Yesterday, in the discussion of ranting and whether romance readers are disrespectful, Teddy Pig made an interesting comment: I wonder with all the male writers that have been found writing romance under a female pen name why has someone not reviewed their books in this light.
This got me thinking: what romance authors are men using women’s pen names? Is there a definitive list? Off the top of my head, I can think of Laura London, which was the spousal-powerhouse duo of Tom and Sharon Curtis, and Leigh Greenwood, which is the pen name of Harold Lowry. I’ve found an article on men in category romance, which mentions both Lowry and Jim McBride, and another article from Writer’s Digest that focuses on those two gentlemen as well. What smaller blurbs I’ve found in my cursory search usually focus on the question, as asked in a letter to RT from publisher Carol Stacy, “Since romance novels are generally written from a woman’s perspective the question is can a man REALLY capture the female perspective? Over the many years I have been in this business it seems that readers always know when a romance novel is written by a man.”
I honestly think that men certainly can write romance, and that readers may not really be able to tell the difference, but that a man might is remarkable purely from a standpoint of established sex/gender expectations. It’s remarkable when a man writes from a female perspective – consider the hooplah that surrounded Wally Lamb’s She’s Come Undone, which was told from the perspective of a female protagonist. A man! Writing a woman’s point of view! And doing it well! Oh, the shock! And awe!
In A Natural History of the Romance Novel, Pamela Regis discusses the fact that women are taught in school to read the experiences of a male protagonist as representative of humankind in general, therefore including women within that representation. Men, on the other hand, are not taught to read the experiences of a female protagonist as representative of their own experience, and when it does happen that a male writes a female protagonist accurately, it’s remarkable.
But what about romance? I’m really curious – not from a “I’m going to review their books and see if I can tell the difference” perspective but from a “how many are there and how’d you like them?” perspective. What male writers of romance do you know of, and what titles have you read? A list! Let us compile it!
UPDATED: Teddy Pig left a pretty good list in the comments, and Laura Vivanco also has one on her site (which I am sorry I missed!). Are there more?
UPDATED AGAIN: Ancillary thought: I cannot tell you the number of times I have searched eBay and other sites for a US-compatible DVD or even VHS of Hugh Jackman’s Aussie film Paperback Hero wherein Jackman plays a truck driving romance writer? Seriously. I want to see this film so bad, and I can’t find a copy that will definitely play on my DVD player, nor can I find a Torrent. Woe! WOE!
Updated AGAIN AGAIN: Sorry for the mis-link. Not sure why I had a Wiki article about first born redemption, but I fixed it. My bad.
James Patterson wrote a couple of “love stories” (not necessarily romances…I don’t consider Nicholas Sparks’ books to be romances either…they’re love stories). In Suzanne’s Diary for Nicholas, he has two major female protagonists: Suzanne (who’s diary Kate is reading) and Kate.
And in his Women’s Murder Club series (nowhere near as well known as his Alex Cross series), he writes in 1st person POV of a woman. OK, not romance…it’s mystery, but still, it’s female POV.
I’ve done a few romances, mostly novellas. Aspen Mountain Press will be releasing an anthology of them shortly under the name Gillian’s Place.
Those stories were posted on a website for a while. I received a lot of feedback on them that said I did a good job with my female characters.
And two of the stories were told from the man’s POV. This didn’t harm their popularity at all.
Personally I think the dichotomy between male and female writers is a false one. They experience the same emotions. The only difference is those enforced by the society we live in. Men are supposed to be ‘strong’ for which read unemotional. That makes it hard for them to express those emotions.
But that’s nothing a good writer can’t overcome.
That’s a writer’s job, to explore emotion and write in a way that the reader is drawn into it.
I see no reason why that ability should be limited to a single gender.
I know a few aspiring male romance writers, and I don’t see why men can’t want romance as much as women. I think it’s a question more of disposition than sex. Some people like romance, some people don’t. There are plenty of women who would drop dead before they’d write romance, too.
As far as voice, I’m not sure I’d be able to tell. In fact, I’m almost sure I wouldn’t. Good writing is good writing. 🙂
I always suspected Jennifer Wilde was a man because “her” heroines hopped from bed to bed without ever once thinking about birth control.
But I’ll give Jennifer/Tom credit for writing heroines who were independent and went after what they wanted. I always liked his books.
I knew Jennifer Wilde was a man! Ha!
I really liked those Marietta books. The heroine was so amazingly practical and such a breath of fresh air to my teenaged self. Especially after gorging myself on Jennifer Blake. Is she a man?
I’ve recently discovered Jude Morgan (who is a guy), an English writer who’s got at least two books out in the US: INDISCRETION, which is his Austen tribute with a great beta hero; and PASSION about Mary Shelley and the girls and boys (Byron, Caroline, Claire, etc. etc)—both wonderful and brilliant.
One author that comes to mind is husband wife duo that write historicals under May McGoldrick and romantic suspense under Jan Coffey. They tend to be hit and miss for me, but I don’t think that is soley because a man is partially writing them.
Not only can a man write the female perspective, but can they write the male perspective as females want to read it? Obviously men writing romance have to relate to women somehow if they’re comfortable enough to write to mostly a female audience. My question is can they write the heroes we love? Can they write the alpha that we love to hate, but just love by the end of the book?
I didn’t pick up J.R. Ward’s first book b/c I thought she was a man. Biased? Sure. I am glad I flipped to the back though, wondering what a man writing romance looked like. LOL
a book is a book. it stands on it’s own. this is the era of cyberspace- no one is who they say they are. how could someone say they were “betrayed” at discovering a gender? what about race? socio-economics? education? we’re ghosts in the machine, and the romance is subjective. people who read literature based on the author’s biography (example: the people hounding laurell hamilton) are gossipy biddies. i say bring on the men.
Now wait a minute. Hounding Laurell K. Hamilton?
Not likely.
She has a mouth and a foot. She has shown she has both of these by demonstration on her own blog.
Sure, men can write romance. Most don’t want to.
Typically, male writers tend to produce stories that are more plot-driven, and their characterizations are not as deep as those produced by women.
Why? Because women are trained to focus on emotions and feelings and men are trained to focus on action and results.
There are always exceptions, of course. This is not a hard and fast rule, but something I’ve noticed over the years.
Interesting timing on this topic as I’m in the middle of a book by Laura London called Gypsy Heiress that I got at a garage sale. To be honest I bought it because the cover and the blurb made it sound like dated, slightly campy fun, but it’s actually quite good. I do find the writing style different from the usual romances I read in that there’s a lot of what Jenny Crusie calls info-dump, but I’m still enjoying it.
I recently read a “romance” written by a man and was struck by two things: 1) there was precious little dialogue, and 2) what little dialogue there was came mostly from the hero. It was every man’s fantasy.
Dean R. Koontz wrote as Leigh Nichols, and I admit I loved “her” books. When I found out that Leigh was Dean, my first thought was, no wonder I liked “her” so much! LOL.
Well, since Love’s Tender Fury was probably the first romance novel I read—and one that I can read again and again without getting tired of it—I would have to say I don’t mind male romance writers. And OMG! Dare to Love! I threw glassware at men for YEARS after reading that one.
I actually find some of Charles deLint’s female characters a little annoying, but I know I’m in the minority there, since most people I know love them. It’s just that Jilly Coppercorn has always seemed too perfect to me, like some geeky guy’s idea of The Ideal Woman. I did love the heroine (and her mother) in Greenmantle, though.
(I hope this doesn’t show up three or four times; every time I preview it first, it tells me to enter the verification text, but doesn’t give me a space to do that from the preview)
OMG, I thought I was the only one who felt that way. deLint seems to worship and revere Jilly Coppercorn, like he’s half in love with her or something. My husband suggested maybe she’s based on his wife, so that’s what I’m picking up. I don’t know, but she gets on my nerves with her embodiment of all virtues and constant sunshine in the face of adversity. I do like deLint, though. I think I’ve read everything he’s ever written.
In the 60’s and early 70’s there was a sub genre of romance called gothics. Featured heroine who had to be TSTL in some bizarre peril, usually some wacked out castle. The hero who was the bad guy at the beginning was usually pretty grouchy for at least the first 2/3 of the book. Sounds bad I know, but I LOVED THEM. And 2 of my favorite authors were guys—Jean Francis Webb and Madeleine Brent.
Aaah, crazy women. I fantasised about men writing romance… you can find them being romantic in a lot of places outside the romance genre (First book in Terry Goodkind’s Sword of Truth series, maybe? Wizard’s First Rule. No HEAs, though… still haven’t reached the end of the series, though.)
Hmm, possible unexplored market. Romance novel for the straight guys. That would be very, very interesting. If a woman read those, it would be likely their feministic ideals would probably be offended…
Am I the only one who has had issues with two authors writing a book together? I find, most of the time, that the differences in the voice of the authors comes out. I’ve noticed inconsistencies with the writing, and it just bugs the heck out of me.
That can be the case, but not always.
Jenny Crusie and Bob Mayer say they write their characters separately, and it works because they have naturally similar speech rhythms. I agree with Sarah Frantz—Don’t Look Down wasn’t good, but they’ve really hit their stride with Agnes and the Hitman. In particular, I hear more of Crusie. It reads like a classic Crusie, with an edgier hero than usual and lots of action. I’m all for it.
Thirding the de Lint love, although I do agree that Jilly Coppercorn is not a woman who would ever exist in real life as I know it. But I think de Lint handles romance fairly well. The romance was my favorite aspect of
The Little Country
, for example.
Oh, even I agree that Jilly is quite a Mary Sue (tortured past but shines with all kinds of wonderfulness in her daily life), but for all that, de Lint still writes wonderful women, especially in his earlier work, I think. Though his later stuff has a few great characters—I’m partial to Saskia, myself. 🙂
Hooray to Gail for helping to push J Morgan out of his ‘cyber closet’
He’s a lot more romantic than I am, and I know as I’m the wife in the little blurb above. But the happily part varies, especially during football season. I won’t go into the cat or the teenager bits because the truth is scarier than fiction.
I dont know if someone else has said this, but I picked that movie up in England, and have a copy transferred to US DVD. Let me know if you can’t find it and I can get a copy made. Its cute!
Ann, have you read de Lint’s short stories he wrote for Marion Zimmer Bradley’s anthologies she edited for DAW? I remember his stories for her Sword and Sorceress anthologies were always original and different. Good stuff.
It could be, I tend to stay away from books that I know have been written by two authors. I’ve tried them, mainly in sci-fi/fantasy, and the speech patterns, plotting, and voice in general, all seem to be off. I’ve got one of the PC & Kristin Cast books in my TBR, so I’m going to give it another shot but I’m reserving judgement.
CM, this is brilliant. I doubt if they would sell, but I’d be willing to read it just to see the differences, as opposed to a romance written for a female audience.
Quality is totally more important than author gender, silly bigots are missing some great reading.
Sandra D…Laura London aka Tom & Sharon Curtis, fabulous authors. Anybody know where they disappeared to?
Although I invariably spot male authors writing heroines, it doesn’t change my enjoyment of a good story. I’s the differences in how the heroine relates to herself.
Example…I just finished King’s Property by Morgan Howell (SF); enjoyed it and anticipating the sequil. By mid-book, it’s clear to me that “Morgan” is male. Although there is one early description of heroine, NOTHING thereafter, and the tell for me was the hair. Not even casual references to cutting short for cleanliness & convience, nor mentions of braiding or care if it’s long. Ergo, Morgan is a man because a woman would account for her hair. Even as slave being dragged around and abused, the subject is going to come up even causually or in passing, if the author is a woman.
Yes! Gay erotica is my new favorite genre…esp. gay vampire stories.
AND…those of you who know budding male romance authors, PLEASE encourage them for the rest of us…quality writing is ALWAYS welcome.
I think it is a pity when any writing genre is seen as the province of only one group. More power to the romance writing men out there! That being said, I was startled to realize at some point that most of the books on my “compulsively reread list” (compiled across genres) were written by women. I think that I just connected with their voices better at some level.
On another note, I’ve read a fair number of Charles DeLint’s books, and recommend either Trader or Yarrow for a nice romance sub-plot.
Now see that is an interesting observation. It is also one I noted when the current rash of Marion Zimmer Bradley “Ghost” written Darkover novels hit the market.
Marion had an intelligent use of this. You knew the type of clothing and the hair styles and such.
The person who is writing now under her name goes overboard. It is jarring when there are whole paragraphs, hell pages even, dedicated to the heroines cloths and talking about their choice or their color or how the character feels about what someone else is wearing.
It is also a problem I have in Contemporaries when the author uses brand names as short hand constantly. Like you are reading an elaborate sales catalog. La Croix Sweetie La Croix
I just never thought of it as distinctly female author writing.
Teddy, I wouldn’t even bother with those. I know Marion wanted Darkover to continue after her death, she even wrote about it before she died, but they just aren’t the same. Even some of the ones that are co-written prior to her death seem off to me. Yes, I’ve read all of them, along with all of the Darkover anthologies, I was a nut about that series.
As for the difference in her style vs. a contemporary author, that could probably be chalked up to when she first started writing. She wrote sci-fi/pulp fiction when it was strictly a men only club back in the 50’s. I would imagine she had to adapt to fit what would sell, hence her style might be spare on the descriptions and be more “male” in tone.
I wonder how many of the men writing wonderful, nuanced, gay-romance are really women using male pen-names? Over the last thirty years, most ‘slash’, which is just gay romance in the guise of fanfic, has certainly been the province of women writers, and a good place where they could have honed their craft.
Gwynnyd
Dean Koontz’s Leah Nichols was romantic suspense, heavy on the suspense & supernatural. However, way back when, he also wrote five gothic romances as Deanna Dwyer. These were Koontz’s first novels and were intended to pay the bills. There is also a small possibility that he wrote an erotic novel under Leonard Chris. I want to say there’s another bigger name author who wrote romance early in his career, but I could be wrong. I have to check some of my reference books.
What’s the poop on the copyright page? If something is written under a pen name, will it ALWAYS give the author’s actual name after the copyright? Or is there a way to get around that so that it can be copyrighted under the pen name? Just curious.
I caught about half an hour of Paperback Hero and since then have always wanted to finish it off. I remember not really caring one way or the other about the story (even five, sixish years ago it felt dated) but Hugh Jackman as anyone is hot, and Hugh Jackman as a romance novelist/truck driver is super hottt. Multiple t’s, no joke.