Smart Bitches Trashy Books | All of the romance, none of the bullshit.

...not to mention the rakish Regency Lord and the cross-dressing spinster who runs her own all-women private-eye agency fighting for social change and feminist rights.
Oh God I couldn’t get two pages into that one before I hucked it across the room. :(
Ugh.

My sense is that the Brits like sagas and what the Americans would call women’s fiction. And chick lit. They don’t seem to be big on romantic suspense although have some of the best suspense writers around (PD James, Minette Walters, Frances Fyfield, Ruth Rendell/Barbara Vine). Even someone like Penny Vincenzi would fall into the women’s fiction category than romance I think. I see them as having more restrained tastes in romance.

Are they doing the Disney “Pretty Woman” stamp, all about the romance between a rich tycoon and the woman he pays to get down on her knees and blow him?

Somehow the romance of that one always eluded me.

It’s hard to put my finger on what exactly the British taste in romance is, because of how, well, unpopular, romance seems to be here in the UK. Few bookshops have more than a couple of shelves devoted to what they term romance (which seems to be mainly made up of American authors and some M&B), if any at all and then romance is mixed in with the ‘regular’ fiction (if there is any at all in the shop). If you want a specific book, or are even just browsing, secondhand bookshops and t’internet are the way forward.

Romance’s unpopularity (argh, wish I could think of a better term than that) isn’t just evident in availability, but also people’s reactions to readers of romance. I’m 21, so I’ve still got time to be proven wrong, but I have yet to meet someone British (in real life, as opposed to online), male or female, of any age who doesn’t react with disdain or surprise - it’s as if romance ranks below sci/fi or fantasy in the credibility/coolness stakes, and as if romance is ‘below’ the expected standards for someone studying for an MA. I often feel like I have to make a joke out of what I read, or apologise for it, or explain that I do in fact read quite widely, from all genres and that actually, not all romances are bodice rippers for the 80s (not that they don’t have their place), or Cathtrine Cookson (she doesn’t have her place for me anymore though), nor do they all have to have covers full of flowing hair, man titty and women falling out of their dresses all over the place.

This kind of reaction, and the incorrect perception of romance (and the women who read it) of somehow being less in value than other fiction puts people off even giving romance a try in the first place. This probably feeds into the lack of availability of good (imho) romance, which completes the vicious cycle by restricting the choice available to people first trying out romance, and perhaps putting them off.

Perhaps the difference between the US and the UK is not one of tastes (after all, within each country, individuals differ in what hey choose to read) but more one of tolerance and ease of access.

I think there probably is a difference, though, Helen, to judge by things like the alternative endings to the latest film of Pride and Prejudice. And there must be differences which affect which lines of M&B are sold in the UK (there are far fewer than Harlequin sells, so I would assume that’s because M&B select the ones which most appeal to UK readers).

I think you do have a point with the M&B lines, Laura, especially as the heroes that the M&B lines tend to have are somewhat different from the Harlequin ones. I know there is some overlap, obviously, but there are less cop / SEAL(or, rather SAS/paras) heroes and more ‘tall, dark, handsome and NOT English’ heroes with M&B. I’m making massive generalizations, I know, but it seems to me that a Harlequin is more likely to have an American hero than a M&B is to have a British one (unless it’s a medical).

With the ‘selecting lines which most appeal to UK readers’ thing though, I think the fact that there is a smaller market here in some ways might force to M&B to not even try some lines which might have gone down really well.

Maybe, even though I am British, having grown up in Hong Kong, where American authors were as available as their British counterparts (if not more so), I don’t have as much of a feel for the British taste. (My comments in the post above are, obviously, only based on my own experiences). However, seeing the kind of thing that does sell well in the UK, I don’t see why more American authors aren’t doing well here. Some sort of British buyer bias towards British authors? But that’s more a fiction-wide thing than a romance thing, I guess.

With respect to the alternate ending of the recent P&P movie (I haven’t seen the US version, though I’ve seen screen caps and read about it) : After the movie had been released, and there news that there was a more suggestive (brain not working, can’t think of a better term!) ending, there was a petition people were signing, demanding that the US ending be included on the UK dvd. Universal (?) were probably planning on doing that anyway, but just because the ending was only designed for the US market didn’t mean it wouldn’t have gone down well with British audiences. It may not have been Austenesque, but spicing P&P up a little is more than acceptable in the UK (to the masses, if not the critics), if the popularity of the BBC miniseries is anything to go by.

I’ll put an account of twelve hours of non-stop serious drinking the RNA awards lunch at the Savoy on my blog when I have caught up on a bit of sleep.

I haven’t read Gardens of Delight, I’m afraid, so I can’t answer your first question, but I think that a clue to the answer to the last question might be found in comparing US and UK soap operas.

Yours are full of impossibly attractive people where as ours are full of very ordinary, and usually thoroughly miserable people.

My theory is that Americans turn to romance (as to soaps) for escapist fantasy, transporting them away from daily life, while Brits look for some sort of reinforcement, that true love does really happen for people like us.

But I haven’t read enough to know whether there is a scrap of truth in that.

Did you see the way the Guardian reported it? It did note that romance accounts for 15% of paperback sales, but ended the piece ‘A possible clue to the age band of many readers of romantic fiction lies in the identity of the prize sponsors: Fostergrant Reading Glasses’.
And - what? - a possible clue to the age band of the readership of the Whitbread winners lies in the fact the sponsors own Pizza Hut?

Having watched both P&P endings, the UK got the better ending. As one of the masses, I would have liked a last scene with Elizabeth & Darcy together, but the US ending was just silly.

Yes, the US ending, from what I heard, wasn’t so much spicy as sickly sweet fondling and lingering glances.

I agree with Stephen that there seem to be more perfectly beautiful heroes and heroines in American books. Not to say that there aren’t some written by UK authors (e.g. Barbara Cartland) but there’s less of the ‘look here are two beautiful people, drawn irresistibly together because they are beautiful and that means they have something in common’. I have the impression that in UK romances a shared sense of humour is more important and attractiveness isn’t based so much on perfect looks. Darcy, for example, is attracted by Elizabeth’s impertinent wit. He only ends up thinking she’s beautiful and has fine eyes etc because he’s attracted by her liveliness. Heyer also has lots of heroines who aren’t as beautiful as someone else in the book, and the heroes aren’t always the most handsome men either.

I’m with Stephen on the explanation lying somewhere in the differences between the soaps as well.

Linked to his points, a lot of the books marketed as “women’s fiction” (ie. aga sagas, clogs-and-shawls dramas and chick lit variants) don’t have a neatly-tied up HEA. There’s more of a pause or a sense that while some things are resolved, life goes on.

I find there’s also much less focus on the hero, and unless the book is set in WWII, he’s almost never in the military.

Oddly, Mills&Boons/Silhouette books, where most non-Brit writers crop up, fit the more traditional templates, even when it comes to an HEA. Medical romances, innocent virgin heroines, exotic foreign businessmen and so on. There are other differences. Only certain Bombshells are being published in the UK as part of the Silhouette Sensation line. M&B historicals still sell well here (apparently the UK’s about the only big market for series historicals).

Despite the continued popularity of Jane Austen and Georgette Heyer, as well as historical fiction, most of the non-Brit single title historical romance authors aren’t big sellers. I suspect this is partly to do with the language differences being felt more acutely with this sort of setting. Thanks to telly dramas, we’re used to history with a British accent.

When it comes to contemporary women’s fiction, one thing I’ve noticed is that the way the countryside is portrayed is completely different. It strikes me as very much a middle England thing and even affects the way overseas settings are used. Hard to explain, but it’s to do with gardens, villages and order. Class often rears its head, particularly where the differences are grey. Sometimes it’s a sub-text, sometimes more overt. Whereas Americans in romances yearn for small-town life, Brits hanker for a green and pleasant land and a small village shop selling cheese and bags of organic lavender in unbleached linen.

There’s something in the covers too. Man-titty is really unacceptable. I can clear entire train carriages with strategic use of hard core man-titty. Have any of you guys seen the Piatkus UK covers for Christine Feehan?. In real life it’s matte, as well. Or more interestingly, their covers for the Gaelen Foley re-issues?

Wow!  I must admit to liking those covers much better than those we see here in the states.

And as for the books in the Harlequin Presents line, can someone please explain the appeal of them?  I can’t figure it out.  What’s so wonderful about being extorted into marriage (sold if you’re the heroine of a book with “shiekh” in the title) or being the object of some arrogant jerk’s revenge who reluctantly falls in love with you and is still a jerk in the end?

Although I’m not British (I’m Chinese), I’ve lived in the UK since I was 3, and I finally started reading romance about two years ago. And when I did, it was a HUGE revelation. I’ve always loved books, having gone through the children, young-adult period, I was finding it difficult to discover my reading niche--which turned out to be romance.

I think that there are probably many more people like me out there. I don’t watch soaps, so perhaps I’m not really a ‘British’ reader, but I can’t really see how the audience could be that different, but maybe I’m being naive. I’ve lent out a few romances amongst my peers (17, 18-year olds) with pretty good success. Generally speaking, only people who can’t deal with the sex didn’t like romances. I don’t think that they appall British tastes as much as some people might think they would. One of my friends is VERY British. She lives in the countryside, owns a horse etc. She’s also very Christian and conservative, and is obsessed with Tolkien. I lent her some medievals, specifically Judith McNaught’s ‘Kingdom of Dreams’ and Julie Garwood’s ‘The Prize’ and she loved both of them. Lisa Kleypas has also been popular amongst my friends.

I think it’s hard to say whether people would like something until they’ve tried it, and given the state of the romance market in the UK, we can probably say with pretty good certainty that people aren’t giving US-style romances a go, because they can’t. Somebody mentioned that due to Borders having UK branches, romance is expanding a little. Personally, I think that’s true. There’s a Borders in Cambridge, and I go there quite often, at least to check out if they’ve got anything new. I frequently see full shelves one days, and then a few days later, the same shelf practically empty because an author’s books has sold out, and then a few days later the shelf is re-stocked . The romance section is also frequented by a fair number of people.

I think Nora Roberts’ popularity has been discussed briefly before. Personally, I’d never heard of her until I started going on romance message boards, so whatever publicity Piatkus was doing (and I used to work at a bookshop as well), it wasn’t really getting out there. Most people haven’t heard of her at all. I think it’s a publicity issue more than a like/dislike issue. Being a fairly geeky romance reader, I frequently go onto my county’s library catalogue and check out which books are popular, which book is being bought by libraries, being put on hold etc. And Nora Roberts IS popular in the library crowd (at least in Cambridgeshire), which I expect is more of a ‘reader-crowd’ than the general book-buying public. So, incidentally, is Gaelen Foley, although on a smaller scale. The public library in Cambridge buys quite a lot of american romance novels. Recently, they ordered all the Bridgertons--which I was very happy about. Although the romance section in the library is very small, it’s nearly impossible to get hold of any romances I want. I KNOW the library owns e.g. The Bride Hunt by Jane Feather, and has done for several months. I haven’t seen it in the library ever, even though I go at least once a week. And that’s because within hours or days of the book returning, it’s taken out again. Most of the library’s US single-title romances in circulation don’t spend much time on the shelves--they’re usually in the hands of readers because they’re so popular.

Oh, I think I should also mention non-negative reactions I’ve received regarding romance reading. Generally speaking, I tell everybody around me I read romance (apart from strangers--that would be kinda weird), and nobody expresses disgust or anything.

Anyways, I’m an optimist and I feel pretty confident about romance readers in the UK. Even though romance isn’t the most popular thing now, I do think that it does have a chance here. It’s all very well to try and infer cultural likes/dislikes, but not everyone in the UK watches soaps, and many people dislike them too.. Popularity of certain things can come as a complete surprise--in a way, it’s sorta pointless to try and predict these things, which is why publishers ratio of good books: bad books is kinda bad. My personal approach to the whole romance in the UK thing is to try and expose as many people to it as possible, and lend books out, possibly risking personal embarrassment. I think it’s worth it though. So few of my friends read books, and many of them say it’s because they don’t find books they like. This always strikes a chord with me because it was exactly how I felt before I read romance. Gah, I hit post and it told me I was over the word-limit, so I’ve just ruthlessly cut out some stuff. Sorry if bits don’t make sense!

Beibei

You know, I’d have liked to see Alice and the Hatter on a stamp. They’re not the most obvious twosome, but, uh, they’re both human, and at least at Disneyland in California, I have it on good authority that the park actors play it up.