GS. vs. STA: Heroines Who Don’t Want Kids

Bet MeGS vs. STA is “Good Shit vs. Shit to Avoid,” and is all about books of a particular trope or type that you adore or think should be tossed out the window at the nearest opportunity, just as soon as the car slows down enough. M. is looking for books wherein the heroine, like Min of Bet Me, doesn’t want children.

Okay so I have been a long time lurker, occasional poster, but this Bitch
needs some help. Thanks to your lovely site, I have discovered that I LOVE
contemporaries. Like a lot. Before it was all historicals, but thanks to
Jennifer Cruise, Lisa Kleypas, and others, I’m in love.

So my deal is, personally, I don’t want kids. Like at all. I respect people
who do, and those who don’t, but personally, having kids is just not what I
want. That is why I fell in love with Min from Bet Me. Finally! A heroine
who just wants a man, a dog ( and cat) and a house for the rest of her life.
A message that you can live fulfilled without kids. So I wanted to know if
the Bitchery knows of any more romances ( or fantasy or romantic fantasy or
fantastical romance or whatever) in which the heroine just doesn’t want kids.
No epilogue about how she is happily pregnant or adding to her family of 5.
(The books can be historicals, but I just thought it might be easier to find
contemps of this nature.)

I have been craving books like this and realized that if anyone could help
me it was the Smart Bitches. ( Sorry in advance if this HABO subject has
already been hit up)

This topic comes up every now and again in romance, because there are some times when, as you read, it seems in every other romance there must be a baby-epilogue, or baby-logue, with pregnancy and glowing and 2.5 children in the future. Which books feature heroines and heroes who are not interested in having children, whether it’s a major topic point or not? Which ones did you like best?

 

Comments are Closed

  1. J says:

    Maybe I’m wrong, but I think I recall some Anne Stuart contemporary books being child free – like Into the Fire.  I know kiddies show up in some Ice books, but she is such a prolific writer there must be others w/o kids (um…Ritual Sins…Shadow Lover…etc.).

  2. Rory G says:

    I just finished the first and third book of a Robin Kaye series, Romeo Romeo and Breakfast in Bed, that have great furbabies but no ankle biters.  The middle book has the heroine getting pregnant and the last one does mention it but not for the heroine of that book.  Kaye’s furbabies are fabulous characters all on their own.  Laurenston is still the best bet in my opinion.  I love her.

  3. Jessica says:

    As someone who has decided never to had kids (and had to have a hysterectomy that I was happy to have) the kids in romance, and baby ever after with babies stuff has always gotten to me.  I can deal with it in historicals if only because it was harder for women to get to choose then. 

    I haven’t read many contemporaries but I’m going to look for some of the ones mentioned as I can only deal with them if there are no babies.  Aren’t there more women out there who want a happily ever after without babies?

    Since I do have cats (my boys) I’d love a romance where the couple gets together and decides not have kids because it would upset the resident cats. 

    On a related note, the only romances I never ever read are the ones that have actual kids in them.  Something about that just makes me go ugh and wrecks the romance for me.  Minor kid characters like in All I Ever Wanted are bearable, but anything more than that is NOT for me.

  4. JamiSings says:

    Oh! Forgot to add ones to avoid – ANY of the Fabio “written” romances! Ug! Every single one ends with kids. The worse being the one where they end up together in Cuba. She’s pregnant with their 6th o 7th child, barefoot, and doing laundry by hand and is HAPPY about this! She’s become a baby machine and is hanging clothing on a clothes line and is HAPPY?! EW!

    I like technology too much. Thank God for washing machines and dryers!

  5. Susan/DC says:

    I always knew I wanted children and was lucky enough to get my wish.  I adore my three sons and found they have enriched my life enormously.  However, I hate epilogues with 8 babies and another on the way, as if the HEA is one size fits all and babies—the more the better—are required.  Not to mention that the sappily paternal heroes in the last 10 pages seem to be the pod-person/Invasion of the Body Snatchers version of the hero who appeared in the first 300 pages (Anne Stuart definitely has heroes who fall into this category).

    Others have already mentioned the childless books I know of.  Zoe Archer’s “Lady X’s Cowboy” ends with a baby, but it’s refreshing in that the heroine’s infertility is not cured by the hero’s magic sperm—they adopt a child and are perfectly happy with the baby and each other.

  6. Rose Fox says:

    It doesn’t quite fit your parameters, but I found it really lovely: Nicola Cornick’s Regency Whisper of Scandal, in which [SPOILER ALERT] a woman who’s barren struggles with her own desire for kids, the news that her deceased husband had a bastard daughter, and her new husband’s need for an heir. I’m childfree, and I really appreciated the way Cornick handled all the nuances of a very tricky storyline. The book is due out in October.

  7. Kaetrin says:

    I’d add another vote for JD Robb’s In Death series.  Eve and Roarke + childen = end of the series.

  8. Julie says:

    We’re happily childfree, and would not have it any other way, despite the fact we love other people’s kids.

    This thread is real food for thought. Considering the fact that 13 million Americans now identify as childfree, I’m surprised there aren’t more choices for romance readers as well.

    In the meantime, I love, love, love Jennifer Crusie’s heroines, especially Min.

  9. Cassie says:

    Shit to avoid:

    Do NOT read Lisa Kleypas’ Blue Eyed Stranger. As a childfree vegan I felt personally attacked by that book—-and I usually like baby-logues etc (men who are good with kids are hot)!

  10. Kaetrin says:

    @ Cassie.  er, I think the book you’re referring to is Smooth Talking Stranger – that one has a baby in it IIRC.  Blue Eyed Devil doesn’t as far as I can recall.

  11. Camile says:

    I’m slightly surprised this hasn’t come up, but a few of MaryJanice Davidson’s cross overs btwn the Wyndham werewolves and the vampires from the Betsey universe have discussed their intentions to not have children. The ones I can think of off the top of my are all in anthologies (Over the Moon and Dead Over Heels).

  12. Cassie says:

    @Kaetrin: Whoops! Knew I should have googled that. The rage got to my brain : P

  13. Kaetrin says:

    @ Cassie.  Don’t worry about it – I do it all the time 😀

  14. sweetsiouxsie says:

    @Lynnd….I loved that book (“Not Quite a Husband”)! I was going to mention it too!
    My husband and I chose to be child free. He was firm on the subject and I could go either way. I love my nieces and nephews and their off spring, but frankly, I was a much better teacher than I ever would have been a Mother!

  15. orangehands says:

    Well, most of the ones I was thinking of have been covered, esp since Bet Me is the main answer I give when people ask for a childless romance book.

    Cassie: I know what you mean (yep, Smooth Talking Stranger). I really disliked that heroine; she didn’t f-ing think, she just repeated her boyfriend, and then she kept calling herself a feminist. Ugh. I really liked Blue Eyed Devil but STS was horrible.

  16. Cassie says:

    @orangehands: I liked Blue Eyed Devil until I re-read it and realised the hero tells the heroine (a rape and abuse survivor) that he’s paid off the victim of his rapist brother, so that she won’t bring charges, and the heroine is okay with this.

    My mind was boggled.

    Sorry, I usually do really like Lisa Kleypas, it’s just these contemporaries of hers that really rubbed me the wrong way.

  17. Kilian Metcalf says:

    I second Graceling.  Lovely, nuanced romantic thread with unusual hero/heroine, and no desire for children.  High fantasy, rather than pure romance, but a great read.

  18. Zoe G. says:

    Though I love kids and have a child of my own that I adore, I love the idea of child-free romances. It’d be nice to get away from my own realities with childbearing and now I have a fabulous list of titles to explore. Thank you for this thread!

  19. Jennifer says:

    Subtext: There’s something otherworldly about not wanting to reproduce?

    You know what I think it is?

    (a) Almost all paranormal heroines are Action Girls and they need to kick ass all the time. Pregnancy would drastically interfere with this. (I was thoroughly disturbed by Elena’s pregnancy in Broken, actually. She’s huge with twins and still getting up to stuff? HOW? I know she’s a werewolf and it’s fiction, but HOW?)

    (b) Most paranormal books feature people of two different species getting their sex on, so odds are you probably can’t impregnate a vampire/were/witch/whatever if you are a something else. (Example: Rachel Morgan doesn’t need to worry about birth control as long as she doesn’t boff another witch.) I remember being really annoyed at reading Anne McCaffrey’s Freedom series because it was decided for the heroine that she should have kids (her alien boyfriend can’t impregnate her and there’s no turkey basters about), so she got raging blackout drunk and OOPS slept with humans. Twice. UGH. And thank the gods that most authors aren’t Stephenie Meyer on this subject.

  20. Ros says:

    SBSarah, did you know that the search function on the site isn’t working?  Or at least, for me it isn’t – I keep being told that I don’t have permission to use it.  Anyway, I used google and came up with the link I was looking for – the last time we had this HABO discussion.  There’s some overlap but there are some different suggestions there too.  And exactly the same discussion about why this issue matters (or doesn’t).

  21. SonomaLass says:

    Thanks, Ros, for finding that link to the earlier discussion here. One of the commenters there posted this link to a list at AAR: http://www.likesbooks.com/childless.html

    Quite a few good titles there.

    Spamword “consider48”: I did, thanks, and then sailed on past it. No more kids for me!

  22. Sally says:

    Harlequin Blazes for the most part don’t feature any babies, pregnancies or children at all, with the exception of Rhonda Nelson’s Feeling the Heat, The Renegade, and Kathleen O’Reilly’s Long Summer Nights. Those are the only ones I’ve come across with a pregnancy or a child so far.

  23. Cat Marsters says:

    I can’t tell you the number of fresh, funny, thoroughly modern romances I’ve read which have been spoiled by a clichéd ‘Oh darling I’m so happy you’re having my babies’ epilogue. Bitch, please.

    As for paranormal characters, I think it’s often the fact that they are paranormal that prevents the baby question coming up: ie, inter-species romance, or beings who are technically undead (remind me why we find this so sexy?). Sometimes, of course, adding children into the mix can make it all the more dangerous and exciting: something to temper the recklessness of an immortal being.

    I find it kind of sad and depressing when I read a modern book that seems to assume you’re not complete and happy without a child, as if it’s a strange cult we’re all being pressured to join through the subliminal medium of the romance novel. I’m looking for a happy ever after, not a baby ever after.

  24. Minna says:

    @ Jennifer: Re Elena from Broken, I haven’t read this so am assuming you’re referring to sexy-time and not kung -fu, I had twins and was “active” up to the days prior to labour.  Although alot of people seem quite put off about intimacy during pregnancy, it is possible.  If however this is about kung-fu, my apologies.
    I am enjoying this thread enormously as although a ‘breeder’, the last thing I want to do after a trying day with my lovlies is to read about some winsome little darling or adolescent darling (a species that I’m sure doesn’t exist), so am now looking forward to checking out a heap of new books. AWESOME.

  25. Ros says:

    @Minna, I’m not Jennifer but I definitely thought that Jennifer was talking about kung-fu rather than sex.  That’s part of being an Action Girl Heroine.

  26. Sarah says:

    Your Scandalous Ways by Loretta Chase – this is in all ways a delightful and unconventional romance, and there’s no mention of children in the HEA (I just re-read the ending to be sure). I don’t remember the heroine thinking about kids at all during the book, but I could be wrong about that.

  27. Helen R-S says:

    Jennifer – I hated that part of the FREEDOM series too. Once I could maybe cope with, but twice?? It would have been much more interesting if she’d actually dealt with the moral dilemma of choosing to sleep with someone else to get (more) kids. Not to mention I really couldn’t believe it the second time. He’s so drunk he _passes out_ as she helps him to the bed, and doesn’t wake up for at least another 24 hours after, and yet somehow managed to undress her and get it up in between? Not buying it.

  28. Maggie says:

    I don’t know if this one has been mentioned or not but you can keep it going with Crusie’s Anyone But You. I love the ER doc Alex who is younger than divorced, editor Nina (neither want kids). I both read and listened to this book on audio and loved it both times. I have to say that the narration of the audio was great and I thought it really added to the story.

  29. SB Sarah says:

    @Ros: thanks for the heads up about the search and for the link! I knew I had a link and even I couldn’t find it. Sheesh. The improvements to the site, I shall make them soon.

  30. cead says:

    This is the best thread ever, and not just for the recommendations.  I don’t want children; I know many women do, and that’s fine, and I don’t mind reading about heroines who want children (although I try to avoid books that highlight pregnancy and/or children because I’m not interested).  But I hate the “all women want this” subtext one sometimes encounters, and I wish there were more diversity in HEAs.  It’s a relief to discover so many others who feel the same way.

    One thing that always, ALWAYS makes me crazy is the scene in the historical novel when the hero realizes that he “lost control” and maybe knocked up the heroine. At this point, he gets instant wood just thinking about his child growing inside her (and that’s always the phrasing, too). Creepy, antiquated, and patriarchal. Also, eww!

    Yes yes yes!  This!  It always feels to me like wish fulfillment rather than an accurate description of how men think.  I want to read romances with real men, not men who behave the way women want them to.  I mentioned this trope to my boyfriend once and he looked at me like I’d grown another two heads. 

    It would probably be hard to do properly, but I really wish someone would write a historical about a titled nobleman who needs to marry to get an heir but falls in love with a woman who doesn’t want children and doesn’t change her mind about it.

  31. Terri DuLong says:

    I found all of these comments extremely interesting because my debut novel last Nov. Spinning Forward had an important character that chose not to keep a child she had many years ago and even over fifty years later, she never regretted this decision for one moment.  Actually, my character was based on my beloved aunt….childless by choice, during a time it wasn’t popular to do so.  However, she had a happily married life that included traveling the world and other things that brought her joy.  Selfish?  That’s the theme I explore in my novel.  Personally, and I have three grown children, I always understood and supported my aunt’s decision.

  32. Sue says:

    What a great topic! I’ve always been disappointed that only the paranormal or crime romance books I’ve read didn’t have a baby epilogue (and even those usually have a line about how they wish they could have kids). What’s so wrong with a childless-by-choice contemporary romance? Or one where they wait a few years? I mean, usually the heroine only hooked up with the hero maybe a month before the proposal, don’t they want some time to at least get to know each other first?

    As a subcategory, has anyone heard of romances where the hero is a divorced dad but the book ends WITHOUT full-custody and a baby on the way? (Instant full-time mommy!) I’d love to read a story like that.

  33. Jennifer says:

    Yup, I meant kung fu, or whatever the hell the werewolf equivalent of asskicking is. I kept thinking, dang, wouldn’t her balance be off, or wouldn’t she be slower, or something? I seem to recall there being fights going on and she was fairly well far along enough for it to be a problem for her as a human (beats me about werewolf). It scared me that she wasn’t as up to protecting herself as usual, or at least shouldn’t be. Same thing that gives me the wiggins about say, a Slayer getting pregnant. I always imagined that (Buffy reference!) Nikki Wood’s life would be in massive danger during that time because every vampire would really be after her and she wouldn’t have it as easy to beat on them the way she used to.

    Back to bitching about the Freedom series: it annoyed me that she got BLACKOUT DRUNK when she wasn’t even an alcoholic/frequent drinker. Again, twice. It’s not like she didn’t have friends offering to “make the donation.” Hell, her boyfriend didn’t even CARE how she did it and didn’t seem to consider it “cheating.” And yet some random dude is brought in specifically to be babydaddy #1, too? Even creepier. At least #2 was a friend of hers, though yeah, implausible erection there. It was so stupid on every level. I also, as a childfree chick, wanted her to tell the idiot who told her she HAD to have kids, “Screw you, you can’t make me, and when you know the Eloi could show up at any moment and do anything to us that they want to, you guys really think it’s a good idea to start producing kids right now?!”

  34. Kiersten says:

    Awesome topic. Plus, now I have several new authors to suss out!  I too have no children and no interest in changing that state. It really is a cultural taboo; people often look pityingly at me because of it, the whole “well, your time will come, dear” attitude. Really, it’s OK. When I told my best friend that the only time it bothers me is when I think of being 80+ (my family is notoriously long lived) and old and alone in a nursing home b/c I have no kids to visit, she said, that’s OK, mine will come keep you company. Now that’s covered, I have no worries.

  35. JamiSings says:

    You know, it actually bugs the crap out of me when a paranormal romance says a vampire can’t have kids because in the actual mythology male vampires CAN get human females pregnant. Which results in a dhampire, a natural born vampire hunter.

    I know authors pick and choose what they like out of myths and make up new mythology, but I hate it when they completely ignore this. Now if they explained it as two vampires cannot produce a baby, that I could take. But vampire-human crossbreeds existed in the actual vampire mythos. (Often it was the widow’s husband who came back from the grave to impregnate her.)

    I went through a major vampire obsession in high school when a friend of mine was hit by a car and killed. So I tend to know WAY too much vampire trivia. Like this, for instance, and the fact that you can identify a dhampire upon birth because their skin is see-through like a jellyfish. Though as they get older their skin turns normal.

    Doesn’t mean I don’t want more child-free romance novels. More contemporary then historical. I’d love, love, LOVE to see a heroine with PCOS. Especially since I’ve only known I’ve had it for about a year and somedays I feel so freaking alone in this. I’ve searched out groups on Facebook but no one answers my questions there. Best I’ve done is mentioned I had it while in the ER and the ER nurse stopped me to talk about the fact she had it too.

  36. DreadPirateRachel says:

    Cead said

    It always feels to me like wish fulfillment rather than an accurate description of how men think.  I want to read romances with real men, not men who behave the way women want them to.  I mentioned this trope to my boyfriend once and he looked at me like I’d grown another two heads.

    Exactly! I had a pregnancy scare a while back, and my husband’s reaction was pure horror, not secret delight. We’re happily child-free. I don’t want to say we’ll never reproduce, but at this time, having been married to him for two years, I can’t imagine wanting to change our dynamic. We’re happy the way we are. I guess our theme song would be “Just the Two of Us!”

    Spamword: run92. 92 children? RUN!

  37. orangehands says:

    Cassie (just in case *TW*): Do you know I completely blocked that scene out of my head. I hate when in books that have a heroine rape survivor the H/H have to have rough sex to help the hero through whatever emotional trauma he is in at the time. (To clarify, it’s not that a rape survivor has rough sex, but that the scene always reads as if the hero wants rough sex, no if ands or buts, and because the heroine oh so loves him she does it, even though half the time the initiation into the rough sex has flavors of her original rape and would, in reality, more likely be a trigger for a horrible flashback than sexy time. And to clarify further, I know rape survivors who work out issues through sex with similarities to their rape, but it’s on their time and initiation, not because the hero wants it that way and they better get on board. I’m not sure how clear I’m being about this…)

    Anyway, all of that is to say, I totally blocked that whole scene and lead up from my memory of the book, including the part where he says that. So now I’m all ewww.

    Terri: Are you talking about Spinning Forward?

    JamiSings: Over at The]http://www.thefword.org.uk/index]The F Word[/url], at least one of the contributors (Philippa Willitts) has PCOS; I’m not sure how often she blogs about it, but she may have other links to get you to blogs/etc.

  38. orangehands says:

    Ack, totally link failure, sorry.
    http://www.thefword.org.uk/index”>The F Word

    JamiSings: Anyway, I hope that can help you find a group.

  39. orangehands says:

    Okay, my linking powers suck today.

    http://www.thefword.org.uk/index

  40. cayenne says:

    I had to delurk to this topic- amazing one, thank you for bringing it up.  As a constantly pestered but child-free-by-choice woman, this is a big personal gripe of mine (though not enough of one to give up reading romances!).  I don’t have any book suggestions to add at this point, but I’ve made long notes & a few library holds on some that have appeared today.

    @TerriDuLong, great point.  Selfish & self-centred aren’t necessarily synonyms.  I’ve always thought that it’s not selfish not to have kids (sorry, Gran), whatever the reason, but it is selfish to have kids & maintain a kidless lifestyle since the children might get somewhat shortchanged for attention (based on a few cases I’ve observed – granted, caveat small sample size).

    filled39: I think my house is just fine not being filled with 39 kids

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