Uh-oh, romance

I have been reading Shards of Honor by Lois McMaster Bujold. It’s about a man and a woman on different sides in a war who have to work together to survive when they are stranded on a hostile planet. It’s pretty decent so far and quite exciting. However, romance seems to be about to happen, and I find the book’s appeal decreasing with every page.

I think part of it is the sense that most romance I’ve read (not much, admittedly, and as part of other stories) feels unrealistic. It squashes the characters into pre-set roles like a sort of pornography. Who cares about Helmut’s difficult childhood, or his struggle to put himself through engineering school – he’s here to mend this lady’s washing machine, and that’s what he’ll do (or not). It feels the same with bad romance.

None of the tropes of romance have much appeal to me. They all feel clichéd or just totally unlike real life. I can already see the tedious possibilities and am hoping very much that Bujold avoids them: the bit where he is not just rugged but inexplicably vulnerable; the bit where she is feisty and he likes that despite coming from a brutal dictatorship; maybe even the bit where a less rugged but more suave man turns up and she has to choose between them. Thank goodness, the characters haven’t hated each other on sight, which is surely the ultimate guarantee that they will get together.

One of the reasons I like Mad Max: Fury Road so much is the lack of romance, even the hint of it. Max and Furiosa are two people who fight together to survive. Neither is forced to become a “romantic” character. There’s no sense that they have to fill a role beyond the very broad need to be tough and heroic. This may not be the most popular opinion on the internet, but I think a lot of female characters are stronger without needing to find a partner in the course of the story.

I think there is a broader point here about what people want in novels. I have a friend who hates the Hunger Games films because, to his mind, they reduce an action story set in an interesting SF world into a dull question of who will end up dating who. He’s not the target audience, but neither is his wife, who likes them (they’re both in their 30s). It may be that the further the romance gets from the cheesy teen romance version and the clichés that go with it, the more tolerable and credible it gets.

Toby Frost said:

Thank goodness, the characters haven’t hated each other on sight, which is surely the ultimate guarantee that they will get together.

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The Mills&Boon technique. :/

Toby Frost said:

This may not be the most popular opinion on the internet, but I think a lot of female characters are stronger without needing to find a partner in the course of the story.

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This is an extremely strong cultural bias, and it comes from 5,000 years of men ruling the roost, imo. But I do agree with you.

Men hate it when women don't need them.

I find romance in genre literature often waters down plot and character motivations, and is usually an aside that feels forced, instead of being a central part to the plot. Most established stories would work just as well without the romantic bits. That's not to say it can add to character development if done right, but there are usually more interesting, less cliched ways of developing character anyway. Love is only one of many feelings and abstract constructs to work with. Its popularity as a (usually weak) plot device may stem from the maxim that everyone wants to feel loved.

There was an Anne McCaffrey book I read fairly recently that wound me up (Powers that Be). It had a great strong female main character who was a soldier - an officer as I recall - whose character would have made a great female role model. That was until she met a handsome man and immediately dissolved into some sort of helpless Mills and Boon shadow of her former self. This was the second time I've had this with a McCaffrey book, the previous one being The Rowan where exactly the same thing happened to the previously strong female lead. In both cases it destroyed my enjoyment of the books and has put me off further McCaffrey reading. And yet as a kid I remember loving the Pern books; maybe I was less affected by such things in those days or maybe it's just because back then it was the norm to portray women as helpless swooning bundles of emotion. Whatever, that sort of writing just annoys me these days.

She deals with it better in PERN

I agree to a point, I have more of a problem with the wibbly bits of character that appear when the romance appears. One reason I like Hamilton.
I was thoroughly enjoying the powerful characters in Brett's demon cycle but the last book made me froth I was so angry about how it turned into a romance.
Kristin Brittain does very well and the whole real life aspect is excellent. No one ends up in a bleh relationship even though there is plenty of potential for that to have happened, but she refrained from ruining it. Even if the latest book is a bit odd and I have no idea what happened with that

Kylara said:

She deals with it better in PERN

I agree to a point, I have more of a problem with the wibbly bits of character that appear when the romance appears. One reason I like Hamilton.
I was thoroughly enjoying the powerful characters in Brett's demon cycle but the last book made me froth I was so angry about how it turned into a romance.
Kristin Brittain does very well and the whole real life aspect is excellent. No one ends up in a bleh relationship even though there is plenty of potential for that to have happened, but she refrained from ruining it. Even if the latest book is a bit odd and I have no idea what happened with that

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Ah maybe that's why I don't remember having a problem with the Pern books then. And I agree that Hamilton is pretty good at keeping romance believable and low key.

To be fair with the romance genre the writers have to tick certain boxes with their stories. A male has to be an alpha or beta type and he has to be the strong one. (unless its changed in the last few years)

I do find it frustrating that when I write a strong woman and an easy going man together romance readers tend to refer to my man as weak.

AnyaKimlin said:

To be fair with the romance genre the writers have to tick certain boxes with their stories. A male has to be an alpha or beta type and he has to be the strong one. (unless its changed in the last few years)

I do find it frustrating that when I write a strong woman and an easy going man together romance readers tend to refer to my man as weak.

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Sadly I suspect that's social conditioning for you. Maybe, just maybe, we'll get past it one day...

Haven't read this particular book. But isn't romance just like any other kind of genre/storyline - if it's predictable, or seems to revert to tired stereotypes, it's annoying; if it's fresh and well written then it makes for a great read?

I know I mention her a lot on here, on threads about female protagonists, but Sheri S Tepper does romance really well - and often rather bizarrely, she's a fairly unconventional writer. Grass and The Family Tree being great examples among many others. (Neither are primarily romances, it's an element of the book.) Her heroines get stronger and more independent over the book too.

I don't read a lot of "romance" as such, but I have favourite books which are essentially romances: all the Jane Austens and Gaudy Night (Dorothy L Sayers) spring to mind.

aThenian said:

Haven't read this particular book. But isn't romance just like any other kind of genre/storyline - if it's predictable, or seems to revert to tired stereotypes, it's annoying; if it's fresh and well written then it makes for a great read?

I know I mention her a lot on here, on threads about female protagonists, but Sheri S Tepper does romance really well - and often rather bizarrely, she's a fairly unconventional writer. Grass and The Family Tree being great examples among many others. (Neither are primarily romances, it's an element of the book.) Her heroines get stronger and more independent over the book too.

I don't read a lot of "romance" as such, but I have favourite books which are essentially romances: all the Jane Austens and Gaudy Night (Dorothy L Sayers) spring to mind.

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I've not read The Family Tree but have read Grass and I certainly had no problem with the level of romance in there. It is, as you say, an element rather than the focus of the book. Where I have a problem with both Bujold and the McCaffreys I mentioned above is that they don't start off as romances but rather morph into them and the romance aspect comes to dominate. Which, I guess, is fine if you like romances but I'd rather have the romance (if necessary) as a small but believable component rather than being or becoming the main focus.

I'm a big believer of romance in fantasy. Not just because it makes for great (or at least easy) plot points, or because its one of the great universals of human experience. But because, I've realised upon reading this thread, I like reading love stories. I need the love story to take place in a more interesting scenario that "Miss Honeymelon has never been more determined to succeed than since she inherited her family's old ranch - or more lonely - but will the broodingly handsome stablehand Cumbersausage salve that loneliness - or erode that determination?" but I like good love stories.

Therein lies the issue of course. Good love stories. I probably definitely have a lower bar for what constitutes a 'good' love story than some here, but there is no argument that the vast majority of fantasy love stories are either very simple subplots, or make no attempt to fresh up the cliches they force into the limelight. I have no objection to cliches but they need to be done right. And I can definitely understand people's objection to books that start as not-romance and end as romance. Bait and Switch is discouraged for a reason.

Do I know how to do a good fantasy romance? Eh no. Which ones do I like?

I like Sparhawk & Ehlana in Eddings' Elenium/Tamuli, possibly because there's no big will they/won't they thing. It just suddenly happens and then there's a fairly realistic loving, slightly bickering couple. I guess I like it because its a love story without being a romance.

I like the romance subplot in Pratchett's The Truth because
Gemmell's Legend features one of my very favourite fantasy love stories. The connection feels real, the characters feel real, and the way it motivates them into the story feels real. I think this is because:

a) Both characters are set up very quickly and clearly as being strong yet flawed. As a result, I do not object to their flaws bringing them together, nor do I find them weaker for it.

b) Neither of them dramatically changes their characters, but nor are they unchanged; just the changes feel logical responses to the new situation. They are better people for having an extra source of strength

c) They fight at times, but they don't wage war

Its not perfect, but it is very charming.

And, well, I think I do now know how to write fantasy romances. The first and most important rule is:

Do not cheapen what the character is for the sake of their romance.


p.s. Come to think of it, its a very quick courtship too. I like love stories, but not every love story is an interminable drawn-out courtship. Long will-they won't-they romances are what gives the thing a bad name. Getting straight to the relationship seems to result in better love stories. That doesn't have to be the case of course.

p.p.s. I too think Pern's romances are fine.

Good points all! I'll have a think about all of them. In the meantime, I stumbled across this article. It's not exactly on the same topic but it is vaguely related.

Why Are The Worlds of Fantasy Romances So Grim? | Fantasy-Faction

Another good romance that seems rather essential to the character but yet not rribly shoehorned in and also feels legitimately real life ish is the Kristin Cashore novel Graceling. It's subtle and you can almost see it happen but it does so in a very well written way and almost feels like an after thought that once happened leaves you questioning how they ever managed as separate people. Very good.

She also, in "Fire" deals quite nicely with the whole relationships thing in a very interesting way.

So what do you lot think of the romantic plot in Rothfuss' Kingkiller Chronicles then?

The girl there is independent in her own way, though she appears to rely on romantic relations with men to facilitate that. It's a sort of limbo.

Talking of bad relationships. Mistborn. Ruined a good book. Everything by Trudi Canavan, again ruined otherwise ok books.

Stephen Palmer said:

This is an extremely strong cultural bias, and it comes from 5,000 years of men ruling the roost, imo. But I do agree with you.

Men hate it when women don't need them.

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But men dislike romance. Many will happily read a book where there are no female characters at all. So it's hard to see how these tropes are meant to gratify men.

Vertigo said:

Sadly I suspect that's social conditioning for you. Maybe, just maybe, we'll get past it one day...

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And yet it's women who write and read romance. It's patronizing to think they don't really like what they like, or they only like it because of patriarchy. But then I believe that culture isn't the only source of these sorts of differences, that evolutionary psychology plays a big role.

Romantic story tropes aren't going anywhere. Their appeal is too widespread, too deep. Just like the story of a young man overcoming great odds through physical prowess (often violent) and indomitability to earn himself high status isn't going anywhere. These stories are the psychological equivalent of sugar, salt, and fat. Even if we recognize that they can be unhealthy, we can't deny their innate appeal. And sometimes people just want to wolf down a donut.

MWagner said:

But men dislike romance. Many will happily read a book where there are no female characters at all. So it's hard to see how these tropes are meant to gratify men.

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That's not true - ask your average librarian and a fair number of romance authors are men in disguise. They reckon even with the cultural bias encouraging them not to about 30% of romance readers are men.

The trope of a woman needing a man is not just a romance genre trope and its not there for the gratification of men.

I actually bumped into this the other day. I tried to think of a female character from fantasy literature that I'd describe as marriage material that wasn't in a long term relationship* and I couldn't. In fantasyland, if a female character is interesting and interestable, she'll have a husband. Or wife, or live-in boyfriend, but virtually never nothing.

Why?

I actually think the first reason is that the majority of fantasy authors continue to write more male than female characters, so it stands to reason there's more single male characters than single female characters.

The second reason though is that there is still a cultural bias that single women are mad, undesirable, or probably a whore. Still a cultural bias that a woman needs someone; that women get excited at weddings while all the men go "Haha you're no longer free" to their mate. And so on. I do not wish to belabour the point. But are we subconciously more likely to think a female character should have a partner than a male one? I think so. Is that because we're trying to please men? No. Its just what we think of normal.

The third reason would be that since there's more male characters (and more straight male characters), there's a lot more female characters dreamed up to be romantic interests than male characters.

Nobody - or at least next to nobody - writes romances deliberately to please men who think all women need a man. But everyone who writes romances - be it as the genre or by putting romances into other genres - borrows off of real life societal expectations and biases. No, scratch that. Everyone who writes borrows off of them.

The trope where there's no single women annoys me.


In other news, predestined romances annoy me a little too. I feel like it cheapens things when Destiny made them love each other.

Shards of Honour put me off the Vorkosigan books for ages, Toby. I hated it because the romance seemed so heavy handed. However, the Miles books brought me round and by the time she does romance again (in the Miles in Love collection) she does it incredibly well and, indeed, with so much humour I cry when reading A Civil Campaign.

It - Shards - was her first book, and I think that shows.