Amazon Bestelling Author Sundari Venkatraman on writing contemporary romance, happy endings & more.
Sundari Venkatraman has blazed a trail in the literary world with over 64 books to her credit. Yes, you heard me right. 64 books to her credit. Sundari's novels have been conquering the bestseller lists in India, US, Australia and the UK. Her latest hot romances have all been on number one bestseller slot in Amazon India with rave reviews
And, yes, I know this is a steamy romance, and that is the kind of romance I like to read, and probably also the reason why I want to write those kind. And what I can say here is the flow is pretty natural. Like, how I write is it's like I just create the basic characters, maybe their career or their education or the family background and those kind of things
The thrill of a contemporary romance novel is in the careful arrangement of tropes and the relatable characters and the situations that make the book unputdownable. I think that really was the case with me when I read Dance with me. I absolutely devoured the book overnight. And I had this question for you, Sundari. As a prolific writer, how do you come up with protagonists whose struggles resonate with your target audience and stay on in their minds?
I am so very glad that you enjoyed reading my book Ramya, and it resonated with you. What I have to say here is I go with those subjects which kind of touches my heart, which kind of tends to disturb. Like, you come across news articles, you come across stories, you hear about people and you have conversations with people who you will socialize with, you hear of circumstances, know the kind of problems people face
And, yeah, once they are written, yes, they seem to fit into different genres. I mean, beyond the romance part of it. And, yeah, drama, because I love drama. And after that, I keep sharing this. Enemies to friends and et cetera, et cetera. I'm not even very sure of what tropes there can be, but I think each of my book falls into those tropes. And, yeah, it works beautifully for me and my readers, I hope
You intimate and steamy scenes? Yes, especially with the number of romances I have. I must say, hard work is not the term I would associate with myself. But, yeah, this part of the story, I do that little bit of extra work because I try my best not to sound repetitive. And I'm glad a lot of my readers who are regular, regular readers, like, they come and tell me that each book is different
Hello. I absolutely agree with what you said about happiness being a choice. And I must say that you have a wonderful knack for writing stories with happy endings. So when I read your books, I know that things are going to go wrong, people are going to get hurt, bad things are going to happen. But I also know that the love story is going to turn out okay in the end
I thought if you can spread a few hours of joy and hope in somebody's life not this is exactly what I want to do, and I'm very, very happy doing this. And, yes, it's a conscious choice. And it's also like I'm exactly writing the books, which I like to read. And, yeah, my readers love it. Love them. Thank you for the question
And if so, how do you balance incorporating popular elements while maintaining your unique voice and style? And how do you decide which elements to include in your stories to make sure that they resonate with both longtime romance readers and those who may be very new to the genre? I'm very curious
And that's how they treat her. And the story is about how she rises above the pathos and of course, there is a romance in her life and how it comes about, especially for a woman who has been like, had a horrible marriage, like the first marriage where she was widowed, she was actually secretly very happy when her husband dies. And for that woman, how does she find happiness with another man and how she is ready to accept another guy in her life?
Like a woman has her own strength and a man has his own strength and they can kind of bring it together and lead a wonderful life instead of fighting against it. And yeah, maybe they begin that way, but they end up together happily, which is what the story I want to talk to. And then I wrote this another story which is called The ooing of the Shrew where it is about the MeToo moment. The MeToo moment has two heads to it. It's like a two headed snake