A New Year and a Quiet Return to Romance
Every new year invites reflection, but sometimes the real story isn’t about resolutions. It’s about return.
For me, 2025 has been an unexpectedly meaningful year as an author. Not because everything was new, but because something I once walked away from found its way back.
Romance.
The First Time I Tried to Write Romance
The first romance I ever wrote was in seventh grade.
It was intensely confessional. Earnest. Vulnerable. A handwritten declaration of a crush on a boy at my school—one I never intended anyone else to see.
Unfortunately, someone did see it.
A “friend” took my notebook, passed it around, and by the time it made its way back to me, the damage was done. I threw out the notebook—and that story—as quickly as I could.
I didn’t just stop writing romance after that.
I stopped writing anything romantic.
For a very long time.
A Reader Before a Writer (Again)
What does this have to do with the New Year?
New years often invite honesty. And honesty means acknowledging where we’ve been before we decide where we’re going next.
About five years ago, I began to realize something quietly: I loved reading romance. I returned to it first as a reader—curious, comforted, inspired. A handful of books, especially gentle, character-driven romances, reminded me what the genre could be.
Not embarrassment.
Not exposure.
But tenderness, hope, and courage.
Still, writing romance felt like a stretch.
So I took a side road.
Finding My Way Through Romantic Fantasy
Before writing contemporary romance, I eased back in through familiar terrain—fantasy.
On Kindle Vella, I began writing The Dragon and The Ranger, a romantic fantasy series I’m now revising and continuing on Royal Road, with hopes of bringing it to ebook and paperback in 2026. It gave me room to explore connection, longing, and partnership behind the protection of magic, swords, and non-modern settings.
Then a romance writer kindly—and accurately—named something important for me:
The Dragon and The Ranger wasn’t romance.
It was romantic fantasy.
And that distinction mattered.
Stretching Into Contemporary Romance
If I wanted to grow as a romance writer, I needed to write romance without armor. No dragons. No enchanted barriers. Just people.
So I gave myself a small, safe challenge:
short contemporary romance stories.
Meet-cutes. Quiet moments. Gentle risks.
Last spring, I released my first short romance, Rain Check. I had so much fun writing it that I immediately wrote five more—and sketched ideas for a dozen.
Somewhere along the way, something shifted.
The stories stopped being just about strangers meeting. They became stories about artists, makers, and creators—bakers, sculptors, photographers, mechanics learning to knit. People who communicate through craft when words fail.
Art became the bridge.
Creation became the language.
Romance became the reward.
And without realizing it, I had returned to the genre I once abandoned—this time on my own terms.
What This Has to Do With the New Year
The New Year doesn’t always ask us to reinvent ourselves.
Sometimes it asks us to reclaim something we laid down long ago—not because it was wrong, but because we weren’t ready yet.
Writing contemporary romance in 2025 has been less about starting over and more about coming home. About offering tenderness where there was once silence. About trusting that some stories deserve a second chance.
Including the ones we tell ourselves.
As we move into a new year, I’m grateful for readers, for encouragement, and for the long arc that led me here. And I’m excited to keep exploring romance.
One story at a time.
A FREE Book for a Happy New Year!
What’s the best way to celebrate New Year’s?
You could go out and go dancing. Yes, that’s fun!
But also, you could curl up with a sweet romance.
True, this sweet romance starts on Halloween, so it isn’t quite set on New Year’s, but it is FREE, and it does involve a sweet meet-cute at a costumed community event. The book will be free December 31st through January 1st.
Kiss or Treat into Love
When the Maple Street fall festival turns the neighborhood into a river of lights and laughter, art teacher Hailey is there with paint-spattered sleeves, a booth full of tiny watercolors, and a heart she’s still mending.
Enter Jack—a Navy photographer with steady hands, a soft smile, and a way of noticing the quiet good. He comes to help for one evening… and ends up fitting into every corner of Hailey’s life.
From a bonfire with friends and cider-steam in the air, to a slow dance that steadies more than footsteps, to pizza night where sketches and photographs trade stories, Hailey and Jack learn the tender art of going slow—on purpose.
Together, they discover how love grows in small acts: a fixed game, a shared joke, a promise kept.
Get Kiss or Treat for FREE!
Note: this is a Universal Link for all readers and will go through a Bookfunnel site that will not say “free,” but once you click through, readers will find the book FREE on Amazon.
Rene (Rose) Hawthorne 