Simmer Down: 5 Agonizingly Slow Burn Romances

Slow burn romances are my favorite romance trope. I love the gradual build of feelings over the course of the novel. This helps the love feel genuine and earned between the characters. If a character falls for another character too quickly, it makes me wonder why they fell in love with them in the first place. Do they actually love them, or just the idea of them? Do they even know each other well enough to fall in love? I feel more fully in the heads of the protagonists when I’m immersed in their complicated and deliberating feelings over someone. That slow growth of feelings over the course of the novel is what makes me fall in love with fictional characters too. Slow burn romances feel more true to real life. Love takes time to build. As you get to know someone, you learn their endearing qualities, but you also come to know their quirks, their passions, their annoying habits. You see them for who they truly are, and you decide to love them because of how all of these factors collide into the essence of that person. Another Book Riot writer, Julia Rittenberg, wrote a handy guide highlighting the elements of slow burn romances, including deep characterization, complicated relations...