I’d been thinking about interracial romance over the weekend, while I was trying to draft a section for The Book (OMG The Whole Genre?!) {that’s a working title, obviously} that examined minorities in RomanceLandia. What a verdant, green – or white, perhaps – pasture of peaceful writing that was. Not a landmine in sight for my clodding feet to trip on. No, no. *head desk* So when a friend of mine forwarded me a news article that Mildred Loving, the Black woman whose marriage to a white man overturned laws against interracial marriage died today at the age of 68, I had to think how different the world is in 2008 vs. 1958. Before I move on – our condolences to her family. I always thought it was unspeakably awesome that the name of the court case that declared laws restricting marriage on basis of race unconstitutional was called “Loving v. Virginia.”
Since I count among my neighbors several interracial couples and families, I have been spoiled with an experience that indicates interracial marriage as something that’s somewhat common. As the friend who forwarded me the article said to me over email, I’m nuts if I think that’s the rule across the US. It’s certainly not the case in romance – interracial couples in romance novels are still somewhat rare, though there are more of them of late. One writer of bestselling awesomeness told me recently that many romance writers, including herself, would love to write a romance that crosses racial lines – but those books are difficult to get into publication from established print romance publishers. In the e-format, there’s a more vigorous supply, but then, the “e” in romance is the one area that does tend to push the boundaries of the genre a little bit harder, giving the “nudge nudge” a more diverse meaning. Samhain has an entire section of interracial titles, featuring white heroes and Black heroines, and vice versa—and hero/hero, as well, so clearly someone or many someones are shopping for interracial romance specifically.
On one hand, it’s difficult to ask the right question. Would the presence of an interracial couple stop someone from buying a romance? (Would it stop me? Nope.) Is interracial romance solely the domain – and by domain I mean “located in the bookshop section” – of Black romance, because the minute one half of a protagonist pair is Black, the book moves toward Black Romance as a subgenre marker? Speaking solely for myself, I’m curious why interracial romance appears to be mostly found in epubs, small presses, erotica, or within Black romance publishing lines. Brenda Jackson has written several for Silhouette Desire, but those seem to be an exception among the backlist of series romance – and yet another reason how the dismissed-as-staid category romances can sometimes not just push but shred the envelope of boundaries every now and again like nothing else.
I’m also curious whether it’s a target people shop for, a type of storyline that some really enjoy the same way I am a total and complete sucker for a certain plotlines, including one that is too embarrassing to mention. If people shop deliberately for interracial romances, then why aren’t there more of them in mainstream romance (unless they’re there and my Google-fu has failed me)? Is there a difficult barrier towards publication of a romance that takes place across cultural and racial lines? And what counts as interracial, anyway? Does a Black woman and a Middle Eastern man count as interracial? (This reader thinks so.) Or is “interracial” code for solely white/black combinations? Hell, depending on what anti-Semite you ask, my marriage would be interracial.
Mostly I’m wondering simply why there aren’t more interracial couples in romance. There’s more than a few powerhouse examples in mainstream romance across several genres, so I am curious why there’s not more of it. For example, Ward’s Brotherhood plays with race, and the question’s been asked of her point blank whether the Brothers are Black (her answer was that they are not an identifiable human race so it’s impossible to say). Kleypas’ Mine Till Midnight also crossed a racial line in the historical sense, in that her hero was Rom and the heroine was white – a combination that caused me to question the endurance of their happy ending, given the social prejudice working against them. And someone will hunt me down and kick me in the knees if I don’t mention the multi-book subplot of Brockmann’s Sam & Alyssa. All three examples were holy crapping damn successful. Perhaps the problem is that what I perceive of as “few” needs to be adjusted. Someone else might think that’s plenty.
I’m not so much asking for a list of interracial romances, though feel free to suggest some that you’ve enjoyed, but more of a “Interracial romance: what’s up with that? How come there’s not more of it?” type of random musing. So? Your thought? Ha. I crack me up. I know you have more than one.
From the top of the thread:
” What I have found interesting is that most of the time, when an interracial couple is written, it is a white man and a black woman.”
Well, I know for a fact that at least one major print line (that I worked for) REQUIRED that pairing—that is to say, the viewpoint character had to be a black woman (reflecting the target audience). Sometimes one would “get away with” a mixed-race heroine. (Or just give the heroine green eyes, creamy skin and butt length hair and SAY she was black.) But more often than not, no.
In addition to the insightful comments already made here is the issue of minority readers who still feel that marrying/dating/boinking outside their race is a copout and a capitulation.
One of the things I enjoy about fantasy is that I can make up my own damn races. And mix them up at will. Which is cheating, I know. But I am constantly afraid of otherwise someday being pigeonholed on the “black” shelf in the back of the bookstore. (At the moment I am tired and ineloquent and the caffeine has not kicked in, and so am not finding a diplomatic way of saying “America is not interested in the black shelf.” I’d like to be more nuanced than that—I’ll try again later.)
(My sign-in is “girl46.” I like the anonymity of that. God I need sleep.)
Carrie—I watched “Crossing Delancey” again the other night and remembered why I loved it so much.
Peter “Akiva” Decker from Faye Kellerman’s Decker/Lazarus mysteries is also quite the hunk, even though the books aren’t strictly romance.
Nita Abrams does some great Jewish heroes in her spy novels set during the Regency period. And I had a Jewish privateer in one of my books, but he was the hero’s best friend, not the hero.
we don’t like the race issue to be the only plot
How about Karyn Langhorne’s Unfinished Business, which has political differences being the main source of conflict between the hero and heroine?
Black activist Erica Johnson wears her causes on her sleeve—literally. With her class of beloved fourth graders depending on her to represent their concerns, Erica’s ready to confront golden-boy conservative senator Mark Newman. And she’s willing to suffer through a night in jail and a battle of wits with a real-life war hero, if it will help get the children the money they need.
Mark Newman’s a worthy adversary. But there’s a more human side to the ambitious politician with the dreamy blue eyes—from the physical pain of his war wound, to his grief over his wife’s death.
Unfinished Business is an awesome book. I enjoyed it tremendously.
Never really considered a Jewish hero, but I can definitely see it.
Most of the publishers doing African American books are AA publishers. Presumably most of their readers are black women, so, of course, they would want a black heroine. As far as I know, most of my fans are black. Thus far out of 300+ e-mails, I’ve only had two who identified themselves as white. That’s a very unscientific sampling, but that’s all I have to go by. Also, I doubt there’s a huge fan base of white women wanting to read about AA heroes with white women, but I could be wrong. Some of the e-pubs have them, but I haven’t seen any from a New York publisher.
Someone said something earlier about not getting the “black†label, that AA was better, right, whatever. I have to say, most of my “black†friends don’t like to be called AA (anymore than most of the Native Americans I know like to be called “Indianâ€).
I think this is just the very tip of the very scary iceberg that keeps some writers away from writing interracial. Thoughts?
J.J. Murray is a white man (I think) who writes some pretty good black-woman-white-man romances. I enjoyed SOMETHING REAL, which perhaps leans a bit harder toward women’s fiction, but has a strong romance.
I enjoy interracial romances—Jade Lee’s done a number of Chinese heroes with English or American heroines. I’d like to read more of them. I’m still wary of writing them, though, for the very reasons L. listed… Then again, I do write fantasy…
I love Suzanne Brockmann and I kept thinking of her when I read this post because she writes diverse couples:
Harvard’s Education – bm/bf
Taylor’s Temptation – native american hero/waspy heroine
Into the Storm – Asian female/white male
Sam & Alyssa – white male, black female
Jules & Robin – two gay men!
Into the Night – hot sexy young man/older woman
and I get the impression that Frisco’s kid is also an interracial couple
As an Asian female who reads romance novels I enjoy reading books where the heroine is Asian too. I’m not so much for Asian heroes, mostly because I’m not attracted to Asian men so much (exceptions will include Jet Li and Andy Lau). Of course I married a white boy so that’s probably another reason why I enjoy AF/WM books.
As a historical, Mary Jo Putney had the China Bride and I really enjoyed that.
You wrote this seriously? I’m going to assume you didn’t mean that to come out the way it did.
Anyway, I am an AA author in an interracial marriage of nine years (as someone else mentioned, if that matters). I have to say I disagree with the comments on desegreation in the bookstores. IR is a genre. Face it. We wouldn’t be having this discussion otherwise. If you’re looking for an IR book, you wouldn’t want to have to search through the paranormals and the other genres to find it.
I’m not sure what’s wrong with the way it came out? I mean, most romance authors are white. If they wanted to write books with black heroes, I would have to assume that they would. And as white women seem to be the bellweather for this industry, presumably they would be published. Given the dearth of them, once can only gather that white women aren’t interested in reading black heroes.
Indeed, when the topic of why white women don’t read black romances comes up, one of the key responses is that they can’t ‘relate’ to black books. What is one supposed to gather from that, other than that white women don’t want black heroes? After all, these same white women have no problems with sheikhs, shifters and any number of other species, but Negro sex? *horrors*
“R is a genre. Face it. We wouldn’t be having this discussion otherwise. If you’re looking for an IR book, you wouldn’t want to have to search through the paranormals and the other genres to find it.”
I think the very issue of this discussion thread (or one of them) is that Interracial Romance is NOT a genre, or at least not a large and recognized enough genre to be even a little bit easy to locate. Possibly even floating the suggestion that it should be one?
I edit for an e-pub, and they used to call such romances Multi-cultural, which I preferred, but now they call them interracial. I hate this term. I’m also a teacher and it comes up in many a book discussion about educational issue, etc. I really hate this term “race.”
I have no desire to disregard any part of who I am; why would I simply go by a description of color? To my mind, I’ve read plenty multi-cultural romances. To me, it’s anytime the hero and heroine are from different cultural backgrounds, not simply different “races.” (My Big Fat Greek Wedding could be a simple example.)
Now, I know—that’s not the whole issue, particularly not in the US. But I dislike seeing the idea of multi-cultural/interracial romances reduced to a B/W issue. (There’s a whole other issues veering off from that general topic, but I’ll try to keep it to romance.) What about the NR’s Stanislaski’s? What about any author who’s written (with any degree of accuracy) about Cajuns? Are those IR, or not?
If you’re looking for an IR book, you wouldn’t want to have to search through the paranormals and the other genres to find it.
What if the IR IS a paranormal? How does something become a whole ‘nother genre just because the two people are of different races? Yet this doesn’t happen except for when one of the people is black. Sheikh books aren’t housed in the ‘Arab’ section (if such exists). Why is that okay? Is it somehow beyond the scope of reason to believe that fans of paranormals would somehow overlook it if a paranormal IR somehow wound up shelved with others of the same type?
Perhaps I’m naive (and marketing assures me that I am), but I would like to believe that people who love good books would love them regardless.
As a woman who quite enjoys her “Negro sex” at home and would read about it if it was well-written and interesting, I’m going to half-way agree with Roslyn, in that I think most publishers and writers are generally swayed by “what was” (AKA the vast majority of romances from a WM/WF perspective), and it’s only “now” that we’re seeing the racial diversity embraced (almost) by our culture reflected in our romances.
I will say, however, that I had to overcome my instinctive hackle-raising at how I initially interpreted her words.
Also, for those out there looking for a good AF/WM, the incredibly hot Vampire’s Slave books (duo, hopefully soon to be trio) were incredibly smokin’ hot.
I’ll agree with the vast majority on this site, though, and say that, provided it’s a good story and well written, I’m down for whatever. But I’ll jump off the raft if the plot gets to be TOO “race oriented”. People are people, and people in interracial couples know this first and foremost…which allows their said interracial coupleness to flourish and develop.
Lots of interesting discussion here. As a white girl who’s been with my black boyfriend for four years and counting, I would love to read more IR romances if I only knew where to find them and which ones were well written. As for such books dealing with “issues”, I for one would be glad to read them as long as they feel real. In my own relationship I have had to deal with the issue of my family being Christian and my boyfriend being Muslim (his family has no problem with this but boy oh boy, mine sure do), multiple cultures (him being from Africa, me nominally American but raised in SE Asia), multiple social contexts (him from one of the poorest countries in the world, me from one of the richest), languages (neither of our native languages are the same and we often rely on a third language to get complex ideas across), and so on. Skin color differences seem like a trivial thing compared to the diverse backgrounds we bring to the table. Granted, my IR relationship is not a typical American b/w relationship…more of an international one, but still. There are issues. I would expect them to figure into a story and would feel cheated if they didn’t.
The world is a diverse place and that’s what makes it interesting. I would be surprised if we don’t see more racial and ethnic diversity showing up in our reading material over time to reflect the shifts.
It’s interesting Allie, my e-mail runs about 5/50 on this issue. Some think there was too much racial conflict. Others say there’s not enough. Of course, there are those who say it’s not realistic. Now, you’d think they were talking about the fact that a rock star falls madly in love with a small-town bookstore owner. No, they have no trouble buying that. They think it’s unrealistic that there would be no racial conflict between them.
I can’t wait until they see my next book. 😀
Race doesn’t matter to me, but setting sure does. I LURVE me some Beverly Jenkins historicals!!! But I don’t find myself drawn to books categorized as “Urban Litâ€. Not drawn to reading Chick-Lit about 20-something white chicks either, though for some reason Brit Lit (like those of Wendy Holden and Marian Keyes) is totally my cuppa. *shrug* I can’t explain it. But I will totally second Champagne Rules as a fab IR romance (BM/WF).
You might want to join the MSN group for interracial/multi-cultural readers/writers. Here’s the link:
http://groups.msn.com/InterracialMulticulturalRomanceReaders/general.msnw
Right now they’re going nuts over books with Japanese heroes, but I’m sure they can point you in the direction of books with pretty much any combination you desire. Most will be e-books, of course.
Thank goodness I write sci-fi and can skip the race nonsense. I give almost everyone tan skin and let the reader decide what they look like. My MC (hero) for my present WIP is described as being tan with blonde-white hair. I picture him as the perfect Polynesian boy with huge muscles and white hair, but he has a Russian name so maybe he has Mongol ancestors somewhere? Still, romance is one of the few places where I think race is still a huge issue in writing, that and historicals.
But, if you think back a few hundred years, it was taboo to have an Englishman marrying a French woman, they were at war and marrying across borders was not welcomed in some circles. Further back (or maybe not) marrying outside of your social circle was forwned upon. Romance worked past those problems and we regularly have Duke’s marrying the cinder girl. It’ll go mainstream soon enough :o)
I haven’t all comments, so I’m just responding to what SB Sarah wrote. I’d buy an interracial romance no problem. (in fact I have as I own Suzanne Brockmann’s books with Sam and Alyssa). I honestly shop for the storyline and if it interests me. I wouldn’t care what ethnic background the characters are.
My parents best friends when I was growing up was an interracial couple (Hispanic man/white woman). Never thought anything of it. Seems completely normal to me. In fact, I spent my teen years fantasizing that I married their HOT son! LOLOLOL
I’ve seen how an interracial marriage can work. It’s not without it’s struggles with the rest of the world, but every marriage has it’s struggles, just different ones.
I apologize if one of the 58 comments that precede this has said the same thing. I suspect that there is a strong desire in women to pair with exotic men (or to put it more bluntly, the other), but that the prevailing culture still sees it as taboo (irrespective of how many mixed race marriages we are able to say we know about personally). I think this is why there are so many Spaniards and the like out there. I also suspect they are made billionaires to make them even more acceptable.
Why should it matter what people read or want to read? Reading romance (and other fluffy by the poolside genres) don’t have to be about political or social correctness. They have to get your rocks off or scratch the proverbial itch.
It comes down to what consumers want to read and what writers want to write about. If no one is writing it because no one is really interested in it then it shouldn’t matter. I hate it when people push a racial or sexual issue just because no one wants it.
I don’t think it’s taboo or that there is a desire for the exotic. I think it just doesn’t occur to writers to put it in their books. Romanceland tends to lean towards the traditional trope. And when it deviates from that it also tends to do so conservatively. Is there something wrong with that? Not at all. ESPECIALLY from this genre because it is meant as a comfort food and entertainment, not as a political statement.
The best examples of interracial romance books are the ones which deal with the characters’ races almost as an after-thought. It’s not as if it’s a prerequisite for a reader to know the race of the characters before reading a book. A good example of an author who totally disregards race as an issue in constructing her books is Marjorie M. Liu. Of course, she’s dealing with the paranormal, and if the reader can accept a gargoyle as a hero, why can’t they accept a different race of human?
What if a mystery is a fantasy (e.g. The Dresden Files, which I have seen in both sections at different libraries)? What if a Romance is SF? Sometimes things are in more than one genre.
There isn’t an IR section at my library, but I can tell you why there’s an AA section: because before we had one, people came in and asked where they could find it. Do people who are browsing the general fiction possibly miss something that they would like because it’s shelved in AA? It probably happens from time to time. A person browsing Fantasy might also miss something she’d like in SF. A person who never heard of The Dresden Files who browses the fantasy section might miss it if that library considers it mystery, or vice versa. We try to make things easy to find based on how we think people are most likely to look for it, but sometimes there are two categories that fit a book equally well. In an ideal world multiple copies would be split between both places (which is often done for many of our AA books of which we own multiple copies).
As one member of an interracial couple, I have to say that I’m not sure it’s enough of a subject to carry a romance. Most of my friends are in interracial or inter-cultural relationships/marriages. The issues, however, that make relationships difficult/challenging are mostly not related to race. The couples I know who’ve had problems – have the usual gambit of problems (money, infidelity, etc.,) so I don’t know if it’s enough to carry a romance, but it would be interesting in the sense that I could see a reflection of myself in a romance.
One interracial romance that I read recently was: The Tao of Sex by Jade Lee (though I wasn’t a fan of the book, too abstract for me). Then there have been a sprinkling of ‘mainstream’ (read Harlequin) books over the years where the hero was 1/8 or 1/4 native American – and recently A Scent of Seduction by Colleen Collins with a (NOT MY WORDS) ‘Native American hottie’ – hero.
I’m also one half of an interracial couple (he’s black and I’m about as white as you can get), and maybe it’s because of where I grew up/currently live (Seattle), but it seems fairly normal to me. I agree that novels specifically about interracial couples tend to focus too much on race, but I think it’s more out of a want to be sensitive to the issue than a reflection on real life (at least my life – I can’t speak for anyone else). Out of all the issues my bf and I have had, race has never been one. We’ve talked about it, obviously, but it was never an obstacle or a factor – other than it’s part of the way he looks, and I kinda really like that :). That is not to say that racism doesn’t exist, or to disregard the experiences people have had with it, but I look at it much the way I look at the color of his eyes or the way he smiles – it’s just part of the person I love, and one of the reasons he is who he is. I’d love to see that reflected in a novel.
Also, can we all have a cheer for Sam and Alyssa? One of my favorite novel couples of all time, bar none! Hmm, it’s been a while since I re-read that one…
As an author of black and bw/wm romances, I’m thrilled to see all the messages from readers saying that you’d read these books. However, if print books are your cuppa, you’ll have to go to the black section to find most of them. Genesis Press and Parker Publishing are two small print presses who regularly publish bw/wm. As others have said, may epubs do too.
shameless plug—my last release was part of an anthology What White Boyz Want, released in March—end shameless plug.
As for why black books are shelved where they are, might I direct my fellow RWA members to your May RWR, starting on page 15? I’ve said plenty on that subject on my own blog, Monica’s blog, here and at Dear Author, but the RWR has it in a black and white keepsake edition, pun intended.
Roz has already mentioned the MSN group. They are voracious readers who love books with bw and non-black men in them. They’ll be more than happy to give you recommendations.
Race is acknowledged in some way in both my full length IR books. In No Commitment Required, the hero and heroine don’t have problems with color (they’ve got bigger issues) but their friends and some minor characters do. In Three Wishes, they discuss it and move on (heroine is black and Vietnamese, but identifies black) but again secondary characters have issues. No issues in WB. I know Amazon reviews are suspect now, but I’ve only ever once asked someone to post a review there. Dear Author gave NCR a B, if that helps.
Allie:
may I offer gay interracial pirates?Kestrel on the Horizon
Carrie: Nikolai has an observant Jewish main character (not the title character, but his mentor). Watch for “Burning for Eight Days” from Ellora’s Cave’s Exotica line.
working71. Yep, pimping myself. That’s work.
The best examples of interracial romance books are the ones which deal with the characters’ races almost as an after-thought.
Oh yes. I’m a firm believer in drawing on universal emotions (especially when writing outside my own eastern European background) and adding in cultural elements as needed.
I work hard to get things “as right as I can” and the response has been good, but I admit that it’s frustrating at times to have to work around genre expectations.
It pained me to have my samurai hero tell the British heroine he loved her at the end of a novella instead of letting the fact that he kept her with him make the point.
So why arent there more interracial romances? Short answer: because the majority of (white) people in this country are socialized to feel uncomfortable with discussing race or ethnicity.
.
I am a woman of color. I am a woman always. I am a person of color always. I cant separate that. So if I fall in love I am a woman of color falling in love. Ss if you write a story about me then it must be a story about this particular woman of color falling in love.
As some of the posts on this thread indicate people are socialized to say all the PC things that they would love to read about other races/ethnicities. In reality the majority of romance readers only really do so only when its “safe”.
Safe means no uncomfortable feelings generated by reading the novel. The novel shouldnt force you to think about your unearned privileges, inequality, prejudice or anything uncomfortable. It doesnt matter if the love story is compelling and the characters are well drawn.
It doesnt matter if the love story deals with love AND race. That little inkling that you might have to deal with confronting race privilege then it becomes unsafe. Read about bloodsucking killer vampires and shifters in paranormals? Sure. Read about serial killers and abusive husbands in romantic suspense? Yup.
Read about interracial romances? Not so much. Before you say what about all those Asians, Latinos, Native Americans. Yes they are in romance. But these are essentialized Others. These are Others that are made safe. Safe as in the noble savage of Cassie Edwards, the powerful martial arts practicing Asian a la Liu or Stuart. So why arent there any essentialized versions of black people in romance? Cause for the most part the archetypes of black folk are negative. Think of what you see on the news, TV and film. But there arent any safe images of black folk that would fit in romance. The archetypes of the black female are the oversexed, angry and lazy black woman or the hardworking, nurturing and asexual mammie. Black men are hypersexual, masculine and and violent. There is no place for the asexual mammie in romance and the oversexed angry female is too scary. Popular culture flirts with the tall dark and handsome black male with an edge ( think of Denzel) but rarely if ever is he the romantic lead with any sort of deep exploration of the relationship with a woman. He is too masculine and violent to be a romance hero. So the mainstream houses ( as do the majority of the white romance readership) dont see anything that would sell (or that they would want to read).Why? Because its too scary if you have to explore what the couple actually has to go through. If you have to deal with some real world stuff ( stuff I cant run away from on daily basis) then the white majority romance readership doesnt want to read it.
In the same way that little boys are socialized to read all stories as male stories; So we see that more men like to read stories about male protagonists. On the other hand girls are socialized to read male stories but also seek out stories where there are female protagonists. The corollary is that the white majority is socialized to read all stories as stories about white people; so we see that the white majority of romance readers read stories that deal with white protagnists falling in love. People of color read mainstream romances while at the same time seeking out stories about folks of color.
I think there is a large group of readers out there who really want IR’s but for some reason NY isn’t getting it. I’m a writer with 1 IR available now and 3 coming out next year, in an IR relationship, and am a member of IR yahoo groups and message boards. I think readers want the books its just finding a way to get NY to realize it. That being said, in my personal relationship race as never been an issue. Not with friends, family or our community unless it’s behind closed doors. That is how I write my books as well. Sure the H/H are of different races but it isn’t the conflict or a major issue in my book. There are so many other iussues out there other than race. I think that also helps the books to be more relatable to people of every race. I think a lot of people want to read what they can relate too and not everyone can relate to an race issues in a relationship so it might make the book harder to get into for them. I’m not saying thats the case, just a possibility. Love that you brought this topic up. Hopefully if we keep talking about it the bigger publishers will see and start to publish more IR books.
Also, my publisher, Parker Publishing has a line of books about people from races that aren’t written about a lot. Someone mentioned that in a post. The Lotus Blossom line has books about races that you don’t often read in other romance books.
(To start, I’m referring almost exclusively to historicals below)
I’ll tell you what strikes me funny… women do want to read about inter-cultural romances. I can’t conveniently count the number of books I’ve read where the white hero was raised by a culture distinctly non-white. Sheiks, Navajo/Apache/etc., Barbars. The theory seems to be as readers it’s okay if a writer wants to cross a cultural barrier, but don’t you dare put the heroines lily white skin next to someone of anything more than a working tan.
The norm seems to be that if a person of x origin is raised as a person of y and paired with another x. It’s still and xx pairing. But xy is… well not taboo, but the next closest thing.
So it doesn’t seem to be that [whoever makes these decisions on the reader’s behalf] has an objection to a cultured/savage paring. It is almost strictly a colour issue.
Wow, thanks for the kind comments about my Champagne Rules and Hot in Here, the first two books of my Awesome Foursome series.
When I started the series, I knew I wanted to write about four 20-something girls (kind of a younger Sex and the City, set in Vancouver). I knew they couldn’t all be white, and couldn’t all have romances with white guys. That’s just not realistic in Vancouver. So, the heroine in Champagne Rules is white and her guy is African-American – the child of a single parent immigrant mom with big aspirations for her kid – and partly as a result of that, he’s kind of a workaholic super-achiever. The race thing isn’t an issue for the heroine and hero or their families, but his workaholic tendencies are. She wants a man who puts home and family first – and he has to re-examine his priorities.
In Hot in Here, race is more of an issue. Not for the heroine and hero, but for their families. Hers is Chinese and very traditional – and dating a white guy is taboo for them. She’s torn between being the good respectful daughter she’s been raised to be, versus being a modern Western woman like her friends and being able to date – and fall in love with – whatever kind of guy she chooses.
So, in these books, race both is and isn’t the issue, if you see what I mean. Although both couples are interracial, I see the issue in Champagne Rules as being his workaholism, and in Hot in Here it’s her problem re respecting her parents versus being true to herself. However, both those problems happen to exist because the CR hero and the HiH heroine aren’t white, but live in the middle of a predominantly white society.
A very interesting discussion!
Thanks so much, Roslyn. I’ve marked the link and will be checking it out. 🙂
You know, I think it should be made clear that a Hispanic/Latino character with a white character isn’t INTERRACIAL. It’s intercultural. There are white Hispanics, black Hispanics, brown Hispanics, Asian Hispanics…being Latino isn’t a race, it’s a culture. I think I was even misleading in my own post.
So in other words…that’s a whole ‘nuther topic.
Verification word: fear26. Should I fear the controversy? Nah.
1) The mainstream (NYC) publishers have been/still are squeamish about putting out interracial romances (or any other kind of cutting edge romance such as gay romances) because they
a) would rather not get into fights over distributing/racking/selling them in certain locales, and thus lose money, and
b) feel they don’t know how to market/to whom to market such books, and will thus lose money.
Both are legitimate fears, but time has ameliorated each situation to some extent. Things truly have changed in our country. And publishers have more diverse staff (not just editorial) with less hidebound perspectives. There is no reason to suppose things won’t continue to change for the better.
2) Not a lot of interracial romances were written and submitted to romance publishers in the past. Very, very few. There may be more now, but they still face the same statistical battle for publication as any other kind of romance, plus the issue that any new type of romance (usually defined as a subgenre) has to find an adventurous editor to test the waters. If and when the subgenre hits, nearly every publisher will take it on.
3) Chick lit (which you can claim isn’t romance if you feel you must, but I think it is) finally opened the door to Jewish heroes, Italian families, and other recognizable ethnic groups. Previously, nearly all romances were about white bread middle American heroines, with some glamorized Irish blood or the occasional macho Italian hero thrown in. Since most Americans are a product of some ethnic mix, all romance readers except Barbie herself have had to willingly suspend disbelief in order to bond with heroines who are not exactly like them and who have romances with Texas oil barons, British lords, billionaire Italian counts, French wine producers, Spanish or Mexican aristocrats, and so on.
Bottom line: Publishers are in business to make money and if you show them they can make money publishing your kind of book (for instance, by being epublished and being a hit, the current paradigm), they will. Regardless of who or what it is about.
I’ve been monitoring this discussion with interest. I too am a member and an assistant mgr of IMRR, Interracial Multicultural Romance Readers. I encourage anyone interested in learning more about such books to visit our site and apply for membership http://groups.msn.com/InterracialMulticulturalRomanceReaders The books we discuss and promote celebrate love in all of its many creative hues.
Now that being said you’ll find that there are some who insist that IRs should feature racial conflict because that’s the reality. But you will find even more, such as myself who argue that it’s only one reality and it certainly isn’t mine. I too have been in an IR relationship for the past 21 years and at no time have experienced any of the racial conflicts depicted in some of the IR stories published. That’s not to say that such things don’t happen, but it is not everyones reality.
There appears to be a move now to take racial conflict out of IRs as the driving factor in a story and instead focus on other problems. I’ve always argued for that and I think the voices on this thread support my thoughts. That is most women who buy a romance want just that. A well written romance regardless of the color of the protagonist and not social commentary. Who wants to read about how much one peoples hate another? After awhile it just gets old.
The second thing is the way these books are shelved, I for one would want my book shelved so more people would be likely to come across it and buy it. Cause isn’t sales the point? Shelving it in anything other than romance if that’s what it is would be ridiculous. Yes there are some books that cross over genres, sci/fi romances, but it’s still not that hard to figure out. If the romance drives the story it’s a romance, if the romance is merely ancillary to the sci/fi storyline it’s sci/fi. Odds are if you can’t be sure it’s a romance.
I feel very fortunate that I met with no resistance or qualms whatsoever from Kensington when I submitted my paranormal romance, “Dark Thirst” to them two years ago. In it, the hero is white and the heroine is black. I’ve had mixed reader response to it—some folks think I downplay the racial issue too much, while others say just the opposite, that I play it up too much, but when I was writing the book, I simply tried to be practical and realistic, based on my own experiences and observations. To me, the focal point of the book and the relationship with the h/h was always that they fell in love, the way(s) and reasons they fell in love, not their race. But I felt to simply ignore the race factor would have been not only inappropriate, but a disservice, because it is something I think a young couple in similar circumstances would face and likely address. The whole “the hero is also a vampire” thing aside, of course, LOL.
For me, one of the most interesting parts of working on this book was talking with my friend, Maxine, who is black, and from whom I gleaned some of the anecdotes shared by my heroine in the story. For example, in the book, the heroine, Lina, talks about how her mother recalls that some cousins could go to the circus in their youth, because they were fair-skinned enough to “pass for white” especially in a dark circus tent, but Lina’s mother, who was darker-complected, couldn’t. That was based on a true story that Max shared with me.
Max’s father was also a police officer at a time when integrated police departments were something new and novel. She and her family really were brave and overcame a lot of racial obstacles to build lives for themselves. I admired the hell out of that and wanted to express that in my book in some way.
Anyway. I’m babbling. It’s late on a school night and I’m whipped, LOL. The sequel to “Dark Thirst” comes out in September—“Dark Hunger.” My agent is reviewing my pitch for a third book, “Dark Pasison,” and in it, the hero is black. We’ll see how that goes. Again, I have to give kudos to Kensington and my editor for not balking at all off the premise of “Dark Thirst” (because the hero is also deaf and mute—yeah, this book had a lot of challenges going for it, LOL).
Sara
I wanted to add as well that my book isn’t classified as IR. It’s shelved in the romance section. There’s nothing on the cover or back blurb to indicate it’s IR, just like there’s nothing to indicate the hero is physically disabled in it. Which is the way more books should be, I think. No one has contacted me to complain about the unadvertised IR content, which leads me to suspect that other IR books would be similarly received, even when the content was known aforehand. I agree completely—if the romance drives the story, the book should be shelved with romances.
Your book is very good Sara, I eagerly await the sequel. I’m not surprised your book wasn’t segregated. Brockmann’s wasn’t either. Publishers shelve based on the race of the author, not the characters. White women can write multi-cultural as much as they like with no fear of being placed in the Negro ghetto. It’s most unfortunate.
Thank you to Seressia, Roz and Kelley Nyrae for mentioning IMRR. Our group of more than 600 members focuses on IR/Multicultural Romances and as each of the ladies mentioned above know so well, there is a demand for them and the readership will hunt you down for them.
There is a demand for IR books that go beyond the boundaries set by the sheikh and “indian” romances. Readers are eagerly seeking them and there are many of us quickly writing them.
Virtually anyone can write an IR romance regardless of their complexion or ethnicity through the power of one tiny thing….Research.
If you as a writer can write about the regency era, then you can write IR.
You’re living in the 21st century and can only write about it (the Regency Era, Civil War, whatever) based upon what you’ve read about that time period. You don’t fear messing that up, why would you fear messing up or offending ethnic readers because you’re not the same complexion or ethnicity as your heroine?
Shoot, most of you aren’t men either, but that doesn’t stop you from writing about them as if you were. Trust me on this. Kate Douglas and JJ Murray both write IR and do them well while living this life in “white” skin.
And if you’re truely terrified of offending readers, then locate readers that read IR exclusively and they’ll tell you if what you’ve written rings true or if it’s just one stereotype after the other. Shoot, email me and I’ll tell you.