Today’s Romancing the Blog entry by Charlene Teglia is a love-letter of sorts to alpha heroes. I don’t mind alpha heroes, as long as they don’t segue into “jerk” territory. But I’m seeing a lot of false conflation in the ensuing discussion—and I’m by no means innocent of it, either.
People who don’t like alpha heroes immediately equate them with jerkholes who consistently mistreat the heroine, sometimes (in the older romances, anyway) raping her unrepentantly.
People who don’t like beta heroes immediately equate them with wussy girly-men who are wishy-washy and weak.
I’ll admit that the first type of conflation makes a lot more sense to me, because most alpha heroes in old-school romances WERE pretty much royal asswads of the first degree. These heroes made wrong assumptions about the heroine’s sexual experience, raped her, then became furious with the heroine for not telling them she was a virgin, then later they might apologize that they assumed she wasn’t a virgin (note: implying that raping a sexually-experienced woman is fine and dandy).
Not all alpha heroes are like that, of course. There are asshole tendencies in many alpha heroes, but the extent to which these latent tendencies emerge varies greatly from author to author and book to book. I like alpha heroes who, by the end of the book, realize they’ve been arrogant shitheads, apologize accordingly and reform enough so that although they’re still confident, they’re not going to go back to acting like a bull with a hornet up his ass. Sebastian of Lord of Scoundrels, Devon of The Windflower, Whatsisface of Lily (yeah, I liked the book mostly because of the heroine) and Ransom of Midsummer Moon had reformed enough and seen where they’d gone wrong that I was confident they weren’t going to keep on mistreating the heroine badly—not that they had crossed too many lines in the sand in the first place, though Devon and Whatsisface came very, very close.
Derek Craven of Dreaming of You is a good example of an alpha hero with few to no asshole tendencies—or would he be considered more of a gamma hero? Ugh, so confusing. Come to think of it, Kleypas consistently writes alpha heroes with few to no jerk tendencies.
But beta heroes = wishy-washy wimps? What the hell? Like I said in the comments: I have yet to encounter a pussywhipped romance novel hero, and I’m a person who actively seeks out books featuring beta heroes. Even nerds get to save the day and make the heroine come until she sees stars in romance novels.
And does anyone else find it disturbing that a lot of people seem to be equating “nice guy” with being a wimp? Because I don’t. I equate a nice guy with, uh, niceness. He won’t cheat on me, he won’t assume horrible things about me, if something’s bugging him he’ll talk to me about it instead of thinking the worst and smacking me around, and best of all, he has a sense of humor and can laugh at himself when he needs to. When I try to boss him around, he usually gives me a Look, then walks away instead of trying to escalate it into a pointless fight. He doesn’t want to change me, nor does he want to “just tame” me, he likes me as I am, flaws and all. In short, nice guys are functional. Dysfunction may be more interesting and exciting because it generates so much turmoil, but that doesn’t mean nice guys are boring. Not always, anyway.
And THAT, really, is the biggest problem with beta heroes, because some romance authors cannot resist the temptation to impart every species of perfection onto their heroes, which ends up with them being kind of bland. A great example of this is the hero from The Naked Duke. He wasn’t a wimp by any stretch of the imagination, but man, he made me snore and then snore some more.
And I’m going to bring up Christy of To Love and To Cherish yet fucking again because man, talk about a beta hero done right. He’s perfect too—as the heroine notes, he even argues without rancor. Yet he’s adorable. He’s the sexy kind of nice that makes you want to tie him up and dirty him up a little. And Anne, the heroine, certainly doesn’t run roughshod over him; they both compromise during the course of their love story—you know, like rational adults often do.
Anyway, to summarize:
I don’t necessarily mind if my heroes are assholes, but if they are, they must be thoroughly repentant assholes by the end of the book.
I really, really like nice guys, both in real life and in my fiction. I have NO IDEA why people immediately equate nice guys with wimps, because all the nice guys I’ve known are plenty assertive—they’re just not dickheads about having their way all the time, every time.
This has been a great debate as there are so many interpretations as to what makes a hero a certain letter of the alphabet soup – sort of like what makes a heroine a Mary Sue.
I like the alpha male, but to me it means a strong personality that is savvy, not easily pushed around but has a soft spot and a lot of respect for the heroine. Give me an author who writes this kind of hero, and baby, I’m there.
Now, I’ll caveat that by saying I recently read Mary Balogh’s Slightly Dangerous. I’m probably risking getting pelted by various and sundry produce, but I thought she had a good alpha character who ending up wilting on the vine so to speak because he jumped through some unnecessary hoops for the heroine. I felt it diminished both of them because of it, and ultimately ruined the story for me, and that’s saying something as I usually like Mary Balogh.
I think the writer has a two-fold responsibility with the alpha hero. Not only does she have to keep him from turning into a major asshat by mistreating the heroine, but she also has to keep him consistent in character with how he reacts to the heroine treating him.
Gah! Sorry. I’m not making much sense. It’s been a long and horrible number-crunching day. I’ll stop now.
No, don’t stop! Because now I’m interested in hearing about the hoops this guy jumped through for the heroine.
Do you want me to put a spoiler tag on the comment, so I don’t reveal stuff to anyone who hasn’t read yet? And have you read it, or plan to?
I don’t care about spoilers at all—I’m one of those freaks who sometimes reads the end of the book. And sure, go ahead and use a spoiler tag for the other readers who very likely WILL care a lot more about spoilers than I do.
Candy, I too have no idea why people equate nice guys/beta heroes with wimps. I blathered on at RTB about my take on alpha heroes, so I’ll confine myself here to saying that to me, beta heroes are ‘still waters run deep’ kind of guys. There is a balance to them (or potentially there is), and external evenness of temperament and control, but underneath they feel things very deeply. Hence their deep commitment to a cause – and, ultimately, to the heroine. Extrinsic notions of success – wealth, power, influence – don’t motivate them as much as their intrinsic value systems, and therefore they have usually focused their passion and intensity on something (work/role/whatever) that enbles them to enact those values. They won’t fall lightly or easily for the heroine because they know how deep their commitment would have to be, and (in some cases)that it may conflict with other commitments they have made.
Nothing wimpy about that, IMHO!
—-S.P.O.I.L.E.R.S—- ahead concerning Mary Balogh’s novel Slightly Dangerous. Please scan on by if you don’t want to know.
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Slightly Dangerous centers around Wulfric and Christine. Wulfric is one of these very formal, stiff, uber-British aristocrats with a snob factor that rockets off the scale. Still, Balogh does a pretty good job with making him sympathetic to the reader with some historical hints into earlier life that make you understand his motivations. Taking all of her descriptions of him, and his place as head of his family and his rank in society, he’s definitely an alpha male IMO.
Christine starts out as a decent heroine. She’s down to earth, seems to have a sense of humor, not over written. She’s casual and at ease with people. An obvious foil to Wulfric.
I’m reading through the novel, thinking it’s not bad, with the exception of one particular redundancy and Balogh’s somewhat heavy-handed aim at convincing me how charming Christine is, when I came to the scene where he proposes to her.
That just blew it for me. It’s presented in such a way that this hero, who carries a massive amount of responsibility on his shoulders, is used to command and has enough pride running in his veins to float a battleship, sets it aside to ask a woman to marry him. Her answer is less than stellar. Beyond a simple no, she tosses in a few character assassinations that would cut a less prideful male pretty deep.
I get the idea of the drama of the scene, the conflict, blah, blah, blah, but his reaction to her in that scene, and the fact that he comes back for more of the same later on, just didn’t work for me. He’s just about begging the woman for her hand, and she’s always coming up with some nonsense about how he just doesn’t meet her high standards concerning TWUE LURVE.
I felt that Balogh had built this hero up to act in a particular way in the first part of the book, and then he does an about face in the second part. I was pretty much thinking “WTF?” through the rest of it.
Beyond that, the first sex scene sucked, plain and simple. I would have found more excitement in reading someone’s recount of their gynecological exam. And the villain was lame. I like my bad guys to be ‘TEH EVAL!’, and that doesn’t necessarily mean mysoganist. This one was just dull and st-o-o-pid.
/rant
I don’t get it. What’s the deal about alpha vs. beta men in romance? It seems to me that the character should emcompass far more than whether he big-he-man-who-stick-it-to-ya-good, or he sensitive-back-massager-who-actually-listens.
I think a debate about big vs average dicks in romance would be far more fascinating.
(chortle) I will try to keep sensitive romance sensibilities in mind and restrain myself tho’.
Really. %-P
Yeah, there’s definitely a false dichotomy of sorts going on, with heroes being crammed willy-nilly into categories. But dammit, it’s so much to bitch on and on about what we like and don’t like about alpha/beta/gamma/delta/epsilon/zeta/eta/epsilon heroes, and indirectly accuse other readers’ tastes as being crap.
And Monica, just for you, I WILL be talking about dick size tomorrow. Watch this space—and you better provide some awesome comments, dammit.
I am so with you about heavy-handed heros. Alpha does not necessarily mean autocratic asshat.
I like alpha heros whose “alphaness” stems from confidence and (sometimes too stiff) acknowledgements of responsibilities. I am weird in this, I know, but I think it’s hot when the lord of the manor is actually interested in caring for his estate, taking an interest in the people who live on his land, and in the people who rely on him as the landowner. It’s such a great way to establish an alpha when the alpha hero is actually master of his domain.
Sarah: great definition of that term. I’m in agreement. The heroes (and I use that term very loosely here)in Beatrice Small’s books might have once been considered alpha. I just think they’re dickheads.
I’m getting a kick out of the alphabet soup terminology. It fondly recalls all the arguments in the fanfic world where folks debate about what house (Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff and Slytherin) your character is in. So many great things to bitch about. Wonderful stress reliever. 😉
Looking forward to the dick entry (pun intended).
Oh, and a friend just sent me a god-awful line out of a story she’s currently reading. It’s supposed to be romantic. Somehow, I place it up there with the occular-sucking Vampire hero:
“Your meat curtains will forever be draped over my dick.”
:sick:
MEAT CURTAINS?!
Oh I’m nauseous.
Yeah, I’ve tried to cut back on alpha-beta discussions. Because I’ve come to realize I equate beta heroes to heroes that I like, and alpha heroes to heroes (and writing) that I don’t like.
This isn’t so useful.
I tend to equate alpha heroes with those guys who phyically overpower the heroine when she thinks she doesn’t want him to, but really does (a cousin of the rape fantasy). Or those guys who the heroine at first meet has this incredible internal combustion and reacts to said hero as she has to no one else in her life and we learn about his amazing body (yawn) and overt sexuality. After ten minutes.
But, see, I’m conflating writing I don’t like with alpha heroes and it’s not quite fair.
OMG. That line was BAD!! My husband wants to know what I was laughing at. How do I tell him?
I have to say, I didn’t participate in the RTB discussion but I love a good alpha hero who is brought to his knees begging forgiveness at the end of the book. Why? I don’t know. Maybe it’s the closet masochist in me. But I often feel as if he should have to do some awesome grovel.
And I’m with Monica- I’m tired of this debate and don’t completely get why we have to analyze why we like the kinds of heros we do. It’s almost like being in therapy (and as a mental health professional, I should know) having to figure out our motivations for reading what we read. Is it going to reveal some deep childhood trauma if we eventually suss out our reasons for everything? So yea, I’d read with much more interest an entry on dick size. And join in a…err… heated debate 😉
I agree with everyone who says alpha/beta/gamma is too simplistic. I don’t have anything else to add there, but I gotta know:
Meat curtains? What book was this? I will buy it, I swear, just to read that line and howl.
And I’m looking forward to the Big Dick post 😀
Meat curtains? Wow. It reminds me of this line I once read in some slush, that went like: “Her womb wept sex oils, and she engulfed him in a pouring ocean of desire…” Or something like that. Either way, it was very wet.
Regarding the debate, and the self-analysis that goes with it, I’m with Jorie:
I tend to equate alpha heroes with those guys who phyically overpower the heroine when she thinks she doesn’t want him to, but really does (a cousin of the rape fantasy). Or those guys who the heroine at first meet has this incredible internal combustion and reacts to said hero as she has to no one else in her life and we learn about his amazing body (yawn) and overt sexuality. After ten minutes.
But, see, I’m conflating writing I don’t like with alpha heroes and it’s not quite fair.
Who cares about fair? I think it’s a completely accurate description of many Alpha heroes (says I, who usually stays away from generalizations, and is probably guilty of writing the same stereotype), and while the typical (above described) Alpha male is the kind of hero who is sometimes fun to read—because hey, I suppose there must be some allure to the fantasy of meeting a man who makes you combust (metaphorically speaking) with sex oils and oceans of desire and throbbing meat curtains—such stories are not terribly realistic. Or rather, I don’t think it’s the kind of thing that happens and then leads to the True Eternal Love that Romance novels promise.
Then again, it is a fantasy, Over analysis will probably get me into trouble.
Meat curtains? Nothing screams “CLASS” like drawing attention to the size of one’s labia. Jesus. What other terminology was used? Bearded clam?
Hairy. Donut.
Oh, no. That’s just wrong. I can’t help but imagine the kind of glaze you’d find…
Coconut. Emphasis on the nut?
Ok I have to stop. I’m getting seriously narsty.
Meat curtains? Omg the visuals! Ack…my eyes are bleeding!!!!!!!
But I’m with Meljean….send me the name of that book…I gotta have it *g*
Jaci…thinking of putting ‘meat curtains’ in her next book just so people will buy it for the horror of reading that line
Um. Wow!
I’m very interested in Monica’s proposed penis size discussion!
That post generated a lot of discussion I didn’t expect. I was looking at the preponderance of alphas in erotic romance specifically and wondering why that might be. Not intended to be “nice guys suck” or alphabet soup.
I do think it’s just as hard to make a good guy strong as it is to make a strong guy good in a novel. No matter what kind of character it is, making them live on the page is a tough, tough dance.