Writing Romance: Heat Levels

Romance comes in a wide variety of spiciness and heat levels. Depending who you ask, there could be anywhere from three to six different levels with a variety of names and differing definitions. As I’m sure you can imagine, this can make it rather challenging to pinpoint where your romance novel falls on the heat scale. So, how do you tell how spicy your romance is?

Although there is no hard and fast rule for the romance heat scale, most of them align fairly similarly. Here are the five heat levels I use as a guideline, how I define each of them, and examples of books that would fall into each heat level.

Clean romance has very limited physicality, if any. There will be flirting, but not much beyond that. Any flutters have more to do with love and emotion than arousal. Christian romance or young adult romance novels fall into this category, but are not the only ones.

Sweet romance has some kissing and possibly even a fade-to-black (closed-door) sex scene, but nothing vulgar or explicit. The reader will know something is about to happen, but it won’t happen on the page.

Sensual romance crosses over into the sexier side of romance, making it the first heat level intended for readers 18+. There will be at least one on-screen sex scene, but it won’t go into too much detail. You might see the characters stripping off their clothes and noticing some of the more harmless physical details, like the man’s sculpted abs or the woman’s delicate collarbone, but emotions will still be heavily involved here.

Spicy romance kicks it up a notch with two or three sex scenes that are more explicit than the sensual heat level. Coarser words may also be used to up the ante, arousal will be obvious, and sometimes lust comes before love at this level.

Erotic romance is the spiciest of them all before tipping over into the erotica category (which I will go over next). This heat level will have the most on-the-page sex scenes—often four or more—out of all the heat levels and will use lots of explicit visualizations and coarse words. Heavy on arousal, this heat level is more about lust and need between the characters, but the characters will eventually fall in love, even if it’s just a happy-for-now rather than a happily-ever-after.

Erotica is…

Erotica is not considered part of the romance heat scale for one main reason: consensual and romantic love is not what drives the plot forward. In fact, romance doesn’t necessarily have to be involved at all (and there may not even be a plot!). It could simply be two people coming together to satisfy momentary need. They may only meet up once or they may get together many times, but regardless, they do not form a relationship outside of the physical.

Should I Shout My Heat Level from the Rooftops?

Now that you have this guideline, should you clearly state your heat level for your readers? You may have noticed many clean or sweet romances do tend to claim their heat level on their cover or in the blurb (“In this sweet romance…”), while the spicier heat levels become obvious with their saucy covers (think romance novels from the ’90s). But what if you fall in between heat levels? Don’t fret over this detail too much. While you do want to attract your target readers to prevent disappointment or offense, you really just need to be in the ballpark.

Bottom line: Study up on your heat level and make sure your cover and/or blurb clarify what the reader can expect between the sheets (of pages . . . wink, wink).

More About Romance

Want to learn even more about the romance genre? Check out these other Tips for Writers articles in the Writing Romance series:

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