Nine Essential Elements of Romantic Fiction

Today we welcome, Catherine LaRoche who writes about her research into romantic fiction.

I spend a lot of time thinking about romance fiction.  My mom reads the books, and I picked up the love of the genre from her when I was a teenager.  She always had a tottering pile of novels beside her bed that I’d rummage through for something to borrow.  Now I write historical romances and, in my day job, I’m a college professor of gender studies and cultural studies.  For the past several years, I’ve included romance fiction in my teaching while I’ve been writing an academic book entitled Happily Ever After: The Romance Story in Popular Culture (forthcoming in mid-2015 from Indiana University Press).

My students choose romances from a big box that I bring into class and write responses on them.  We do cut-up exercises with the novels to create alternative storylines.  We write a collaborative online romance with scenes ranging from suspense to spicy erotica.  I’ve set up a romance lending library in my office; my eight-year old son decorated a poster for borrowers to write down comments about the novels they check out.  As I draft my academic book, I workshop chapters with the students in order to get feedback.

I’d like to invite similar feedback from readers here, on some of the book’s conclusions.  I propose that romance novels have nine essential elements.  (I’m playing off Dr. Pamela Regis’s work in her wonderful 2003 text A Natural History of the Romance Novel.)  What do you make of my list so far?  Do you agree or disagree?  Am I missing anything?  All comments welcome!

The nine central claims made by the romance narrative:

1.                  It is hard to be alone.  We are social animals.  Most people need and want love, of some kind.  Amid all the possibilities for love as philia (friendship) and agape (spiritual or selfless love), the culture often holds up eros or romantic partner love as an apex of all that love can be and do.

2.                  It is a man’s world.  Women generally have less power, fewer choices, and suffer from vulnerability and double standards.  They often get stuck looking after men or being overlooked by men.

3.                  Romance is a religion of love.  Romance entails belief in the power of love as a positive orienting force.  Love functions as religion, as that which has ultimate meaning in people’s lives.

4.                  Romance involves risk.  Love doesn’t always work out.  Desire can be a source of personal knowledge and power but also of deception and danger.  Romance fiction is the safe, imaginative play space to explore the meaning and shape of this landscape.

5.                  Romance requires hard work.  Baring the true self, making oneself vulnerable to another is hard.  Giving up individuality for coupledom requires sacrifice.

6.                  Romance facilitates healing.  Partner love leads to maturity.  Love heals all wounds.  Love conquers all.

7.                  Romance leads to great sex, especially for women.  Women in romance novels are always sexually satisfied.  Romance reading can connect women to their sexuality in positive ways.

8.                  Romance makes you happy.  The problematic version of this claim is that you need to be in a romantic relationship for full happiness.  Here, romance fiction can be oppressive if it mandates coupledom for everyone.

9.                  Romance levels the playing field for women.  The heroine always wins.  By the end, she is happy, secure, well loved, sexually satisfied, and set up for a fulfilling life.  The romance story is a woman-centred fantasy about how to make this man’s world work for her.

Catherine LaRoche is the romance pen name of Catherine Roach, who is a professor of cultural studies and gender studies at the University of Alabama.  Catherine won the Romance Writers of America Academic Research Grant in 2009.  This essay is from her forthcoming (2015) academic book HAPPILY EVER FTER: THE ROMANCE STORY IN POPULAR CULTURE.  A lifelong reader of romance novels, she combines fiction writing of historical romance with academic writing about the romance genre for the best of both worlds.  Her latest Victorian romance ebook KNIGHT OF LOVE was released in June 2014 by Simon & Schuster.  See more at: http://authors.simonandschuster.com/Catherine-LaRoche/

Click here for a video interview of Catherine by the Popular Romance Project: http://popularromanceproject.org/power-of-romance/.

Thank you, Catherine.

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Liam Livings: Men and the RNA

Today, we are delighted to welcome new member, Liam Livings. Liam agreed to answer our questions about being a male member of the RNA and what he thinks of the association.

Are male writers welcome within the RNA?

I’ve found two other male members of the RNA: Bill Spence, writing as Jessica Blair, has 23 novels to her name, is more regularly borrowed from UK libraries than King or Le Carre, and was shortlisted for an award at the RoNAs on 17th March. Andrew Shephard, who uses the pen name Robert Fanshaw, said, ‘The RNA is a useful source of information and contacts. I went to the conference in the summer and met loads of fantastic, experienced writers who made me feel very welcome. A man attending the Conference is in a small minority, but a shared interest counts for more than a shared gender.’

I’ve always worked in mainly female workplaces: nursing homes, hospitals, so am well used to being outnumbered by women. I’ve been to five or six RNA London chapter meetings, and every time, being the only man hasn’t really been an issue.

I was welcomed very warmly into the RNA. At the first meeting, one of the women said they used to have a man coming to the London Chapter meetings, ‘but never a gay man, although we did have a gay women once before, if that’s the correct term.’ Some people may have come over all how very dare you at that, but I’ve received enough genuinely hurtful comments to recognise a benign one when I hear it. Another author, during a conversation about Nanowrimo, said that of course I didn’t mind being the only man there did I because I liked the attention? I agreed, and she nodded knowingly with a wink, and we continued our conversation about to plan or not to plan, and how I’d written so much during Nanowrimo. Conversations like that are what going to writers groups are about, not one's sexual persuasion. 

Can men write romance?

I write a niche genre within romance: male/male fiction. Within that niche, as a male, I am a minority. I’m often asked how that makes me feel, being a minority in a genre about gay men, of which I am one. Good writing is good writing, and bad writing is bad writing, whichever gender you are.

I’ve read some awful schlocky romance by both genders. And some marvellous romance by both genders too: men can write romance just like women can write crime/horror.

I’ve also read some great male/male romance by both sexes, as well as some dire male/male romance by gay men and straight women.

It’s about how that writer tells the story, and whether their voice appeals. There are some writers who could write about taking their mum to buy a new fridge, and I know I’d be enchanted by the story and voice. There are others who, despite filling four hundred pages, failed to actually tell me the story, or make me smile, cry or laugh. That skill isn’t determined by gender. More women write romance than men. There are more female midwives than male, by 99 to 1, but it doesn’t mean the male midwives are any worse at midwifery than their female counterparts. 

How have you found the RNA since becoming a member?

I’ve found the newsletters informative, and am looking forward to the RNA conference in summer. I’ve read Robert Fanshaw’s blog about his experience as a man at that conference in 2013, and am looking forward to joining his small minority of men in 2014.

I believe writers need other writers and the RNA does a great job at connecting them, in real, face to face life. I’m all for social media, but there’s something wonderful and human about making connections in real life. And that’s why I come back to the meetings.

Liam’s blog:  http://www.liamlivings.com/blog.html

Facebook:    https://www.facebook.com/liam.livings

Twitter:         @LiamLivings

Thank you, Liam. We hope you enjoy your first conference.

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