The Heroine with a Herb Basket: She works in the kitchen to brew the herbal concoctions with which she heals the tenants! And the neighbors! And, of course, the noble, injured hero who just happens to get oh-so-nobly injured right in her neighborhood. The Herb Basket Heroine is frequently aided in her activities by… The…
We are now in process of periodically updating the If You Like lists at AAR. Pollsters Lee Brewer and Cindy Smith have given me suggestions for updates to the lists as they appear now. We also would like to hear what our readers have to say. This week’s author writes contemporary romance in quite a…
Both historical and contemporary romances set in England abound, and there are plenty of Scottish romances (especially Scottish romances with the word “Highlander” in the title). In fact, our own listing of Scots and Irish romances is dominated by the Scotland-set books. However, when I started thinking of Irish romances for St. Patrick’s Day, I…
Monogamy, polygamy, bigamy – these are all terms that have always been on my radar. The -gamy suffix comes from the Greek for “marriage.” I had never heard of hypergamy, though, until a month or so ago when I started to browse sites written by men about the modern dating scene. Basically hypergamy is marrying…
I came across a link to an article from last year that still annoys me, so it got me thinking about a topic that comes up in romanceland from time to time – the placeholder heroine. This idea seems to come from two main sources. There is the discussion in Dangerous Men and Adventurous Women…
There are certain books with which I have a bit of a love-hate relationship. Perhaps love-unease might be a better way to describe it, because I’m not sure my feelings ever quite fall to the level of hate. My love-hate books tend to be those which are unabashedly retro in their outlook, so I suspect…
A few months ago, I promised I would be updating the If You Like lists at AAR. I asked for help from pollsters Lee Brewer and Cindy Smith, and they provided me with input. Now I’m going to go to the readers. This week’s author will be an addition to the list as it now…
For my generation, there is a very public way to declare a serious relationship. It’s not a class ring or letter jacket. The question “Have you been pinned?” died long ago. Today, the question is, “Is it Facebook-official?” Facebook offers several relationship options: Single, It’s Complicated, In an Open Relationship, and In a Relationship. When…
I’ve got my cranky pants on today. First of all, I’ve always loved contemporary romance. And there are many – many – writers of contemporary romance I love. Really love. Welcome to Temptation is my touchstone for all that is perfect in contemporary storytelling. Still, I’ve been burned a bit lately and I could use…
A few weeks ago, I blogged about how I discovered romance in the exquisite pages of Gail Carson Levine’s classic children’s novel, Ella Enchanted. A few years later came a different book that showed me another side of life and love. Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli tells the story of a new girl in a small…
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