![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kaigouI 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. Paranormal.
I hardly count 'people who can shapeshift' as paranormal.
I would, however, describe a great deal of the fantastical romance as romantic in the classical sense, where the fantastical exists to lend a romantic/quasi-idealised view of the world (and of love in particular, in the HEA stories). Charles DeLint, IMO, is romantic urban fantasy, too, even if he doesn't have happy endings; he's still a highly romanticized view of fantasy. Hrm. Fantastical Romance might work as a sub-genre for the romance world, but it still wouldn't pull me in as an urban fantasy reader. Maybe Contemporary Romantic Fantasy?
Another element that seems to be required in Romance is that of the pairing of the main protags: you can pinpoint from the beginning who's going to end up with whom, and the question isn't who, but when and how. This as opposed to well-written Chick Lit, it seems, where the protag's choice waffles between two or more guys and each has good and bad, and the question isn't when, but who and how. There is a tendency to emphasize the "fated!destiny" crap in Romance, too; the only other genre I can think of that uses this as strongly/often is fantasy. It's the only reason I could forgive its emphasis in Liu's work: she uses fantasy tropes to give the romance a reason that's believable in that world; when the fantastical is everyday, then who's to say that in that world, two people couldn't be drawn and bound so quickly?
Perhaps the real question is this (because we're really dealing with crossovers): is it a romance with heavy fantasy overtones, or is it a fantasy with romance in it? Hell, a lot of science fiction does have romantic plotlines, as do Westerns, and plenty of great literature. Those aren't in the Romance section, and not only because they're not all HEAs, either -- there are plenty that are. (Lord Valentine's Castle, anyone?)
Now, though, I am off to swing by the office and wrap up the last of the week before heading up to see the brother & his family & his new house. Woot. Let's see if he's waiting at the door with a shotgun to take me out for the xmas gift CP and I sent him, bwah. And then, tomorrow morning, a long drive back to Philly, catch the flight out, and I should be home by 6pm tomorrow evening. Here's hoping I can find a decent grocery store between here and northern PA that has good chocolate. Sigh. Next time I pack plenty in advance.
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.
Sleep dep may have made my comments muddy, but this is what's underneath: not whether labelling urban fantasy as 'romantic' would make romance readers come over to our side of the fence, but whether labelling the fantastical romance subgenre would bring over more fantasy readers to the romance side. I don't know whether Gilman or Dayton have been shelved in romance; I've only found them in fantasy; they may be writing to romance expectations (and published by romance publishers, to boot) but they've proven to be popular among fantasy readers, as well. So if there's question of whether crossovers would work, those authors (at minimum) are proof such do.
I do not, for the record, find Gilman to be a romanticist/idealist; her view of the world is rather sharp-edged, as is Liu's. Dayton's is a little bit softer around the edges, like DeLint's. That, though, is entirely my opinion and a completely subjective thing, and simply how I personally categorize authors I like, really like, and those I read for story or character but not so much place or voice. (The less romanticist, the greater the chance it'll appeal to me.)
Then again, my idea of a romantic gift is built-in shelves, and I can't remember birthdates, anniversaries, or speshul holidays without sixteen sticky-notes, ten verbal reminders, and possibly a neon sign flashing in red and blue. It's not that I don't like happy endings. I just don't like sap... but a romance writer who writes fantastical romance that's sap-free would get my money as much as any urban fantasy writer, if I knew where/how to find such writers. *shrug* That would be the entire point of asking for a label -- not for anyone inside the genre, but for making it clear to those outside the genre who might also be interested.
As for covers? Yeah. I snark on the covers Liu got, but I snark equally much on other covers -- it's just that Liu's covers are so stereotypically 'modern romance' and yet her work goes far past those boundaries. They seem misleading, when a more ambiguous could have appealed to anyone who likes happy squares, in fantasy or romance.
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. Paranormal.
I hardly count 'people who can shapeshift' as paranormal.
I would, however, describe a great deal of the fantastical romance as romantic in the classical sense, where the fantastical exists to lend a romantic/quasi-idealised view of the world (and of love in particular, in the HEA stories). Charles DeLint, IMO, is romantic urban fantasy, too, even if he doesn't have happy endings; he's still a highly romanticized view of fantasy. Hrm. Fantastical Romance might work as a sub-genre for the romance world, but it still wouldn't pull me in as an urban fantasy reader. Maybe Contemporary Romantic Fantasy?
Another element that seems to be required in Romance is that of the pairing of the main protags: you can pinpoint from the beginning who's going to end up with whom, and the question isn't who, but when and how. This as opposed to well-written Chick Lit, it seems, where the protag's choice waffles between two or more guys and each has good and bad, and the question isn't when, but who and how. There is a tendency to emphasize the "fated!destiny" crap in Romance, too; the only other genre I can think of that uses this as strongly/often is fantasy. It's the only reason I could forgive its emphasis in Liu's work: she uses fantasy tropes to give the romance a reason that's believable in that world; when the fantastical is everyday, then who's to say that in that world, two people couldn't be drawn and bound so quickly?
Perhaps the real question is this (because we're really dealing with crossovers): is it a romance with heavy fantasy overtones, or is it a fantasy with romance in it? Hell, a lot of science fiction does have romantic plotlines, as do Westerns, and plenty of great literature. Those aren't in the Romance section, and not only because they're not all HEAs, either -- there are plenty that are. (Lord Valentine's Castle, anyone?)
Now, though, I am off to swing by the office and wrap up the last of the week before heading up to see the brother & his family & his new house. Woot. Let's see if he's waiting at the door with a shotgun to take me out for the xmas gift CP and I sent him, bwah. And then, tomorrow morning, a long drive back to Philly, catch the flight out, and I should be home by 6pm tomorrow evening. Here's hoping I can find a decent grocery store between here and northern PA that has good chocolate. Sigh. Next time I pack plenty in advance.
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.
Sleep dep may have made my comments muddy, but this is what's underneath: not whether labelling urban fantasy as 'romantic' would make romance readers come over to our side of the fence, but whether labelling the fantastical romance subgenre would bring over more fantasy readers to the romance side. I don't know whether Gilman or Dayton have been shelved in romance; I've only found them in fantasy; they may be writing to romance expectations (and published by romance publishers, to boot) but they've proven to be popular among fantasy readers, as well. So if there's question of whether crossovers would work, those authors (at minimum) are proof such do.
I do not, for the record, find Gilman to be a romanticist/idealist; her view of the world is rather sharp-edged, as is Liu's. Dayton's is a little bit softer around the edges, like DeLint's. That, though, is entirely my opinion and a completely subjective thing, and simply how I personally categorize authors I like, really like, and those I read for story or character but not so much place or voice. (The less romanticist, the greater the chance it'll appeal to me.)
Then again, my idea of a romantic gift is built-in shelves, and I can't remember birthdates, anniversaries, or speshul holidays without sixteen sticky-notes, ten verbal reminders, and possibly a neon sign flashing in red and blue. It's not that I don't like happy endings. I just don't like sap... but a romance writer who writes fantastical romance that's sap-free would get my money as much as any urban fantasy writer, if I knew where/how to find such writers. *shrug* That would be the entire point of asking for a label -- not for anyone inside the genre, but for making it clear to those outside the genre who might also be interested.
As for covers? Yeah. I snark on the covers Liu got, but I snark equally much on other covers -- it's just that Liu's covers are so stereotypically 'modern romance' and yet her work goes far past those boundaries. They seem misleading, when a more ambiguous could have appealed to anyone who likes happy squares, in fantasy or romance.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 12 Jan 2007 03:43 pm (UTC)While I agree with you that de Lint writes romances, he writes romances in the classical sense - like Nathaniel Hawthorne's "Blithedale Romance". If you tried to feed de Lint to a standard romance reader, she'd object, saying that wasn't what she'd ordered.
Sometimes, we English majors (and allied professions) need to adapt our jargon :-)
no subject
Date: 13 Jan 2007 02:12 am (UTC)And yes, I'm just wasting space here. And your time. Sorry about that. :o
no subject
Date: 14 Jan 2007 06:14 pm (UTC)Such important semantics to master! :-)
no subject
Date: 14 Jan 2007 06:06 am (UTC)I still don't know why in the romance world they use the phrase paranormal -- why not supernatural? or fantastical? Paranormal seems like... I don't know. Like pyschics who talk to ghosts, not djinn or immortal egyptian princes or dragons.
no subject
Date: 14 Jan 2007 06:23 pm (UTC)It's all jargon, isn't it? :-)
(And sorry to hear about your hellish weather delays!)
no subject
Date: 12 Jan 2007 04:07 pm (UTC)I posted on my other blog about the differences between para romance and urban fantasy: http://miladyinsanity.wordpress.com/2007/01/11/urban-fantasy-vs-paranormal-romance/
What Mindy Klasky said about romance in the classic sense...Well, that's at least part of the reason for the Dear Author discussion, because people who came in from the romance side of it says "relationship that leads to a couple making a commitment to each other" and people who come in from fantasy see romance from the classic point of view.
no subject
Date: 14 Jan 2007 06:09 am (UTC)I am aware there's a difference between urban fantasy and paranormal romance (though I hold to my opinion that the connotations of 'paranormal' are always going to make me think of that squeaky-voiced woman from Poltergeist and such late-era badly-filmed ghost-hunter shows), but that perhaps the categorization of the 'urban-fantasy influenced' subgenre in romance could use a better title. *shrug*
no subject
Date: 12 Jan 2007 04:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 12 Jan 2007 04:41 pm (UTC)Well, or happily ever after.
no subject
Date: 14 Jan 2007 06:17 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 15 Jan 2007 05:18 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 12 Jan 2007 07:46 pm (UTC)If you want to know why romance readers and writers are so pissed about the "romance in the classical sense" argument, think of your own initial reaction to Shadow Touch, based on the fact that a)it's billed as 'romance', and b)the cover.
Somewhere inside, you sneered, didn't you? For so many years, those who are a part of the romance community have had their inclinations laughed at, but now, it's seen by publishers and writers that a whole hell of a lot of people, both men and women, read romance. Saying, "It's a classical romance, so I can call it romance," means a writer or publishing company is attempting to cash in on the selling power of the genre, when they know good and well that no reader in search of a romance would pick the damn thing up if labeled correctly.
I don't care what most people outside the community seem to think, labeling matters. A lot. A person doesn't trot to the romance section for a book that's going to end badly or even ambiguously. They're looking for a feel-good HEA even if it comes with a lot of previous angst, and when a book touted as romance doesn't end well, they're going to be, rightfully, furious.
Before you think to yourself, well I'm not looking for that, remember... you are not a romance reader. You might read books that have strong romantic side-plots running through them, but in a true romance novel, the focus is always on the relationship between the two main characters. Yes, of course they're going to get together. That's the whole point of a romance! If that's not what you want to read, look elsewhere.
Romance readers know what they like... they have for a very long time. If they wanted a different kind of story, they'd go to a different section of the book store, and, as most of them have many other interests, they often do. The point is, when they want that HEA, they know where to go.
When an author takes advantage of a romance reader in this way, they're basically telling said reader, "Well, I think your genre is stupid, but I'm still going to make money off you, anyway."
The word 'romance' has a different connotation now than it used to. Language shifts with the times. This is not the nineteenth century.
If writers want a "classical romance" section, well... they should damn well carve one out for themselves.
no subject
Date: 14 Jan 2007 06:26 am (UTC)I would, however, describe a great deal of the fantastical romance as romantic in the classical sense, where the fantastical exists to lend a romantic/quasi-idealised view of the world (and of love in particular, in the HEA stories).
'fantastical romance' = what the publishing world, for reasons no one has yet explained, insists on calling 'paranormal' romance. who came up with that term, anyway?
where the fantastical exists to lend a romantic/quasi-idealized = this was my intended lead-in to how in urban fantasy, this romantic/idealized part is often missing, even if it does have a romantic subtext/plot. In urban fantasy, the dirt is not pretty. (Unless you're DeLint.)
My entire point is in agreement that labeling matters, but we are dealing with squares and rectangles. Urban fantasy readers can be unhappy rectangles and happy squares, but romance readers are only happy squares.
I'll conclude this instead as an edit to the post, because it's either that or tell everyone with romance-leanings to take a hike. I just got back from the trip from hell, with the airport day from hell to arrive at my car to find the battery dead, and I'm really not up for anyone else snarking around. MY turf to snark on. MINE. *stomps around*
And my soda fountain soda has the most peculiar metallic aftertaste, too. Bleah.
no subject
Date: 14 Jan 2007 06:42 am (UTC)And god only knows why booksellers shelve romantic fantasy in the sci-fi/fantasy section. It does not compute.
Hope things look and feel better in the am.