I’ll admit I’ve always been a little envious of those romance readers who admit they got hooked on the genre because they found that ubiquitous “grocery bag full of Harlequins” sitting by Mom’s side of the bed. My parents did encourage all three of their daughters to read, first by reading to us as toddlers, and then making frequent library trips when we were older. But my own mother was not the type to steer her children towards specific books or genres. She was more of the type to just turn us loose. Once we got past the children’s book phase, trips through the adult section were largely unsupervised. We freely read everything from Barbara Michaels to Stephen King—a style of parenting that would likely horrify the helicopter generation.
While I was always encouraged, my Mom was not the type of mother I shared books with. Frankly, she didn’t have the time. A registered nurse by trade, she worked nights and would routinely pick up extra shifts because the overtime pay was so good. It’s a wonder she had time to read the daily newspaper, which she has done without fail for as long as I’ve known the woman. However, books? Not really.
Even though I’ve currently declared a moratorium on paranormal reading, that does not mean I ignore the subgenre completely; I still buy plenty for my library patrons to read, and I follow many bloggers who are diehard paranormal fans. One thing that is typically always mentioned in reviews for paranormal books is the world-building. Was it good, bad, or indifferent? In some cases, the world-building can make or break a book for a reader—too much and the romance gets lost. Not enough and the reader is slogging through wallpaper. But what about world-building in other corners of romance?
I read a fair amount of category romance, and what any category romance reader will openly admit is that many themes have a way of routinely cropping up. (The rest of the genre isn’t immune to this; just take a look at all the Regency heroines who need to sell their souls to the hero in order to get their degenerate gambler father, brother, cousin, family dog out of debt. However, I digress.) What I like about category is that it isn’t ashamed of these themes. Their existence is admitted, accepted and embraced.
I have long embraced the fact that I am not a very attentive romance reader. While some readers can remember whole passages of their favorite books, I cannot seem to muster up the brain cells to remember character names—even in those books I consider keepers. I can swoon with the best of them, but once I finish a book, I would say 95% of the time I am able to wipe the slate clean and move on to the next read. But there is that pesky 5% still left dangling out there in the wind—books that feature those moments of Delicious Despair that render me totally spent, and useless for all other books for at least 48 hours after I get to The End.
As much as I love historical romance, medievals are pretty low on my personal food chain. I have been known to go years without reading a story set during that time period. But in the last several years I’ve turned to medievals when I’m looking for something different. It’s been my good fortune to discover 
There was a time in my romance reading life when I was over anything set in Regency England. My burnout on the era got so bad, I was lucky if I read one or two Regency-set historicals a year. Luckily for me, since I hadn’t been reading romance seriously for that many years, I had long backlists and many out of print titles to keep me warm at night. Toss in my love of category romance, and it was surprisingly easy to avoid Regency England.
Prior to getting accepted into library school, I spent my college undergraduate years studying British history. My studies pretty much ranged from Henry VIII to World War II, and to be honest, the Regency was never a particular favorite. It was okay, I guess.
One of the knocks against category romance I hear most often is that the books are just “too short.” Simply screaming an emphatic “You’re wrong!” doesn’t seem to work all that well, so I go another route. That route is by suggesting to reluctant category readers that they might want to try a Harlequin SuperRomance, the category romance equivalent to a gateway drug.
Sex is like any other element in fiction. If it is not organic to the story, it just gets in the way. Sometimes the sex in a romance novel works exceedingly well and propels the story forward; other times it feels tacked on and unnecessary.
All my life, I’ve had a thing for the underdog. The little guy who is not only the odds on favorite to lose, but is expected to do so in a spectacularly epic fashion.
I missed out on what many consider The Golden Age of historical romance. Now, the idea of what constitutes a “golden age” of anything is highly subjective, but for the sake of this post, I’m talking about those days when it wasn’t frowned upon for authors to hop around time periods and settings. Back when publishers were not toeing the party line that authors should stick to one setting and one time period to make it easier for marketing. Back when authors could publish one book set in medieval Ireland and the next in the American West and the sky wouldn’t turn black or come crashing down to Earth.
