708. From the Vault: Sociology, Romance, and Community with Drs. Jen Lois and Joanna Gregson

[music]

Sarah Wendell:  Hello, and welcome to episode number 147 of the DBSA podcast.  I’m Sarah Wendell from Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, and with me today are Jen Lois and Joanna Gregson who are Professors of Sociology.  We are going to talk about their continued study of the romance community from a sociological perspective.  We talk about the sneers and leers that romance writers and readers are subjected to and the gender dynamics of the romance community.  Plus, book recommendations, ‘cause that’s how we roll here.  You’ll also hear Jen’s cat purring at the end, which is my favorite part.

This podcast is brought to you by InterMix, publisher of Z. A. Maxfield’s My Cowboy Promises, the sizzling-hot new cowboy romance.  It’s on sale now wherever eBooks are sold.

The music that you’re listening to was provided by Sassy Outwater.  I will have information at the end of the podcast as to who this is.

And now, without any further delay, on with the podcast!

[music]

Sarah:  So if you would please introduce yourselves and tell the lovely people who are listening who you are and what you do.  [Laughs]

Jen Lois:  It just occurred to me that you’re recording this, and so now I’m, like, all tongue-tied.

Sarah:  Don’t worry; I edit a lot.

Jen:  All right, good.  So I’m Jen Lois, and I’m a Professor of Sociology at Western Washington University in Bellingham, Washington.

Joanna Gregson:  And I’m Joanna Gregson, and I’m a Professor of Sociology at Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma, Washington.

Sarah:  So you hang out on the west coast, and you study sociology.

Joanna:  Exactly –

Joanna and Jen:  Yes.

Sarah:  What, what’s sociology?

Joanna:  [Laughs] Sociology is the study of groups.  We’re one of the many social sciences, and the particular piece of social science that we call our own is the part that looks at how individuals are affected by society and how society affects individuals.

Sarah:  So you guys look at how people behave when they’re around other people.

Joanna:  Yes –

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  – and what are the influences on that behavior.

Sarah:  Interesting.

Joanna:  Yes, and the influences we’re interested in are the ones that are outside of people’s heads, so not, like, your relationship with your mother or, you know, the way your brain is hardwired, but more the structures that operate on us on a societal level.

Sarah:  And so gender plays a huge role in that, and gender expectations.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  Yep.

Sarah:  So is there going to be, like, a whole new sociology, like a buffet of Ph.D. papers about Caitlyn Jenner?

[Laughter]

Jen:  Oh, yeah.  Probably.

J:  I have –

Sarah:  And the media reaction to transgender individuals in major mainstream media publications?  I’m just guessing.

Joanna:  Yes.  So I’m teaching Sociology 101 right now, this summer, and already –

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Joanna:  – yesterday, I got my first undergraduate paper submission on this topic yesterday, so it’s been, what two days?

Sarah:  Wow.

Joanna:  So you have 24 hours.

Sarah:  Wow.

Jen:  Yeah, sociology just had a shout out in some article I was reading.  So, there’s a sociologist named Kristen Schilt, I think is her name?

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Jen:  And she studied transgender people.  She found all this kind of interesting stuff, and they talked about it in this article I just linked the other day, but I can send it to you.

Sarah:  Please do!

Jen:  It’s super interesting, and one of the things that she discovered is that female-to-male transgender folks, like, were like, hey, everybody listens to what I say now at work!  Hey, everybody takes me seriously!  I say the same things I did before, and nobody calls me an aggressive bitch.  You know, so that, that has opened up a lot just recently.

Sarah:  Yes, how, how are you received based on the gender that you present is fascinating to me.

Jen:  Exactly.

Sarah:  So you studied romance novelists, and you studied, did you study the, the writers specifically, or were you looking at the genre as a community?

Joanna:  We started looking specifically at the writers, and when we started this project in 2009, it was about the writers –

Sarah:  Right.

Joanna:  – but that’s because we didn’t know anything else.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  Right, we knew that we weren’t interested in the books as texts, because that’s not what we do in sociology, or our kind of sociology doesn’t do that?

Sarah:  But, but, but our books are people!

Joanna:  [Laughs] Books are people too!

Sarah:  Our books are people!  You don’t understand!

Joanna:  Yes, our books too, yes.

Sarah:  Like, we have relationships!  I’m just kidding.

Joanna:  That’s not the kind of people that we are interested in studying as much.  So our interest is, has, was in the authors originally, and it wasn’t until we joined the community –

Sarah:  Right.

Joanna:  – that we realized the community is more than just writers.  It’s also fans; it’s reviewers; it’s publishers; it’s editors; it’s publicists!  It’s, it’s huge, and it’s all interconnected.

Sarah:  And it’s changing rapidly.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  So you started this project, you said, in 2009?

Joanna:  I think so.

Jen:  10.

Joanna:  Oh, we –

Sarah:  So it’s been five years.

Joanna:  Yeah, five years.

Sarah:  Really not very much has changed in the romance genre in five years at all.

Joanna:  [Laughs] Oh, nothing.  Self-publishing –

Sarah:  Like, nothing.

Joanna:  – it’s a small impact.  No, no difference.

Sarah:  Yeah, that’s all vanity presses; don’t you know that?

Jen:  Right.

Sarah:  People who self-publish are just egomaniacal, sad people who suck.  You didn’t know that?

Jen:  That is the term, though.  When we started this research, that’s what a sea change we’ve seen is when we started, they were called vanity presses.

Sarah:  Yep.

Jen:  So it’s been fascinating that we got in right as this change happened.

Joanna:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  Yep.  Print on demand used to be the devil, and now it’s an economic savior.

Jen:  Yeah.

Sarah:  Amazing!  So one of the things that I know about your research that I find really fascinating is that you have studied communities of a single gender for a while –

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  Yes.

Sarah:  – and there are some things that happen when women are in the bunch, are, are in the company of a bunch of other women, and there are things that happen when men are in the company of a bunch of other men exclusively.  So –

Joanna:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – what are some of those things that you noticed in the romance community?

Jen:  You always talk well about this, so you start.

Joanna:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  Okay –

Joanna:  Can you tell we talk about this a lot?  Early on we were struck by this gender dynamic that you talked about, because our previous exposure to an occupational group was sociologists, which is mixed gender.

Sarah:  Right.

Joanna:  It’s, I don’t know the gender dynamics.  You could Google that, I’m sure –

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  – the gender composition of professional sociologists, but there’re a lot of men, so it’s totally, totally different for us to enter this community and see, like, oh, my gosh, it’s women everywhere!  So we were struck by that, just the composition, at the beginning?

Sarah:  There’s, like, three dudes.

Jen:  Yeah – [laughs] – yeah, we know who they are.

Sarah:  Yeah.

Joanna:  We could name them.

Jen: [Laughs]

Joanna:  So we were struck by that, and we were struck by the way that played out in many ways, including, I think the first thing was, like, dress –

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  – so we joke about how our professor clothes, our clogs and the other standard-issue professor clothes, just don’t cut it.

Sarah:  Noooo.  No, RWA shoe game is high level competition.

Joanna:  It is!

Jen:  Exactly.

Joanna:  And even, like – I can’t even think of the word ‘cause I don’t do it normally – nail, having a nail file to file your nails and shape them instead of just, like, toenail clipping.

Jen:  Are you talking about manicures?

Joanna:  Manicures!  That’s the word!

[Laughter]

Joanna:   We’re like, oh, these are my rough claws.

[More laughter]

Joanna:  But it’s so much not a part of my everyday experience that it struck me.  Like, this is a community of manicures.

Sarah:  Yes.

Jen:  Mani-pedis.

Joanna:  Yes, mani-pedis.

Jen:  I know that from reading contemporary romance.

Sarah:  Yes, yes.  Well, I will tell you, before RWA and before RT I have a calendar reminder that when I put RT on my calendar, one week prior I set a reminder to go off to schedule a mani-pedi.  Like, it’s an automatic two-step.

Jen:  Yeah, exactly!  I have to get my hair cut, I have to, like, restock all my makeup, make sure –

Sarah:  Eyebrow waxing.  Got to mow your eyebrows if you’re me.  I mean, if you’re me you have to mow your eyebrows.

Joanna:  And go buy our, like, more feminine-looking clothing –

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  – but also more professional clothing, because in academia, you know, it’s kind of slobby.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  It can be.

Jen:  Can be.  Not always.

Sarah:  You’ve already got the Ph.D.!  It’s time for elastic-waist pants, damn it!

Jen:  Exactly!  Well, with tenure I just started wearing jeans every day, so it’s like my –

Sarah:  Woohoo!  [Laughs] So in the romance community of women, we are all, I think you used the term when we, when we last spoke, you called it, is it hyperfeminized?

Joanna:  Yes.  This is the other part Jen wants me to talk about, I think, ‘cause –

Jen:  Yeah.

Joanna:  Yeah.  So there’s sociological literature that suggests when you have a single sex group, the characteristics of that group tend to magnify.  So the example I always give is, like, a men’s prison:  really masculine.

Sarah:  Yep.

Joanna:  A women’s sorority:  hyperfeminine.  So –

Sarah:  I went to a women’s college in the South.  My experience matches that experience.

Jen:  Yeah.

Joanna:  Yes.  So this is just, you know, another case study of something that people have found in other settings, whether they’re occupational settings or institutions, that you bring one sex together and the characteristics that are associated with that sex tend to be more pronounced.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  So we see that, like we said, we see that in dress, but we also see it in, like, the interactional dynamics, so the way women interact with each other is different.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  How is it different?

Jen:  Well, in the romance community one of the things we saw that everybody talks about, you know, when you go to RWA or RT, is you can sit down with a stranger and, like, start a conversation, and people call you over to their lunch table.  Sit here!  You know, it’s very welcoming, very inclusive.  We’ve also seen it in terms of optimism and, like, encouragement, so the keynote addresses – I mean, the point of a keynote is to be inspiring, but the keynote addresses are always like, you can do it!  And actually we were interested in, you know, is that just, you know, a function of the keynote address?  Is it a function of publishing?  Is it, you know, being in the creative industries and having, like, you know, such a, a long shot to get published or to be successful, or is it, like, part of the femininity?  So we started talking to people who have been to, like, ThrillerFest and other things like that, and one romance author that goes back and forth between ThrillerFests and RWA told us, when men get up there to, like, do a workshop or give keynotes at ThrillerFest, it’s, you know, here are all the things I did right, hence the reason I’m so famous, right?  Whereas the romance authors, in her view, have this, this way of being vulnerable.  Here are the mistakes I made; please learn from my mistakes; I’m here to share with you; you can do it too.  And it was funny, because when we went to RT, there was a thriller writer who got an, an award, a woman, and she got up there, and her, her sort of, like, speech was way less encouraging than we had expected, so.

Sarah:  Really!

Jen:  Yeah, that was a few years ago, but that was, it was interesting, you know?  And she said something, something about, like, it being a competitive industry, and she wasn’t going to share her secrets or something like that, and we were like –

Sarah and Jen:  – what?!

Joanna:  That doesn’t happen at RWA.  You know, it’s like, sit down, honey.  Let’s have, you know, a glass of wine, and I’m going to tell you about my entire career and all of the things that you should be doing differently, and this is what I’ve learned.  And so that kind of support – I don’t know.  We, we don’t really have grounds to compare it, you know, and, and make those claims.  We just, you know, that it’s more or less than what men would do, but it sure is consistent with what women do.

Sarah:  It’s a consistent pattern.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  Is that, in your, in, in the sociological view, is that because women are instructed and inculcated to be supportive and nurturing?  Or are we supportive and nurturing towards one another intrinsically?  Is there literature that looks at one versus the other?  You guys are smiling at each other like, yes, and you can have a Ph.D. if you write it all down.

[Laughter]

Joanna:  So there may be literature that looks at intrinsic stuff, but we, we don’t go there in sociology.

Sarah:  Ah!

Joanna:  We, we view the part that is a result of what we call socialization.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  So I think you use inculcate.  We, we look at it as something that’s taught.  It’s taught –

Sarah:  Right.

Joanna:  – implicitly and explicitly through being members of society, through the explicit lessons we get about what it means to be a lady –

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  – and to the implicit lessons we get from the, you know, role modeling and the exposure to the media and just all the interactions we have on a daily basis that reinforce what it means to act according to our gender.

Sarah:  Nice!

Jen:  And, you know, I don’t think any reasonable sociologists say biology has no effect –

Joanna:  Right.

Jen:  – you know, but it’s just not –

Sarah:  Right.

Jen:  – our, you know, our wheelhouse –

Sarah:  It’s not the only thing.

Jen:  – and so, when you go cross culture or you look across time, you see, like, huge variation in gender presentation or understanding of gender, and so we know that environment does have an effect, and that’s the part we look at.

Sarah:  So now that you’ve done your study and you’ve done, collected a lot of data, ‘cause I know I’ve met with you a couple times while you were collecting data, and you were like, I need to, I have a, need a memory card for my recorder.  These six are full.

[Laughter]

Sarah:  Yes, this one is full too!  So you’ve collected all your data.  Now you’re writing things?  Is that right?  Is that the next step?

Jen:  We’re writing things.

Joanna:  We’re writing things.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  Yes, we are.

Sarah:  Writing words down in various orders.

Joanna:  Writing all the things.

Sarah:  [Laughs] So what –

Joanna:  last year.

Jen:  We didn’t go to RWA because we were writing, and it was a really good thing that we didn’t go to RWA, ‘cause we got a lot of writing done, and it’s, it was sad.  We’re going this year, so –

Sarah:  Yay!

Joanna:  And just to, so, to illuminate what it means when we write, it, it, it’s kind of two things.  It’s analyzing data and writing it up.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  So we, we lump it all into the category of writing, but it means, you know, combing through all our interview transcriptions and our field notes looking for themes, which we’re doing now –

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  – and then pulling relevant quotes or excerpts out into an organizational framework –

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  – and then checking to see if these themes exist in the exist-, you know, in the, the literature that’s already out there from social science, and then putting that all together in some kind of synthesized argument.

Jen:  And going back and forth between, like, here’s these, you know, sort of this tentative pattern I see.  Can I make finer distinctions here?  Can I throw this out?  Can I filter this?  Can I go back to the data, add more stuff?  It’s, it’s very interactive that way.

Sarah:  So basically what you’re doing is looking through all of the things that you’ve learned –

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – and it’s not, like, numbers; it’s all words.

Jen:  Right.

Joanna:  Yes.

Sarah:  And you’re looking for patterns.

J:  Yeah.

Sarah:  Yeah, what are some of the things the patterns will tell you?  Is it we’re all bonkers?

Jen:  [Laughs]

Joanna:  Yes, that’s our conclusion.

Sarah:  Okay, ‘cause I just wanted to make sure.

Jen:  Well, as sociologists and as gender people, we’re interested in sort of the, the gender stuff.  We’re interested in what, well, for instance, one of the things we’re working on now is this, that I’ve always – we’ve always just laughed at how common this story is – the  way people tell their stories of how they became a writer, ‘cause that’s been part of all of our interviews.  You know, how’d you become a writer?  Or if you go to any writer’s web page, that’s the story.  You click on Bio or About So-and-So, and then they give the story –

Sarah:  Right.

Jen:  – of how they came to write stories, which is always interesting.  And so, so many people, you know, talk about the story they wrote in second grade that they still have to prove that they were meant to be a writer.  You know, I think that’s a really interesting narrative.  I was born with a book in my hand; I come, I’m a fourth-generation storyteller; these kinds of things.  And so when something pops up like that again and again, and we’re interested in, like, identity issues as sociologists, and so we have to say, you know, like, how do people come to think of themselves as writers, and what are the different narrative paths that they use to get there?  That kind of stuff, so –

Sarah:  Right.

Jen:  – once it starts cropping up again and again, we just go, well, that’s interesting; let’s look more at that.  So, yeah.

Joanna:  Another example would be the eighty-seven examples we have of somebody telling an author, when are you going to write a real book?

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  So, we call that a pattern.

[Laughter]

Sarah:  Yeah.  Yeah, I would call that a, I would call that a, a highway.

Jen:  Yeah.  Or how do you do your research?  You write romance, huh?  How do you do your research – wink, wink, nudge, nudge.  That kind of stuff.  We’ve talked to one writer who said, oh, I don’t get that.  And we were like, awesome!  Do, do you write romance?

[Laughter]

Sarah:  I just don’t tell anyone I write romance; maybe that’s why.

Joanna:  Yeah.

Jen:  Yeah.

Sarah:  So, you are, you have a paper that’s going to be published really soon.  Can you talk about it?

Joanna:  Sure!

Sarah:  Are you allowed to talk about it?

J:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  Okay, so I have the title as Sneers and Leers:  Romance Writers and Gendered Sexual Stigma.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  There’s really nothing to say there.  It’s, that’s sort of like, you know, vanilla, vanilla, air, air, plain yogurt.  Like, there’s nothing at all that’s meaty about that title, please tell me all the things right now!

Jen:  All of the things.

Sarah:  You could just read it, it’s fine.  It’s the internet.  [Laughs]

Joanna:  Once upon a time –

[Laughter]

Jen:  So, so that’s an example of how, like, we combed through the data.  We were interested in the sexual stigma of romance.  We were interested in the stigma of romance, and then that, we had to narrow that down, because we had so many examples, and so we just said, let’s just look at the sexual stigma as one source of the stigma, and then as we started to look at it and authors sort of telling their stories of what people say to them, how the stigma impacts their lives, those kinds of things, we saw that – and then one writer said, well, you get that sneer or you get that leer, or something like that.  You get that leer, or you get stuffy people who say, I don’t read that kind of stuff.  And then we had another writer say, you know, oh, I was in the bookstore buying BDSM books because I had to do some research, ‘cause I was going to write some erotic romance for the first time, and as I encountered this snooty bookseller, and then the guy behind her in line was like, you know, waggling his eyebrows and, you know, giving sexually suggestive looks, and so we said, oh, that’s two interesting sort of reactions to the sexual stigma, so we called it Sneers and Leers because lots of people said, oh, people sneer, and that’s sort of this disapproval, derogatory, oh, you write sex, you must be a dirty girl, that kind of thing.  Or, the leering is sort of this sexually suggestive, hey, dirty girl!

Sarah:  Yeah.

Jen:  You know, like, it’s this mock approval which is also, not always, but many writers said in many interactions, they felt sort of this implicit derision with respect to that.  And it’s not just always, like, a sexual proposition, but sometimes it’s, you know, the question, how do you do your research?

Sarah:  Wink, wink, nudge, nudge.

Joanna:  We’ve had people say that to us, you know, like, I was at a Fourth of July party last year, and someone said, oh, what do you do?  Oh, I’m a sociologist.  Oh, what do you study?  So we got into this conversation about the romance writer research, and the first thing this woman said to me is, so what does your research show?  Are romance novel writers more adventurous in the bedroom than the rest of us?  That was air quotes:  “the rest of us.”  And I was, you know, like, yes.  That’s what, that’s what my research shows.  That’s what we’re studying.

Jen:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  You’re having bad sex.  That’s what I’ve learned.  You’re, you’re bad at sex is actually exactly what I learned.  They all said so?

J:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  All of them said you are bad at sex.  Do you want to see the research?

Joanna:  So, you know, that’s just, so the, the paper deals with those two kinds of reactions and then how romance writers have to respond to that.

Sarah:  And manage it.

Joanna:  And how they choose to.  And that’s another part of the paper is, is sort of the different paths that people can do, and maybe we’ve talked to you about this before, that, it kind of boils down to we talk about personalizing it or professionalizing it.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  That you can take on the sexual identity and play up that part of, of your writer identity.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  Or you can professionalize it and talk about sex as an emotional stepping stone in a story and, you know, it’s, it’s part of telling a good story.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  Right.  I’ve told you the Judith McNaught story, right?

Jen:  Tell us again.

Sarah:  Okay.  So, Judith McNaught is one of the more impressive names of historical romance.

Joanna:  Uh-huh.

Sarah:  She’s, she’s what I call the holy romance trinity of J:  there’s Jude Deveraux, Judith McNaught, and Julie Garwood –

Jen:  Okay.

Sarah:  – and their historicals are the ones that I absolutely refuse to part with, and I wrote this whole article about them, but Judith McNaught is also someone who, for the majority of her career, has taken no crap about the fact that her books are sexual and that people are going to make fun of them.  She pressed for less, like, evocative, bosomy covers.  She wanted flowers or a nosegay or something less suggestive on the cover of the books because to put all of that sexuality on the front sort of said, well, that’s all there is inside.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  And so she went on a television show or a radio program, I don’t remember which it was, and as, as usual, the host read aloud a, a sex scene from her book and then, like, completely out of context, just started reading this sex scene, and then dismissed it as trash, and she came prepared and read Song of Solomon from the Bible rewritten into third person and read it aloud –

Joanna:  Wow.

Sarah:  – and when he dismissed it as trash, he said, she said, well, that’s the Bible, so ha-ha.

Joanna:  Yes.

Jen:  Yes!

Sarah:  And I was like, you’re my hero!  I love this story so much!

Jen:  Oh, that’s a great story!

Joanna:  That is!  You have not told us that!

Sarah:  Oh, I’m pleased to give you that data.  [Laughs]

Joanna:  I was, I was doing a presentation on this Sneers and Leers paper recently –

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  – and there is a, a story that CBS This Morning posted online a couple years ago about an erotic romance author, I can remember her name right now, but she lives in West Texas, and, oh, what’s –

Jen:  It was on the CBS Sunday morning show –

Joanna:  Mm-hmm.

Jen:  – and then reposted online.  Right.

Joanna:  Right.

Sarah:  Was it the Barbie dolls?

J:  Yeah.

J:  Yes!

Sarah:  Yes, Desiree Holt.

Joanna:  Yes, and what’s the, the reporter?  Bill somebody.

Sarah:  Somebody, yeah, I don’t remember.

Joanna:  And he, he’s, like, this old guy or whatever, but he set up the whole segment where he sits on the porch and he says, read me a passage, an erotic passage from your book, and he, then the camera on him, he’s making all these faces, like these shocked faces, and then he’s fanning himself, you know, because – but it’s all in this mocking tone?

Sarah:  Yes.

Joanna:  And so I had to teach myself how to make a .gif of his reactions, and I put him into my PowerPoint –

Sarah:  Ahhh!

Joanna:  – presentation because it was, like, so telling!  You know, she like, you know, starts reading this erotic romance, and he’s making all these faces, and – anyway.

Sarah:  So, so you had all of the Sneers and Leers in one convenient .gif package.

Jen:  Exactly!

Joanna:  Ultimately, yeah.  I wanted to, like, put up there her with the Barbie dolls or all that, but you know, I couldn’t, I couldn’t do it all.

Sarah:  Yeah, if .gifs get big, then they get kind of unwieldy.

Joanna:  I was, yeah, it was my first.  My first .gif.

Sarah:  Yay!  [Laughs] So, when you go to R, RWA this year, you’re going to be presenting, right?

Joanna:  Yes, we’re –

Sarah:  So, you’re, you’re presenting your paper?

Joanna and Jen:  No.

Joanna:  We’re in a panel of other recipients of the RWA academic grant, so, I can’t remember, maybe there’s five?

Jen:  There’s about five or six.

Joanna:  Five or six, and we’re the only team, so just one of us will be speaking to represent, but it’s, it’s kind of like a retrospective of the academic grant for –

Sarah:  And what it does.

Joanna:  Mm-hmm.

Jen:  What it does, and where that research money goes.  What we found, how it contributes to our understanding of the romance genre.

Joanna:  And it’s interesting, ‘cause people come from, you know, different disciplines and have, they have, you know, different foci.  It’s, it’s going to be interesting.

Sarah:  Cool!  So are you still working in the romance world, or are you, are you going to move on to some other community with your research?

Joanna:  Oh, we’re doing –

Jen:  Never, never.

Joanna:  Never.

Jen:  We’re never moving on.

Joanna:  No.

Jen:  We made this pledge to each other.

Sarah:  You guys are like, no, we’re never leaving; we’re here.  We found or people; now we’re never going anywhere at all!

Joanna:  We’re just, there’s so much.  I mean, really, it’s ‘cause we like it so much, but we’re going to justify it academically?

[Laughter]

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  ‘Cause there’s so much to do still.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  There is no other sociology on this topic, and every time we start writing one paper, we realize there are, like, seven papers in it.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  So, for example, the sexual stigma paper that, that Jen talked about, that was originally going to be a paper called “The Stigma of Romance” or something –

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  – and it, that is now, like, five different papers.  Or at least three.

Jen:  Three.

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Joanna:  It would be five if I had my way.  It would be a whole book if I had my way.

Jen:  Okay, so the other day Joanna said to me, I was tell, I was talking to her about the paper that I’m working on.  She’s working on one primarily.  I’m working on another one, and she said, so, I think maybe we have two books here, and I was like, oh, my God!  [Laughs] No, let’s just get one more, one done.

Sarah:  You guys are like the sociology version of those families that have, like, nine eligible brothers, and every brother gets a story?

J:  [Laughs] Yes!

Sarah:  Like, you guys are your own sequel bait.

Jen:  Yeah, I suppose.

Joanna:  Yes, you’re right!  Sequel bait, sequel bait.

Sarah:  Yes.  You are all –

Joanna:  I’m going to see if I can use that next Jen give me a hard time when I say, save that for the second book.

Sarah:  Yeah, sequel bait.  So, are you writing a book?

Jen:  We are writing a book, so –

Sarah:  Yay!  Is it a romance?

Jen:  Oh –

Joanna:  It’s our love affair with the romance genre.

Jen:  – it’s, it’s – yeah.

Sarah:  That’ll do!  So you’re with me!  You’re over with me on the nonfiction about romance shelf.

Jen:  Exactly.

Sarah:  It’s not a crowded shelf.  Bring as much as you want.

Jen:  Yeah.

Sarah:  I’ll set up a bar.  You just bring whatever you need.  There’s not a lot of us on that shelf.

Joanna:  We have dabbled in the actual writing of romance, which I think we’ve told you before –

Sarah:  Yes.

Joanna:  – because it’s kind of part of our methodology is learning by doing?

Sarah:  Of course.

Jen:  Yes, it’s for science.

Joanna:  It’s science.

Sarah:  Yeah.

Joanna:  But we’re terrible at it, so –

Jen:  Also science.

Joanna:  Also science.

[Laughter]

Joanna:  We are scientifically incapable of writing romance, but it gives us an appreciation for how hard it is.

Jen:  It does.

Sarah:  Yes.  That’s my favorite thing, when someone tries and they go, oh, my God, it’s really hard.  I’m like, can I just record people saying that, because I still see so many people say, oh, it’s easy.  Anyone can do that on a weekend.

Jen:  Exactly.

Sarah:  Really?

Jen:  Exactly.

Joanna:  Which is another pattern!

Sarah:  Yes.

Joanna:  How often people hear that.

Sarah:  Yep.  Any, so anything that is said over and over and over and over, and are you, I’m, I’m assuming you also collected data on the stigma that is attached to reading romance, as well.  Like –

Joanna:  We haven’t done that as much.  Only, that act-, area has been studied a little bit.  Readers and the kinds of reactions they get.  It’s actually been more about, to be honest, the more, more of the literature on readers has looked at whether they have realistic or unrealistic expectations.

Sarah:  I keep seeing those papers, and my blood pressure goes up.

Joanna:  Yes.

Jen:  Yeah.

Joanna:  Because the assumptions of the people posing those questions are just –

Sarah:  Yes.

Joanna:  – really problematic.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  Really problematic.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  One of the things that I really dislike, the, the pattern that I have seen most recently, is the position, much like the person on CBS Sunday morning, the position of the journalist when they are tasked with writing about romance.  Sometimes you get a person who likes the genre or is curious about it and comes out, comes at it with sort of an honest enthusiasm –

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – and then you have people who are like, oh, my God, I can’t believe I was assigned to this.  This is so embarrassing.  I can’t wait to get back to, like, you know, the economy and really important things like food, and I’ll just phone – this is so ridiculous, I can’t believe I have to be here.  And then implicit in that attitude comes this almost insecure desire for reassurance on the part of whoever’s reading their article, like, well, you and I know that this is ridiculous, but this is my job, so I have to report on this, but you and I both know that this is just terrible, so let’s just, here’s my word count, moving on.

Joanna:  Mm-hmm.

Jen:  Right, right.

Sarah:  There’s that sort of distancing and then elevation or, and, and disdain.  ‘Cause you, you can’t –

J:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – you can’t write about it if, if you don’t like it without explaining how distasteful it is.

Joanna:  Right.

Jen:  Yeah.

Sarah:  And that, that is so much of the journalism about romance.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  And writers, as you know, are really wary of that, you know, inviting journalists into their writers-only spaces, because they’ve been burned so many times.

Sarah:  Ohhh, yes.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.  And I think we told you, we’ve talked to you about this before, and we’ve chatted about this, but we have seen this, we’ve seen this over and over again in our data, but we’ve al-, we’ve also experienced it in what we call the contagion of stigma, because the reaction we get when people find out we’re studying this is the, like, mocking disdain.

Sarah:  Why?  Why would you look at that?  That’s dumb.

Joanna:  Like, we’re, we’re social scientists, and for us to get that response gives us a little insight, a little inkling into what it must be like to be the people who actually produce this work.

Sarah:  Yep.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  Welcome!  It’s fun.

Joanna:  Yeah.

Sarah:  But this is why there’s a bar.

[Laughter]

Sarah:   Like, really, this is why we have a lot of bars.  I still get that.  I’ve been running the blog ten years, and this has been my job for five years, and I still get people who are like, wait, wait, wait, I don’t understand.  That’s what you do as your job?  Professionally?  Not like, hey, it’s really awesome that you don’t have to put on shoes if you don’t want to.  More like, why would you, would anyone want to do that?  Like, why?

Jen:  Right.  Right.

Sarah:  Like, do you – okay.  Sorry.  It’s awesome!  Ha-ha.

Jen:  And the assumption is that nobody has anything interesting or important to say about romance.

Sarah:  Nope.

Jen:  How could you make an entire career on people commenting on the romance genre?  And your, your, you know, community on Smart Bitches and, you know, the romance-reading community in general is so smart and insightful and hilarious and, you know, there’s so much to say.

Sarah:  It, it is, and it’s, and it’s also interesting because I know of some men who read my site, and a few of them comment regularly, but I hear from them privately.  Like, I’m never sure if I should comment, because I’m a dude.

Joanna:  Hmm.

Sarah:  And I’m like, wait, you’re a dude who’s considering before giving your opinion?  Are you ill?

J:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  Are you okay?

Jen:  And thank you for doing that.

Sarah:  Yeah, exactly!

Jen:  Being here.

Sarah:  I’m always like, wow, are you single?  Because I know women who would really like someone like you.

[Laughter]

Sarah:  You’re a really good guy.  Don’t move.  We’re, we’re just going to get a little stun gun and a tag.  Just don’t move.  We’re going to tag you for research.  Just, just stay right there.

Jen:  That’s another book.

Joanna:  Yeah!

[Laughter]

Sarah:  I’m tagging the good men for research?  Choo!

J:  Yeah.

Sarah:  [Laughs] So, when you are working on, looking at all of your data, are there particular pieces of data, and I don’t know how much of this you can share, but are there particular things that you really like revisiting or things that you’ve done in the course of developing all of this patterned data that you really enjoyed exploring?

Joanna:  I think we might both have our, our pet favorites?

Sarah:  Yeah.

Joanna:  Because they align with the things that we’re interested, as sociologists, that are recurring themes in our careers, so, like stigma is my thing.  I love it.  It’s my favorite thing, and every time I get to teach stigma in class, I always say, this is my favorite thing!

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  And students are like, you told us that last week.  Like, no, but this one really is.

[Laughter]

Joanna:  It really is my favorite.

Sarah:  And, and stigma is when someone is doing something that other people reject them for.

Joanna:  Yes.  Yep.  It’s, yeah, other people look down on them, they devalue, they disparage, exactly.  So, I see stigma everywhere, and it’s sort of like the lenses we wear when we look at the same thing.  So we’ve got this pile of data, and what lenses are we using when we look at it?  So I see stigma everywhere.  Jen sees emotions more than I do?

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  Maybe in real life too?

Jen:  I doubt that.

[Laughter]

Joanna:  So she sees emotion, so, you know, like, Jen is more interested in how authors deal with rejection.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  And those inspirational speeches.  What are the words people use to tell their inspirational narratives?

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  So I think in terms of our having, like, favorite things, they might differ based on the things that get us both excited and have been getting us excited in other projects we’ve also done.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  But I think we might – but we haven’t actually talked about this.  This is a good time to talk about it.  I think we might both be interested in the feminine subculture part?

Jen:  Oh, yeah.

Joanna:  Yeah.  That part is really exciting to think about.

Jen:  All that gender stuff, yeah.

Sarah:  So the way in which at R, at, at conferences like RWA and to a lesser extent, extent, RT, the women dress up for one another, basically.  It’s like plumage –

Joanna:  Well, yeah.

Sarah:  – in a, in a single-gender community, ‘cause there’s no dudes there.  It’s not like we’re trying to pick up a dude.

Jen:  Right.

Joanna:  Yeah, and, and the other stuff that is not at conferences, but the, behind the scenes, the encouraging email threads and the –

Jen:  Support.

Joanna:  – support, the optimism –

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  – the looking out for each other.  The, the lack of hierarchy.  All those things.  Be nice.  The be-nice culture that you talk about in your book.

Sarah:  Yep.

J:  Yeah.

Sarah:  That’s, like, my least favorite thing, but that’s, that’s my, that, those are my lenses.  [Laughs]

Joanna:  Well, it’s got a downside.

Sarah:  Yes, it does have a downside.  One of the things I think I told you about was that at RT this year I noticed – and now of course that I’ve seen it, I notice it everywhere – more and more women who are, I’m presuming, have mostly gone gray are dyeing – Hey, kitty!  There’s a pet on the podcast!  Who’s that?

Joanna:  This is Daniel.  He’s so excited.  I’ll, let’s, let’s show.  Look who’s there.

Sarah:  Hi, kitty!  There’s no video component, but that is a large, orange cat.

Joanna:  It’s a great big orange kitty.

Sarah:  Hey, bud, do you have anything to say about gender?  No.

Jen:  Not so much, no.

Joanna:  Who’s this gendered person sitting next to my mom?

Jen:  Yeah, I think that’s what he’s wondering.  What’s Jen doing here on the couch?  This is our space.

Sarah:  Get off my couch.  I, I had an elderly cat who we had to put to sleep a couple of months ago, but every time I started recording, she would hear my voice and come in and start meowing, and ever since she died, every podcast has had a pet guest, usually the person I’m interviewing.  Sometimes it’s one of my pets, but I only, I’m down to two dogs and one cat, which is a normal number of pets and is very strange for me.  Either way, a pet in the podcast!  I’m so excited!

Joanna:  Yeah.  This is thirteen-year-old Daniel, and this is his media debut.

Sarah:  Hey, dude.

[Laughter]

Sarah:  Nice to meet you.  You’re, you’re, you’re destined to a long life, because all of my cats are and were old.  Both of mine died at seventeen-plus, and then the one I have around here somewhere, he’s fifteen.

Joanna:  Oh, good.

Sarah:  Yeah, so he’s, you, you have many years ahead.  Yay!

J:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  So I noticed, among all of these women at RT, especially at the book signing, that presuming that they had gone mostly gray, they chose the most amazing hair colors.  Blue and green and pink and purple.  Like, it was, it was like the antithesis of fading into the background as an older person.

Jen:  Yeah.

Sarah:  It was like, I’m going to shock you with my blue hair.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  Did they do it together at RT or did they come that way?

Sarah:  No, they rolled in that way.

Joanna:  Huh!

Sarah:  And, and there were so many different women when I was sitting at the book signing, ‘cause I’m at the end of the row because I, my last name begins with W, so I get, this year, the, the li-, the check-out line, so people who were approaching the check-out line would walk by me, and I was like, blue, green, purple, yellow!  Yellow’s cool.  Blue, blue, red, pink.  It was, it was really cool –

Jen:  That is cool.

Sarah:  – and I wasn’t sure if, and I’m still not sure if that’s a romance reader thing or if that’s just a thing that has been happening that I’m not aware of ‘cause I haven’t gone gray and reached that point of dyeing my hair something other than gray.

Joanna:  Huh!  I don’t know.  I’ll have to keep that in mind, though, as an option.  [Laughs]

Sarah:  Pretty cool, right?  ‘Cause it’s all, all the more plumage.

Jen:  Yeah.

Sarah:  ‘Cause we do break out the plumage.  Like, that, that’s one of the things where I’m, I am, like you, a very practical, you know, clogs and elastic-waist pants kind, kind of person, and so RT and RWA are an exercise in, okay, these things go together and those shoes go with that –

J:  Right.

Sarah:  – okay, and I actually, for the sake of packing light, and also my own sanity, I will schedule my wardrobe so I know what I’m wearing on what days and what pieces I bring?

Jen:  Uh-huh.

Sarah:  I know for a fact that not a single person in the world remembers what I wore at any of these conferences, but yet, I think I can’t wear the same dress twice.

[Laughter]

Sarah:  Even though I know there’s no way anyone else remembers what I wore, unless it was particularly bizarre or egregious or, like, I had a wardrobe malfunction, I can –

Joanna:  Or it had a picture.

Sarah:  Or it had a picture.

Jen:  Three years in a row at the RITA we had the same dresses on.  [Laughs]

Joanna:  But I did my hair different each time.

Sarah:  Oh, good!  [Laughs]

Joanna:  Ponytail, up or down.

Jen:  Yeah, exactly.  Up, down, ponytail, I don’t know what my third hairdo is.

Joanna:  You don’t have a third hairdo.

Jen:  Maybe I alternated.

Joanna:  She only has two.

Jen:  I do.  Ponytail and down.

Sarah:  But you could always move your part.

Joanna:  Oh, yeah.

Sarah:  If you move your part to the other side, that’ll give you a big, ‘50s sort of pouf thing, ‘cause your hair’s not used to it.

Joanna:  Yes.  I’ve already been worrying about that for this year, although I don’t think we’re going to the RITAs.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  I don’t think I’m staying up that long.  Like, oh, my gosh, I only have the one dress for three times.

[Laughter]

Sarah:  You can do what I do and alternate.  I have two, and I switch ‘em off.

Jen:  Oh, that’s a good idea.

Sarah:  And I save my packing spreadsheet so I know which one I wore last year.

[Laughter]

Sarah:  And one of them is from H&M, and it was like ten bucks.

J:  Oh, best.

Sarah:  And then I’m in line with all these women who are wearing, like, actual thousand-dollar gowns, and I’m like, oh, I did this wrong.  [Laughs]

Jen:  I, I understand that feeling.

Sarah:  Yep.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  That’s, like, a whole other thing, the subset of women who are not good at fashion – [laughs] – or just faking it well enough to pass?

Joanna:  Yes.

Sarah:  Like, okay, I’ve, I’ve passed without notice.  Moving on.

Joanna:  You know what, the other thing, when you said you, you schedule your outfits per day, we have to do that because we end up with the same clothes all the time, and so I’ll say –

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Joanna:  – what day are you wearing your coral sweater, because –

Jen:  Yes.

Joanna:  – I’ll wear my orange/coral sweater on a different day.

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Joanna:  – together, and we know Jen and Jo, like, nobody can remember which one of us is which –

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  Yep.

Joanna:  – so we don’t want to make it even harder by wearing the exact same outfit.

Jen:  Yeah.

Sarah:  Have you answered to each other’s names at this point?

Joanna:  No, but occasionally – what did we have?  We checked into a hotel or something, and they gave me a piece of paper, and my name was Jennifer Gregson.

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Jen:  Yes, one name out of the two of us.

Joanna:  Uh-huh.

Jen: It just felt perfect.  Yeah.

Sarah:  So, in Washington State, are you guys, like, common-law married?

Jen:  [Laughs] I don’t think we’ve cohabited long enough for that.

Joanna:  You know what we should do, though.  We should take Jo Gregson and Jen Lois, and we should call ourselves Jo-Lo.

Jen:  Oh, we should!

Sarah:  You totally! – This isn’t a thing that you do?

J:  No.

Sarah:  You should do this immediately!

Jen:  I already go by J-Lo to my classes –

Sarah:  Of course.

Jen:  – which they think is funny, but it’s not going to work forever.

Sarah:  No.  No, it’s not.

Jen:  Jo-Lo.

Joanna:  Jo-Lo.

Jen:  It’s like a version of –

Jo-Lo:  YOLO!  [Laughter]

J:  YOLO, Jo-Lo!

J:  Jo-Lo!

[Laughter]

Sarah:  So –

Jen:  We really missed the boat, not publishing under that name.

Joanna:  We did.

Sarah:  There’s still time.  You can get a little icon made and then trademark it.

Joanna:  Ooh!

Sarah:  Yeah.

Joanna:  It’s an idea!

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  Little Twitter head.  Little, little avatar.  So, when you, when you entered the romance community, you didn’t know that much about romance, and then you had to start reading it and then writing it.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  What, are there authors that you recommend most?  Or are there authors that you think, okay, this is awesome; if someone asks me, I’m going to spread the word about this, this book?  Do you have favorites, or have you not read enough to declare your favorites?

Jen:  Oh, yeah –

Joanna:  We have favorites.

Jen:  – we totally have favorites.

Joanna:  We do.

Sarah:  Yay!  What are your favorites?  Can you say so?  Are you allowed to?

Jo-Lo:  Oh, sure.

Sarah:  ‘Cause that’s not going to mess up your data, is it?

Joanna:  No, ‘cause we’re not studying the texts at all, and we don’t identify authors by name in our write-ups.  It’s the conventions of the discipline is that we, we blur the identities of the people we write about, so.

Sarah:  Right.

Joanna:  Nobody will need if we just read these because they’re the books we wanted to read or if we’ve ever even these met these people.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  Yay!

Jen:  So.

Joanna:  So, I think Kristan Higgins is a favorite book for both of us.

Jen:  For both of us, yeah.

Joanna:  We love her.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  How come?

Jen:  She’s funny.

Sarah:  Yes.

Joanna:  Yes.  I think that appeals to both of us.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.  And her characters are, they seem realistic and –

Joanna:  Mm-hmm.  Believable.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  Do you have a favorite book that you both like, or did you each like different ones?

Jen:  My favorite in, in all of her books is, I think it’s called My One and Only, and it’s about Harper, Harper and Nick?  I might be making up those names.  But I, they used to be married, and then they’re not, and then they go on a road trip.  I really like that one, and I like Parker and James, and I forget the name of the book, and they work on a cabin together, and they’ve known each – she’s from a different book.

Joanna:  Oh, yeah.

Jen:  She’s from the, a different book, and she’s a, and then sh-, she got her own book.  Which Kristan Higgins didn’t always used to do until she started her series, but when she was writing in first person, each book was a standalone.  Somebody to Love, maybe?

Sarah:  Yes, it is Somebody to Love.

Jen:  Oh, okay.

Sarah:  I just looked it up.

Jen:  Yeah.  I really like those.  I mean, I love ‘em all, but those are my –

Joanna:  Yeah, I love ‘em all.

Jen:  – favorites of her.  I think we both like Jenny Crusie –

Joanna:  Mm-hmm.

Jen:  – in a similar vein of contemporary with some humor in it.

Sarah:  Yep.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.  I love Suzanne Brockmann.

Joanna:  So do I.

Jen:  So, I know you don’t read a lot of romantic suspense, but I love –

Sarah:  I do not.

Jen:  – love her.

Joanna:  Another romantic suspense author we both like is Kate Brady.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  Her first book, is it One Scream Away?

Jen:  That sounds right.

Joanna:  I think that’s it.  It is great.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  That’s the one I recommend to a lot of people who are new to romance but say they like mystery and thriller.  It’s that one.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  It’s really good.

Jen:  That was a good one.

Joanna:  Who else do we read?  I’m now reading Julie Ann Walker.  She’s a new discovery for me, because I bought that anthology that Suzanne Brockmann was in?

Sarah:  Yep.

Joanna:  That just a couple, couple weeks ago that came out?  And I think the whole project was Julie Ann Walker’s pet project, I think –

Sarah:  Ooh.

Joanna:  – and she’s the first story in that, and I really liked that story, so I started with her, her backlist.

Sarah:  Whenever I post her books that are on sale, I get, always get a response from her fans that are like, oh, my God, that book is so good!

Joanna:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  Every book that’s on sale.  Oh, my God, that book is so good!  So she –

Joanna:  Yeah.

Sarah:  – she definitely has a sort of addictive writing.

Joanna:  You know who’s addictive?  Kristen Ashley.

Sarah:  Yep, pretty much.

Joanna:  My gosh.  Total.  Crack.

Sarah:  Yep.

Jen:  And I head, I think I heard about her on one of the podcasts, and one of your reviewers thinks she’s crack.  Maybe it’s Elyse.

Sarah:  Elyse thinks she’s crack, Jane has called her crack, Angie James has called her crack, I think Katie D. who also reviews for, for Dear Author, I think she calls them, like, Pringles?  You can’t just stop with one; you have to keep going.

Jen:  Yeah.

Sarah:  Which, yeah.

Joanna:  It gets –

Sarah:  We, we interviewed her, and I was like, what is the crack?  Do you know what the crack is in your writing?  What is it?  And she said, Kristen Ashley said she thinks it’s that she is writing down emotion, and she’s doing it in such a, an immediate way that people connect with it, and I think she’s got a point, especially because a lot of the, of her books are told from first person, or a very, very close third person –

Jen:  Right.

Sarah:  – but she’s writing down emotions as much as possible –

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – and that people get really hooked on that.  I don’t know if that’s the reason, but you are not alone.

Joanna:  And it’s weird, because sometimes I read that and I’m like, I should not be liking this character.  This character is a complete asshole – [laughs]

Sarah:  Yes.

Joanna:  – you know?  But I’m like, but I, I love him/hate him!

Sarah:  Yep.

Joanna:  Why am I still reading?

Sarah:  Yes.

Jen:  Yeah.

Sarah:  He’s creepy, but in a fictional environment, it’s okay.

Jen:  Yeah.

Sarah:  In real life, I’d be like, oh, no.

Jen:  Exactly.

Sarah:  That’s always my, my, I want to, I want to answer to people who talk about how romance gives people unrealistic expectations and that we can’t tell the difference between reality and fiction.  I think most readers would look at a character like that and be like, in fiction, it’s great, because I have already agreed that this is the hero and the heroine, and I know more about this than they do, but in real life, I recognize this is not a good dude.

Joanna:  No!

Sarah:  I think most people are able to recognize almost immediately, this is fiction, and this is not, and those are not the same thing.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.  I agree.

Sarah:  But then I tend to have a lot of faith in people.

Joanna:  Another author that I just read and I, I know Jen has read her too and likes her, is Farrah Rochon.

Sarah:  Oh, yes.

Joanna:  We both, I think we both just read her RITA-nominated book –

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  – whose title is escaping me, but it’s about an academic, a professor.

Jen:  Forever something.  Forever Yours, maybe?

Joanna:  Maybe.  I’m terrible at remembering titles.  But it, you know, it’s got the professor angle –

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  – which we can identify with and just, you know, charming her-, hero and all that –

Sarah:  That would be Yours Forever.

Jen:  Yours Forever.

Joanna:  Oh, darn it, so close!

Sarah:  I’ve, I’ve got, I’ve got Google, so, you know.

J:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  And you liked it ‘cause it was an academic?

Joanna:  I, I don’t generally enjoy category as much because I like longer stories that I can really get immersed in for a long time, but this one caught my attention because the, the protagonist is, is a professor, so I totally get it, and she does a great job of, of making it believable –

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  – the storyline of this professor who has this project she’s working on and this department she’s beholden to and all that stuff.

Jen:  And, and it’s small town, which we like.

Joanna:  Yeah.

Sarah:  Yep.  Have you –

Joanna:  We, ‘cause we do everything the same.

[Laughter]

Sarah:  Yes.

Jen:  We –

Sarah:  ‘Cause you’re actually the same person.

J:  Yeah.

Sarah:  You’ve just temporarily morphed into two for the purposes –

J:  Yes.

Sarah:  – of this interview.

Joanna:  Jo-Lo likes small town.

[Laughter]

Sarah: When you give, when you start giving cover quotes, I better see it’s Jo-Lo.

[Laughter]

Sarah:  So, have you guys read Julie James?

Jen:  Yes!

Joanna:  No.

Sarah:  You would like her.

Jen:  I read her – you have.

Joanna:  Oh.

Jen:  The royal we have not.

Joanna:  Jen has.

Jen:  Jen has.

Joanna:  Jo-Lo has not.

[Laughter]

Jen:  Yes, because I was listening – I get a lot of my recommendations from your website –

Sarah:  Ah!

Jen:  – and you were talking about that FBI/U.S. Attorneys, U.S. Attorneys series.

Sarah:  Yep!

Jen:  And so I read the first one, and I really liked that a lot, because it was a witness protection story, which I love –

Sarah:  Yep.

Jen:  – and then I started reading the second one, and it wasn’t as suspenseful to me, and so I’m still in the middle of that.

Sarah:  You can skip that one and move on to the next one if you want to.

Jen:  Okay, so –

Sarah:  They get better and better and better and better and better.

Joanna:  Okay.

Jen:  Is it all in the same series?

Sarah:  They’re all in the same series, you’ll see characters recurring, but you can read them as a standalone.  The only thing that might get spoiled is that you’ll see a couple that in a previous book will have gotten together –

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – and there are some where a few attorneys that I know have been like, yeah, no, that could not happen and that person keep her job.  Like, no, there’s no way.  But the fact that the characters, particularly the heroines, are so consistently competent –

Jen:  Yes.

Sarah:  – and they like their jobs –

Jen:  Uh-huh.

Sarah:  – and they’re not – there’s a, there’s a sort of a theme, a repeating theme, I think, in small-town contemporary, where someone is starting over, their life has ended in some way, and it’s usually the heroine, and she wants to take a break at this town and then go back to where she was.  With the James books, all of the women have jobs that they like.

Jen:  Hmm.

Sarah:  They like their jobs.  They’re busy, but they enjoy what they do, and they, they are competent and confident in what they do, and I happen to love them for that.

Jen:  Yeah, I –

Sarah:  Because there’s only so many times you can read somebody starting their life over, you know?

Jen:  [Laughs] Exactly!  Exactly.

Sarah:  I get it, I get it.  No.  Nononono.

Joanna:  Oh, I just thought of another one I just read recently that I act-, I got from your podcast.  It’s an epistolary – Letters from Skye.

Sarah:  Ooh, did you like it?

Joanna:  Yeah.  When you talked about it, I think you hadn’t read it yet but had heard about it from several people.  I loved it.  Loved, loved –

Sarah:  Yay!

Joanna:  It actually brought a tear to my eye, which Jen can attest never happens to me –

Jen:  Never happens.

Joanna:  – when I read.  I just, I’m not moved in that way.

Jen:  Happens to me all the time.

Joanna:  It happens to her all the time.

Jen:  All the time.

Joanna:  But never to me, except Letters from Skye did it to me.  I really like that book.

Sarah:  I love epistolary books.  I wish there were more epistolary romances.

Joanna:  Yeah, me too.

Sarah:  I wish there were more, because they’re so, it’s like eavesdropping on somebody’s email –

Joanna:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  – you know?  Like, oh!  I loved, I loved that.  Yay!  I’m so glad you liked it.

Joanna:  Yes, loved it.

Sarah:  That’s just the best feeling.  Yay!

Jen:  We both just read an epistolary that’s not a romance, but it’s very funny.  Did you read Dear Committee Members?  You did, right?

Joanna:  No!

Jen:  Oh, Dear Committee Members, it’s an academic, it’s hilarious, and so it’s this, like, disgruntled professor who just, the whole story is his letters.  It’s hilarious.  Very Where’d You Go, Bernadette? type –

Sarah:  Insider-y, highly detailed, hilarious –

Joanna:  Would people like it if they weren’t in academia?

Jen:  I think people would like it if they weren’t academia.  If people are in academia in any way, they would think it’s hilarious.

Joanna:  Hmm!

Sarah:  Awesome!  Cool.

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  Any other recommendations you have?  Feel free to recognize, or to recommend sociology textbooks that you’ve really enjoyed.  [Laughs]

Joanna:  Crickets.  No.

Sarah:  No, no, we don’t have any of those.

Joanna:  There’s some good sociology out there right now.  Like, if you’re interested in, like, women and sexuality and that kind of thing, a really good book is by Amy Wilkins.  Wilkins?  Yeah.  Christians, Goths, and Wannabes?  [Wannabes, Goths, and Christians]

Jen:  Uh-huh.

Joanna:  Is that what it’s called?

Jen:  I think so.

Joanna:  So she’s another field researcher/ethnographer like we are, and she sort of compared theses young, adolescent girls, I think –

Jen:  Mm-hmm.

Joanna:  – across the Goth subculture, Christ-, young Christian women.  The part we focused on, the reason it’s in my head is because we use a little bit of that in our sexual shaming paper, and the interesting thing that relates to our work is that the Christian women she interviewed tried to sort of recreate sort of moral selves by, if, if they weren’t virgins anymore, by sort of, like, recreating that in their heads, you know.

Jen:  What’s that Hamilton one called?

Joanna:  Paying for the Party?

Jen:  That’s, that’s really hot right now, actually, in sociology.  I think it’s called Paying for the Party, and the-, these two sociologists lived in a dorm –

Joanna:  Mm-hmm.

Jen:  – with a bunch of freshman and, like, followed them for four years or something like that, and they, they talk a lot about campus life for young people, and young women in particular.  One of their findings is that, like, when fraternities are involved – and other sociology shows this as well – when fraternities are on a campus, they tend to control the social life, which disadvantages women, and so fraternities can have parties in their fraternities, whereas sororities are usually banned from having parties and alcohol and that kind of thing, and so the women are forced to go to the male turf.  Their, you know, drinking and partying is controlled by the men in the house.  The transportation is controlled, because they have to get to the house, because the dorms don’t, you know, permit alcohol, and so just, there’s all this sort of gender stuff going on that really leads to a lot of exploitation of women on college campuses.  That’s one of their findings.  They focus a lot on social class, as well, and how there’re different tracks in college, depending on where you come from, you know, from a socioeconomic perspective, so that one’s, it just came out, I think.

Joanna:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  Wow.

Jen:  Yeah, it’s, that’s a good one.

Sarah:  I’m trying to figure out if I am hearing your cat purring or if I’m hearing –

Joanna:  I think you are!

Sarah:  – my dog snoring.  I’m hearing some purring here.

Joanna:  That is Daniel.

Sarah:  The cat looks so indignant, like, ugh, fine.

Joanna:  He sounds like, kind of like a pigeon cooing.

Sarah:  Yeah.

Jen:  Yes.

Sarah:  Yep, I totally hear it.  That’s totally the cat, ‘cause my dog is here, but he’s not asleep.  He’s just looking at me like, what’s that noise?  I love it!  Pets on the podcast!

Joanna:  Uh-huh.

[music]

Sarah:  And that is all for this week’s podcast.  I want to thank Jen and Joanna for taking time to talk to me about all of their research.  I hope you thought that was as interesting as I did.  They will be presenting at RWA, and I will have a link to the agenda where their panel is featured if you want to learn more about it or about the academic grants available through Romance Writers of America.

This podcast is brought to you by InterMix, publisher of Z. A. Maxfield’s My Cowboy Promises, the sizzling-hot new cowboy romance, on sale wherever digital eBooks are sold.

The song that you are listening to is Peatbog Faeries from their new album Blackhouse, which I like a lot.  It was produced by Sassy Outwater, who you can find on Twitter @SassyOutwater.  This song is called “The Dragon’s Apprentice,” (a) ‘cause it’s awesome, and (b) ‘cause I really like dragons.

And I have a piece of information for you, should you be curious about Book Riot Live.  If you use discount code TRASHYBOOKS, you can get $20 off full registration for a new attendee for the Book Riot Live conference.  It’s a reader convention featuring book lovers, a bunch of authors, and the Book Riot team for a celebration of books and the reading life.  They have speakers, including Sarah MacLean and Beverly Jenkins.  It’ll be held November 7^th and 8^th at Metropolitan West in New York City.  It is limited to attendees eighteen and up, but if you want to register, go to bookriotlive.com and use TRASHYBOOKS – all one word, TRASHYBOOKS – to get $20 off a full registration.

Jane and I are currently working on a lot of interviews, so future podcasts will include me and Jane and other people – also my dog.  What do you think?  Yeah?

Dog:  Bark!

Sarah:  Yes, romance novels.

Dog:  Woof.

Sarah:  Yes?  Any other recommendations?  No?  Okay.  My dog would recommend that the people who are repairing the fence leave immediately, ‘cause he’s tired of them.

Anyway, as I was saying, if you have suggestions or ideas or you have a request or you want us to help you find a book or you have an idea for a podcast, please email us at sbjpodcast@gmail.com.  I love your email, it’s awesome, and I love that you send it, so thank you.

And for now, that is all for this week’s episode.  On behalf of Jen and Joanna and Jane and myself – my name does not begin with a J; I feel left out – we wish you the very best of reading.  Have a great weekend.

[dragon music]