# Men can't write romance



## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Just found this quote on a thread I started on Amazon.

A veteran romance novelist once told me, "Men can't write romance." When I asked her why, she said, "Because their sex scenes only last a paragraph."


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## robertduperre (Jun 13, 2010)

I win!  I win!  I have a sex scene that's 6000 words long!

But alas, it's also a single paragraph.  So much for that.


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## Guest (Mar 7, 2011)

I'm smiling over the subject line.
The blockbuster "Love Story" was written by a woman named Erich Segal.
Oh no! That's a man!
Well, Jennifer Wilde certainly knew how to write a sexy romance. Her books always went to the top of the charts. Her sex scenes were very steamy.
What, Jennifer Wilde was a pen name for Tom E. Huff?
Hmmm.
How about Vanessa Royall? Nope, she was Mike Hinkemeyer in drag.
e-book romance giant Ellora's Cave knows that men can't write romance. Not true. Ellora's Cave has some men writing romances, those sneaky devils.
Let's stir up a few more names.
Michael Little was president of the Aloha Chapter of Romance Writers of America.
And don't forget Harold Lowry who has written about 20 spicy historical romances under the best-selling name Leigh Greenwood. He was also national president of Romance Writers of America for two years.
A survey of publishers once discover that from 5 to 40% of their romance writers were men.
Harold Lowry summed it up once when he said:
"It's funny. The man is the adored object, but he is also the enemy."


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## J Dean (Feb 9, 2009)

Sex is not romance.

And I'll bet that I could write a romantic story.


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## Nathan Lowell (Dec 11, 2010)

One of my villains was a romance writer in his spare time. 

I'm thinking I'll write a few of his books for him. 

He used a pen name of course. 

(j/k Robin)


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## Sean Sweeney (Apr 17, 2010)

I see the title of the thread, and I see me a challenge.


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## alexisleno (Mar 4, 2011)

hahah what about Nicholas Sparks?


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## BTackitt (Dec 15, 2008)

alexisleno said:


> hahah what about Nicholas Sparks?


I was just going to say this exact thing. Romance does not mean SEX. Men can write great romance. I don't see why anyone of either sex cannot write something normally considered the genre of the other sex.


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## PeggyI (Jan 9, 2011)

Memoirs of a Geisha was written by a man.

I couldn't believe it.


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## hs (Feb 15, 2011)

I once wrote a romance short story that was actually published. When my wife read it, she couldn't believe it came from me. So if you asked my wife before she read it, she would've agreed with you that I couldn't write romance.


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

alexisleno said:


> hahah what about Nicholas Sparks?


Nicholas Sparks doesn't write romance. His books are love stories, which might seem like a fine point of distinction, but it's a big one.

For a book to be a Romance, it must have a HEA. Most of Nicholas Sparks' books have bittersweet endings, with one of the characters dying, or the characters marrying other people (but still pining for one another from afar). NOT a romance.

I disagree with the statement that men can't write Romance, however. Some are very good at it. And a certain Kindleboards resident author named Bob Mayer has done quite nicely introducing his writing to a whole new audience when he started collaborating with Jenny Crusie on a series of fabulous romantic suspense books.


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## Bob Mayer (Feb 20, 2011)

I think I get to wade in here as the only male on the Romance Writers of America Honor Role.

No, we really can't, not in the way woman expect.

Before co-writing with Jenny Crusie, my few sex scenes always ended up with someone dying, usually her, because, heck, my hero didn't want that afterglow chitchat and also he needed to go out and wreak vengeance on whoever killed her.  In our first collaboration, Don't Look Down, there's a scene where Jenny's heroine got mad at my hero.  So I had him do what guys gotta do:  say I'm sorry.  To this day, I still have no clue why her heroine was mad.  

In Chasing the Ghost I have sex scenes and both live afterward, but I've been told they're somewhat disturbing sex scenes and that was my goal-- the purpose is to show the flaws in the man and woman and why they were together.

Jenny made the point at RWA National, in front of 500 women to tell them that in the draft we had just finished, my hero never said "I love you" to her heroine.  500 women hissed at me.  I said:  Hey, they've only been together five days.  She pointed out they had sex, though.  I said "15 minutes" is about what a guy needs in meeting a woman for that.

So now, near the end, as they're in a gun battle, and he's seriously regretting not having brought his night vision goggles, after asking her to toss him another magazine, he also throws in "I love you."  I think it's wonderfully romantic.  But for a guy the romance is not saying those words, but he's willing to DIE for her, throw his career out the window and give her everything he's got.  (It would have been nice if she'd remembered the night vision goggles too).

But seriously, a guy saying "I love you" is like being the guy in 137 hours with his arm pinned by the boulder.  You're sawing it off and giving it to a woman when you say it.  I know this might cause a ruckus, but women say it a lot easier.

On the flip side, can women write all these Special Ops heroes in all these romances?  Susan Wiggs sent me some scenes from her last book in manuscript form to look at and they were pretty good.  Because here's the deal:  It's fiction.  99% of what we did in Special Operations was boring as crap.  However, I do get tired of the heroes who can do everything:  the shooters in Delta Force shoot.  It's like Jenny says:  don't have a heroine whose only problem is her breasts are too big.  I like making my characters somewhat realistic.

When I looked at my agent 3 years ago and said maybe I should write more romances and become known as the 'guy romance writer' she didn't look enthused.  Thus I'm bringing out a Civil War trilogy on 12 April.


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## Guest (Mar 7, 2011)

robertduperre said:


> I win! I win! I have a sex scene that's 6000 words long!
> 
> But alas, it's also a single paragraph. So much for that.


That's what you get for letting Jack Kerouac inspire you.


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## Christopher Bunn (Oct 26, 2010)

Shakespeare.

Didn't he write a romance or two, as well as some of them new-fangled luv sonnets?

Heck. Romance isn't that hard to write, is it? Just turn the lights down low, get out some appetizers like beer and nachos, turn on the football game... oh, wait a second. What were we talking about?


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## J Dean (Feb 9, 2009)

Bob Mayer said:


> So now, near the end, as they're in a gun battle...


Guns and love... that's romance to me, folks!


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## Jennybeanses (Jan 27, 2011)

alexisleno said:


> hahah what about Nicholas Sparks?


That's the first thing that popped into my head when I read the thread title.

And Tolkien wrote a fair bit of romance, though it was twisted in with the mythology, but Aragorn and Arwen and the Tale of Beren and Lúthien was also very romantic.


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## daringnovelist (Apr 3, 2010)

The first thing I thought of when I saw that header was "how do you know?"

Men have been writing romance for decades under female pseudonyms.

Camille


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## OliverCrommer (May 17, 2010)

I'm actually a male romance writer myself, and I don't write under a pseudonym. I'm a member of my local RWA. I write more like Nicholas Sparks/Robert James Waller, so I write more love stories than romance. That being said, although I can write romance, who knows if I can write _good _romance?


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## Anne Victory (Jul 29, 2010)

alexisleno said:


> hahah what about Nicholas Sparks?


I agree that Romance does not equal sex, but if we're talking the Romance genre, then Nicholas Sparks and Erich Segal don't really qualify (no happily ever after). That said... I giggled at the OP - good one!


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## Anne Victory (Jul 29, 2010)

Bob Mayer said:


> I think I get to wade in here as the only male on the Romance Writers of America Honor Role.
> 
> No, we really can't, not in the way woman expect.
> 
> ...


Okay - I'm now having giggle-fits


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## Kenneth Rosenberg (Dec 3, 2010)

Ha, too funny!  I gotta love this thread, being another man writing romance.  Of course, my romance novel doesn't have a single sex scene in it, so I guess she's got a point there.  But that said, it's also the number one downloaded romance on Amazon UK right now, so I guess some people must think it's all right.


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

Kenneth Rosenberg said:


> Ha, too funny! I gotta love this thread, being another man writing romance. Of course, my romance novel doesn't have a single sex scene in it, so I guess she's got a point there. But that said, it's also the number one downloaded romance on Amazon UK right now, so I guess some people must think it's all right.


Glad you're amused, Kenneth. I find this entire thing annoying as ****. Honestly.

But since you look pretty darn successful at "what you can't do" I guess you can afford to be. Way to go!


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## K. A. Jordan (Aug 5, 2010)

J Dean said:


> Sex is not romance.
> 
> And I'll bet that I could write a romantic story.


Romantic Story? Yes.

But can you write to Harlequin guidelines? That's the trick!

I dare anyone to write a romance and get Harelquin to publish it. Not as easy as you may think.


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## Kenneth Rosenberg (Dec 3, 2010)

K.A, you're right about that.  I submitted mine to Harlequin and got the big rejection.

J.R., thanks!

And B Tackitt, I love your profile image.  I could stare at that all day...


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## K. A. Jordan (Aug 5, 2010)

Kenneth Rosenberg said:


> K.A, you're right about that. I submitted mine to Harlequin and got the big rejection.


There are more 'rules' to romance than anyone (who doesn't read it) will understand.

I think I will qualify the statement with "Men, who don't understand the genre, can't be PUBLISHED romance writers." But niether can anyone else.

Bob - until you mentioned it, I never thought of it. But my hero and heroine in "Let's Do Lunch" don't say the three magic words either. Though he does say "All's fair in love and war."

Oops!


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## alexisleno (Mar 4, 2011)

I never knew there was a discernible difference between Romance and Love Stories. I guess it's good to learn.


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## yomamma (Feb 10, 2011)

There are men that write for Harlequin! Toni Carrington is a husband/wife author team.

And Leigh Greenwood is a guy that writes western romances.


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## Eric C (Aug 3, 2009)

I can't even read romance.


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## D. Nathan Hilliard (Jun 5, 2010)

We can too write romance!

It's just our romance features scantily clad blondes bringing trays of beer and sandwiches to where we're watching the football game on our big screen TV


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## wildwitchof (Sep 2, 2010)

Eric C said:


> I can't even read romance.


  This is it right there. Best to write what you like to read. Toddler board books excepted.


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## Gordon Ryan (Aug 20, 2010)

hs said:


> I once wrote a romance short story that was actually published. When my wife read it, she couldn't believe it came from me. So if you asked my wife before she read it, she would've agreed with you that I couldn't write romance.


And she never asked you where you did your research

Gordon Ryan


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

The funniest part was all the men coming in here to say "that's not true, what about..." and then proceeding to show they think romance and love stories are interchangeable. 

Some men have written for Harlequin over the years, but it's not something you can do without an understanding of the expectations for the genre. Romances are built on the concept of being safe, comfort reads. The books women choose at the end of a stressful day with the understanding that no matter what happens this book will end happy. Any man who has ever wondered what women want, what he said to perturb his wife, or been confused as to why his wife finds a character or actor on a show or movie attractive either needs a woman beta reader or a remedial course or he will not get the fantasy right. (Yes, this last part was a horrible generalization, but this is gauntlet throwing down time!) I will submit that what women actually find sexy or romantic is often different from what the man in their lives thinks works for them, although there are exceptions. (Not one man in 100 would guess on their own that Snape would become a sex symbol, for instance.)


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## Gordon Ryan (Aug 20, 2010)

Okay, Michelle, if the gauntlet has been thrown down regarding what women find sexy, then tell me why all the signature books on these threads have men with their shirts off, chests that need a bra, and women swooning as they adore the hunk that stands over them, dominating the situation. Hmmmm??

Gordon Ryan


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

Gordon Ryan said:


> Okay, Michelle, if the gauntlet has been thrown down regarding what women find sexy, then tell me why all the signature books on these threads have men with their shirts off, chests that need a bra, and women swooning as they adore the hunk that stands over them, dominating the situation. Hmmmm??
> 
> Gordon Ryan


You're asking about the covers? The convention started because male distributers and whole-salers thought those covers would sell and pubs wanted to sell books so they said, "Okay! Fabio?! Bring you pecs over here!" The covers proliferated and were the ones offered for sale in bookstores, drug stores, etc. The covers then became so recognizable that they really did help women find the books and are now indelibly associated with the genre. The covers that men thought would sell, in short, became a self-fulfilling prophecy because those were the ones they allowed to be stocked and became what women looked for.

I should clarify that men know some of the things their wives find sexy, but what a woman seeks out when she has no one to please but herself is usually a different matter, and I think it's the same for men. In a relationship, you find things that arouse both partners and part of the turn-on is turning on the other person. When someone just has to find something to read or watch to just amuse their own darn self it's often different than what they select if they're sharing with a partner because no compromise is needed.


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## Christine Merrill (Aug 19, 2010)

Gordon Ryan said:


> Okay, Michelle, if the gauntlet has been thrown down regarding what women find sexy, then tell me why all the signature books on these threads have men with their shirts off, chests that need a bra, and women swooning as they adore the hunk that stands over them, dominating the situation. Hmmmm??


Agreeing with Michele on this. Gordon, you're talking about clinch covers, which are still around, but definitely old school. At this point, my stuff coming from Harlequin has mostly fully dressed couples in poses I would consider 'equal'. Also, women standing alone, and one man alone.

Lots of people with no heads, though. Headless is in.

I have one, straight up, Fabio type cover, and that is on a French translation of my first book. Apparently, the French think English peers wax their chests. 

I have been trying to remember the name of the guy that writes for the Harlequin Superromance line, and coming up blank. All I can remember is that I liked his stuff better than a lot of the women writers.

Of course, men can write romance. A good writer is not bound by their gender.


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

I'm starting an Anti-HEA Romance genre. All of you who love romance but think mandatory HEA is an insult to our literary intelligence, please sign up. (Daphne DuMaurier, Emily Bronte and Nicholas Spark are in -- and I don't even like Nicholas Spark!)


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## J Dean (Feb 9, 2009)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> I'm starting an Anti-HEA Romance genre. All of you who love romance but think mandatory HEA is an insult to our literary intelligence, please sign up. (Daphne DuMaurier, Emily Bronte and Nicholas Spark are in -- and I don't even like Nicholas Spark!)


HEA?


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

The title of the thread was just an invitation to read the joke - hope no one thinks I meant it was true. 

DH Lawrence's sex scenes were definitely longer than one paragraph!


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## Christine Merrill (Aug 19, 2010)

J Dean said:


> HEA?


"Happily Ever After". The current marketing definition of romance novel is a book that focuses on the romantic relationship between a couple (or group) and has a happy ending. And this definition is enforced by both publishers and readers, and continually bolstered by RWA. It works well for sales. Romance is the biggest and best selling genre. The fans are very loyal.

Nicholas Sparks is not part of the tribe. Not because he's a man, but because his characters often cannot sustain the relationship. They end up dead.

Not being a romance author is not doing him any harm, you notice. But it's why you'll find him in the general literature section and not the romance section of the book store.


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## yomamma (Feb 10, 2011)

Sorry, I want my HEAs.


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## DavidMacinnisGill (Mar 4, 2011)

Like the adage says, "write what you know."


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

Exactly, Jill. That's why I read a romance -- for the knowledge that the characters are going to get a HEA.

If I want a HFN, I'll read a book with strong romantic elements. If I want the relationship to end with someone dying, then I read Nicholas Sparks. But I want to know ahead of time whether I'm going to cry so I can avoid it if that's not what I'm in the mood for.

I'm not saying that Nicholas Sparks-style stories aren't valid. Just that they're not Romance.


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

jillmyles said:


> Sorry, I want my HEAs.


I have nothing against HEAs as such but I dislike mandatory HEAs -- it insults the intelligence of the reader. If you know in advance everything is going to end "happily ever after" why keep reading? People say "to see how they figure it all out to get together" but that is a bogus argument because it presupposes that they will remain forever exactly as they are on the last page. Unless a building falls on them and their romance ends abruptly (but lovingly) together, they are in for either an unrealistically one-dimensional life or some major challenges.


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> I have nothing against HEAs as such but I dislike mandatory HEAs -- it insults the intelligence of the reader. If you know in advance everything is going to end "happily ever after" why keep reading?


There's nothing wrong with books where it doesn't necessarily end happily ever after. I read plenty of them. But they're NOT Romances.


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## AnnetteL (Jul 14, 2010)

Yep--Kathleen's out of luck. Saying no to the HEA is like saying Miss Marple doesn't figure out the murderer. It's not an insult to the reader's intelligence when we pick up a mystery and know the "who dunnit" will be figured out, so I don't see how the HEA is an insult either. 

Readers come into a romance with expectations with a romance, and you can't violate that w/out ticking them off. Sparks and others are proof that you don't need a HEA for success--but they're also proof you can't call it Romance. Genre expectations are pretty important.

On another note, I have a writer friend who balked when we told him he wrote romantic comedies. He had the image that Romance = Fabio. 

Then he attended a conference workshop taught by a friend--about romance. He came out going, "Crap. I write romances." We laughed our heads off.


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## Aidan (Jan 26, 2011)

but in all probability we'd make a good effort writing porn.


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## Atunah (Nov 20, 2008)

Oh here we go again . Really now, a HEA insults the intelligence of the readers? Really? Ask the millions of readers that buy the gazillion of romances each year _because_ they have a HEA.

I just love how the word "intelligence" is branded about when talking about Romance, of course used in a way as to mean lacking. 

As to the actual topic as suppose to the once again bash down on Romance, I never really thought much about men writing romance. Who knows who is really who behind the screen, but I assume that most romance writers are women.

And yes, Sparks is not a Romance writer. He sneers at the term romance just like some do around here all the time. 
In my opinion, if he wasn't a man, he would not have been as successful.


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

AnnetteL said:


> Yep--Kathleen's out of luck. Saying no to the HEA is like saying Miss Marple doesn't figure out the murderer. It's not an insult to the reader's intelligence when we pick up a mystery and know the "who dunnit" will be figured out, so I don't see how the HEA is an insult either.


Totally disagree -- when Miss Marple figures out the mystery, it could go in any of several different directions -- in mandatory HEA it can only end in ONE way. I'm not going to go through this again but doesn't anybody see the narcissism in demanding that a story end the way YOU want it to end? That's an insult to the writer by saying "you have to give me the ending I want or you can't be part of my private club (romance)". With mystery, you are willing to let the sleuth select from any number of possible endings. With mandatory HEA you are saying "give me what I want - and only what I want - or I'm going to sulk and not read you any more."

You people are convincing me that genre romance is to literature as Big Macs are to cuisine -- very popular but...


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## J Dean (Feb 9, 2009)

jillmyles said:


> Sorry, I want my HEAs.


Don't read anything from Europe, then.


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

It could go in any one of several directions, but Miss Marple will always solve the crime and she doesn't die in the process. That's the reader's expectation going in, just like the Romance reader's expectation going in is that the story will end happily.

If you don't like it, don't read it and don't write it.


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## jessicamorse (Jan 31, 2011)

AnnetteL said:


> Yep--Kathleen's out of luck. Saying no to the HEA is like saying Miss Marple doesn't figure out the murderer. It's not an insult to the reader's intelligence when we pick up a mystery and know the "who dunnit" will be figured out, so I don't see how the HEA is an insult either.


Exactly. There are plenty of genres with very strict rules, but romance always gets called on it. Like a mystery, the interest is in how they get to the ending, not if they'll get there. That's not less intelligent, it's just different.

Back to the original topic, yes, the stereotypical man is going to have a lot more trouble writing romance than the stereotypical woman. But I don't think that matters much when it comes to actual human beings, especially writers. Even within the genre conventions of romance there's a wide range of attitudes and points of view. Nothing about gender makes you more or less capable of telling a good story about people falling in love.


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## Adria Townsend (Feb 24, 2011)

Amanda Brice said:


> Nicholas Sparks doesn't write romance. His books are love stories, which might seem like a fine point of distinction, but it's a big one.
> 
> For a book to be a Romance, it must have a HEA. Most of Nicholas Sparks' books have bittersweet endings, with one of the characters dying, or the characters marrying other people (but still pining for one another from afar). NOT a romance.
> 
> I disagree with the statement that men can't write Romance, however. Some are very good at it. And a certain Kindleboards resident author named Bob Mayer has done quite nicely introducing his writing to a whole new audience when he started collaborating with Jenny Crusie on a series of fabulous romantic suspense books.


Hi Amanda (we keep running into each other here!)
I liked the distinction you made about Nicholas Sparks not writing romance. (When I chose my pen name, a friend of mine didn't like it because she said it sounded like it could be a man and she can't stand it when men write romance. But I think it's a question of not liking it when men make more money than we do at writing romance...)

I think it's all write what you know and make up the rest. I heard the guy who wrote the Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All used to get a lot of inquiries about how he honed his interview skills to get the widow's story and he would say, I don't have any interview skills, I made it all up. Don't quote me on that, I might be remembering it wrong, but the gist of it always stayed with me. The mind is a strange and wonderful thing. Who knows what we're capable of??
J. S.


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## WVMark (Feb 23, 2011)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> Just found this quote on a thread I started on Amazon.
> 
> A veteran romance novelist once told me, "Men can't write romance." When I asked her why, she said, "Because their sex scenes only last a paragraph."


Okay, I gotta admit that when I read that, I took it as one very funny joke. You know, the one stereotype about men and sex and it lasting only a minute. Transmuted over into men can't write romance because it'd only last a paragraph. Get it?

I never took the post seriously that men can't actually write romance stories. Huh, guess I'm weird. 

Mark


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

WVMark said:


> Okay, I gotta admit that when I read that, I took it as one very funny joke. You know, the one stereotype about men and sex and it lasting only a minute. Transmuted over into men can't write romance because it'd only last a paragraph. Get it?
> 
> I never took the post seriously that men can't actually write romance stories. Huh, guess I'm weird.
> 
> Mark


That's how it was meant to be read  Glad you got the joke .
As they say: Comedians make you laugh. Humorists make you think - and then laugh.


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

WVMark said:


> I never took the post seriously that men can't actually write romance stories. Huh, guess I'm weird.


I thought it was pretty obvious that it was meant as a joke (I could even hear the "ba-dum-bum!" cymbal crash in my head) but people started getting offended by the subject line.


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## Christine Merrill (Aug 19, 2010)

I laughed too.

And to add another romance author type joke:  Nicholas Sparks writes books where the characters die at the end, because apparently he's the sort of guy that thinks a lifetime of great sex with the same woman isn't a happy ending.


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## caseyf6 (Mar 28, 2010)

Bob Mayer said:


> I think I get to wade in here as the only male on the Romance Writers of America Honor Role.
> 
> No, we really can't, not in the way woman expect.
> 
> ...


Don't take this the wrong way, but I just realized THAT is where I've heard your name before. I really enjoyed "Agnes and the Hitman" and I just noticed "Wild Ride".  Thoroughly enjoyable collaboration.

And your comment about guys saying "I love you" makes me appreciate my dh even more. He was the first to say it.


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## telracs (Jul 12, 2009)

Gordon Ryan said:


> Okay, Michelle, if the gauntlet has been thrown down regarding what women find sexy, then tell me why all the signature books on these threads have men with their shirts off, chests that need a bra, and women swooning as they adore the hunk that stands over them, dominating the situation. Hmmmm?
> Gordon Ryan


Gordon, I am a voracious romance reader, but as people know, I deplore those kinds of covers. Which is the reason that I love my kindle, I buy from blurb and sample and can ignore marketing's idea of a sexy cover.

As to the original supposition, that men can't write romaces, yeah, sure they can. But do they really want to follow the extremely rigid formula of Harelequin, etc? Possibly, since they write to other formulas.

It's also about perception, not reality. Would I buy a romance by Gordon Ryan? Probably, because I know you. Would I buy one from [insert generic male name here]? Possibly not. But males using pen names for romances is as valid as women using pen names for action novels. Perception by the buyer.


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## wildwitchof (Sep 2, 2010)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> I have nothing against HEAs as such but I dislike mandatory HEAs -- it insults the intelligence of the reader. If you know in advance everything is going to end "happily ever after" why keep reading?


(I see many have commented, but here's my 2c)

Because it's the genre. That's the promise to the reader. It's the opposite of an insult--it's _respecting_ what they want, promising it with your title/cover/blurb, then delivering.

Genre is just shorthand for the promise. Like mysteries have a question that is answered. A mystery without a solution at the end would be shelved in General/Lit Ficiton. Like fantasies have elements that are impossible under the rules of nature as we know it. A fantasy with everything proven to be a hoax (vampire wearing plastic teeth) would have to be shelved in General/Lit Fiction.

If you disapprove of these rules, you probably belong in Literary or General Fiction--because the promise there is that you don't know what you'll get. Another promise. The publishing houses and bookstores just want the reader to be happy; we should too.


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## yomamma (Feb 10, 2011)

I'm sorry, but I feel like people read romances BECAUSE they're expecting a certain kind of book. We expect to have a story about a relationship that ends happily. What's so weird about that? I would pick up a mystery expecting the mystery to be solved by the end of the book. If it wasn't, I'd probably be pretty pissed off - what was the point of 300 pages of buildup then, right? So why is it bad that romance has a similar expectation of a payoff?

Just because you're not happy with the genre conventions doesn't make it a 'Big Mac' of literature or disposible. It's written for a very specific audience to give them what they want in a story. If you don't like how it's patterned, then stay away from the genre romance shelves and stick with the main fiction category. No need for insults.


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## Bob Mayer (Feb 20, 2011)

Ah the HEA.  

The original screenplay for Pretty Woman was titled $5,000.
Richard Gere went back to NYC.  She went back to the streets.
I don't think it would have done as well.

At the end of one of my thrillers, the hero died.  
My agent called up and said:  Why'd your hero die?
I said:  because he got shot six times.
My agent said:  Well, only  shoot him five times and let him live.  We need the sequel.


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## wildwitchof (Sep 2, 2010)

To continue my thought, since I have absolutely no desire to be antagonistic, and I completely respect the desire to break rules and be original...

Think movies. Imagine a movie marketed as a Romantic Comedy. In the trailer, we see Hugh Grant and Meg Ryan are...neighbors. He's a reclusive computer geek, she's a local television star. They have to...uh...create a community garden full of organic veggies for the senior center and... (montage of gag scenes, arguing, kissing, etc)...

Then, she gets cancer, they fall in love, she gets better, he gets run over by a bus and dies, the end.

Surprise!

I think my touchiness with the HEA-is-stupid argument is that I'm a reader who loves my HEA and I feel like you're insulting me. I graduated w/honors from top U in the country in lit and I like genre fic. 

As a fellow writer, though, and an indie one, I think you are right to question conventions and be a rebel, etc. Just read deeply in a genre that you're criticizing. Have you read Jenny Crusie? Susan Elizabeth Phillips? Eloisa James? I myself didn't touch romance until 5 yrs ago, not knowing that's what I was trying to write. I still don't like most Harlequins, but have discovered such a wealth of underrated work in the rest of the genre.

OK! Got to write on my WIP and get off this addictive site!!!


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## Anne Victory (Jul 29, 2010)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> I'm starting an Anti-HEA Romance genre. All of you who love romance but think mandatory HEA is an insult to our literary intelligence, please sign up. (Daphne DuMaurier, Emily Bronte and Nicholas Spark are in -- and I don't even like Nicholas Spark!)


Good luck with that


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## telracs (Jul 12, 2009)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> I'm starting an Anti-HEA Romance genre. All of you who love romance but think mandatory HEA is an insult to our literary intelligence, please sign up. (Daphne DuMaurier, Emily Bronte and Nicholas Spark are in -- and I don't even like Nicholas Spark!)


There already is a non-HEA genre. It's usually called "love story" rather than romance. (It's all semantics.)

Some people expect romance to have a happy ending. I expect Harlequins and other formula romances to have a happy ending. I don't expect anything else to.

If you want to write a story without a happy ending, more power to you. But be prepared for people with narrow definitions of a "romance" to be unhappy with your ending.


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## Anne Victory (Jul 29, 2010)

WVMark said:


> Okay, I gotta admit that when I read that, I took it as one very funny joke. You know, the one stereotype about men and sex and it lasting only a minute. Transmuted over into men can't write romance because it'd only last a paragraph. Get it?
> 
> I never took the post seriously that men can't actually write romance stories. Huh, guess I'm weird.
> 
> Mark


Nope. That's how I took it, too. Then people started getting all serious


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## Atunah (Nov 20, 2008)

Yeah, I was laughing too, especially at Bob Mayer's post, who made me about spit my tea yesterday with this



> Jenny made the point at RWA National, in front of 500 women to tell them that in the draft we had just finished, my hero never said "I love you" to her heroine. 500 women hissed at me. I said: Hey, they've only been together five days. She pointed out they had sex, though. I said "15 minutes" is about what a guy needs in meeting a woman for that.


I still giggle at the 500 hissing women 

But then of course as usual with the subject of Romance, the insults started.


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## K. A. Jordan (Aug 5, 2010)

Atunah said:


> Yeah, I was laughing too, especially at Bob Mayer's post, who made me about spit my tea yesterday with this
> 
> I still giggle at the 500 hissing women
> 
> But then of course as usual with the subject of Romance, the insults started.


Insults or expressions of misunderstanding? It is like Sci-Fi - some people curl their lip and say 'Trekkies' with equal scorn.

Kathleen - You are the type of woman I wrote my romance novel for. Someone who wants a book that speaks to her intelligence. Now, if I could just figure out how to target that corner of the market...


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

K. A. Jordan said:


> Kathleen - You are the type of woman I wrote my romance novel for. Someone who wants a book that speaks to her intelligence. Now, if I could just figure out how to target that corner of the market...


We are rare. Does it follow the "formula"?


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

Amanda Brice said:


> It could go in any one of several directions, but Miss Marple will always solve the crime


You really don't understand the difference, do you?


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## K. A. Jordan (Aug 5, 2010)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> We are rare. Does it follow the "formula"?


Only in a general way. It has been called "women's fiction" as the romance is less than 50% of the plot, not 70%.

And the HEA is only implied.

If anyone is curious - the smashwords page is:  Let's Do Lunch Promo Code is RE100


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## Jenni (Feb 20, 2011)

Hmmm, a couple of the best romantic sex scenes I have ever read where written by men. 

Yeah, men and women are wired differently. That is what makes it so interesting.


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## TSOROZ (Aug 2, 2010)

I have to admit trying to write a romance - but it turned into a mainstream literary cum-crime novel.... I meant 'come-crime novel... for you 'romantic' ladies 

http://www.amazon.com/Killing-a-Friend-ebook/dp/B004H8GVPE


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## Jenni (Feb 20, 2011)

TSOROZ said:


> I have to admit trying to write a romance - but it turned into a mainstream literary cum-crime novel.... I meant 'come-crime novel... for you 'romantic' ladies
> 
> http://www.amazon.com/Killing-a-Friend-ebook/dp/B004H8GVPE


OK -- I can't stop laughing at that one...... I teach a class on writing sex scenes. Usually it is to a room full of women, but one year a mixed fiction writers conference and half the room were men. One woman asked me about language for an erotica novella she was writing. I told her in erotica its okay to use the three C's and it's not church, cooking, or cleaning. I hope I didn't offend anyone with that statement, but as someone who has published in the genre those 3 c's are highly encouraged.


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

scarlet said:


> I expect Harlequins and other *formula romances* to have a happy ending. I don't expect anything else to.
> 
> If you want to write a story without a happy ending, more power to you. But be prepared for people with *narrow definitions* of a "romance" to be unhappy with your ending.


EXACTLY!!! If you want to call them "formula romance" that is fine with me but to claim that every _romance_ HAS to follow the formula is narcissistic and ridiculous (despite what the very, very, very expensive marketing companies hired by the formula-romance peddlers tell you). Take, for example, Daphne DuMaurier's *Frenchman's Creek*, what Masterpiece Theater host Russell Baker referred to as "one of the twentieth century's greatest romances". In that story:
1. the "h" is married with 2 children, far from naive and "virginal"
2. has an incredible affair with the "H" plus all kinds of terrific adventures
3. saves his life
4. in the end realizes her husband is the better man and leaves the "H" for her "DH"

Now, according to the formula-romance lovers with their "narrow definitions", that is not allowed to be considered a romance. To me that says they've swallowed the marketing kool-aide and want what they want or they are going to stamp their feet and not take a chance on a fabulous romance that might not follow their rules.

/rant


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## K. A. Jordan (Aug 5, 2010)

Isn't just another marketing tool? Like the 'clinch' covers?

Come to think of it - Nora Roberts doesn't use clinch covers and her books have good solid plots. No one can say that she can't sell books. I'll spend money on her books, but I won't pay for a category Harlequin. 

I like HQN books.

(needed to fix that.)


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## Jenni (Feb 20, 2011)

K. A. Jordan said:


> Isn't just another marketing tool? Like the 'clinch' covers?
> 
> Come to think of it - Nora Roberts doesn't use clinch covers and her books have good solid plots. No one can say that she can't sell books. I'll spend money on her books, but I won't pay for a Harlequin.


Some of the BEST romance writers came out of Harlequin, which includes Nora Roberts.....http://www.eharlequin.com/author.html?authorid=198


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## K. A. Jordan (Aug 5, 2010)

JenniHolbrook-Talty said:


> Some of the BEST romance writers came out of Harlequin, which includes Nora Roberts.....http://www.eharlequin.com/author.html?authorid=198


HQN has some really good writers. Carla Neggers is another good one. I like her small towns.


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## SuzanneTyrpak (Aug 10, 2010)

JenniHolbrook-Talty said:


> Some of the BEST romance writers came out of Harlequin, which includes Nora Roberts.....http://www.eharlequin.com/author.html?authorid=198


And Tess Gerritsen wrote romantic suspense for them.

Why does this issue of romance lead to insulting comments? Isn't it possible to have differing views, and an intelligent discussion, without insults? (And I don't mean: men can't write romance--I thought that was tongue-in-cheek funny.)


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

Doncha just love all the attacks?

It's a GENRE, people. Genres have conventions and readers have expectations. If you want to write outside those conventions, awesome, but then you're not writing in that genre. Which isn't a problem, really.

But must we always insult the intelligence of people who read and write Romance? I'm fairly confident I can hold my own in any high-brow Lit Fic or classics discussion. I've got more degrees than many people can count, but *gasp* sometimes at the end of a challenging day I want to curl up with a happy ending.

Evidently that makes me stupid...

Incidentally, including elements of a genre's expected conventions does not make something formulaic.


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## Atunah (Nov 20, 2008)

Its almost useless Amanda trying to defend against these kinds of insults.


I am getting more and more a sense of gleeful, malicious anger for some reason. Could be envy I guess. It is after all the biggest selling genre. Just very odd to be so lashing out at women, especially if comes comes from other women. 

Not the first thread on this subject I sensed that. Pretty sure OP didn't have that in mind starting this thread. 

But let me stop typing now, my puny brain might not be able to handle any more.. words.


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## telracs (Jul 12, 2009)

Amanda Brice said:


> Doncha just love all the attacks?
> 
> It's a GENRE, people. Genres have conventions and readers have expectations. If you want to write outside those conventions, awesome, but then you're not writing in that genre. Which isn't a problem, really.
> 
> ...


I feel the same way Amanda. I like Harlequins for their escape value, just like some people like sunning on a beach somewhere.

I was on a romance binge last week, this week I'm doing hard science fiction. Next week? Who knows?

I think writers should write whatever they want. That's the beauty of indie publishing. I respect that right and enjoy a whole range of writers. 
People need to accept that there are certain things that have formulas. If you don't like the formula, don't read it. And don't write it. That's your choice. But allow me my choice to enjoy the redi-wip right from the spray can sometimes.

And one general statement. An insult is like a drink. Harmful only if accepted. Let's all give each other the benefit of the doubt.


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

K. A. Jordan said:


> I like HQN books.


What is HQN?

What fascinates me in these discussions (and sort of encourages me to keep getting involved in them) is the perception that, if I attempt to make a distinction between the word _romance_ as it has been understood since the time of King Arthur, and the late 20th Century narrowly-defined genre-romance, it raises such ire and perceptions of "insult". I don't see that with any other genre. To detective fiction fans, Sherlock Holmes is just as much "detective" as contemporary genre detective novels; to sci-fi fans Jules Verne is just as much "sci-fi" as contemporary genre sci-fi. But to suggest to a romance lover that "Wuthering Heights" is just as much a romance as contemporary genre romance is to touch off a fire-storm of defensiveness.

I resist the conclusion that it is due to the fact that sci-fi and detective fans tend to be of both genders while romance tends to appeal largely to women. But it is certainly predictable what will happen in every one of thee discussions.


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## telracs (Jul 12, 2009)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> What is HQN?
> 
> What fascinates me in these discussions (and sort of encourages me to keep getting involved in them) is the perception that, if I attempt to make a distinction between the word _romance_ as it has been understood since the time of King Arthur, and the late 20th Century narrowly-defined genre-romance, it raises such ire and perceptions of "insult". I don't see that with any other genre. To detective fiction fans, Sherlock Holmes is just as much "detective" as contemporary genre detective novels; to sci-fi fans Jules Verne is just as much "sci-fi" as contemporary genre sci-fi. But to suggest to a romance lover that "Wuthering Heights" is just as much a romance as contemporary genre romance is to touch off a fire-storm of defensiveness.
> 
> I resist the conclusion that it is due to the fact that sci-fi and detective fans tend to be of both genders while romance tends to appeal largely to women. But it is certainly predictable what will happen in every one of thee discussions.


Kathleen, believe me, sci-fi fans can get very particular over the sub-categories of the genre and what falls where. And don't even try to get into the fantasy vs. sci-fi category.

I believe KA was using HQN to mean Harlequin.

And again, I think the best thing is for people to realize that everyone sees things differently and language may not be as precise as we like.

Especially on-line, when what I may mean as a joke, you might read as an insult.


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## Atunah (Nov 20, 2008)

The "ire" does not stem from discussing definitions of a genre, in this case Romance. It stems from you calling into questions the intelligence of romance readers with a smirk. It is you saying reading romance is like the big mac to whatever perceived high brow stuff you like to bring up. You either don't get the difference, or you pretend to.

And your post just now shows me that you enjoy riling up people and enjoy flinging those insults. Then in the end you end up getting another dig in at women, not very thinly veiled that is. Very odd indeed.


And a general comment, I see Harlequin keeps getting mentioned and it might give the impression to those unfamiliar with romance as a whole that that is all it is. I read very few Harlequins, just not my cuppa. There is a huge amount of romance out there not Harlequin. Not that there is anything wrong with them of course, they have been pioneers with ebooks. 

eta: HQN are full length romance novels as suppose the shorter ones with the different imprints.


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

scarlet said:


> Kathleen, believe me, sci-fi fans can get very particular over the sub-categories of the genre and what falls where. And don't even try to get into the fantasy vs. sci-fi category.


I'll take you word for that, though I have yet to see a whole discussion here about it.

Believe me, I take very little seriously and almost nothing personally while online. Little black marks dancing across a screen aren't that important...


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

Scarlett is correct. Every genre has its conventions and afficionados will make fine distinctions as to the various subgenres. Hardboiled crime lovers are not going to find a cozy mystery to be a perfect substitute. They're not the same thing at all.

And HQN is Harlequin's single title imprint (as opposed to the category lines).

Don't get me wrong. I love "love stories" or novels with strong romantic elements. Heck, I don't even write Romance, per se. (I've yet to write a HEA, just HFN.) But if something is called a Romance and it's not, I get annoyed. I read for very specific reasons. If I'm going to cry, I want to know that ahead of time. If the heroine decides she's better off without the guy, that's fine, but if I was expecting a HEA (which I do if I pick up a Romance), then that book is going to be a wallbanger.

I see Harlequin brought up a lot. Yes, I know they're huge, but they're certainly not the only publishing house out there. They may have a stranglehold on category romance (Harlequin Present, Desire, Blaze, Intrigue, etc), but not the single titles. Not by a long shot.

And I do find it insulting to say that an entire genre that you don't like is the Big Mac of the literary world.


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## wildwitchof (Sep 2, 2010)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> Little black marks dancing across a screen aren't that important...


So says the writer.


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

Oh how I wish people could love what they love without implying that people who love something else are of lesser intelligence.

Writers: This forum is a public venue. What you say here is out there in the ether forever. Insulting fellow authors and readers isn't great marketing.

I, too, took the OP to be merely fun. What happened afterward, not so much.


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

Amanda Brice said:


> I read for very specific reasons. If I'm going to cry, I want to know that ahead of time. If the heroine decides she's better off without the guy, that's fine, but if I was expecting a HEA (which I do if I pick up a Romance), then that book is going to be a wallbanger.


See, to me that defeats the purpose of literature. Literature has traditionally offered readers a way to understand the world in a new way, not just idle entertainment. It's sad what we have devolved in to.



Amanda Brice said:


> And I do find it insulting to say that an entire genre that you don't like is the Big Mac of the literary world.


Well, it's a pretty good analogy -- Big Macs are very, very popular and loved by a lot of people. And the people who buy them want the assurance that they will come with Special Sauce" -- no mustard allowed. You have to admit, it fits.


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

Monique said:


> ...implying that people who love something else are of lesser intelligence.


It's fascinating that you draw that conclusion.


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> Well, it's a pretty good analogy -- Big Macs are very, very popular and loved by a lot of people. And the people who buy them want the assurance that they will come with Special Sauce" -- no mustard allowed. You have to admit, it fits.


No, I don't have to admit that. I don't think it fits at all. I think you have a very limited understanding of the Romance genre and are applying your dislike of some books that you consider formulaic (and I admit, they are most definitely out there) to the entire genre as a whole.

I guess we'll have to agree to disagree, though, because I have found some Romances to be pretty amazing pieces of literature, that offers me a way to understand the world in a new way, that shed light on current events, comment on political or social issues, teach, let me travel to different worlds and era...all while entertaining.


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

Amanda Brice said:


> I have found some Romances to be pretty amazing pieces of literature, that offers me a way to understand the world in a new way, that shed light on current events, comment on political or social issues, teach, let me travel to different worlds and era...all while entertaining.


Did those works follow the "formula"?


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## Jenni (Feb 20, 2011)

Taken directly from Romance Writers of America as to what makes a romance which can be found here: http://www.rwa.org/cs/the_romance_genre

"About the Romance Genre
Romance fiction is smart, fresh and diverse. Whether you enjoy contemporary dialogue, historical settings, mystery, thrillers or any number of other themes, there's a romance novel waiting for you!

Two basic elements comprise every romance novel: a central love story and an emotionally-satisfying and optimistic ending.

A Central Love Story: The main plot centers around two individuals falling in love and struggling to make the relationship work. A writer can include as many subplots as he/she wants as long as the love story is the main focus of the novel.

An Emotionally-Satisfying and Optimistic Ending: In a romance, the lovers who risk and struggle for each other and their relationship are rewarded with emotional justice and unconditional love.

Romance novels may have any tone or style, be set in any place or time, and have varying levels of sensuality-ranging from sweet to extremely hot. These settings and distinctions of plot create specific subgenres within romance fiction."

It doesn't matter if you are writing category romance or single title mainstream romance, this is the basic elements that go into a romance novel.

I write Romantic Suspense. People die in my books but the main storyline is always about the Hero and Heroine and their struggle and yes, always an HEA. Truthfully, any novel, regardless of genre, if the ending is depressing or too dark or not very happy, I don't want to read it. That doesn't make the book bad or not good or nor worthy, it just means it's not my cup of Tea.

And I take my Big Mac without the Special Sauce and extra pickles.


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

Christine Merrill said:


> Lots of people with no heads, though. Headless is in.


Then there's its fraternal twin, the half-head that starts at the nose or lower. Although, often those are also the ones with the gorgeous, but often anachronistic, gowns.


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

If by "formula" you mean they had a HEA, yes.

The joy of reading Romance to me is in the journey. Sure, I know what the outcome will be, but I don't know how they get there. It's just like a cozy mystery. I know the amateur sleuth is going to solve the crime. But I don't know how.


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> I'm starting an Anti-HEA Romance genre. All of you who love romance but think mandatory HEA is an insult to our literary intelligence, please sign up. (Daphne DuMaurier, Emily Bronte and Nicholas Spark are in -- and I don't even like Nicholas Spark!)


HEAs are a promise. Women, in part, seek these books out as a form of comfort and invested in a relationship that ends of failing isn't comfortable. I don't need an HEA in most of my reading, but on days I chose a romance that is exactly what I'm looking for and what a lot of other women are seeking. Without an HEA, it's a different genre.


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

MichelleR said:


> HEAs are a promise. Women, in part, seek these books out as a form of comfort and invested in a relationship that ends of failing isn't comfortable. I don't need an HEA in most of my reading, but on days I chose a romance that is exactly what I'm looking for and what a lot of other women are seeking. Without an HEA, it's a different genre.


^^ This.

I probably read more books outside of Romance combined, but when I choose a Romance, I'm looking for the for promise of a happy ending. If you tell me it's a Romance and the hero dies? Nope. Not a Romance. It may be a wondeful story, and I might actually love it, but it's not a Romance. And if that's what I was looking for that day, I'm going to get annoyed.


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> I have nothing against HEAs as such but I dislike mandatory HEAs -- it insults the intelligence of the reader. If you know in advance everything is going to end "happily ever after" why keep reading? People say "to see how they figure it all out to get together" but that is a bogus argument because it presupposes that they will remain forever exactly as they are on the last page. Unless a building falls on them and their romance ends abruptly (but lovingly) together, they are in for either an unrealistically one-dimensional life or some major challenges.


It's fantasy, specifically there because the people reading it are cognizant real life doesn't have the same guarantee. It's like saying musicals insult people's intelligence because people don't just burst out singing. Or that mystery series and medical dramas insult people by saying we think it's normal for one person to constantly have all those things happen to and around them when real life cops, and doctors, and what-not have very little read drama. Genre conventions based on what people want for that type of book or entertainment which actually help folks decide.


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## Mike Nettleton--Author (Aug 10, 2010)

One of the things that makes me crazy is the assumption that all men are the same as are all women. The stereotype that men selfishly only care about getting themselves off, hate the idea of commitment and don't have any sense of what is romantic is just dead wrong. People are people and we're all different. I know women who are the least romantic human beings on earth and men who are starry-eyed romantics of the most profound sort. Can a man write a romantic scene. Absolutely. It may not fit the stereotypes some people hold on to, but can be romantic. My wife finds Lee Child's Jack Reacher to be a romantic figure, not because he buys flowers, opens doors or caters to a woman's needs and desires but because he treats them with respect and dignity. This whole conversation is a little like saying a woman can't possibly understand machinery. I know some pretty darn good female mechanics.


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## Anne Victory (Jul 29, 2010)

Mike Nettleton--Author said:


> One of the things that makes me crazy is the assumption that all men are the same as are all women. The stereotype that men selfishly only care about getting themselves off, hate the idea of commitment and don't have any sense of what is romantic is just dead wrong. People are people and we're all different. I know women who are the least romantic human beings on earth and men who are starry-eyed romantics of the most profound sort. Can a man write a romantic scene. Absolutely. It may not fit the stereotypes some people hold on to, but can be romantic. My wife finds Lee Child's Jack Reacher to be a romantic figure, not because he buys flowers, opens doors or caters to a woman's needs and desires but because he treats them with respect and dignity. This whole conversation is a little like saying a woman can't possibly understand machinery. I know some pretty darn good female mechanics.


*sigh* The original post and it's accompanying subject was a JOKE. That's it, that's all.


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## Christine Merrill (Aug 19, 2010)

And the continual use of formula is pretty insulting, too.

I just spent months of my life reworking Dickens' A Christmas Carol into a Luddite rebellion story in Northern England, circa Dec. 1811 (because it had to be set before the repeal of the Orders in Council) playing on current union strife, economic problems and war weariness to give modern readers something to latch on to.

And that was a Harlequin category novel.

Other than, 'Can you do a Christmas book by February?' I got no other instructions.

If there is some kind of formula for these books, I'd like to see it now please, as clearly, I waste too much time trying to make them unique (Apart from the endings. They are all happy).

And you notice, I don't go around poking Bob and Gordon, asking to see the basic outline they must use for all that men's adventure stuff, and assuming that it is a walk in the park and all the books must be alike because there are so many of them.

Because I know from experience that _there is no such thing as a formula for genre fiction._ Not for romance, Not for any of the other genres.


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

Christine Merrill said:


> I just spent months of my life reworking Dickens' A Christmas Carol into a Luddite rebellion story in Northern England, circa Dec. 1811 (because it had to be set before the repeal of the Orders in Council) playing on current union strife, economic problems and war weariness to give modern readers something to latch on to.
> 
> And that was a Harlequin category novel.
> 
> Other than, 'Can you do a Christmas book by February?' I got no other instructions.


Title, please! I want to read this one!!!


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## Anne Victory (Jul 29, 2010)

Christine Merrill said:


> And the continual use of formula is pretty insulting, too.
> 
> I just spent months of my life reworking Dickens' A Christmas Carol into a Luddite rebellion story in Northern England, circa Dec. 1811 (because it had to be set before the repeal of the Orders in Council) playing on current union strife, economic problems and war weariness to give modern readers something to latch on to.
> 
> ...


Pretty much this. I'm trying to keep my mouth shut, for the most part, but agree with everything you wrote.


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> Totally disagree -- when Miss Marple figures out the mystery, it could go in any of several different directions -- in mandatory HEA it can only end in ONE way. I'm not going to go through this again but doesn't anybody see the narcissism in demanding that a story end the way YOU want it to end? That's an insult to the writer by saying "you have to give me the ending I want or you can't be part of my private club (romance)". With mystery, you are willing to let the sleuth select from any number of possible endings. With mandatory HEA you are saying "give me what I want - and only what I want - or I'm going to sulk and not read you any more."
> 
> You people are convincing me that genre romance is to literature as Big Macs are to cuisine -- very popular but...


The Miss Marple comment doesn't work. The point is that we expect her to solve the crime -- that she does so by choosing from a drawing room of people is a mystery convention. By the very fact that it's called a mystery, you are supposed to be kept guessing. There aren't any number of possible endings, there are several people who could step into the needed role. There is still a met expectation. The romance novel convention is a different one, and it still must be met. Genre fiction has rules.

Readers are not holding writers hostage. Romance novelists go in knowing their genre. Aware that HEA is job requirement and probably something they believe it too or they'd be drawn to write something else. Your claim that readers are narcissistic is like claiming someone is a narcissist for buying a can of chicken soup and being put out upon finding out the inside is Cream of Tomato. I'm aware soup and art are different, but I'm commenting that if something is labeled in a certain way, readers are not selfish for wanting what they were told they were purchasing and over decades to hundreds of years depending on how you look at it, readers have been told that romances end happily and have purchased based on this. There is no insult to the writer unless you think romance readers think there's shame in someone writing loves stories instead of romances.

You make it seem like readers just arbitrarily chose last Tuesday to demand only romance novels with HEA. Readers expect HEA, because it's what they've been sold all their lives and their mothers lives, what makes them happy, and what they chose to read in their leisure time.

Romance is* the *recession proof genre -- the sales never actually slump and often spike when times are bad. No other genre can touch the hem of its gown. It's also a genre filled with loyalty. With readers seeking out back-lists and recommending to friends. There is no logical reason to take away the most consistent element of its success. Over the years a lot of things have changes in terms of gender roles, level of explicitness,career paths, and the expectations women have for relationships, but the one thing that doesn't change -- for good reason -- is that the hero and heroine end the book together. A romance writer knows it when she (or he) types their first word and wanted to provide it, or they wouldn't have selected the genre or would have been told upon submission that it doesn't fit. Or should all pubs throw submission guidelines out the window?


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

WVMark said:


> Okay, I gotta admit that when I read that, I took it as one very funny joke. You know, the one stereotype about men and sex and it lasting only a minute. Transmuted over into men can't write romance because it'd only last a paragraph. Get it?
> 
> I never took the post seriously that men can't actually write romance stories. Huh, guess I'm weird.
> 
> Mark


I think most of us got that joke, but the conversation evolved based on whether or not the joke premise was true. If it hadn't, the threads would have consisted of, "Oh, yah! That's a good one!"


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

I couldn't imagine Pride & Prejudice if Lizzy and Darcy hadn't ended up together.


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

caseyf6 said:


> Don't take this the wrong way, but I just realized THAT is where I've heard your name before. I really enjoyed "Agnes and the Hitman" and I just noticed "Wild Ride".  Thoroughly enjoyable collaboration.


Sooooo funny, Casey. I had this exact moment last night. I realized a couple days ago that I know Bob's name, but couldn't place it, and then I read his post last night, saw Crusie, and it all came together! Sounds like we had the exact same journey there, although I never read the books. (Yet! )


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

Michelle, you totally should!

My fave from that collaboration was DON'T LOOK DOWN. I thought the cover was especially clever. The dust jacket is done in pastels and promises a chicklitty read, but then you take it off and the hardcover is in camouflage.

It really is the perfect book to share with your husband and is action-adventure-y enough to appeal to many men. My hubby reads nothing but old school Tom Clancy and the newspaper, and even he enjoyed it!


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

TSOROZ said:


> I have to admit trying to write a romance - but it turned into a mainstream literary cum-crime novel.... I meant 'come-crime novel... for you 'romantic' ladies


I'm weeping here.


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

K. A. Jordan said:


> Isn't just another marketing tool? Like the 'clinch' covers?
> 
> Come to think of it - Nora Roberts doesn't use clinch covers and her books have good solid plots. No one can say that she can't sell books. I'll spend money on her books, but I won't pay for a category Harlequin.
> 
> ...





K. A. Jordan said:


> Isn't just another marketing tool? Like the 'clinch' covers?
> 
> Come to think of it - Nora Roberts doesn't use clinch covers and her books have good solid plots. No one can say that she can't sell books. I'll spend money on her books, but I won't pay for a category Harlequin.
> 
> ...


Nora Roberts started out with Harlequin as you mention, writing contemporaries, and so she didn't start out with the clinch covers, rarely to never wrote the type of books that get those covers, and came out of the Harlequin experience with huge name recognition, which became all she needed. She had the dream experience. She also had the talent -- which Janet Dailey wanted too -- but that's a whole other topic.


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## KerylR (Dec 28, 2010)

K. A. Jordan said:


> Romantic Story? Yes.
> 
> But can you write to Harlequin guidelines? That's the trick!
> 
> I dare anyone to write a romance and get Harelquin to publish it. Not as easy as you may think.


Hell, I can't read to Harlequin's guidelines. Trying to imagine writing to them makes my head hurt.


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> What is HQN?
> 
> What fascinates me in these discussions (and sort of encourages me to keep getting involved in them) is the perception that, if I attempt to make a distinction between the word _romance_ as it has been understood since the time of King Arthur, and the late 20th Century narrowly-defined genre-romance, it raises such ire and perceptions of "insult".


You can use it in any sense you want and tell people you consider yourself a romance novelist and actually consider yourself a romance novelist, but in the hands of a publishing house they would not market the books you're talking about as romances. The word has evolved to mean something else, at least in the literary sense.

Just like if you went around calling people gay. You have every right to like the old-timey meaning of cheerful and to wish the meaning would go back to being that, to use it in the period correct sense in a historical, but in contemporary society people will think you mean something else. There is no insult intended in saying that for book buyers, romance novel follow the Cinderella formula -- AKA _And They Lived Happily Ever After. _ That romance once meant something different is interesting, makes for a good column on words, and is all well and good, but I doubt that as a rule you walk around peppering your speech with anachronisms and defending them instead of seeking to be understood.


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> See, to me that defeats the purpose of literature. Literature has traditionally offered readers a way to understand the world in a new way, not just idle entertainment. It's sad what we have devolved in to.


Genre fiction and literary fiction are two different tracks. You know how people who hate Kindles act like owners have forsworn print forever? Or how Kindle owners have signed away the right to enter a library ever again, probably in blood? People who read genre can and do read between genres, can and do read literary fiction, and vice versa.

Where, from what you see in this thread, is the devolution? What I see is people believing in met expectations on whatever they read. That a woman reads a romance novel and expects a HEA doesn't mean she can't or won't read A New York Times Critical Darling next and end up crying into her pillow, knowing that's what she signed up for as a possible result _this_ time.


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

KerylR said:


> Hell, I can't read to Harlequin's guidelines. Trying to imagine writing to them makes my head hurt.


Hear, hear!!!


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

MichelleR said:


> You can use it in any sense you want and tell people you consider yourself a romance novelist and actually consider yourself a romance novelist,


Good God!!! I'd rather be known as a Glenn Beck fan or [gasp!] Charlie Sheen's therapist!


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## KerylR (Dec 28, 2010)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> I'm starting an Anti-HEA Romance genre. All of you who love romance but think mandatory HEA is an insult to our literary intelligence, please sign up. (Daphne DuMaurier, Emily Bronte and Nicholas Spark are in -- and I don't even like Nicholas Spark!)


Kathleen, tell me where the meetings are and I'll bring the cookies!

I love Nicholas Sparks, and John Jakes so formed my idea of romantic and romance that I still think George and Constance had the perfect marriage.

I don't need an HEA. I do need characters that respect each other. I need women who get that having a guy literally through his life in front of yours is a significantly bigger deal than having him say 'I love you.' I want heroes who really like sex and are creative about it. I want characters who are not declaring undying love two days after meeting each other. I want characters who are in touch with what they are feeling, but aren't stupid about it. Nothing turns me off faster than stupid characters.


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## flanneryohello (May 11, 2010)

I encourage anyone who wants to "break the mold" and write a story with romantic elements and a dissatisfying, pessimistic ending to do so. If you insist on calling it a "romance", your only option will be to self-publish, because no publisher of "romances" will touch your book. If you market that book as a romance and target the large audience of romance readers, be prepared for negative reactions. At the end of the day, it doesn't really matter what an individual author believes about romances and the readers who enjoy them: whether it's that they're stupid, narcissistic, or somehow unevolved. That author will discover soon enough that when you break a promise to your readers, most of them won't come back for more.

I don't want to read a mystery that doesn't get solved. Don't want science-fiction that contains no scientific elements. Don't want a fantasy without make-believe worlds and/or creatures. I don't want a thriller with no tension. And I most definitely don't want a romance with a sad or depressing ending.

That the romance genre (as it's understood by both the industry and the readers) requires an emotionally satisfying, optimistic ending does not a "formula" make. You think Miss Marple has many different options at the end of her mystery novel? Sure, the crime could potentially have different resolutions, but the important part is that she'll solve it. Likewise, a romance can take many different roads to its optimistic ending, but the important part is that the reader isn't depressed when it's over.

I don't understand why people who don't understand or appreciate the romance genre insist that it should change. Those of us who like reading romances are happy with the status quo. Nobody is forcing you to read (or write) a romance. If you don't like it, write literary fiction (and label it as such). Trust me, you'll find a more receptive audience that way.


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## Bob Mayer (Feb 20, 2011)

Did someone mention Don't Look Down?  Jenny Crusie and I come up with the dust cover being kind of romancy and the hardcover being camo during a meeting with the sales force.  I said a guy has to be able to read this book on the beach and not get sand kicked in his face.  So he pulls off the dust cover and it looks like he's reading something really manly.  Actually, writing romantic suspense was more difficult than just a straight thriller because you had to support the suspense and the romance.  I actually think we hit our stride with Agnes and the Hitman.
But anyway-- there's a much better thread than this one, which really makes little sense:  Dogs can't write cats.


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## flanneryohello (May 11, 2010)

KerylR said:


> I don't need an HEA. I do need characters that respect each other. I need women who get that having a guy literally through his life in front of yours is a significantly bigger deal than having him say 'I love you.' I want heroes who really like sex and are creative about it. I want characters who are not declaring undying love two days after meeting each other. I want characters who are in touch with what they are feeling, but aren't stupid about it. Nothing turns me off faster than stupid characters.


You do realize that there are plenty of romance novels that tick all the boxes on your list, while still being representative of the genre...right?


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

Amanda Brice said:


> I couldn't imagine Pride & Prejudice if Lizzy and Darcy hadn't ended up together.


Hmmm, now here is an idea for a series of books -- Jane Austin: Twenty Years On. It's twenty years later and the Darcy's are now the proud parents of four impossibly spoiled brats. Darcy spends all his time at his club or in the company of loose women and Lizzy takes comfort in her bottle of Lydia Pinkham.... No, wait! I can't do that. The only genre I dislike more than formula romance is miz-lit.

Never mind.


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## flanneryohello (May 11, 2010)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> Good God!!! I'd rather be known as a Glenn Beck fan or [gasp!] Charlie Sheen's therapist!


I really can't imagine why anyone took any of your comments on this thread to be insulting toward romance authors, readers, and the genre as a whole. Boggles the mind, really.

</end sarcasm>


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

KerylR said:


> I want characters who are in touch with what they are feeling, but aren't stupid about it. Nothing turns me off faster than stupid characters.


Amen! I wrote my blog the other day on Must A Woman Be Stupid To Be A Heroine? and it provoked another blogger to blog about my blog.


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

MichelleR said:


> Genre fiction and literary fiction are two different tracks.


Which is the point I have been trying to make all along. Literary romance is every bit as valid as genre romance, despite what the genre romance marketing departments tell you.


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

Zee mind, eet boggles.


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## KerylR (Dec 28, 2010)

Atunah said:


> Oh here we go again . Really now, a HEA insults the intelligence of the readers? Really? Ask the millions of readers that buy the gazillion of romances each year _because_ they have a HEA.
> 
> I just love how the word "intelligence" is branded about when talking about Romance, of course used in a way as to mean lacking.
> 
> ...


The reason the HEA is often insulting to my intelligence is that I can look at the two characters and see that they aren't going to make it. In reality, if they try to make a long term commitment, they badger each other for twenty years and then get a divorce, but because it's a romance I'm supposed to believe that, over the course of an incredibly intense few days all their issues magically disappear and they'll be together forever?

I'm fine with the idea that they date for a while, and when the adrenaline clears they realize they don't have all that much in common and head off to (separate) greener pastures.

Now, I'm sure the argument can be made that if it's clear the H/h can't/shouldn't make a life together than it's badly written romance... But it might be a fine story, and they usually get shoehorned into a HEA so they're easier to sell.


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

flanneryohello said:


> I really can't imagine why anyone took any of your comments on this thread to be insulting toward romance authors, readers, and the genre as a whole. Boggles the mind, really.
> 
> </end sarcasm>


It sounds like you think being a Glenn Beck fan or Charlie Sheen's therapist it a bad thing.


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

KerylR said:


> But it might be a fine story, and they usually get shoehorned into a HEA so they're easier to sell.


EXACTLY! Publishers aren't stupid -- they know if they can push all the right buttons they can make a buck. It's like the "test endings" to movies. They'll shoot 2 or 3 endings, test market them with audiences, and release the one with the biggest audience draw factor -- it's not art, it's commercialism. And that is fine if that is what you want.


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## Brenda Carroll (May 21, 2009)

Has anyone asked the burning question:  What is wrong with a one paragraph sex scene?  LOL


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## MegHarris (Mar 4, 2010)

> I encourage anyone who wants to "break the mold" and write a story with romantic elements and a dissatisfying, pessimistic ending to do so. If you insist on calling it a "romance", your only option will be to self-publish, because no publisher of "romances" will touch your book.


My first published romance was about as close to "breaking the mold" with regards to an HEA as was possible. There was something of an implied happy ending, but it was more a suggestion than a fact. I had some comments from reviewers that there should have been an epilogue (which I was trying to avoid). This was 1998, so there was less feedback from readers than there is now. I think now a lot of readers would rate me down on Amazon for that ending, but I liked it *shrugs*.

My contemporaries all "break the mold" by being about nerdy, shy heroes rather than alpha heroes. I couldn't sell them to New York for that very reason, but a lot of readers do seem to like them. (I do think there's a larger market for forceful alpha heroes, which is why the big publishers prefer that.) My novella In the Mood finalled in the Lori Foster Brava Novella contest, and the lovely and lamented Kate Duffy kindly called me to explain why she wasn't buying it: "This excerpt is funny, but shy heroes are not what the Bad Boys books are about!" Nerds can't be bad boys? Too bad. 

I also wrote a romance with an android hero. That one's been rated down on Amazon quite a bit, too. Some readers really loathed the idea (and to be fair, some just didn't like the way I wrote it ). But again, I liked it, and I felt compelled to write it. I never even _tried _to sell that one to New York, though.

The point is, as the above poster wrote, if you want to break the mold, go ahead and do so, but don't expect to sell something genre-bending to a major publisher, and be prepared for some readers to hate it.


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## telracs (Jul 12, 2009)

Brendan Carroll said:


> Has anyone asked the burning question: What is wrong with a one paragraph sex scene? LOL


depends on the length of the paragraph, don't it?


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

Mike Nettleton--Author said:


> One of the things that makes me crazy is the assumption that all men are the same as are all women. The stereotype that men selfishly only care about getting themselves off, hate the idea of commitment and don't have any sense of what is romantic is just dead wrong. People are people and we're all different. I know women who are the least romantic human beings on earth and men who are starry-eyed romantics of the most profound sort. Can a man write a romantic scene. Absolutely. It may not fit the stereotypes some people hold on to, but can be romantic. My wife finds Lee Child's Jack Reacher to be a romantic figure, not because he buys flowers, opens doors or caters to a woman's needs and desires but because he treats them with respect and dignity. This whole conversation is a little like saying a woman can't possibly understand machinery. I know some pretty darn good female mechanics.


The original premise was based on a joke.

I think men know what romance is, I think that men are romantic, but I think that when a man or woman are constructing their very down to the smallest detail most romantic moment, complete with dialogue, it's often going to differ in at least small ways from what they're partner would design and some of that comes down to boys and girls.

When a man says something romantic to an interested woman, she will be moved. She will know the words came from his heart. It will probably be more lovely to her than anything a writer can compose, but when she picks up a romance she very well might like the same sentiment that made her weak in the knees in real life to be said in a different way in the book. Not because her man is a doof, not because writing gives a chance to clean up prose, because this is the ideal fantasy that has to be more perfect than real life in order to make her sigh happily.

I think it works the same way the other way around. A man's wife can walk into a room and say something he finds romantic, sweet, and hot all rolled into one, something he'll think about the next day and have to, um, adjust himself, but when he's reading a book or watching a movie the expectation might change, the thing he wants a female character to say, how he wants her to dress, etc. And there is respect for that.

Another reason we find what our partners say to be moving and sexy is because I think humans genuinely want to share with their partners, they want to know about them, they're interested in how the other half thinks. That doesn't always translate into what a person picks up to read all the time.

Real world love is beautiful and glorious and awesome, it's also worthwhile compromise. Genre fiction is a different matter and when you're writing in certain genres, there might be a small but important divergence in expectations that someone similar to the ideal reader might fulfill.


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

scarlet said:


> depends on the length of the paragraph, don't it?


Precisely.


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

Amanda Brice said:


> Michelle, you totally should!
> 
> My fave from that collaboration was DON'T LOOK DOWN. I thought the cover was especially clever. The dust jacket is done in pastels and promises a chicklitty read, but then you take it off and the hardcover is in camouflage.
> 
> It really is the perfect book to share with your husband and is action-adventure-y enough to appeal to many men. My hubby reads nothing but old school Tom Clancy and the newspaper, and even he enjoyed it!


I was confused for a moment on what I totally should do, because I posted a lot, but I just figured it out.  I actually own "Agnes" -- just haven't gotten to it yet, and I expect to love it.

I used to read romance novels to my husband, back when we were dating. It was an actual thing we did for hours at a time, and he liked them, or said he did.


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

flanneryohello said:


> I encourage anyone who wants to "break the mold" and write a story with romantic elements and a dissatisfying, pessimistic ending to do so.


If you think the only two ways to end a novel are HEA or "a dissatisfying, pessimistic ending" you need to broaden your reading!!!




flanneryohello said:


> If you insist on calling it a "romance", your only option will be to self-publish, because no publisher of "romances" will touch your book.


Yes, because we all know how writers like Emily Bronte, William Shakespeare, Daphne DuMaurier, Muriel Spark, A.S. Byatt, Joyce Carol Oates, Alice Walker, Toni Morrison, Francine Prose etc. etc. etc. would never get published by a reputable publisher.


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

Why not just do what you want to do, let everyone else do what they want to do and we all live happily ever... wait a minute!


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> Good God!!! I'd rather be known as a Glenn Beck fan or [gasp!] Charlie Sheen's therapist!


It's funny that you mention Beck and Sheen in association with you.

My mother actually loved the Sheen show, I'd watch it with her in her last months, and I told her that I loved spending time with her but that I would never voluntarily watch it again after she passed away, and I don't. The local station shows reruns of it before American Idol, House, and Glee, and I literally will not change the channel to Fox until I know it's switched over to House, AI, or Glee. The sound of it, the theme... ::shudder:: I don't even think it's that bad of a show, not to the level at which I dislike it, but the fact remains it's painful for me to watch it for a few reasons.

I also think that Beck is not worth my time and would not buy one of this books, though morbid curiosity might make me check out a freebie/someone else's copy. As long as people want to watch him or read him, he sound exist as a public figure, but will not be someone I will follow.

I suppose we all have those areas -- people, shows, music, writers, we will not support. For me, one category of professional I won't support are those writers I feel hold me or women like me in contempt or who imply readers should place no expectations that writers fulfill promises made.


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## flanneryohello (May 11, 2010)

KerylR said:


> The reason the HEA is often insulting to my intelligence is that I can look at the two characters and see that they aren't going to make it. In reality, if they try to make a long term commitment, they badger each other for twenty years and then get a divorce, but because it's a romance I'm supposed to believe that, over the course of an incredibly intense few days all their issues magically disappear and they'll be together forever?
> 
> I'm fine with the idea that they date for a while, and when the adrenaline clears they realize they don't have all that much in common and head off to (separate) greener pastures.
> 
> Now, I'm sure the argument can be made that if it's clear the H/h can't/shouldn't make a life together than it's badly written romance... But it might be a fine story, and they usually get shoehorned into a HEA so they're easier to sell.


What's hilarious to me about this thread (and the criticisms about "romance novels") is that all romance books seem to be getting lumped into the same category. I think even the most ardent fan of romance will agree that there are crappy romance novels out there. There are crappy novels in _every_ genre. Romance is no exception. Because it's the _largest_ genre, I'm confident that there are more crappy romance novels out there than, say, crappy cozy mysteries.

But guys, that doesn't mean that _all_ romances (even the ones that meet genre expectations) are crappy.

Is it impossible to write an intelligent, thought-provoking, realistic romance novel with characters who make a great couple? Of course not. And just because you've read crappy romances, or your knowledge of the genre begins and ends with the most formulaic Harlequin titles, that doesn't mean there aren't genuinely good romance books out there. The example given above is so incredibly specific, it's hardly a reason to dislike an entire genre, or deem it all ridiculous or stupid or whatever. There are plenty of romance novels written by authors who know how to create characters the reader can imagine together--even root for. Keryl, it sounds to me like you've read some crappy romances. And that often what you'd really rather read is a "love story" (based on what you described). Which is totally fine.

I read a crappy science-fiction novel not long ago, but that didn't tempt me to damn the entire genre as being insulting to my intelligence.



Kathleen Valentine said:


> Which is the point I have been trying to make all along. Literary romance is every bit as valid as genre romance, despite what the genre romance marketing departments tell you.


I didn't see anyone suggest that literary romance isn't as valid as genre romance. You have suggested that genre romance insults the reader's intelligence, that readers who crave HEA are narcissistic (?), that romances are the literary equivalent of a Big Mac (i.e. junk food), that women are catty audiences who take offense where none is intended, and that being considered a romance novelist is even worse than being a "Glenn Beck fan or Charlie Sheen's therapist". So...the only person here who's questioning the legitimacy of a genre is... you.

Recognizing that the current definition of the "romance" genre carries with it certain expectations is not equivalent to saying that love stories or "literary romance" is invalid. All anyone here has suggested is that if you want to be a successful author, a big part of that is understanding what kinds of books you're writing, and who your audience is. If your books contain love stories but have sad endings, it wouldn't be particularly intelligent to market them as "romances", since in today's society, that word has a certain meaning. But you're welcome to do so. Brace yourself, though.


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## MegHarris (Mar 4, 2010)

> Yes, because we all know how writers like Emily Bronte, William Shakespeare, Daphne DuMaurier, Muriel Spark, A.S. Byatt, Joyce Carol Oates, Alice Walker, Toni Morrison, Francine Prose etc. etc. etc. would never get published by a reputable publisher.


And none of them write romance, as the genre of romance is currently defined by publishers (and readers of romance). That's all that's being said here-- that "romance" in publishing refers to a genre with certain well-established expectations. But I believe the point has already been hashed over quite enough, and any more discussion on the topic will likely be redundant. So I shan't say any more on the topic.



> Why not just do what you want to do, let everyone else do what they want to do and we all live happily ever... wait a minute!


Heck, if you prefer to live pessimistically ever after, that's okay too.


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> Which is the point I have been trying to make all along. Literary romance is every bit as valid as genre romance, despite what the genre romance marketing departments tell you.


Oh, I thought the point you were making is that genre romance didn't need to have a happily ever after and to guarantee they do is to oppress the writer and condescend to the reader.

No one, no one, is saying that books where relationships end badly or have the potential to end badly are less valid, they just can't be marketed as a romance novel.


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

MichelleR said:


> It's funny that you mention Beck and Sheen in association with you.


For a thread that started out as humorous it has certainly attracted some genuinely humorless posters!!! I've never seen Charlie Sheen's show and only watch Beck when I need a laugh. Yes, I poked fun at the "horror" of being considered a genre-romance writer who writes according to a formula and I would do it again.

I'm sure Charlie Sheen, Glenn Beck, and most genre/formula-romance writers are far more popular and successful than I will ever be -- and I am just fine with that!


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## flanneryohello (May 11, 2010)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> If you think the only two ways to end a novel are HEA or "a dissatisfying, pessimistic ending" you need to broaden your reading!!!


My reading is quite broad, thanks.

The RWA defines a romance as a story that concentrates on the romantic relationship between two characters, which has an "emotionally satisfying, optimistic ending". That's what you're railing against, right? The emotionally satisfying and optimistic ending? The opposite of that would be a "dissatisfying and/or pessimistic ending".



Kathleen Valentine said:


> Yes, because we all know how writers like Emily Bronte, William Shakespeare, Daphne DuMaurier, Muriel Spark, A.S. Byatt, Joyce Carol Oates, Alice Walker, Toni Morrison, Francine Prose etc. etc. etc. would never get published by a reputable publisher.


You and I both know those authors are not published by romance publishers. And (speaking for the ones I've read), they are not romance authors, as the genre is currently defined. So this is yet another example that's totally irrelevant. Apples to oranges.

If you write a literary fiction book (as the authors you just mentioned have), publishers of literary fiction just might be interested. Publishers of romances won't. Which was my point.

There's nothing wrong with labeling your book appropriately. It allows readers to know what to expect. If you hate "romances" so much, why are you so intent on having your literary fiction labeled that way?


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

KerylR said:


> The reason the HEA is often insulting to my intelligence is that I can look at the two characters and see that they aren't going to make it. In reality, if they try to make a long term commitment, they badger each other for twenty years and then get a divorce, but because it's a romance I'm supposed to believe that, over the course of an incredibly intense few days all their issues magically disappear and they'll be together forever?
> 
> I'm fine with the idea that they date for a while, and when the adrenaline clears they realize they don't have all that much in common and head off to (separate) greener pastures.
> 
> Now, I'm sure the argument can be made that if it's clear the H/h can't/shouldn't make a life together than it's badly written romance... But it might be a fine story, and they usually get shoehorned into a HEA so they're easier to sell.


When I was a kid and a teen, most of the couples in romances -- particularly historical romances -- didn't have a snowball's chance of making it. Even back then I realized that and would actually think about it. I think it was healthy to contemplate that. Some of that could be chalked up to that time and those books are unreadable to a lot of women today for various reasons. It seems to me though that the only thing that made the HEA wrong is that the writer didn't write a couple that could realistically (even with genre allowances) arrive at that ending or maintain even a week in the presence of the other without losing their minds.

While I'm defending the HEA expectation, it would be interesting to imagine a line or imprint that actually markets as saying they don't guarantee it. I don't think it will ever be the norm, but maybe it can be successful as an alternative. Erotic romance even now has a little more leeway -- the couples have to have a HFN, but that's a bit of a loosening of the expectation.

I think that there is plenty of room in fiction for relationships to be satisfying for the moment and not work out. Romance novels often do even have those story lines, where a heroine dates someone else too and has feelings for him. I think though that there is nothing wrong with saying that the label has to be changed for the books where the heroine ends up in no relationship. Doesn't mean it's not a great read.

I actually read a YA recently that ended with the main character overcoming tragedy and abuse, falling in love, and then having her love interest end up with her daughter while she has to smile and pretend her heart wasn't ripped out.. I cried, I even wept. If it were a romance novel, it could not have that ending. It wasn't a romance novel though and so it could end like it ended, leaving me as distraught as when I realized Fonzie and Pinkie Tuscadero could never be! There is nothing in me saying this book was anything less than exceptional, just that if it had been marketed as a romance it would have gotten ugly.


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## Anne Victory (Jul 29, 2010)

flanneryohello said:


> I don't understand why people who don't understand or appreciate the romance genre insist that it should change. Those of us who like reading romances are happy with the status quo. Nobody is forcing you to read (or write) a romance. If you don't like it, write literary fiction (and label it as such). Trust me, you'll find a more receptive audience that way.


Pretty sure I lurve you, Flannery


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## Anne Victory (Jul 29, 2010)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> Amen! I wrote my blog the other day on Must A Woman Be Stupid To Be A Heroine? and it provoked another blogger to blog about my blog.


That blog has cemented my opinion: You know absolutely nothing about the Romance genre. I also suspect that you really don't WANT to know, and would rather continue on thinking that all readers of romance are idiots without two brain cells to rub together. The only part of your "formula" you got right was the HEA - everything else was pretty much dead wrong.


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> For a thread that started out as humorous it has certainly attracted some genuinely humorless posters!!!


Are you kidding? Biggest fight I ever had with my husband... ::stops and thinks about it, calculates:: ... seventh biggest fight I ever had with my husband was because he said I made everything a joke and never took anything seriously. He now gets that underneath the surface I take most things seriously, but the point is that he was irritated that in a moment of crisis, I crack jokes.

I am slovenly on occasion, cannot resist eating too much mac and cheese, not always appreciative of the things I have in life, don't always focus on my own writing enough, have a serious temper, have an unerring but not at all admirable knack for knowing the worst thing to say in any situation, my butt gets bigger by the day, I crumble under pressure, when I sing dogs howl, but I promise you that among my many faults, humorlessness <-- wow, that's a real word? Thank you spell check -- does not appear.


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## MegHarris (Mar 4, 2010)

> Erotic romance even now has a little more leeway -- the couples have to have a HFN...


Took me a minute to figure out this acronym. My mind went to a rather naughty place first.


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## Anne Victory (Jul 29, 2010)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> Yes, because we all know how writers like Emily Bronte, William Shakespeare, Daphne DuMaurier, Muriel Spark, A.S. Byatt, Joyce Carol Oates, Alice Walker, Toni Morrison, Francine Prose etc. etc. etc. would never get published by a reputable publisher.


*sigh* I think you just argue for argument's sake. She never said a "reputable" publisher. She said a "Romance" publisher.


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## KerylR (Dec 28, 2010)

MichelleR said:


> HEAs are a promise. Women, in part, seek these books out as a form of comfort and invested in a relationship that ends of failing isn't comfortable. I don't need an HEA in most of my reading, but on days I chose a romance that is exactly what I'm looking for and what a lot of other women are seeking. Without an HEA, it's a different genre.


This might be another area where I'm just not part of the club. H and h not heading off into the sunset if they aren't really suited for it, or like with Sparks, having loved and lost, doesn't strike me as failure.

I'd rather see characters love deeply even if it hurt. And I'd really love to see them realize that if you're fundamentally different people, with different values, different goals, and different hopes in life, that choosing to part ways is the sane thing to do.

(It occurs to me that I haven't read a 'formula' romance since the mid-90's but at least then one of the most common plot lines was how the love of the good woman somehow takes a man and turns him from a scuzzball into Mr. Honorable Good Guy. And that especially, where he suddenly, over the course of a few days, changes all of his spots and stripes and magically becomes the man of any woman's dreams, grates enormously. If I'm out of date, and this isn't a popular storyline anymore, and my dislike of it has insulted anyone, I'm sorry.)


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## Brenda Carroll (May 21, 2009)

scarlet said:


> depends on the length of the paragraph, don't it?





robertduperre said:


> I win! I win! I have a sex scene that's 6000 words long!
> 
> But alas, it's also a single paragraph. So much for that.


Soooooooooooo, maybe then Robert still wins? I was hoping that someone who had read my stuff might have come to my rescue, but ah well... I'm not so much into bragging since it might ruin my image of deep, dark and mysterious.

I HNFI what HEA or HFN means..........


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## telracs (Jul 12, 2009)

KerylR said:


> This might be another area where I'm just not part of the club. H and h not heading off into the sunset if they aren't really suited for it, or like with Sparks, having loved and lost, doesn't strike me as failure.
> 
> I'd rather see characters love deeply even if it hurt. And I'd really love to see them realize that if you're fundamentally different people, with different values, different goals, and different hopes in life, that choosing to part ways is the sane thing to do.
> 
> (It occurs to me that I haven't read a 'formula' romance since the mid-90's but at least then one of the most common plot lines was how the love of the good woman somehow takes a man and turns him from a scuzzball into Mr. Honorable Good Guy. And that especially, where he suddenly, over the course of a few days, changes all of his spots and stripes and magically becomes the man of any woman's dreams, grates enormously. If I'm out of date, and this isn't a popular storyline anymore, and my dislike of it has insulted anyone, I'm sorry.)


Your "formula" storyline is a bit out of date, but does still exist. And you have every right to dislike it, and avoid it.

The issue for me is people (and I'm using that in a general term, so please folks, don't take it personally) who think that romance readers who LIKE formula stories are less intelligent than people who LIKE "literature". Most readers are eclectic and like a whole range of things (see my early posts for some of my range).

As has been said before, if you like 'em: great. If you don't like 'em: great. e-Books aren't like chocolate chip cookies, there are enough for everyone.


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## Jenni (Feb 20, 2011)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> For a thread that started out as humorous it has certainly attracted some genuinely humorless posters!!! I've never seen Charlie Sheen's show and only watch Beck when I need a laugh. Yes, I poked fun at the "horror" of being considered a genre-romance writer who writes according to a formula and I would do it again.
> 
> I'm sure Charlie Sheen, Glenn Beck, and most genre/formula-romance writers are far more popular and successful than I will ever be -- and I am just fine with that!


There is a formula to writing Romance? Really? Where? You mean you can just plug in a few this and that's into some formula and the product is a romance?

Really, the only formula to writing any kind of fiction that I know of is perhaps Narrative Structure....Know the rules and then know when to break them.


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## MegHarris (Mar 4, 2010)

> e-Books aren't like chocolate chip cookies, there are enough for everyone.


And yet in a way, they ARE like chocolate chip cookies. If you don't care for someone else's recipe, you can bake your own.


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

Now I want cookies.

Thanks a lot!


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## telracs (Jul 12, 2009)

Brendan Carroll said:


> Soooooooooooo, maybe then Robert still wins? I was hoping that someone who had read my stuff might have come to my rescue, but ah well... I'm not so much into bragging since it might ruin my image of deep, dark and mysterious.
> 
> I HNFI what HEA or HFN means..........


hea=happily ever after
hfn= happy for now



EllenFisher said:


> And yet in a way, they ARE like chocolate chip cookies. If you don't care for someone else's recipe, you can bake your own.


Very true. I like mine with white chocolate....



Monique said:


> Now I want cookies.
> 
> Thanks a lot!


Sorry. It's me, you know eventually chocolate will be part of the conversation.


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## wildwitchof (Sep 2, 2010)

Romance. Best not discussed in polite company.

Damn, I'm getting sick of this on KB. It's a reader forum, people. Stop insulting them and us.


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## flanneryohello (May 11, 2010)

KerylR said:


> This might be another area where I'm just not part of the club. H and h not heading off into the sunset if they aren't really suited for it, or like with Sparks, having loved and lost, doesn't strike me as failure.
> 
> I'd rather see characters love deeply even if it hurt. And I'd really love to see them realize that if you're fundamentally different people, with different values, different goals, and different hopes in life, that choosing to part ways is the sane thing to do.


As I said before, what you're describing is a love story. It's similar to a romance, but without the genre requirement of an HEA (or HFN). And that's totally fine. There's nothing wrong with love stories. Just like there's nothing wrong with romances.



KerylR said:


> (It occurs to me that I haven't read a 'formula' romance since the mid-90's but at least then one of the most common plot lines was how the love of the good woman somehow takes a man and turns him from a scuzzball into Mr. Honorable Good Guy. And that especially, where he suddenly, over the course of a few days, changes all of his spots and stripes and magically becomes the man of any woman's dreams, grates enormously. If I'm out of date, and this isn't a popular storyline anymore, and my dislike of it has insulted anyone, I'm sorry.)


For those who don't read many romances, I think it's important to point out that there are plenty of romance novels which follow _no_ formula whatsoever beyond the inclusion of the HEA or HFN. I don't read books like the one you've just described. I don't write books like that, either. To be fair, romance plotlines have evolved with the times. But there are still crappy, stupid, insulting romances, to be sure. That doesn't mean that's all there is.

If you're buying a Harlequin book, for example, yes, they employ more of a formula (it's also worth noting that they are wildly successful, so obviously readers like what they find there). Other romance publishers aren't nearly so specific. And there are self-published romances that definitely aren't formulaic, yet still fall into the category of a true "romance" because of a HEA.

To suppose that the need for a HEA or HFN ending somehow means that every romance book turns out sounding the same is to reveal that you _don't_ have a broad knowledge of romance fiction. Which is also fine. It's not for everyone.

I'm constantly surprised by how many people who don't like or read or even know anything about romance novels are just full of negative opinions about them. I'm willing to bet that many people would be surprised to read the romances I write, because they do _not_ conform to the idea of the typical Harlequin romance. There's a whole world of romance novels out there, and anyone who assumes they all follow a formula hasn't even begun to explore it...


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## Christine Merrill (Aug 19, 2010)

Amanda Brice said:


> Title, please! I want to read this one!!!


A Regency Christmas Carol.

It will be out in November on both sides of the Atlantic.


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## K. A. Jordan (Aug 5, 2010)

MichelleR said:


> Nora Roberts started out with Harlequin as you mention, writing contemporaries, and so she didn't start out with the clinch covers, rarely to never wrote the type of books that get those covers, and came out of the Harlequin experience with huge name recognition, which became all she needed. She had the dream experience.


No one works harder than she does. Her books are wonderful and comforting like a blanket and hot soup.

Maybe the appeal of romance is that the HEA is emotionally nurturing? And I like the cookie analogy better than the Big Mac - sweet and satisifying.


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## wildwitchof (Sep 2, 2010)

Christine Merrill said:


> A Regency Christmas Carol.
> 
> It will be out in November on both sides of the Atlantic.


I'm going to buy it, I promise.

I said earlier I didn't usually like Harlequin categories--but some of them I like very much. It's an immense shelf those Canadians have nurtured. I found Sarah Mayberry via Blaze and now SuperRomance, and I was shocked at how truly contemporary and fresh they were "for a category." It was wrong for me to be shocked. I enjoy my comeuppance.

I actually see a lot of similarities between category romance (for those just tuning in, those are the series books with uniform covers published by the month and often available at Kmart, etc.) and self e-pubs. There is blanket dismissal by those who've never read one, the affordability, the opportunities for new writers, the long tail of royalties, the sheer volume, and those who find readers there go on to great mainstream success.

So may we all. Peace out, peoples! I can't handle the heat around here.


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## Brenda Carroll (May 21, 2009)

scarlet said:


> hea=happily ever after
> hfn= happy for now


Thank you, Miss Scarlet.
I do like the sound of both of those.


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

KerylR said:


> I'd rather see characters love deeply even if it hurt. And I'd really love to see them realize that if you're fundamentally different people, with different values, different goals, and different hopes in life, that choosing to part ways is the sane thing to do.


There are plenty of books like this and many of them are great reads. They just don't happen to be romances.

I would advise writers who find it convenient and entertaining to insult the intelligence of people who enjoy a HEA to step back for a second and realize that not all romance readers exclusively read romance. Many of us read quite broadly -- literary fiction, non-fiction, sci-fi, fantasy, mystery, thrillers, historicals, humor...and oh yes, those dreaded kissing books.

And while I may have been so inclined to check out your non-romance novels (full well knowing that they're not romances...because yeah, I do happen to read many, many genres), your utter disdain for my intelligence has led me to choose to vote with my wallet elsewhere.

I'm sure I'm not the only one...

You know, there are books I don't care for, but I simply avoid discussing them, or say "not my cuppa". I don't state in a public forum that the books are the literary equivalent of Big Macs and imply that their readers and writers are stupid because I don't care for the books.


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## telracs (Jul 12, 2009)

Amanda Brice said:


> There are plenty of books like this and many of them are great reads. They just don't happen to be romances.
> 
> I would advise writers who find it convenient and entertaining to insult the intelligence of people who enjoy a HEA to step back for a second and realize that not all romance readers exclusively read romance. Many of us read quite broadly -- literary fiction, non-fiction, sci-fi, fantasy, mystery, thrillers, historical, humor...and oh yes, those dreaded kissing books.
> 
> ...


Amanda, you're not the only one.

My kindle has Harlequins, indie romances (I'm a big Ellen Fisher fan), Star Trek novels, Asimov, Brendan's Tempo Rubato (which title I always mess up), The Count of Monte Cristo, and 500 other assorted books.

And I to will be voting with my credit card. I wish the authors here luck and much sauces, but you ain't getting my money.

(oh, and before anyone comments, I use ain't as a personal idiosyncrasy, just like I use gonna and don't use capitals often).


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## KerylR (Dec 28, 2010)

i'm loving this discussion.  I've been sitting in the shower, washing my hair, and thinking about the structure of novels, and why the requirement of a HEA bothers me.  

I'd like to spend a bit talking about Nicholas Spark's The Notebook, and I'm picking this one because it's an immensely relevant story to the discussion and I'll assume most of us know the basics of the story.  

But, for those of you not familiar with the story here's the quick version.  The Notebook is a story in a story.  The meta story is Noah and his wife Allie in their old age.  Allie has dimentia and severe memory loss.  Every night he joins her to retell her the story of how they met, fell in love, and how she chose him over the rival.  The story in the story is their courtship.

Now, if Sparks had left it at the story of Noah's courtship this would be a romance, hands down.  But, of course, he didn't leave it there, and there is no miracle cure for dimentia, so the reader gets to see the end of their relationship as well as the beginning.  So, The Notebook is technically not a romance.

But The Notebook is the HEA.  It's the story of the life that came after the romance ended.  Noah and Allie get married, have a bunch of children, and grandchildren, and they love each other through sickness and health.  When Allie is all but gone, barely a shell of herself, when her kids are trying to avoid her because being near a woman who looks like their mom but shares none of her memories hurts too much, Noah is there, retelling her the tale of their romance.  He is there, living his love, living his vows to this woman, comforting her and taking comfort in her presence.

When we read romances, when we imagine the Hero, isn't that the kind of love we imagine him having for the Heroine?  

If The Notebook had ended with just the story of Noah and Allie getting together, we'd never get to see that Noah had the sort of love that survives everything.  We'd never get to see a mature relationship or the depth it can achieve.  

Now, I'm not going to say there's anything wrong with wanting a HEA.  But, it seems odd to me to say that because the heroine dies, after a long and happy life, with her hero by her side, that somehow that relationship failed, or that it's not a happy ending...  That's just very strange to me.  What more could you possibly want for a happy ending?  The movie had them both magically die in bed, together, at the same time.  Is that it?  Why is something so painfully beyond the realm of likely a more satisfying end?


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## KerylR (Dec 28, 2010)

flanneryohello said:


> You do realize that there are plenty of romance novels that tick all the boxes on your list, while still being representative of the genre...right?


Sure.

I'm just making the point that I'm a lot happier with a sad ending and a good relationship than a happy ending and a card board relationship.

And, at least the romances I see in the grocery store, seem to have a lot of card board relationships. (I'm also aware of lots of flat fantasy, shallow mysteries, two-dimensional sci-fi, ect... I don't think this is just a romance issue.)


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## KerylR (Dec 28, 2010)

scarlet said:


> depends on the length of the paragraph, don't it?


Length is overrated. Now, width on the other hand...


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

KerylR said:


> I'm just making the point that I'm a lot happier with a sad ending and a good relationship than a happy ending and a card board relationship.


I think most of us here would agree with that statement. I hate "cardboard relationship" books (I like this phrase!) as well. And I've certainly read some. But I've read many more that are intelligent, witty, thought-provoking, with sparkling dialogue and character development that makes me green with envy.


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## Adria Townsend (Feb 24, 2011)

I'm a little off the recent topic here about the differences between romance, love story, happy ends, etc., but just wanted to say the most compelling love scenes I've read have been by Rosamund Pilcher and Stephen King.  Separately of course.  Almost sounds like they co-wrote.  Now wouldn't that be something to read!


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## KerylR (Dec 28, 2010)

flanneryohello said:


> What's hilarious to me about this thread (and the criticisms about "romance novels") is that all romance books seem to be getting lumped into the same category. I think even the most ardent fan of romance will agree that there are crappy romance novels out there. There are crappy novels in _every_ genre. Romance is no exception. Because it's the _largest_ genre, I'm confident that there are more crappy romance novels out there than, say, crappy cozy mysteries.
> 
> But guys, that doesn't mean that _all_ romances (even the ones that meet genre expectations) are crappy.
> 
> ...


I'm not trying to damn an entire genre. And yes, I have read crappy romances. And, yes I'm sure there are good ones out there. I personally keep finding crappy ones, and back in the late nineties just gave up on the genre because there are things I like better and I ran into so many bad ones in a row.

I've got a very specific HEA complaint, and that's cases where it doesn't really fit the story, but one's been shoved on because that's what's expected. I mean, I can't be the only on who's read a bunch of books that would have worked better without the HEA.

So, um, yeah. I guess I do prefer love stories. I want endings that grow out of the story I've been reading, not added on as an attempt to mold the story into a genre. With a love story, if the characters need to part, they can do that. If the story dictates that one of them needs to die, no problem. If the story works better with an HEA, no problem.


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## KerylR (Dec 28, 2010)

MichelleR said:


> I think that there is plenty of room in fiction for relationships to be satisfying for the moment and not work out. Romance novels often do even have those story lines, where a heroine dates someone else too and has feelings for him. I think though that there is nothing wrong with saying that the label has to be changed for the books where the heroine ends up in no relationship. Doesn't mean it's not a great read.


That's all I'm saying. A relationship doesn't have to have the HEA to be emotionally satisfying to the reader or to the characters.

As for your no guaranteed HEA imprint, I'd go for it. But, once again, I may not be Jane Average as a reader.


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

KerylR said:


> This might be another area where I'm just not part of the club. H and h not heading off into the sunset if they aren't really suited for it, or like with Sparks, having loved and lost, doesn't strike me as failure.
> 
> I'd rather see characters love deeply even if it hurt. And I'd really love to see them realize that if you're fundamentally different people, with different values, different goals, and different hopes in life, that choosing to part ways is the sane thing to do.
> 
> (It occurs to me that I haven't read a 'formula' romance since the mid-90's but at least then one of the most common plot lines was how the love of the good woman somehow takes a man and turns him from a scuzzball into Mr. Honorable Good Guy. And that especially, where he suddenly, over the course of a few days, changes all of his spots and stripes and magically becomes the man of any woman's dreams, grates enormously. If I'm out of date, and this isn't a popular storyline anymore, and my dislike of it has insulted anyone, I'm sorry.)


Nowhere did I say that was a failure in the larger sense, or a book people wouldn't read, but it changes how it's marketed. The books you want exist, they just don't have the word "Romance" on their spines. Or, um, Kindle board so no spines, but you know. 

All women don't have to read or like romance. Women who do like romance can like other genres too. There are no rules here other than truth in advertising and meeting the expectations you (general you) led the reader to have when you call it a romance novel. I don't see one person saying books without a happy ending are bad or lesser or a less worthy read.

The plot you mentioned happens, although it is more of a thing of the past. Modern romance -- meaning when it was written, not when it is set -- seems to be more about compatible people working through issues and coming to an understanding. I think that either is actually valid when we're discussing a story that allows for fantasy, which romance does, but your mentioned storyline is not a must-have in the way an HEA is -- it's just one of many variations.


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

K. A. Jordan said:


> No one works harder than she does. Her books are wonderful and comforting like a blanket and hot soup.
> 
> Maybe the appeal of romance is that the HEA is emotionally nurturing? And I like the cookie analogy better than the Big Mac - sweet and satisifying.


Nora Roberts is great. I'm not a big fan of her writing, but she is the epitome of a class act and deserving of her success. She brings honor to her profession.

Romance novels are comfort reads and there is no shame in that and a lot of pride to be taken in providing that for people. Along with the HEA, readers will also find among the selections good writing, intelligent characters, social issues, and well-researched history.


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## jessicamorse (Jan 31, 2011)

KerylR said:


> A relationship doesn't have to have the HEA to be emotionally satisfying to the reader or to the characters.


Of course not. I don't see anyone suggesting it does. But as satisfying as that story might be, it isn't a romance. What's wrong with that?


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## K. A. Jordan (Aug 5, 2010)

MichelleR said:


> Romance novels are comfort reads and there is no shame in that and a lot of pride to be taken in providing that for people. Along with the HEA, readers will also find among the selections good writing, intelligent characters, social issues, and well-researched history.


I have a thing about social issues. I want to see him and her be surrounded by and stumble over them. I write 'friends-first' romances, which is what I like to read. I want them to talk to each other - but I've found emotional intimacy with dialog to be challenging. I mean most men aren't big talkers anyways, so you have to get the emotion across. They often speak in fragments, not sentences - when women are very verbal and expressive.

There is a balance between the 'alpha' (I know, a whole nother rant, bear with me) and the 'guy next door' that is also a challenge. It isn't easy to write a guy that another guy would sit and have a beer with. (Or that I would sit and have a beer with.)

Come to think of it - I like writing contemporary romance because I like a challenge. The characters have to be well-rounded and flawed at the same time. It isn't easy to write a good romance - or a good love story - or good literary love stories.

It is worth the effort - there is something really satisfying to be told you got it right.


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

KerylR said:


> i'm loving this discussion. I've been sitting in the shower, washing my hair, and thinking about the structure of novels, and why the requirement of a HEA bothers me.
> 
> I'd like to spend a bit talking about Nicholas Spark's The Notebook, and I'm picking this one because it's an immensely relevant story to the discussion and I'll assume most of us know the basics of the story.
> 
> ...


I've really enjoyed this discussion too and your posts in particular. I wonder what our sticking point is. Do you think people are saying all books should have a HEA? Or that there's something wrong with not having one? That what we're calling love stories are less than what we call romance?

Somewhere in here I said when people buy a can labeled chicken soup they don't want to open the can and find Cream of Tomato. That doesn't mean tomato isn't good. I actually love tomato soup with swiss cheese melted in it. I actually, come to think of it, prefer it to chicken. My husband definitely prefers chicken soup. The point is that people want to get what they feel like at that moment -- that other people feel like a different thing is not a judgment on anyone, particularly when I might order tomorrow what they ordered today. (Went from canned soup to a restaurant somehow. ) It's not that the other thing is bad, it's just not what it was labeled as being.

Romance is a small percentage of what I read, even though I go in streaks. I only expect the HEA when I read romance or a series which has a happy cover and is known for being fun. I might read another genre and hope for it, but there are no guarantees, and that's okay with me.

Anyone who has read Christopher Moore's A Dirty Job knows a lot of it has his trademark humor


Spoiler



but the ending is bittersweet.


 He never promised any differently though and the fact that the humor disarms the reader so that any events not in that spirit are surprising is actually kinda awesome, he violated no promises because he never promised us a rose garden, so to speak.

All through this thread the constant thread is women choose these books for romance and the HEA. (People are going to see those letters in their sleep.) I am 100% in favor of people getting the experience they need at that moment. When a woman who is a reader, particularly an eclectic reader, selects a romance novel in most cases she is saying, "at this exact second I need to read something unambiguously happy." For someone to sell her something, call it romance with a knowledge of the expectations, and have the hero's plane shot down is reneging on the promise, is selling her something she didn't choose to buy. I'd say it's wrong, but on a more pertinent level it's bad business and bad for the book. Bad business because the reader feels betrayed, bad for the book because it could actually be a great read that will probably never be appreciated and ended up in the wrong hands, or the wrong hands for this moment in time.

Sometimes I participate in one of the book clubs here -- the one where other people choose books for the reader. I tend to stipulate no animal cruelty or animal death or at least let me know. It's just the most bruised area of my heart. I don't think books with this are bad, because often the writer has them there for valid reasons and it's not the author's fault that I'm so sensitive about these matters. If in the course of life I read a book with the topic, I aint mad.  However, when I ask specifically of people who know the book to let me know, well, I want to know. One month, and no hard feelings since I don't even recall who recommended the book, I ended up reading a book that really went against that in two separate scenes. It was actually worse that the person, no pun intended, vetted the book because I didn't have the chance to steel my heart. I actually liked that book and it would have been worth reading had I known, but my point is that sometimes a genre, a cover, a back blurb, or a recommendation make promises, and those promises are worth something. When I or someone else says that promises mean something it has nothing to do with thinking there's anything wrong with something that made no promises doing something else.

I love romance, but I love love stories too. I want sometimes to read stories that break my heart. I want quite often to read about emotionally complex relationships. It's not an either/or thing unless a promise is made.


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## OliverCrommer (May 17, 2010)

It's like you created this thread just for me. 

At the last writer's conference I attended, I told people that I was a romance writer. As one of the few openly male romance writers out there, people almost always reacted with surprise. I also got the feeling that there is a huge stigma out there if you say you write romance, and there's a double stigma if you say you write romance AND you're male. I intended to use that in my favor, what with me being a rare breed. In fact, a published romance writer (female) told me that I would probably make more money than her, just because I'm a man writing love/romance. (And let's face it, even though we writers make a clear distinction between love stories and romance, to the public, it's the same thing). Anyway, I find it unfair that a man writing romance could be bigger than a woman. A good story is a good story, regardless of the gender of the author.

However, later on, when I learned the distinction between _romance _and _love stories_, I stopped telling people I was a romance writer. Although I am a card-carrying and active member of my local RWA chapter, I realize that because my stories don't end happily ever after, I don't write romance. I don't qualify. That being said, the romance genre is just as legit as the rest. I read my first romance novel a couple weeks ago, and ended up loving it. There's a market for every genre out there, and one is not better than the rest.

And Keryl, it's funny you should mention the Notebook. I was actually inspired by it when I wrote my latest, _Meet Me at Taylor Park. _

As for men not being able to write sex scenes, I can only speak for myself. In _Meet Me at Taylor Park_, there are two scenes that are arguably sex scenes. They are scenes meant to convey the intimacy between the leads. However, I wanted to keep this novel squeaky clean as to appeal to the younger demographic, so I didn't expand on the scenes.


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

KerylR said:


> That's all I'm saying. A relationship doesn't have to have the HEA to be emotionally satisfying to the reader or to the characters.
> 
> As for your no guaranteed HEA imprint, I'd go for it. But, once again, I may not be Jane Average as a reader.


See, I agree. I guess I would since you're actually agreeing with me in this post. 

I think what's getting repeatedly assumed in this discussion, not talking about you specifically, is that women who read romances can't deal with complexity or sadness at other times. As can be seen in another thread, I'm a huge Joss Whedon fan. Whedon is loved and hated for his willingness to kill and destroy the people and couples the viewer has come to adore. He never promised anyone a happy ending though. One of my favorite quotes is that he doesn't believe in giving the viewer what they want, but rather what they need. He believes that in a series sometimes you need to ache for characters and to not be able to count on everything being okay. He is right that his shows need that, even if his fans sometimes curse him for it. He is made of both win and awesome.

He gets to do this because he never in any way implied that love and justice would always win at the end of the day, he in no way violated any promises. Crushed a few hopes, yeah. Now, if he created a show named Buffy The Vampire Slayer and there were never actually any vampires or slaying...

I would actually read the new guaranteed happy ending series too -- and be really tense in a mostly good way. I want to select that though, you know?


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

K. A. Jordan said:


> I have a thing about social issues. I want to see him and her be surrounded by and stumble over them. I write 'friends-first' romances, which is what I like to read. I want them to talk to each other - but I've found emotional intimacy with dialog to be challenging. I mean most men aren't big talkers anyways, so you have to get the emotion across. They often speak in fragments, not sentences - when women are very verbal and expressive.
> 
> There is a balance between the 'alpha' (I know, a whole nother rant, bear with me) and the 'guy next door' that is also a challenge. It isn't easy to write a guy that another guy would sit and have a beer with. (Or that I would sit and have a beer with.)
> 
> ...


I find alpha heroes sexiest usually, providing they don't become jerks. I actually don't need all heroes to be alpha though. If this makes sense, there is more than one way to like a novel. There are romances that make you think, "so sexy! I want that!" and there are romances where you just really like the characters and want them happy, even if their happy isn't your happy, and there are books that combine those things, and all of those can be awesome reads.

I used to find old skool Karen Robards to be the sexiest books on the planet -- hot and daring at the time. I loved Lavyrle Spencer too though, but cannot recall one hot scene ever -- because when I read her it became about being glad these people were satisfied with each other. One of the best things with a talented writer is that they bring the best they have to offer, and offer a unique read, even in the so-called confines or romance.  If I were to go to the store back when they were almost actively writing and find a new book from each, it would be a difficult choice which one to choose even though they offered different things. My hormone level at that moment might be the deciding factor.


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

Jason W. Chan said:


> However, later on, when I learned the distinction between _romance _and _love stories_, I stopped telling people I was a romance writer. Although I am a card-carrying and active member of my local RWA chapter, I realize that because my stories don't end happily ever after, I don't write romance.


You don't write romance, per se, but I'm willing to bet that your books meet RWA's definition of a "novel with strong romantic elements":
_A work of fiction in which a romance plays a significant part in the story, but other themes or elements take the plot beyond the traditional romance boundaries. Novels of any tone or style, set in any place or time are eligible for this category. A romance must be an integral part of the plot or subplot, and the resolution of the romance is *emotionally satisfying and optimistic*._

Note that it does not require a HEA for this category. I happen to read a lot of these types of books.

Oh, and shh...don't tell RWA, but I don't write romance either, despite being the vice-president of my local RWA chapter and presumptive president-elect. I write YA and chick lit, so I write a whole lot of HFN, but have yet to write a single story with an actual HEA.

My WIP is the first book in an adult cozy mystery series, and while there will be no HEA at the end of the first book, and there may be two potential heroes throughout the course of the series that the heroine has to choose between, but rest assured, by the end of the series (whenever that may be, 2 novels, three novels, or 10), there will be a HEA. But at the end of each book, she'll solve the crime, so I've satisfied the mystery convention, but there will only be a HFN as to the romantic subplot.


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## OliverCrommer (May 17, 2010)

That's interesting, Amanda.

*emotionally satisfying and optimistic. *

The thing is, my stuff is emotionally satisfying but it's not really optimistic. I'm glad the RWA is lenient on who they let in.


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## K. A. Jordan (Aug 5, 2010)

MichelleR said:


> I find alpha heroes sexiest usually, providing they don't become jerks. I actually don't need all heroes to be alpha though. If this makes sense, there is more than one way to like a novel. There are romances that make you think, "so sexy! I want that!"


It's funny, I know bikers, cowboys, enlisted soldiers, officers, Spec Ops guys, combat vets with PTSD, college professors, musicians, Vietnam Vets, bankers, construction workers, a doctor and a monk. Quite a few of them are 'alpha males' - none of them are jerks.

They are great guys, alpha as in born leaders, trustworthy, loyal, funny - I use them as templates. The reaction I'm looking for is "Ohhh - I like him!"

That's another one of those tropes that people expect from a romance - no the guy doesn't have to be a jerk. The heroine doesn't have to be stupid and the story can very well play to the reader's mind as well as her heart.


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## MichelleR (Feb 21, 2009)

K. A. Jordan said:


> It's funny, I know bikers, cowboys, enlisted soldiers, officers, Spec Ops guys, combat vets with PTSD, college professors, musicians, Vietnam Vets, bankers, construction workers, a doctor and a monk. Quite a few of them are 'alpha males' - none of them are jerks.
> 
> They are great guys, alpha as in born leaders, trustworthy, loyal, funny - I use them as templates. The reaction I'm looking for is "Ohhh - I like him!"
> 
> That's another one of those tropes that people expect from a romance - no the guy doesn't have to be a jerk. The heroine doesn't have to be stupid and the story can very well play to the reader's mind as well as her heart.


I hope you didn't think I was saying alphas are automatic jerks, especially since they're my preference. 

I know alphas and heroes in general don't have to be jerks, actually shouldn't be jerks, and usually are not jerks. I think that there was a period of time in romance where the heroes were not considered at the time to be jerks, but looking back... The problems we now see in many of the heroes from back then is a basic lack of respect or, sometimes it would seem, liking for the heroine or her wants. It's largely eradicated in modern romance, but there are some pockets of erotic romance where authors can't do alpha without doing jerk.

Since people have learned acronyms from this thread -- HEA & HFN -- this is probably a good time to throw in another. TSTL. Too Stupid To Live which is a trait in some heroines, but not most. I figure you know the term, but don't know if others do and it might come up.


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## K. A. Jordan (Aug 5, 2010)

No, I can tell from your posts that you are familar with the genre. But the TSTL heroine is as much a trope as a 'jerk' hero. 

No, I was giving a general comment. I'm enjoying this conversation.


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## Jan Hurst-Nicholson (Aug 25, 2010)

Atunah said:


> .
> 
> Not the first thread on this subject I sensed that. Pretty sure OP didn't have that in mind starting this thread.


OP thought she would just give everyone a laugh


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

KerylR said:


> Length is overrated. Now, width on the other hand...


I've decided to give up talking about genre-romance for Lent -- but this aspect of the discussion is still of interest.


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## Guest (Mar 9, 2011)

Jan Hurst-Nicholson said:


> Just found this quote on a thread I started on Amazon.
> 
> A veteran romance novelist once told me, "Men can't write romance." When I asked her why, she said, "Because their sex scenes only last a paragraph."


Sounds sexist to me.


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## easyreader (Feb 20, 2011)

Not sure what the purpose of this thread was although there is some good discussion on it.  Of course men can write romance.  Wally Lamb doesn't write romance, but every woman I know says he the female POV down cold.


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

K. A. Jordan said:


> No, I can tell from your posts that you are familar with the genre. But the TSTL heroine is as much a trope as a 'jerk' hero.


Ugh, I can't even tell you how much I hate both jerk heroes and TSTL heroines.


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## Bob Mayer (Feb 20, 2011)

I find it interesting that so many heroes in romances are Special Operations== Green Berets, SEALs, Delta, whatever.  I can't speak for the SEALs because they were younger, in better shape and less experienced on average than Green Berets, but the guys I worked with were Alpha only in the sense they got things done.  They weren't macho, swaggering types.  My ex-team sergeant retired and became a physical therapist, working with wounded soldiers.  My form executive officer, a man who could put a bullet in someone's eye from a few feet away with a silenced pistol, coaches a team of kids with Downs Syndrome.  
I always joke that if you meet some guy in a bar and he claims to be an ex-CIA sniper; he wasn't.
Our informal motto in Special Forces was:  the Quiet Professionals.


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## Christine Merrill (Aug 19, 2010)

My son's high school swim coach was ex SEAL.  Demolitions, I think.  And taught at SERE school, 'making Marines cry' as he put it.

As a high school coach, he was demanding.  But he was very patient and had an excellent sense of humor.

Definitely not the sort of abusive, nut job that you often see when civilian gym teachers coach sports.


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

Bob Mayer said:


> but the guys I worked with were Alpha only in the sense they got things done. They weren't macho, swaggering types.


My late SO was a commercial fisherman all his life (he even worked with some of the _Deadliest Catch_ guys). For some reason fishermen are often mis-portrayed as "alphas", too. He was such a soft-spoken, easy-going guy -- always a gentleman.

I write about fishermen a lot in my stories and, while some of them are macho-jerks, most often they are like he was -- strong and competent but gentle and kind.


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## Anne Victory (Jul 29, 2010)

Nothing says an "alpha" has to be a jerk, or overbearing, or anything else that I'm seeing thrown around.  In my opinion, the "alpha male" is what you think of when you think of a "man", in the most perfect sense of the word:  ie. someone who knows his own mind and doesn't let others treat him as a doormat, but is, at the same time, kind, thoughtful, and considerate and also protective.  I may speak for myself, only, but I doubt it.  I think a LOT of women want "alpha men" - ie. men who are men and aren't homogenized pseudo-women.

And - the purpose of the original post was a JOKE.  Good gravy.


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

I love alphas. I married one. But he's not a Navy SEAL or some other kind of macho job, nor is he an asshole.

I honestly don't like how some romances have taken the alpha and turned him into an asshole.


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

The real issue is stereo-typing -- stereotypes are boring.


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

I don't think anyone will argue with you there.


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## K. A. Jordan (Aug 5, 2010)

Bob Mayer said:


> I find it interesting that so many heroes in romances are Special Operations== Green Berets, SEALs, Delta, whatever. I can't speak for the SEALs because they were younger, in better shape and less experienced on average than Green Berets, but the guys I worked with were Alpha only in the sense they got things done. They weren't macho, swaggering types. My ex-team sergeant retired and became a physical therapist, working with wounded soldiers. My form executive officer, a man who could put a bullet in someone's eye from a few feet away with a silenced pistol, coaches a team of kids with Downs Syndrome.


That sounds more like the men I know. I live near an Army post - we get all kinds of soldiers around here. You never know who you are talking to - there are some real characters.

And there are women who demand the arrogant, swaggering form of the 'alpha' in their romances. That is the only type they want to see.

I don't get that, but to each her own. Maybe they don't have any brothers, cousins or male friends. That's a sad thought.

I was baffled when I was told my hero - Sergeant McTaggart wasn't 'alpha' enough. She liked my villain better, he was a jerk.


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## Jenni (Feb 20, 2011)

The Alpha male gets a bad rap and people hear the word and they think he must be a big jerk. In reality, the alpha male is competitive, driven, and sometimes overachieving individual. Often they are seen as aggressive and bold. But they are also very charismatic and have great leadership qualities. The men that I know that are "alpha males" are very caring, kind and gentle men. The men I know that are jerks and behave the way we think of some alpha males resent the real alpha males and do their best to tear them down...giving alpha males a bad rap.

Just a thought....


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

CoscomEntertainment said:


> His lyrics are touching, heartbreaking and soothing.


It has always been so interesting to me that many men get accused of having no concept of romance and yet so many men write such gorgeous, romantic, sexy lyrics. I have a 17 year old nephew who is an aspiring songwriter and sometimes when I read his work I could just cry -- I don't know where those words come from!


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## K. A. Jordan (Aug 5, 2010)

JenniHolbrook-Talty said:


> The men that I know that are "alpha males" are very caring, kind and gentle men. The men I know that are jerks and behave the way we think of some alpha males resent the real alpha males and do their best to tear them down...giving alpha males a bad rap.
> 
> Just a thought....


I've heard that a man who is too 'Macho' is actually neurotic, with serious emotional issues. I didn't believe it - until 
I very nearly married one of those...all that emotional 'hostage' stuff has a basis in fact, too. Made me very wary. However, it comes in handy when writing.

I met a gay 'alpha' years ago. Had a tough time getting used to the idea. It happens.


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## Kathleen Valentine (Dec 10, 2009)

K. A. Jordan said:


> I met a gay 'alpha' years ago. Had a tough time getting used to the idea. It happens.


That's an odd observation. One of my best friends for years is a gay man who is quite alpha. You'd be hard-pressed to find a man -- gay or straight -- who is more competent, self-assured, and mature. Sexual orientation has nothing to do with it.


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## KerylR (Dec 28, 2010)

jessicamorse said:


> Of course not. I don't see anyone suggesting it does. But as satisfying as that story might be, it isn't a romance. What's wrong with that?


Back a few hundred posts ago was a quote from the RWA saying that a story had to have an end that was emotionally satisfying and optimistic, which apparently gets translated into an HEA.

When an HEA doesn't really fit the story, but has been added to make it a romance, then I don't find it optimistic or emotionally satisfying.

I've got no issue with a good HEA. I've got lots of issues with HEAs tacked onto stories that don't need them/shouldn't have them so they can be romances. Since romance does sell well, since it is so beloved, you see a lot more of these artificial happy endings than you do with other genres. If romance didn't require HEA, or admitted that an ending can be optimistic and emotionally satisfying without the H/h heading off into the sunset forever, the endings of these books (the ones with the badly shoehorned HEAs, not romance in general) would be better.


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## KerylR (Dec 28, 2010)

MichelleR said:


> I've really enjoyed this discussion too and your posts in particular. I wonder what our sticking point is. Do you think people are saying all books should have a HEA? Or that there's something wrong with not having one? That what we're calling love stories are less than what we call romance?


I don't think you and I have a sticking point.

One of the writers, back however many posts referred to a relationship that didn't have an HEA as having failed. That to me is a sticking point. The idea that anything less than eternal perfect bliss is failure strikes me as silly.

But mostly for me it's things like the movie version of the Notebook, where a "happy" ending gets shoved onto a book/movie that doesn't need it so that it can be called a romance and reap the marketing advantages.

Romance is big money. As has been pointed out they sell well, because, as you pointed out, a lot of people want to be able to locate the tomato soup and then buy that tomato soup. (Which I don't have a problem with... You want happy endings when you're in a happy ending mood, more power to you!) But because romance is big money books that don't really support a HEA get them anyway. If romance didn't require the HEA, or if it was a less lucrative genre, you'd see less of these books where the ending just doesn't quite work.

So maybe my issue isn't the HEA, but the marketing, or (especially in the pre-indie age) the power wielded by the publishers to make books conform to a model because that's the model that sells.


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## Atunah (Nov 20, 2008)

As someone that has read a large amount of romance novels and still to this day reads a lot of them, I can't say I have come across many romances where the ending felt either tacked on or not "right" . Again, I read a lot of them and I read them over different decades so I know how they have evolved. 

Romance writers don't have to tack on a HEA to a story that didn't need it. Romance readers would easily spot those that just do that to fit themselves into the romance genre for whatever reasons and they get rated accordingly. One thing one can always trust with romance readers, we let each other know what we didn't like, we recommend books to each other, we trade books, we enjoy them. 

I just see a lot of opinions about the genre that are not reality. Unless you actually read a lot of the genre, its hard to make any statements about whats what.
That would be like me making sweeping statements about fantasy or Thrillers, which I know not a lot about. 

And again, its been brought up so many times, we don't "just" read romance. I read all kinds of stuff. Always have over the years. I just want to know what I get when I buy a romance. Period. When I want something else, I read something else from another genre or fiction section. 

Seeing some covers at the checkout does not make one a informed person about romance. 

There is crap out there in all genres, I know, I read it.


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> Sexual orientation has nothing to do with it.


Couldn't agree with you more!


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

KerylR said:


> Back a few hundred posts ago was a quote from the RWA saying that a story had to have an end that was emotionally satisfying and optimistic, which apparently gets translated into an HEA.


I was the one who added the RWA quote about emotionally satisfying and optimistic ending, but you misinterpreted it. (Or I didn't make myself clear.)

I was stating RWA's definition of a "novel with strong romantic elements", not the definition of a "romance." A romance requires a HEA, whereas a "novel with strong romantic elements" does not.


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## K. A. Jordan (Aug 5, 2010)

Kathleen Valentine said:


> That's an odd observation. One of my best friends for years is a gay man who is quite alpha. You'd be hard-pressed to find a man -- gay or straight -- who is more competent, self-assured, and mature. Sexual orientation has nothing to do with it.


I was 24 at the time, in a small town. I didn't know any better. Two and a half decades later, I'm much wiser. LOL


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