Post by Mini Mia on Oct 6, 2007 22:02:33 GMT -6
Can romance novels have male characters (the hero) that are realistic to real-life men? Or would that be a turn off for the female reader? Do women read romance novels for the fantasy man that will never be found in real-life?
For instance: Bob Mayer writes the male point of view in romance books he co-writes with Jennifer Crusie. Yet he had to rework a scene so that it reflected the romance novel scenario, and not his own.
Excerpt -- Modern Literary Terms: The Glittery HooHa
April 9, 2007
Take J. T. Wilder, the hero of Don’t Look Down. He sleeps with a hot actress his first day in the story, even though he’s already met our heroine, Lucy, but the next day, he feels that something was missing. He can’t put his finger on it (stop snickering) but of course we know now it’s the GHH. Shortly thereafter, he and Lucy get horizontal and by darn, that’s it for J. T.
My writing partner, we’ll call him Bob, took awhile to get used to this, probably because I didn’t know about the GHH and couldn’t explain it to him that way. In fact in his first draft of the day-after-Althea scene, J. T. was thinking he’d had a very good time.
“Nope,” I said.
“You’re kidding me,” Bob said. “He had great sex with a hot actress.”
“Yes, but it wasn’t that great,” I said.
“Yes, it was,” he said.
“No,” I said. “It wasn’t.”
“No, it really was.”
“Bob.”
“She’s an actress.”
“Bob.”
“Oh, come on.”
“No.”
So he sighed and wrote in the part about how something had been missing–”Yeah, right,” he said–and saved us from some angry mail although we still got a lot because J. T. dared to sleep with anybody but Lucy in the book. I guess J. T. wasn’t looking at the ground and missed the glitter on that first day.
Why can't romance books be realistic to real life? Why couldn't Bob's male character have had a good/great time with the actress, and yet still found Lucy to be _the one_? Why does there have to be _something missing_ -- something that only _the one with the glittery hooha_ can fulfill?
Is it time for Romance Novels to be turned on its ear? To be made more realistic, and less fantasy-based?