Over the weekend, The New York Times Book Review published a three page round up of romance fiction. On the front page! Can you believe that?!
I’m not sure where you are in your paywall or whether you’ve used up your free views this month if you’re not a subscriber, but you can read the piece online. And many people are talking about it.
Many.
Why? Because romance was featured on the front page of the NYTBR!
HOLY SMOKES, RIGHT?
And some of the authors featured included Tessa Dare, Cheris Hodges, Joanna Shupe – several excellent writers whom I know you count among your favorites.
So on the surface, lots to celebrate. In fact, if you stop reading after this sentence: “Romance fiction is on the front page of The New York Times Book Review,” you can keep breathing happily ever after. It sounds pretty incredible, doesn’t it?
You can even peek at the covers and the author photographs. Our books! Our favorite authors! In the NYTBR! Hot diggity.
But then there’s the editorial content, written by Robert Gottlieb, former publisher at S&S and Knopf, and former editor of The New Yorker.
And honestly, it’s better for everyone if you don’t read that editorial content.
Take your glasses off, maybe. Let it be blurry, and look at the images and the names in bold.
There are so many things wrong with Mr. Gottlieb’s write up, I might run out of room on the whole entire internet accounting for them all. And if you’ve been on Twitter, you may have seen many far wiser and funnier people than I already expressing outrage at so much of the awful.
And in that editorial, there is so much awful.
Allow me to share some wonderfully funny, erudite, and excellent links to threads and individual Tweets that capture some of it (and thank you to all of these writers for their permission to quote them here):
Olivia Waite: “If you told me someone had written that NYT romance piece as a satire of how the NYT would review romance, I’d believe you.”
If you told me someone had written that NYT romance piece as a satire of how the NYT would review romance I'd believe you.
— Olivia Waite (@O_Waite) September 26, 2017
John of Dreaming Reviews, addressing the focus on “women” in the article: “A gentle reminder that romance is and should be for non-binary and trans people, not just cis women.”
A gentle reminder that romance is and should be for non-binary and trans people, not just cis women.
— Non-Binary Babe (@DreamingReviews) September 27, 2017
Racheline Maltese: “I often say, ‘I wonder what it feels like to be a person.’ I suspect one of the ways it feels is not to have bang[ed] my head into a wall every time the NYT writes about my genre.”
Critiques of the romance genre are generally critiques of women having fantasy lives.
— Racheline Maltese (@racheline_m) September 26, 2017
Alisha Rai: “I am reading this NYT romance coverage and YAY NYT ROMANCE COVERAGE but also um…”
I am reading this NYT romance coverage and YAY NYT ROMANCE COVERAGE but also um https://t.co/9dpIhRf1h3 pic.twitter.com/FdSa9OEOvR
— Alisha Rai (@AlishaRai) September 26, 2017
And for a larger context, please take a moment to read this outstanding thread from Jen, who reviews at The Book Queen.
Jen examines how Gottlieb’s approach exactly patterns the steps of how men suppress women’s writing, as outlined by Joanna Russ ( A | BN ) :
Remember the good old days of 1980 when Joanna Russ wrote about how men suppress women's writing? pic.twitter.com/iidZiKjRhn
— Jen (@neighbors73) September 27, 2017
No question: Mr. Gottlieb’s editorial content was a sexist, misogynist, racist, and condescending assembly of words and letters. It doesn’t represent a round up of anything but antiquated stereotypes with a side order of reductive suppression. It was outstanding exposure for romance…framed entirely by mansplaining.
But!
It also seems to me that from the perspective of some publicists and the folks working for decades to increase the media coverage of the genre, that this might be a victory of sorts. As I said at the beginning: front page, illustration, three-page spread in The New York Times Book Review?
That right there is literarily unprecedented coverage for romance.
To paraphrase Alisha Rai, Yay for the authors getting that newsprint exposure. That is no small feat.
I noticed that the Romance Writers of America responded to the NYTBR’s tweet about the article with the first of a few “Yay, but…” responses:
While we wish the article revealed more of how complex & empowering the romance genre is, so many kudos to the authors featured https://t.co/s9cMGANxyi
— RWA (@romancewriters) September 27, 2017
I asked for additional comment, and the Romance Writers of America replied to me via email:
“We think the romance genre is worthy of front cover coverage in one of the most prestigious book review outlets in the country, and we are glad that the New York Times Book Review dedicated three full pages to showcasing several amazing romance authors. However, we are disappointed that the contents of the article did not adequately convey the complexity, diversity, or sense of empowerment found within the genre.”
Their statement highlights again the conflict between the content and its frame. I remained curious, and I had a question I kept asking myself. So I did some emailing and asking of nosy questions.
I know from working with many publicists both inside publishing houses and from independent firms that this kind of coverage, despite what it is, is a big deal. It’s a win when looking back at a lot of effort over the past several decades. The fact that this article was on the front page, and was three pages in total, was discussed as a victory in some conversations, and I wanted to ask why.
The thing is, sometimes being in publicity (which, to recap, is the free promotion one secures for a book, i.e. press mentions, blog reviews, and coverage that is NOT paid for) means holding on to a big picture view. It’s a tough job, romance publicity. And a lot has changed about the romance genre’s, well, romance with mainstream media coverage. To understand that point of view, I think I do have to take my glasses off, blur the editorial text, and maybe levitate to 5,000 feet above the newspaper issue.
From that perspective, there are a few things I notice.
First, a lot of effort on the part of different teams of people went into encouraging a piece like that, and getting individual books into the collection. A “round up of romance” in a given month amounts to hundreds of books which could be considered “new.” So the people who secured a spot for a book or author from one of their houses worked their asses off.
After that effort, I can recognize it’s a big deal, but I still land hard on the ground under the weight of my anger at what Gottlieb wrote.
So I asked for people’s reactions, and interestingly enough, some of the people I contacted asked if they could be anonymous – which says a lot in and of itself, and which I totally understand. The publishing community, within romance and within the larger corporate environment, is really, really small. I joke often that it’s six total people, the rest is done with mirrors, and everyone has to switch places when someone rings a bell. The joke is obviously the bell part — there are in fact nine total people in publishing (KIDDING). (It’s 27.5.)
The answer to my question, “Why is this a good thing?” was varied.
As one anonymous publicist from a big five house said to me via email,
For years publicists have worked to convince the Times to feature romance so, to some small degree, it’s a success that they finally listened. It’s a shame that when The New York Times gets around to devoting significant space to romance novels they offer up such a dismissive, condescending, outdated, and misogynistic take on the genre.
One of a book review editor’s primary responsibilities should be to find the right reviewer for the task at hand—a reviewer who can cast a critical eye at the work without devolving into condescension.
My hope is that the Times learns from this experience and decides to give romance the same thoughtful and respectful review attention it gives to other genres like science fiction/fantasy and mystery.
Another person I spoke with said, essentially, it’s a complicated happiness.
Pam Jaffee, Senior Director of Publicity and Brand Development for Avon Books and Harper Voyager, took the time to explain some of the history of media coverage of romance, and her own work within it: “I’ve been doing this for more than twenty years. And as you know, everything about romance has been slow steps. There have not been many overnight wins in changing perspectives on the genre.”
“But you have a concerted effort of a community of people – not just publicity, but editors, authors, readers, reviewers – putting themselves out there time and again to talk about romance as being smart books for smart women.”
So when I asked about the positive aspects of this article, Pam’s location of this article as yet another small step in a long, long walk helped me understand this perspective:
“It’s real estate. It’s acknowledgement of the percentage of the industry that we represent. I hope they come from this with a list of people who have written them smart and heartfelt letters with arguments for the genre, showing them what we can do.
As a publicist who has seen this over and over, time and time again, any opportunity can become growth. It comes from many people working together and talking, and taking small steps to spur change, and to spur discussion on why change is merited.
My job is to be a bridge between books and media. And for The New York Times Book Review to have not only covered it, but given romance a cover, three pages – I’m blown away. I never would have expected that. I think there’s got to be a way to bring them forward.”
Pam mentioned writing letters and with arguments for the genre, and I want to touch on something else, with apologies that I can’t share more in good conscience: I saw one of the responses that the editor of The New York Times Book Review, Ms. Pamela Paul, has received for their featuring romance in the first place. Because this letter was posted on a private Facebook page, I don’t feel comfortable reprinting it, but the response I read was staggering in its sexism, vitriol, and condemnation.
So if readers of romance are angry, and some readers of the NYTBR are angry, what does this article accomplish?
What was the purpose of the article, or, more importantly, what work can it do in romance’s favor, if any? Does being in the NYTBR do anything positively or negatively for the genre as a whole?
For example, I initially doubted that any part of what Mr. Gottlieb wrote was going to make a NYTBR reader think differently about the genre. If anything, it’s more likely to suppress any interest by reinforcing and magnifying the stereotypes about the genre that we have worked against for years.
But I was also reminded of what I say in my own workshop about reviews, specifically negative reviews: no matter what was said, if the name of the book and the author were spelled correctly, you’re good. That’s a win. Because someone will read that review and think, “Oh, hold up, what book is that? Because that is ALL of my catnip,” and then WHOOSH the “one click buy” button bursts in to flames – we’ve all been there, right?
And I was reminded of the times that my own presence in some form of mainstream media, including The New York Times, has brought new readers to the site.
And hey, I should have said this earlier: if you landed here because you’re curious about romance, welcome! You are among friends, and we are happy you’re here. And by all means, ask for recommendations because I promise, we can find a book for you that you will love.
I read the article again and, as is my habit, mentally chased my tail for awhile. For example, all publicity may be in some form good publicity, but there’s a difference between a negative review on a blog and three pages in a prestigious weekly newspaper section with a reported circulation of more than a million people.
But as research of the Book Review itself has suggested in the past decade, negative reviews of lesser-known writers has helped sales.
From the abstract of Positive Effects of Negative Publicity: When Negative Reviews Increase Sales, by Jonah Berger, Alan T. Sorensen, and Scott J. Rasmussen:
Specifically, we argue that negative publicity can increase purchase likelihood and sales by increasing product awareness. Consequently, negative publicity should have differential effects on established versus unknown products. Three studies support this perspective. Whereas a negative review in the New York Times hurt sales of books by well-known authors, for example, it increased sales of books that had lower prior awareness.
It seems likely that a NYTBR reader may not have known about any of these titles prior to that article, so I wonder, does that theory still apply? Does the appearance of the selected romances in the NYTBR increase awareness and potentially sales for those authors?
I hope so – but the Times can’t tell us, as they eliminated the Mass Market Paperback bestseller list a few months back.
Which is just depressing, isn’t it?
After reading, re-reading, talking with a bunch of very smart people and texting with more of the same, I’ve come to this conclusion:
It may be progress. But it’s not great progress. It’s smelly, in fact.
It’s as if the Times coverage of romance is in its infancy. It has a long way before it catches up to other outlets. With this article, it has managed to soil its diaper rather than crap on the floor. It’s progress – but we’re a long, long way from being toilet trained.
Personally speaking, it’s difficult for me to see much of the sparkle of victory in this article. And yet, there’s some glimmer: I absolutely want to congratulate authors wholeheartedly, and congratulate the often-invisible behind-the-scenes people who busted serious amounts of work to make that happen.
I also want to commiserate with them. This article is a tawdry outcome to the work of many women – but, hey, what else is new? As much as I want to high five the people for whom this is an outstanding piece of promotion, the collective insult to the women mentioned makes it a somewhat flimsy victory at best, and downright pyrrhic at worst.
Also, my advice, for what it’s worth: I think an excellent framing store would be able to isolate the cover and head shot, the headline, the illustration, and the masthead with the date so that folks can commemorate being featured in an unprecedented placement in newsprint. I recommend a mat board in a contrasting color – it’ll look great.
But I cannot ignore two nagging thoughts.
Thought One: Imagine if!
Imagine what this could have been, but for the involvement of someone with publishing experience and fluency in romance.
I would even forgo some experience with the genre in exchange for cogent and sensitive attention to prose. I remain frozen-cold shocked and ashamed that this line from Mr. Gottlieb’s discussion of Cheris Hodges’ Deadly Rumors was even published:
Oh, yes – Zoe and Carver are African-Americans, though except for some scattered references to racial matters, you’d never know it. (Well, you would from the cover.)
Frankly, as The Ripped Bodice pointed out, we shouldn’t settle for less. We deserve better than that.
And, without a doubt, Cheris Hodges does.
Thought Two. Well, more A Question.
Consider this piece in context, compared to recent coverage.
Look at the way romance has been explored thoughtfully, seriously, and with attentive care and journalistic rigor in an increasing number of mainstream publications in the past five years.
Look at Kelly Faircloth at Jezebel, starting with this examination of how much Fabio actually appeared on romance covers, then make tea and come back for “How Harlequin Became the Most Famous Name in Romance.”
Look at the reviews and coverage at NPR Books (to which I have contributed – thank you, y’all).
Heck, The Washington Post just published an article from editor Ron Charles about a romance author event I attended at Politics & Prose in DC. That article was titled, and I quote, Stop dissing romance novels already.
Look at Bustle, and Book Riot, and WaPo, other outlets who regularly examine romance, up close and from the 30,000-foot round up point of view…and somehow manage not to be as painfully obtuse and condescending as Mr. Gottlieb.
Which brings me to the question I haven’t been able to answer yet, and I’m very curious about your answer:
Do we as a community of readers of the romance genre need The New York Times at this point?
Seriously. I’m asking.
Because there is clearly so much room left for improvement in romance’s relationship with the Times, and I’m not sure we are the ones who should do the work to convince them to include more coverage from experienced writers. If they are starting from a place of very little insight and understanding, it’s not surprising that Mr. Gottlieb’s article assembled the alphabet in such a fashion. Do we want to do the work to bring them up to speed? Should we? Why?
I am over the moon that NK Jemisin covers Science Fiction and Fantasy for The New York Times. Expanding coverage, even with the removal of the mass market list? That’s brilliant!
This?
This was the opposite of brilliant. If anything, it was as if the Times was insisting on irrelevance to a significant and intelligent segment of the marketplace.
That said… I will admit I went looking for framing coupon codes for those who might want a custom mat board cut to fit their needs. There remains some optimism in me somewhere, I guess.
So what do you think? What’s your take?
Ho-hum. More crap from the New York Times.
@Sofia: I’m not going to bother to read Gottlieb’s article. Waite’s and Hogan’s responses and those in this thread are reason enough to dismiss him.
I’m finding more items for my To Read list, too. 🙂
First off, thanks for an articulate and cogent defense of my genre. I was horrified by the article and didn’t really see the point beyond alienating that little part of the US population that doesn’t already see the NYT as a bastion of East Coast elite intellectuals.
Anyhow, I’ve had a Times subscription for over 25 years and Mr. Gottlieb’s acerbic article doesn’t change my opinion of the Times as a great source of news. The Book Review, however, has always been full of bloated and self-congratulatory articles and I sometimes need to take a break from its “preciousness” simply because of that. Even an ignorant romance-reading-and-romance-writing hick like myself gets the message: literature good, genre fiction shit.
I’m fairly new to romance writing but I’m already getting used to being kicked in the teeth. My local (and only book store for 100 miles) carries everything except romance because “people don’t read that around here.”
People I know and even thought liked me appear to have no problem asking me when I’m going to write a “real book” or snickering and telling me they don’t read “that kind” of pulp. Someone does, that’s for sure.
Anyhow, when getting another kick in the face I like to think of what Kurt Vonnegut said several decades ago when he was derided by this same establishment for writing SciFi instead of literature:
“I have been a soreheaded occupant of a file drawer labeled “science fiction” … and I would like out, particularly since so many serious critics regularly mistake the drawer for a urinal.”
Mr. Gottlieb just took a leak all over my genre. Even so, I think I’d like to stick around in the romance “file drawer” for a while and fight for the respect we deserve.
Of course we don’t need the NYTBR! Our genre was thriving before they deigned to turn their august notice to it. Pff. We were fine without them before; we’ll continue to be.
Thanks to everyone who linked to the Olivia Waite piece!
So many intelligently written comments… I’ll try (and fail) to be as well written. 🙂
My opinion is that we, readers of romance, don’t need NYTBR. We validate through our purchases and reading choices that we are a legitimate genre and not a duke’s by-blow (sorry – couldn’t resist!) to be swept under the rug or hidden in a corner of the book store. We are intelligent, valuable contributors in businesses, homes and families around the world.
On another note, there is a ton of education to be found in romance. One of my favorite eras is Regency. I’ve learned more about life in 19th century England from reading romance novels than I learned in many years of school. Same for the Scottish Highlands of a few centuries earlier. The Jacobite rebellion, first and second. Napoleon. The list is quite long.
Do I need to know the proper forms of address for Peers? Nope, but I do. I know all sorts of things and I’m happy to have learned them from the wonderful people who have done research and put the information in a format that is enjoyable for me to read and learn from.
Thank you to all who write and inspire.
Given that romances make the publication of “serious books” possible and without them, most publishers would go out of business, this article reminds me of what happened to Steven King. After the millionth time his editor had to introduce him to the same people in Random House (?), he decided to quit and go to another publisher. Do you bet that everyone in the new house knew him instantly after that? There is NO DOUBT that if romance were written by men, it would suddenly merit great respect. Just compare the attitude toward Nicolas Sparks (who is careful to say he writes “love stories, not “romances”) and any female romance writer.
Don’t forget USA Today has been a huge supporter of romance since 2012 with Happy Ever After!
(Full disclosure, I write for them, but I don’t get paid to so.)
And this nonsense is why I have a Washington Post subscription and not a subscription to the New Yorker or the New York Times. I have to deal with passive sexism every day of my life. I am not paying for that privilege.
The New York Times can take their condescending attitude towards women and shove it.
Olivia Waites wrote a lovely, amusing response in the Seattle Review of Books that made me enjoy Gottlieb’s review a little more. It’s here: http://www.seattlereviewofbooks.com/notes/2017/09/27/robert-gottlieb-is-obviously-smitten/
I seldom appreciate the NYTRB, but it makes me sad to hear that people want to brush off the entire newspaper for the book review section. The science section is one of my favorites, and their only real competitor for international news (among US papers) is the Washington Post. It’s just, you know, the book review section is its own, extremely old-school thing. It’s probably gotten more readers because of the recent romance “roundup” article than it usually gets for a whole issue…
How glad I am that I’ve already read this article and don’t need to do so again.
–I read it in the ’80’s and ’90’s when Harper’s magazine used to run a piece about science fiction every few years, always on the theme that the entire genre is worthless. (Poor authors! How heroic of them to force themselves to read something they dislike, in order to tell us we should dislike it too.)
–I read it in the ’00’s when Discover magazine had an article about rat intelligence, featuring information that would be of wild interest (tinged with “And your point is…?”) to anyone who has ever had a pet rat … but instead they chose to take it for granted that all readers would be repelled by the subject.
Now I know what I’ll be (not?) reading in the ’teens.
Did he even read any of the books? Just skim for the sex parts? He states historically haven’t changed in 60 years, but you now have heroines and heroes with careers, ideas, struggles–even race and class. Contemporary fiction is even more diverse.
My guess is that Romance fiction was the elephant in the room–too big to ignore. But instead of discussing why the genre is so popular, the wide range of writing and sub genre, we got snarky synopses.
That was without a doubt the most condescending eye roll article he could have written. What a dick.
So, yours is the third rebuttal that I have read on this piece. I still haven’t read the original because, let’s be truthful, I could write the piece without too much effort. I do hope that the spot gets those authors some new fans. I am not surprised by this at all. I saw Damon Suede share a rebuttal on this right after I answered a meme on Facebook. The meme said to name something you could talk about for 45 minutes with zero preparation. My first reply was the fact that romance novels are not “smut” or “mommy porn”. If the Bitchery would like to read more rebuttals, I suggest they head to Lauren Layne’s blog or check out Ron Hogan’s piece over on Medium. They are completely worth your time.
[…] SB Sarah’s response on the Smart Bitches, Trashy Books blog, which also references some good twitter threads. […]
Just an old white man, who wants to be seen as relevant doing a Trump maneuver to get the media stirred and evading doing any serious work on the issue! This article should be treated with the same amount of thought and insight and work that went into creating it….yawn and turn the page to something that actually had any meaning and journalistic integrity! It was lazy work and meant to be sensational…it was an article worthy of the Daily Mail and National Enquirer!
As soon as I read it, I thought it was a drunken bet he’d hatched over the summer with literati friends in some Hamptons gin and tonic lunch … “exactly how many ways can I offend before they yank my piece?” He must have TRIED to write it that offensively. The bit about the characters not being African-American ENOUGH? The closing bit about it not harming women if they have fantasies and hopes? All of it. Bringing up Barbara Cartland? It was so, so, so awful. I think he was trying and now there are a handful of similar people (Graydon Carter? who knows) who must buy him dinner b/c the NYTBR didn’t see through his little game and printed him seriously.
And fyi when looking up Robert Gottlieb, be aware that there are two men with the same name who are big in the literary world: one is the big agent at Trident Media, and the other is this Robert Gottlieb, the Knopf and then New Yorker editor. So what one Robert Gottlieb does isn’t necessarily the one you’re looking for if you’re hate searching.
From Robinne Lee’s The Idea of You: A Novel:
“We have this problem in our culture. We take art that appeals to women-film, books, music-and we undervalue it. We assume it can’t be high art. Especially if it’s not dark and tortured and wailing. And it follows that much of that art is created by other women, and so we undervalue them as well.”
Condescending doesn’t begin to cover it. The NYT piece reads like Gottlieb didn’t want to review romance and his boss made him. He sounds rather like a toddler forced to eat his vegetables: “You can make me write about it, but you can’t make me LIKE it! Wah!”
FUCK. HIM. And the dead horse he rode in on.
Thank you for covering this and as always, rounding up the troops. *HUGE SIGH*
Most of the comments on the article are lovely, but there are a few defending him that make me want to punch someone. No, liking romance does not make you self-loathing or unintelligent.
AND E.L. JAMES IS NOT AN AVERAGE WRITER FOR THE GENRE. I don’t mean to pile on the woman, but she was a below average writer in terms of sentence construction, pacing, and characterization. My inner goddess is fuming.
[…] A lot of very smart people have had words about that stance, defending our beloved genre with the fiery righteousness that only comes from being on the side of truth and hope. Lauren Layne’s was a particular favorite, but Ron Hogan’s is also worth your time, as is SBTB’s. […]
I’ve read mystery/thriller round-ups in the NYTBR before but they never had a body count listed for each book which makes me wonder why this guy felt the need to do a check list for the sex scenes in some of the titles mentioned in this Romance round-up.
Also, I’ve noticed that whenever someone unfamiliar with a genre has to talk about it, their references are completely out of date. Barbara Cartland, Rona Jaffe(whose books are not considered romance by many people, more like women’s fiction)-why were they brought up? I would think that a writer for the NYT in any department would know enough to update their references!
Also found his overview on Debbie Macomber’s latest works to be a batch of snide sneering and WHY THE HELL DOES E.L. JAMES HAVE TO BE MENTIONED HERE?! She didn’t create erotic fiction any more that Al Gore invented the internet! *sigh* They say there’s no such thing as bad publicity but this article clearly begs to differ on that.
@LadyT, actually Al Gore did have a lot to do with the invention of the internet as we know it. https://paleofuture.gizmodo.com/did-al-gore-invent-the-internet-1447761524
Romancelandia is doing just fine without the blessings and validation of a piece of crap that is the NYTBR. Saying that this abhorrence of an article is in any way beneficial to the romance genre is truly buying into the “any PR is good PR” nonsense, and it should be roundly condemned for what it actually is: the senile ramblings of a geriatric misogynist who knows as much about romance novels as he probably does about how to give a woman an orgasm. I’m canceling my subscription to the NYT and sending an explanation email as to why. A message we can all send that these media men DO understand – we silly women with our silly books can cost them some seriously silly dollars if we ban together and walk away from their silly newspaper.
The sad thing is that Robert Gottlieb was the editor that discovered Catch-22 which remains one of my favorite books. He undoubtedly has expertise in litfic but what possessed the NYT to commission him to write something about romance is beyond me.
I didn’t bother with the original article, but here are some smart responses you shouldn’t miss:
https://allaboutromance.com/yeah-thanks-nyt-well-take/
https://storify.com/RomanceReader55/man-at-the-new-york-times-explains-romance-to-me
(I’m not sorry if they’ve been mentioned in earlier comments and I’m reposting…I don’t want you to miss them.)
Y’all seriously, NYT hired a climate change denier to write op-eds(?) for them. They’re still denying their responsibility in the normalising of the abnormal in the 2016 elections. They did away with the mass market bestseller list. Why are they considered relevant for anything anymore?
Thanks Ms Bookjunkie! The Storify above is of my original Twitter rant, and I added a lot more detail from the book How to Suppress Women’s Writing. Thanks for putting the link here. A friend of mine doesn’t use Twitter and asked for it in an easier to read format.
And thanks to The Smart Bitches and Sarah for writing this piece, which I really appreciated. If you haven’t had a chance to see it, Salon wrote a very different romance article this weekend: https://www.salon.com/2017/09/30/welcome-to-the-romance-resistance/
Oh. For. God’s. Sake.
Heyer’s first romance was The Black Moth, written a decade before Regency Buck.
Thanks for the shoutout for Russ’ How to Suppress Women’s Writing. Still relevant, sadly.
This is a bit of a HABO comment – a few (more than 2? less than 10) years ago I read an excellent essay exploring why the author had so much disdain for romance and other genre fiction, but primarily romance. The conclusion was basically ‘if you like to read something that i don’t like, and I judge you for it, it’s because I’m an asshole.’ there was a little side bit about how ‘literary fiction’ is as much of a genre as anything (if there is a dog barking, fragmented sentences, a long title, no real plot…winner!) Does that ring a bell for anyone? I’d love to read it again.
I was one of the people who went BS on their FB page… and got a response. The follow-up has been less then stellar. They meant this to be what it was. A hit piece. No romance doesn’t need the NYT. I have a WAPO sub. I not only won’t be supporting the book desk after this, I won’t open a single article. I won’t support a company that looks down it’s nose at authors and readers I care about.
I was in marketing. Not all press is good press. It makes people hide their books, ashamed of themselves and what they like. Afraid of their friends and how they met. These kinds of articles are toxic. And I’m horrified at the RWA. Not another dime or page view from me.
@Karin-perhaps so, but Gore’s role has been exaggerated a bit in that area much the same way that E.L. James is given way too much credit for that particular genre. My main point was that bringing up E.L. James only showcases the laziness of the article writer,who I’m sure we both agree is like Jon Snow, he knows nothing!
Wow. The original article was horrifying. And then today they doubled down with this: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/02/reader-center/romance-novels-books-desk.html. What the actual F?
@KB. At least the comments give me hope. (If you go to KB’s link the editor basically told we don’t understand criticism, and ignored all the comments about racism and sexism.)
I am so glad I went down the rabbit hole, not only reading the articles critiquing the original NYTBR article, but the lame NYT rebuttal written by Radhika Jones. Not for the article itself but for the amazing stuff I learned in the comments. One of them pointed me to a 1950 article by Raymond Chandler called “The Simple Art of Murder” which is about detective stories but could apply to any genre fiction. Chandler says “As for literature of expression and literature of escape, this is critics’ jargon, a use of abstract words as if they had absolute meanings. Everything written with vitality expresses that vitality; there are no dull subjects, only dull minds. All men who read escape from something else into what lies behind the printed page; the quality of the dream may be argued, but its release has become a functional necessity. All men must escape at times from the deadly rhythm of their private thoughts. It is part of the process of life among thinking beings. It is one of the things that distinguish them from the three-toed sloth; he apparently–one can never be quite sure–is perfectly content hanging upside down on a branch, and not even reading Walter Lippmann. I hold no particular brief for the detective story as the ideal escape. I merely say that all reading for pleasure is escape, whether it be Greek, mathematics, astronomy, Benedetto Croce, or The Diary of the Forgotten Man. To say otherwise is to be an intellectual snob, and a juvenile at the art of living.”
Another commenter mentioned Lucilla Andrews, a British author who wrote medical romances; her first book was published in 1954, and her last in 1996. She was a military nurse, and used her experiences during World War II, in the London blitz and nursing the wounded from the Battle of Britain in her books. Apparently Ian McEwan’s literary fiction book “Atonement” also used large parts of her experiences as she described them in her autobiography, which was called “No Time For Romance”. I found all this stuff in her obit in The Guardian. Great stuff. https://www.theguardian.com/news/2006/oct/17/guardianobituaries.booksobituaries
[…] might run out of room on the whole entire internet accounting for them all,” wrote Sarah Wendell at Smart Bitches Trashy Books, even as she went on to talk about the ways in which it was, to some extent, bittersweet victory. […]
@Kristina
there was a little side bit about how ‘literary fiction’ is as much of a genre as anything … Does that ring a bell for anyone?
Oh, oh, that does sound familiar… except that I think I read it more like 20-25 years ago. Well, in this specific case, I don’t think it would be a bad thing if more than one person wrote the same article.
Hello.
I came here via link from Jezebel’s coverage of this travesty. I haven’t read romance novels since I was a teenager stranded in my aunt and uncle’s suburban home, and those did not make a great impression. I was not anti-romance or judgmental of those who enjoy it, but, to be honest, the rapist-turned-husband trope I read repeatedly in Regency works really put me
off. So did the tender-but-resilient-survivor in the contemporary works.
However, in the last year of so, the genre has regained my attention as pertains to social issues – treatment by the good ol’ boy literary world, progressive voices in the genre, etc. I revised my opinion accordingly, but now my interest has been piqued, and the author of this article did openly invite requests, so here I am – What should I read, friends?
Advisors don’t need to worry about triggers, kink, or glaring anachronisms. If it’s good, it’s worth the emotional or academic distress. XD
Thanks to anyone who read all this. Really.
(Sidebar: I distinctly recall that I liked exactly one romance novel because the woman was a naturalist and had crooked teeth and chose to initiate sex with the man, even though this was a period piece. I found her dimensional and relatable. If you know this book, please let me know.)
Hey Claire! Welcome! I’m more than happy to make recommendations. It helps to know what novels you have really enjoyed and why, so I can better customize your recommendations. Do you want to email me directly? sarah AT smartbitchestrashybooks DOT com — I’m glad you found us!