Smart Podcast, Trashy Books Podcast

210. Couples Who Read Romance Together

Sarah interviews Suzanne and Matt, who are both romance readers, and Elyse and her husband Rich, who also both read romances. Suzanne introduced her husband to the genre, and their reading experience prompted Suzanne to contact Sarah about whether there were other couples who read romance together. Elyse and Rich, who also share a lot of reading material, join the interview to talk about their reading perspectives as well. We talk about consent, the female gaze, the male gaze, conflicting messaging in the narrative, descriptions of heroes, and how readers interpret what we are saying about sexuality and gender in romance.

NB: At about 22 minutes in, I talk about my interpretation of a scene in which I believe rape occurred, so please skip that if that would potentially upset you, k? I want you to feel safe. The discussion runs about 3-4 minutes, so please tap that skip :30 button on your podcast player.

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This Episode's Music

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The music this week was provided by Sassy Outwater, and this piece is “Sonata for Piano, Op. 26: Fuga: Allegro Con Spirito” by Samuel Barber, and it’s performed by Jade Simmons.

It’s from her album Revolutionary Rhythm, which is on sale as an mp3 at Amazon or iTunes.

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This podcast transcript was handcrafted with meticulous skill by Garlic Knitter. Many thanks.

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  1. Crystal says:

    @Elyse, I met mine in a bookstore too. Although we both worked there. He was one of the assistant managers when I started there. In retrospect, I should have known he was into me when he was the guy that was fine with me reading on the clock during slow times.

  2. Elyse says:

    @Crystal bookstore romances are the best romances

  3. Ainsly says:

    I am blind, and my husband and I have been listening to audiobooks together for years. We read from all genres. I think it’s funny that now when we are reading, say, An action adventure or suspense novel, and there is what passes for a romance in most of those books, my husband will groan and say, “This guy could really stand to read a romance novel to up his game.”I love it.

  4. SB Sarah says:

    @Ainsly – I just laughed so hard. HA! High fives to you and your husband!

  5. Did someone mention chest hair? 😉

    Loved the interview/group discussion! Can we have a group update in a year or so?

  6. Jewel says:

    I LOVED this podcast SO MUCH! Thank you to all 5 of you for your time and discussion. I’m going to get my hubby to listen to this episode; he already recognizes the fringe benefits of my reading habits 😉 but I think he’d like this discussion. Thank You! Thank You! Thank You!

  7. SB Sarah says:

    Oh, this makes my day. I love hearing from y’all about how much you like particular episodes. Thank you!!

  8. KateB says:

    Great episode!

    Man, I love The Crows series so much but the covers actually piss me off. It’s not just like, sigh, marketing. It’s complete disregard for the stories. These are books about communities of women, whose common ground (for most) and origin story (for all) is violence/abuse to them by men. They rebuild themselves by building connections between themselves. The romances, so far in the series, are 1) secondary to the female friendships and 2) actually completely outside The Crows. And what do the covers show?

    Jacked broody men.

    I know urban fantasy covers have their own problems, but that’s how these books should have been marketed. Badass women, maybe a pitbull, holding an arm in her mouth. The Crows leans much more urban fantasy than romance anyway.

  9. Amy says:

    This episode is fantastic!

    Wanted to recommend a company that does exclusively full cast audiobooks. They’re called Graphic Audio, and they’re AMAZING. Not all of their books have romance, and they’ve never done a straight romance book, but they are so so good. Every speaking voice has an actor, there’s sound effects and music and narration. Their tagline is “A movie in your mind,” and it’s so true. Hope y’all check one out, because they’re excellent.

  10. Tara says:

    I’m a fairly new listener and love your podcasts! This one was so fun. My love of romance novels has grown over the last 3 years and my husband isn’t a big reader of novels but loves that I read romance and tell him about the ‘sexy bits’.
    I hate so many of the covers but like the less obvious ones like the Christina Lauren series or Sawyer Bennet’s books that actually look like the characters should look.
    Keep up the good work and interesting and fun interview – I love all the book referrals 🙂

  11. SB Sarah says:

    @Tara: I’m so happy you enjoy them! Thank you so much!!

  12. Megan Larsen says:

    This episode was fantastic! I loved the discussion. I really enjoy the podcasts that are the Smart Bitches crew just talking books and life. I especially enjoy Elyse and Red Headed Girl as I was born and raised in Minnesota (you betcha) and went to college in Wisconsin and met my husband (total cheesehead who taught our then two year daughter this – Q “what do bears do?” A “they still suck”) When they start with regional stuff – it’s just the best! Thanks to all in this episode – I’ve listened to it twice!

  13. Vasha says:

    Yeah, I have noticed that it is so hard to find ordinary-looking heroes. If they are described as ugly it’s usually because of some dramatically-acquired scar. And trying to find one who has as much body fat as most ordinary people… However, I do know of a couple that have a plump hero; one is The Principle of Desire by Delphine Dryden [all of Dryden’s books are very much nerdy and geeky, but they’re also BDSM erotic romances, so not for all audiences]. Another, that I would heartily recommend to the people in this podcast, is Private Politics by Emma Barry. The hero is a political blogger and the heroine is a socialite who’s really good at fundraising. The competence porn was fun and the hero was sweet.

  14. EC Spurlock says:

    I always wished I could have got my late husband to read some romance authors because I think he would have enjoyed them. He used to love chick flicks (he was the one always watching the Hallmark Channel and was really excited to discover the Cedar Cove series was actually based on a series of books by Debbie Macomber) and we read together a number of books that had heavy romantic elements (Time Out of Mind by John Maxim comes to mind)but he was always leery about actual romances. I almost got him into Suzanne Brockmann (he described her as “the female Tom Clancy”) but after his stroke reading became too difficult. Wish I had thought of audiobooks sooner.

  15. Natalija says:

    Wonderful podcast! I enjoyed it so much.
    My partner doesn’t read romance books, but he often asks me what I’m reading, lets me rant and shares his opinion on different topics that come up during our conversations. It’s doesn’t matter what subgenre: be it MF or MM, we discuss them all.

  16. HollyG says:

    I find that I listen to audiobooks so much more now that I can pair them with my kindle purchases. Nothing like a 1.99 or 3.99 audible especially if the ebook is on sale and you get both for less than $5-6. I just wait for deals now or use overdrive. I find that a really enjoy reading the book and then listening to it a couple of months later.
    Best audiobooks I’ve listen too that I recommend that are fun, have romance and are male friendly UF/Paranormal: anything Stephanie Laurenston/GA Aiken; Nalini Singh Guild Hunter/Psy-Changling; Illona Andrews and Thea Harrison.

    Not a romance but World War Z is a great audiobook to listen to -with multiple stars voicing parts – it’s written as oral history – ten years after the war and is absolutely nothing like with movie of the same name.

  17. Christine says:

    The guy who narrates the Rivers of London series by Ben Aaronovitch? I could listen to him ALL DAY.

  18. yy says:

    Ahhh I loved this episode SO MUCH. It gave me all the warm and fuzzy feelings and just made me so happy. Loved hearing the guys’ perspective and loved hearing about the two couples. Basically I loved it and am so happy. 😀

  19. Christy says:

    GREAT episode! My husband used to read romance with me, but it stopped when he went to grad school and had to limit his pleasure reading. (He didn’t choose wisely in my opinion, but ah well lol)
    I have to say I agree with Sarah and one of the guests on the Phaeton Black series. I REALLY wanted to like the series, but I just cannot get past what happens in pretty much the first scene of the book.
    But now I have some good leads on new books! =)

  20. Diandra says:

    I LOVED this episode. High-fives to everyone! My husband and I are total opposites when it comes to reading. I read in times of stress or to decompress. He watches tv to cope. But this episode inspired me to ask him if he would start reading again (he has a fairly healthy scifi/true crime collection. He just hasn’t picked up a book in years because work has been too intense) and he said he was thinking about it! So I’m going to recommend The Paradox Series to him as an excellent sci-fi read (because it totally is) and see what feedback he gives me regarding the romantic elements. 😉
    I’ve read almost all of the books discussed, so it was really fun to hear other people’s take on them. I’m totally with (I think it was Matt?) who said he couldn’t handle the consent issues in the Kresley Cole books. I’ve tried multiple times with that series and I just can’t get over them. And I totally agree about the Laurenston covers. I want to see my bad ass Crows on the cover! WHERE ARE THEY?!
    And thank YOU for talking about NK’s Fifth Season book. It’s on my TBR list and I keep forgetting to just buy the darn thing. Doing it now!

  21. CK says:

    @Christine Kobna Holdbrook-Smith — YES!! He is so unbelievably good!

  22. Maegan says:

    Thank you so much for recommending Kresley Cole’s the Immortals After Dark! I obsessively read the first one in a day! I loved this episode and hope to hear more from this group again!

  23. SB Sarah says:

    You are so welcome! If you need more recs, please feel free to ask any time. The good news is, you’ve got a bunch of great books ahead of you! Yay!

  24. Sue, Julie, and Dennis says:

    My wife is not a romance reader but my mother-in-law and her sister are and we’ve been sharing and discussing books for a long time. We have a reader group – there are as many as six of us – that gets together at our house about every two weeks to discuss a book that one of the group has selected. Wine and cheese and maybe a fancy dessert plus a good romance makes for a fun evening. We all listened to this pod cast and loved it. Why don’t more men read romance? More than likely because romance is written by and for women and so it gets dismissed out of hand – damn patriarchy! Oh, I don’t think I need to say it but my mother-in-law defies all the mother-in-law stereotypes.

    Again, thanks for a great podcast. May I sign as

    Sue, Julie, and Dennis

  25. Stefanie Magura says:

    I doubt anyone will see this comment, but can anyone tell me what Rich’s job is? It would add context to him talking about talking to people at work about what they are reading.

  26. Stefanie Magura says:

    And if that’s not okay that’s fine too.

  27. SB Sarah says:

    Hey Stefanie! Rich works at a local rescue cat cafe currently, but I think at this point when it was recorded he was working at a different cafe.

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