Yulin Kuang is the debut author of How to End a Love Story, a beautiful new romance novel centered on a bestselling author and a screenwriter forced to reunite in a writing room despite their tragic, shared past. Kuang is also a screenwriter and director who is adapting Beach Read and People We Meet On Vacation by Emily Henry. We were so excited to sit down with her and talk about both the book and TV & Film space, discuss the evolving romance genre and talk about the stories that move her.
How to End a Love Story by Yulin Kuang
Helen is a successful novelist whose series is being adapted to film. The last person she expected to see working on the screenplay is Grant, a man from her past who was there for the worst experience of her life. As the two try to navigate the creative task at hand, old feelings and new ones begin to bubble to the surface. He’s funny and likable, she’s serious and brilliant, but their opposite natures can’t help but be draw the other in. Though nothing can change the past, there might just be some hope for the future.
Buy the book now: Bookshop.org | Amazon | Barnes & Noble
First off, please tell us a little about what inspired How to End a Love Story and what you hope readers will connect with in your book?
I wrote this book at a time when everything else I was working on was an adaptation. I wanted to see if I had anything original left within me, and I wanted to see what kind of story I would tell if I didn’t have to ask anyone for permission first.
I’m a little reluctant to tell readers what I hope they’ll connect with in the book. I’m in the camp that believes once art exists in the world, the intentions of the artist are irrelevant, and what connections exist between the text and the reader are none of my business. (Unless you bring me an annotated book in a signing line – then I’ll hungrily ask to look at what you annotated.)
You are currently working on two adaptations of Emily Henry books. Writing the screenplays for both Beach Read and People We Meet on Vacation and directing the former. What can you say to fans of the books about the experience working with these novels and Emily?
It’s a dream come true to have a hand in shepherding these book-to-screen journeys, and it’s been such a privilege getting to know the voice behind the books everyone loves so much. Emily is everything you’d hope for in a creative partner, as a filmmaker adapting an author. She understands her characters and her audience so well, and advocates for them both with such grace. She also understands adaptation as an art form unto itself and has been so supportive as we do the dirty work of transplanting her stories into the soil of a new art medium.
You’ve talked about enjoying the more angsty elements of a story, even within a romance novel. What do you feel the interplay from the swoony reader expectations of a romance and the desire to incorporate heavier elements looks like in the genre’s landscape today?
In my personal experience, comedy and sadness often exist side by side – we use comedy to get through the “heavier elements” of life. The sadder I am, the funnier I get (sometimes it takes me a few therapy sessions to workshop the jokes.)
I love a light and fluffy romcom escape, but I’m always happy to see readers embracing angstier fare in their romance novels because coming from the Hollywood side of things, the romcom label can sometimes get flattened into the expectation that romcom = kissing + jokes. Whereas when I think of my favorite books and movies and TV shows that give me those big swoony romance feelings, there’s always something deeper at the emotional core.
Romance is my favorite genre because it has this spectacular range – you can swing from the sunlight-filled, happy warm escapism side of the romance spectrum to the bluer, I’m-finally-warm-after-a-long-time-spent-out-in-the-cold side of the spectrum. I love that the genre has such a ‘don’t fence me in’ philosophy in publishing, and I hope Hollywood takes note.
What books do you feel are doing a good job of striking that balance?
Tia Williams writes with such romantic verve – she’s putting the realism in magical realism with A Love Song for Ricki Wilde and there’s this smart-funny gossipy quality to her voice that leaves me breathless when she goes in for the emotional kill, as she does so beautifully in Seven Days in June. Kate Clayborn’s Luck of the Draw is one of my all-time favorite contemporary romances that deals with heavy topics like grief and PTSD while also leaning whole-heartedly into a bananas premise that deftly plays with tried and true romance tropes like fake relationships and enemies-to-lovers. I’ve also spent a lot of time studying Sarah MacLean’s entire back catalogue (No Good Duke Goes Unpunished is the first one that comes to mind, but honestly you can’t go wrong with any Sarah MacLean), and she’s such a great gateway drug into historical romance, my true passion.
When you set off to write your novel, as someone already so entwined in the romance storytelling space, do you feel like you had to shed all of your preconceptions or did you feel more like you were carrying the whole bag of your experiences into the project?
I was chasing my own taste throughout drafting, which of course incorporates all my experiences as a reader and consumer in the romance space. I didn’t feel like it was baggage so much as it was a compass – because I’ve consumed so much within the genre, I know what I respond to as a reader and it made it easier to write towards the points I’d personally look forward to reading (a first kiss, a first indication of oh no, I feel something too real, an emotionally devastating separation that wrecks our hero!)
Your creative path started with fanfic, which makes so much sense from an adaptation perspective. What are some fandoms you see right now that feel exciting and fresh? What do you think lies at the core of fandom?
I have a friend, Amelia Swedeen, who has a theory that fandom is a gene and you either have it or you don’t – you’re either predisposed to extreme hyper-fixation or you aren’t. I would love to see this theory tested in a peer reviewed study, because it does seem to be true in my own anecdotal research. My father (who’s a research scientist who I suspect has the fandom gene based on his media consumption habits) describes fandom as, “It’s like your neural pathway doesn’t have a gate.”
But leaving the science aside – I believe at the core of fandom, there’s also a sense of genuine community that’s often hard to find in our modern world. It’s almost like everyone in a fandom has a shared value, and it’s that I really love what X thing has brought into my life, and at some point that transcends the thing itself and becomes about the community surrounding it. I have met so many of my closest friends through fandom, and maybe our starter fandom doesn’t come up in conversation very often anymore, but it still feels like we’re very aligned as people, somehow.
In terms of fandoms I see now that feel “exciting and fresh” – honestly, everything in fandom feels like that old Battlestar Galactica quote to me, “all this has happened before and will happen again.” I’m watching the trends of 2010s Tumblr and YouTube play out on 2020s TikTok, and all of it reminds me of 2000s Fanfiction.net and LiveJournal, too. I don’t know that any of it is fresh and I feel that’s what makes it exciting – fandom feels like the oldest magic that humanity has to offer. The Brontës were in the Byron fandom, Byron was in the Milton fandom, Milton was “of the Devil’s party.” I love seeing how fandom simultaneously evolves and stays the same, it feels like watching something ancient play out in a contemporary context every time.
What elements of screenwriting helped when writing How to End a Love Story?
Screenwriting gave me an appreciation for economical storytelling. We have very little room for linguistic indulgence in screenplays: every scene should move the story forward or it doesn’t belong in the script. When people describe this book as “propulsive,” I have to credit every studio executive, producer, and editor who’s ever pointed at a scene and told me to kill that darling.
Are there new things you learned from writing a novel that you will carry into film?
I’m fascinated by Sarah MacLean’s theory that we should always be in the perspective of the character with the most to lose. That’s a philosophy I’ll take with me when I’m next in the editing room.
Do you feel as if romcom is becoming a misnomer or a fading term? In your book, you deal with mental health and the heavy topic of suicide. And to so many authors credit in the space, many of the contemporary romances are dealing with incredibly deep issues far beyond “romance and comedy.” Where do you see this genre heading and (much like the shift from “chick lit” to “romcom”) do you feel a different designation is needed for this blend of hard and soft themes?
“Romcom” is a term that is both evocative and useful for marketing purposes, and it’s a label I’m not ashamed of in any way (“chick lit” on the other hand, always felt a bit condescending.) That said, ‘romcom’ probably is not the best term for what I’m trying to do within the romance space in my original work.
I associate a tonal alchemy of warmth and charm with the romcom label, and I love a lot of books that fit comfortably within that categorization while also deftly tackling incredibly heavy topics at the same time. Jane Austen feels romcom coded to me, and Emily Henry feels like a shining example of what the contemporary romcom has to offer.
In my original work, I’ve been reaching for something more artistically aligned with the Brontë sensibility. Less emphasis on warmth and charm, more emphasis on id-level storytelling. I’m drawn to love stories that feel base in some way.
I like the term “romance” as an umbrella term. All other designations are sub-categories as far as I’m concerned and I leave it up to sales and marketing to determine what labels will move paper best.
As someone who clearly adored Harry Potter and felt the fear all millennials had that Hollywood would destroy our favorite series, do you have any golden rules for adaptations to help yourself avoid that fate? In your opinion, what are some of the best book adaptations out there?
My adaptation philosophy today would not be remotely reassuring to my past self: I believe the primary goal of a successful adaptation is not to please the book fans first, but to bring new audiences to the source material. My loyalty will always be to the screen adaptation, because the book already exists and as an artist, I’m uninterested in copyist echoes. That said, you can’t adapt something well without loving the beating heart of the source material. The compelling puzzle of adaptation is finding a way to compose a love letter that’s a work of art itself.
Some of my favorite book-to-screen adaptations:
TV:
One Day (2024)
Normal People (2020)
Big Little Lies (2017)
North & South (2004)
Film:
Little Women (2019)
Far From The Madding Crowd (2015)
Gone Girl (2014)
Legally Blonde (2001)
Clueless (1995)
Leave A Comment