"I am intrigued by the conversation about whether the “I love you” scene is essential to a romance..."

“I am intrigued by the conversation about whether the “I love you” scene is essential to a romance novel. For me that scene is essential to some stories, stories where admissions of love are hard, stories where people are unsure of that love. It’s enjoyable in all stories, because it requires vulnerability, it’s hard to do, it means something. There’s a stillness and a fragility to an “I love you”. But in fiction where every scene must be essential, is that scene always needed?”

- Pene Henson, author of Storm Season and into the Blue, on the necessity of the “I love you” moment in romantic fiction (via interludepress)