National Typewriter Day is June 23, and yes, that’s a real holiday. (There is a National Typewriter Day. There is a National Take Your Cat to the Vet Day. There is something for everyone in this calendar system, which is either a sign of abundance or chaos, and I’ve decided not to investigate further.)

The typewriter arrived in 1873 and, for about a century, it was the fastest a story had ever been told. The sound of the keys, that specific unapologetic clatter, meant someone was making something. By the 1980s, word processors had pushed most of them aside. Now they live in coffee shops as decor and in the offices of writers who believe the friction slows them down just enough to think.

I don’t own a typewriter. My writing process involves a laptop, several browser tabs I’ve convinced myself will be useful, and a document that’s mostly notes to myself in parentheses that I forget to delete. (If you’ve ever read something I’ve written and wondered who I’m talking to, that’s me, in the original draft, apologizing to myself for word choices.)

What I think about, though, is how the tools we use to tell stories keep changing and the feelings don’t. Romance readers in 1890 wanted the same thing romance readers want now: two people, impossible situation, the moment they finally stop fighting it. Different interface. Same story.

Which brings me, in a roundabout way, to dating apps, which are essentially the typewriter of the modern love story. Noisy, somewhat unreliable, and occasionally producing something beautiful by accident.

If you want a romance that leans into exactly that, Swipe Right for Romance is the first book in my Love Bug series. Algorithm meets feelings. Predictably unpredicta.

Happy Typewriter Day. Make something worth clacking about.