Romance Novels

[Chicklet]

Okay, honestly, there are quite a few romances around my place. Mostly Jude Deveraux and Joanna Lindsey. I bought my first one back when I was (too young to mention) so that I could be better at cybersex with my internet boyfriend - lol. IT WORKED.

Now I'm writing Erotica and it's a lot like the books I've read - I try to put more romance in there than sex...more story than sex...such like that. (those of you who've read my work are going 'huh?')

So I guess my question is this - Does anyone else feel inspired by Romance Novels, or are they trash?

Chickklet

 

[KillerMuffin]

I'm not inspired to write by them. Well, one romance novelist inspires me to write. Norah Hess. Whenever I get down in the dumps I read one of her books. If she can get published, anyone can get published.

My faves in the genre are Susan Elizabeth Phillips, Linda Howard, and Pamela Morsi.

 

[sexylilmissie]

a few romance novels I have read have given me basic plot ideas I suppose, sometghing to work with after a number of changes.

The biggest problem I have found with romance novels is the fact that most of them are the same...especially harlequin romance.

Notable exceptions include my favorite authors... Kathleen Woodwiss and Christine Feehan

 

[Just-Legal]

Penny Jordan's "Perfect" series is great

 

[Svenskaflicka]

The typical wine-and-candles stories are a bit boring to me. Romance, to me, is lovers doing that little extra to make their partners happy. Like the first time I met my hubby. It was freezing cold outside (Sweden in November usually is), so I took off my mittens and handed them to him. He loved that little gesture, and still talks about it as a very romantic thing.

When I write romance stories, they are often rather mainstream, often inspired by romance stories I've read as paperbacks, but with a touch of that consideration and caring, that makes sex more like making love than having sex or fucking.

 

[wildsweetone]

Thanks for making me think on this one Chicklet

I read a book several years ago and I think the author was LaVyrl Spencer, but not sure now.

It began with the police turning up at a woman's door and telling her that her police husband had died in an accident. This woman eventually went on to fall in love with a younger man, a police friend of her dearly departed.

The way the first chapter of the story read, had me in tears.

It seems to be indicative of my desire to wrench emotions from a reader. Not sure I can do it, but there's one story in the pipeline that, well... we'll see.

 

[Svenskaflicka]

I read one novel where a woman falls in love with her son's best friend, who comes to comfort her after the son's death. People in town and her other children thought it was disgusting, not only was he 15 years younger than her, but they also thought that her falling for her son's best friend was like she had actually been wanting her son sexually.

Go figure.

Woman, man. Gorgeous man. Sexy man. Young, vital man. What's so strange about her jumping him?

 

[jfinn]

Great question, Chicklet. Yes, I've been accused of being a frustrated romance writer and the only word I take exception to is "frustrated". Both of my major stories here are highly romantic though neither of them would ever be acceptable to Harlequin/Mills & Boone.

I never read romance novels as a teen or younger woman. The genre then was really pretty icky as far as I could tell (Did you ever read Barbara Cartland--ten pages in and you'd need a shot of insulin.) But a couple of years ago, someone convinced me that they'd changed and talked me into reading some of them. Now I'm hooked. Especially Nora Roberts, Ann Stuart and Jude Devereaux (don't ya just love A Knight In Shining Armor?)

Has that colored my writing? Probably. I just wish I could write like those women and have their fan base as well. Oh well, can't have everyhing.

Jayne

 

[SexyChele]

No, I've never been inspired to write by a romance novel. Heck, the last time I read one I was still in high school. Back then, they were naughty and taboo and talked of things that my brain could only hint at. (We used to call them "smut novels" back then) It only took a couple of years to figure out they all have the same basic plot (woman meets man she hates, man rapes woman, woman and man separate/thrown together, woman "gives in" to sexual demands of man, woman realizes that she loves man, man has loved woman since he first met her. Yawn.), and after that I put down my last one - unread - and have never picked up another one. They simply do not appeal to me. Perhaps todays romance novels might, but unless some one were to loan me, I doubt I would go out of my way to read one.

 

[Chicklet]

Now I'm hooked. Especially Nora Roberts, Ann Stuart and Jude Devereaux (don't ya just love A Knight In Shining Armor?)

(that's the first one I read, tee hee.)

 

[Guest]

might as well face it...

Romance novels... have read thousands of them... started in junior high school, took a break in college and started reading them again two years ago.

Knight in Shining Armor... sigh...

I must say that historical romances are usually easier for me to "go with"... i have to suspend disbelief for some of the more practical things like personal hygeine, but i am willing to swallow stretches in plots when they are set in another time and another place...

there definitely is a class of romance novels that has the rape then fall in love thing going on, and i don't care for those at all.

i agree with jayne that in the last decade there has been a shift in the tone of romance novels... Amanda Quick is a smart author with smart heroines, for one...

i know that reading those novels has influenced my writing.. although i WILL NEVER use the term 'manhood' in my stories...

good thoughts, chicklet

 

[Rumple Foreskin]

I don't read romances, or much of any other genre except for Elmore Leonard's detective novels. But I have attended a local, one-day, RWA (Romance Writer's of America) convention. IMHO, writing is writing and the RWA folks had several workshops I was interested in that year.

This is slightly off topic, but I'm including the URL for the manuscript guidelines section of the Simon and Schuster romance site. What's really fun however, is going to the new releases part and reading the excerpts. They're usually the first chapter and virtually all start with a strong action scene.

http://www.simonsays.com/subs/txtobj.cfm?areaid=173&pagename=manuscript

Rumple Foreskin

 

[Lovely_Pink_Queen]

I started reading romance novels when I was 11 (took one of my mom's- Royal Seduction by Jennifer Blake). And I've been reading them ever since. I still read at least three a week (Oh what a boring life i have!). I like Jude Deverux (Summerhouse was a fave), Johanna Lindsey, Christina Dodd, Nora Roberts, Danielle steel and Candace Camp. They make me feel happy 'cause of the happy endings. But it also make me want the same, romance and that one special person.

 

[Dirt Man]

A good romance isn't nessessarily the focus...

One of the most recent love stories in film, Pearl Harbor, was built with the beginning of WW2 as its background. Star Wars is an on going romantic fairy tale with all of the basic elements any Romance novelist could want. The last version of Titanic, is another great romance. Every true classic in literature has a love, or love/hate relationship in it. What I'm basically trying to convey here is, What is the real tennent behind love? And what makes it blossom, or wilt? Many say absence makes the heart grow fonder, but I've seen too many men get Dear John letters by women who loved them only to find someone closer at hand to love. And the same is true for Dear Jane letters. So what is the formula for love, and romance? Is it different for men than for women? Is it the mood, the setting, or the individuals? For me, it's a simple tear at the right moment, sparkling down the cheek of a smiling face when both her and I realize we've fought the good fight together, and come out of it somehow closer than we were before it started, and that battle may only be the paying of the monthly bills on time. Life is conflict, and with conflict one has to pick sides.

As Always
I Am the
Dirt Man

 

[Svenskaflicka]

I like the historical romance novels. An independent wench with guts to speak her mind... a stuck-up young libertin who is forced to be humble...

Or a shy young girl, slowly getting introduced into the art of lovemaking by a patient, sensual guy...

Or a brave woman who fights side by side with a man in battle, and only when he puts her wounded body in his bed to take care of her wounds, does he realize that his best buddy is not a man...

Maybe I should head over to Story Ideas...

 

[Rumple Foreskin]

Svenskaflicka,

You might enjoy the novels of Marsha Canham. http://www.marshacanham.com/

She a Canadian gal and an on-line writing buddy of mine who specializes in historical romances including seafaring tales, with at least one having a female pirate captain.

Rumple Foreskin

 

[Svenskaflicka]

Seems great, thanks Rump!

 

[Chicklet]

Re: might as well face it...

i know that reading those novels has influenced my writing.. although i WILL NEVER use the term 'manhood' in my stories...

lol

 

[jfinn]

Re: might as well face it...

i know that reading those novels has influenced my writing.. although i WILL NEVER use the term 'manhood' in my stories...

Actually one of the last novels I read by Ann Stuart had the line, "Do you really love me, or just my cock?" Thought that had to be a first for Harlequin, especially when the female replied, "Both, but I haven't made up my mind which is my favorite."

Jayne

 

[toffeegyrl]

I started reading romance novels when I was about 13, and ever since I've been writing sex scenes. They always included more 'sex' than romance, but I always loved reading them.

But for some reason, I stopped when I actually started having sex; maybe the 'mystery' was solved after that, but I miss reading them a bit more now that I"m not having any again. Hmm...

It colored my writing in that I realized that detail is the most important thing when writing about sex between characters, and made me appreciate tenderness in sex. A fuck can still be a fuck, but as in real life, it is so much better when you care about the person. . .

I really like Robin Schone and Betina Krahn. Thea Devine is unparalleled in her erotic settings, I think, as well.

 

[Chicklet]

So I guess my question is this - Does anyone else feel inspired by Romance Novels, or are they trash?

Chickklet

Okay, I'm insane. I spent all day at work stressing over this: I should have asked "Does anyone feel influenced by romance novels"

Chicklet

 

[Dirt Man]

Yes, don't stress...

"Does anyone feel influenced by romance novels

Breath in breath out... Now in answer to your new question, people are influenced by everything they see, hear, read, smell, touch, and taste. So why wouldn't they be influenced by romance novels? Granted, presumedly more women read romance novels than men, and thus on St. Valentine's Day men are stuck in a looped cliche of sending their lovers a dozen red roses, and candy boxes filled with moist gooey chocolates instead of thinking about candle lite dinners over a Mackey D burger, and shake, or even God help them, cooking a whole dinner themselves as I might do. Then drinking Ripple out of a shoe, and pouring it all over my lady's flesh before licking it up.

The problem arrises because the mental, and physical needs are different in the two sexes most of the time. In general most of the time men just want to jump a woman's bones, but woman want a personal connection to their reality to justify giving it up. And why is this true? Because even if we don't want to be, we are still clones of our mothers, and fathers. Even as influenced as we are by our peers growing up, and rebeling through our teenage years, we were hurled into the light from that great warm womb, and impressed by the two most important people we will ever meet in our lives, and we ususally meet them first. And that means the same will be true for our offspring, and women want that impressionable little bundle to have their idea of the perfect father image. So you see it's really just a matter of plumbing, and what function that plumbing represents to the person who owns it.

So please don't stress. Just be choosy, as is only natural.

As Always
I Am the
Dirt Man

 

[deliciously_naughty]

Re: Re: Romance Novels

Okay, I'm insane. I spent all day at work stressing over this: I should have asked "Does anyone feel influenced by romance novels"

Chicklet

I think I'm influenced by Nora Roberts...I've read over 50 of her books...how could I not be? I'm also influenced by Marion Zimmer Bradley, Mercedes Lackey, and Jackie Collins. However, I also think that I have a strong personal voice that is individual and seperate from my influences.

 

[islandman]

A brief aside...

I'm influenced by boots and the women how wear them.

hiya, D_N.

 

[deliciously_naughty]

Re: A brief aside...

I'm influenced by boots and the women how wear them.

hiya, D_N.

that's why we wear them around you darlin

Hey sexy islandman