I was going to respond in an earlier thread about this, but figured others might enjoy jumping in, so I'll start a new post just for this. In an intended reply to ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
myladyinsanity, who pointed out a thread over on the Dear Author blog, about why mislabeling can hurt new authors. The gist is that romance readers expect, above all else, a Happy Ending. A story that does not provide, by definition therefore, is NOT Romance-with-a-capital-R. It may be top-notch, but it's not top-notch Romance.
I do agree that 'paranormal romance' is just... erk. I keep thinking, "wouldn't paranormal romance be like those Mary Higgins Clarks books where it's always some poor woman swept up in Amazing Fantasy Alpha Guy who then takes her away and suddenly strange stuff's happening and it might be ghosts and it might be a rather butchered retelling of Turn of the Screw..." Y'know, ghosts. ( And stuff, genre questions, etc. )
EDIT: As noted to RS in the comments below, rectangles and squares, people. Urban fantasy readers can be unhappy rectangles and happy squares, but all romance readers are happy squares. So the chances of a romantic fantastical work appealing to both fantasy readers and romance readers is probably double the chances of an unhappy fantastical work, on average, appealing to both. Which is pretty much a duh. ( Read more... )
myladyinsanity, who pointed out a thread over on the Dear Author blog, about why mislabeling can hurt new authors. The gist is that romance readers expect, above all else, a Happy Ending. A story that does not provide, by definition therefore, is NOT Romance-with-a-capital-R. It may be top-notch, but it's not top-notch Romance. I do agree that 'paranormal romance' is just... erk. I keep thinking, "wouldn't paranormal romance be like those Mary Higgins Clarks books where it's always some poor woman swept up in Amazing Fantasy Alpha Guy who then takes her away and suddenly strange stuff's happening and it might be ghosts and it might be a rather butchered retelling of Turn of the Screw..." Y'know, ghosts. ( And stuff, genre questions, etc. )
EDIT: As noted to RS in the comments below, rectangles and squares, people. Urban fantasy readers can be unhappy rectangles and happy squares, but all romance readers are happy squares. So the chances of a romantic fantastical work appealing to both fantasy readers and romance readers is probably double the chances of an unhappy fantastical work, on average, appealing to both. Which is pretty much a duh. ( Read more... )