On Writing Romance

[angie_frazier]

If you'd asked me ten years ago if I'd ever consider myself a romance writer, I would have laughed. Worse, I probably would have turned my nose up at the idea of it.

Me? A romance novelist? Ha! I wouldn't write that stuff in a million years.

But the more I read, in both the adult and the YA fiction markets, the more I started to realize just how

Comments

The Stigma of Romance

[heartnpen]

Romance comes in all forms, and you're so right when it comes to the double standards regarding the genre. For some time I've found myself revisiting old "trashy" romances and finding it such a fun escape; it's that escape that kind of has me seeing my writing process differently for the same exact points you've mentioned in your post.

I think the stigma with trashy romances is the "mary sue"/damsel syndrome. Yet, for me, I have no problem with it as long as it's clear the author has intended to play his/her characters in that way...what makes me mad is the denial. If we are to take some popular paranormal romances from the YA genres we'll find it's the exact mold! Replace the awkward teen with a princess/duchess, the hunky dark prince/duke/aristocrat with a vampire, and the poor stable boy/hunky woodsman with a werewolf then bada bing bada...well you get the rest, lol.

And that's what's almost equally troubling, if you look at the romance section you can almost find it swarmed with nothing but paranormal themes. It's almost shocking, it made me think, "Where have I been while this was happening?"

Re: The Stigma of Romance

[angie_frazier]

So well put! And what I've found from the dozen or so romances I've read (I'm still a newbie) is that the heroines are far from damsels in distress. They've all been strong, stubborn, witty women who refuse to let a man control them.