the situation. After all, is it in poor taste to end a novel with a couple kissing on a pile of corpses?

“I like horses,” he said. “And for some reason, I like you, too”

Due to the incomprehensible and enduring success of Mills & Boon it was only a matter of time before other publishing houses took the opportunity to wade into the saturated romance fiction industry. Smaller presses specialise in the niche corners of the market Harlequin has failed to capitalise on, but few companies are seen as genuine competition. Finally, one has emerged and recently Avon Romance has attempted to branch into the digital realm. Founded in 1941, Avon did not publish romance until the 1970s, but they quickly became notorious through the work of Kathleen Woodiwiss and Rosemary Rogers whose sexually explicit, rip-roaring rape fantasies such as The Flame and the Flower and Sweet Savage Love are considered forerunners of the modern romance genre that feminists railed against, women bought by the million and men were largely unaware of. What better time for some brand expansion to remind those mildly cognizant that nothing has changed?

In 1999 Avon swapped owners, leaving one despicable newspaper magnet for another. Shortly thereafter News International moved other interests to a sister company and stream-lined Avon down to a single commodity, allowing them to concentrate solely on rivalling Mills & Boon. Although the business claims to be at the cutting edge of reading technology their website is only now accepting unsolicited manuscripts for Impulse, their online imprint. The eventual intention is to throw a new novel into the ether of the internet every week, but before that can happen they will need some people to do the necessary work. This, as you may have already guessed, is where you might come in. While print submissions tend to weigh in at a hefty eighty thousand words, fifty to sixty thousand is all that is expected for their digital e-books. 'We want you to be our next star,' Avon exclaim. Their titles are faintly ridiculous, their cover photographs are unintentionally hilarious, their authors are poorly paid and their subgenres are eerily familiar, but how does Avon match up to Mills & Boon when it comes to idiotic submission guides?

'Q) Do you think all the fun has gone out of romance novels?' Well, Avon, much has changed since you were relevant. Nowadays heroines consent to sexual intercourse, so it would depend on how you were defining fun. 'A) Sometimes we do, too!' Oh, we didn't realise that was rhetorical, but then who knew romance novels used to be enjoyable. Clearly Avon has a passion for reinvigorating this much-maligned genre, and Bewildered Heart cannot find fault with this aspiration. After all, love stories have been in something of a rut for the previous few centuries. Therefore, what do you want, Avon Romance, anything even remotely different from everyone else? 'Fabulously sexy heroes who let nothing get in the way of getting what they want—the heroine of course—and giving her everything she needs.' Grammatical errors aside, a dominate alpha male relentless in his pursuit of a willing sexual partner is hardly a ground-breaking way with which to inject vitality and fun back into writing. The only character more archetypal than a strong, successful and handsome hero would be, 'Heroines unafraid to take chances in life…and in love. She’s smart and she’s never afraid to stand up for herself.'

The generic nature of romance has seen it fall foul of tiresome monotony. There is little here to suggest Avon has grander ambitions than any other purveyor of the identical product. Gone have the daring, politically-incorrect plot-lines that made their name, replaced by an underwhelming blandness. Nevertheless, the casual lack of clarity used to describe the ideal protagonists might imply a willingness to indulge subversion from prospective writers. With hero and heroine supposedly covered, Avon move onto the next vital ingredient. 'You choose the setting, just make sure it’s utterly romantic! We want to be able to immerse ourselves in the wonderful world that you’ve created.' Unlike those other stuffy publishers who insist upon their own suitable location, Avon allows you, dear authors, to invent your very own candlelit restaurants over-looking the ocean. At long last freedom? Possibly, but how many utterly romantic settings are left now that Washington State has been monopolised by vampires and perverts?

One curious avenue that might set Avon apart is their calling for series. 'Readers always cry out for more when you’ve given them characters to believe in…so give us more and you’ll get our attention.' While this sounds meaningless, the suggestion is that success will lead to further opportunities for success, allowing sequels, spin-offs and potentially more things to come from an initial story that readers don't immediately lose interest in. If a novelist has an idea for a trilogy, or an endless family saga loosely based around the drunken ramblings of a ninety-year-old with a god complex then Avon might be the home for such a concept, unless a home is found at practically any other publisher because such an offer is hardly unique. All these perfunctory statements might appear appealing on computer screen, but what kinds of manuscripts induce enthusiasm in the hearts of the Avon editors? Anything whatsoever? 'Dark and dramatic? Bring it on! We all love to laugh, but we’re also interested in stories that explore the many twists and turns of true love.' With this benign sentence the guidelines conclude and no one is any the wiser. There is little to learn from the Avon Romance website besides the fact that Avon Romance exists. Aspiring authors should bear in mind that if Mills & Boon reject their novel then there are other places that might reject it as well.