Ideas - Believe it or not, romance novels are more popular than ever

Episode Date: May 13, 2026

Heated Rivalry, Love is Blind or Boyfriend on Demand all underline the global appetite for passionate swooning. But let’s not forget the source for all of it: the romance novel. It may have a reputation problem but sales in 2023 reached 39 million copies or romance fiction globally — ringing in at $1.5 billion dollars. The books and readership continue to evolve as popularity increases. What is it about romance novels that women are drawn to? Is it unhealthy escapism, harmless fun or a kind of opiate? IDEAS looks back to a 1992 episode called Paperback Love to understand the enduring acclaim of romance novels.

What's that noise? I don't know. I get that checked. Quickly. Yeah, good point. Point S, Tires and Auto Service. You think Point S has good deals on tires? Definitely.

What makes you say that? This. Until May 31st, get up to $125 on a prepaid card when you buy four eligible Yokohama tires. Details at point S.ca.ca. Good point. Point S, Tires, and Auto Service. This is a CBC podcast. Welcome to Ideas. I'm Nala Ayyad. The age of romance is alive and well. And it's growing.

TV series like Heated Rivalry from Canada, Love is Blind from Sweden, or Boyfriend on Demand from Korea exemplify the global appetite for longing glances and passionate swooning. But let's not forget the source of it all. The Romance novel. In 2020, 18 million of them were sold around the world. By 2023, that figure more than doubled to 39 million, with sales ringing in at $1.5 billion. Yet despite its obvious popularity, the genre does have its detractors. Like a lot of escapist literature, romance fiction,

is about making you feel as if you're 10 feet tall and voluptuous. And I think that it's a way of consoling largely women who aren't in any situation in which they have much control over their lives and even families for that with fantasies of empowerment. And in a way, it's a kind of opiate. Opiate? It's debatable. But what's beyond debate is that these novels are still largely consumed by women

who comprise over 80% of the romance readership. Why the romance read is such a powerful experience for women and what women are doing when we read romances is we are regressing to a childhood state and we're reliving, if you want to say, our relationships with our mothers. that's not an addiction. In other words, I wouldn't want to say that women read romance because we are psychologically impaired. But what I do say is that we use our powerful relationship, emotional relationship with our mother as a resource when we need it because of stress in our lives.

Resource or opiate. You'll hear the case for each in this episode called Paperback Love, which originally aired way back in 1992. And even then, the romance novel had long evolved out of the old-fashioned bodice ripper. Some were pretty explicit and hard-pore, while the heroine and others always had to have a successful career. The evolution continues right up to the present, with some now featuring issues like abuse or addiction, and there's been a massive growth in black and LGBTQ readerships. A Indian Gypsy song says, love is like a rough sea. You must surrender to its strength and majesty.

It may destroy you, but you will never withstand it. Love will come to us, whether we seek it or run away. Love is invincible, irresistible, unconquerable. Who can deny love? His shoulder touched hers each time he leaned over her, filling her with her. with a tingling warmth, and his voice, as deep and melodic as a sorcerer's song, filled her ears. Her mind wandered from the London sights she should have been savoring, savoring instead the rock-hard thigh brushing against hers.

Your guide for this excursion into paperback love is Erica Blair. That was the pen name taken by then contributor and now executive producer of ideas, Greg Kelly. A unique singing voice of Barbara Cartland, one of the best-selling romance writers of all time. And yes, it's true. I do have two identities, which I'll explain as we go along. But allow me to begin at the beginning. In the beginning was the word. And the word was on a computer screen in front of me as I sat correcting pages that would soon become romance novels. The name of the company doesn't matter. I was a proof-reader.

Hundreds of women would write in with letters praising the books, but there was a siege mentality to them. Even the women I worked with wouldn't admit to being a romance reader without embarrassment. They knew what the world thought of them and their books. Feminist and reader of romance novels, Angela Miles. To make a decision to let people know that you are a romance reader or a harlequin reader was a decision you actually had to make. I had a pile of them on the bottom of my bookshelf,

and I thought, I will not lie. I will not pretend that I'm going to be doing research on romance. There's this stereotype of the romance reader. You know, you've got your bingo player, you've got your housewife, you've got your romance reader. In other words, one aspect of the activity of a very vibrant and functioning adult human being is taken, is despised because it's associated with women and women are despised and then is seen to stand for the

whole. And a wide cross-section of women read romances. The same as they're employed in as many numbers and proportions as other women. They're varying ages, varying educational levels. There isn't such a thing as this mythic and very, very denigrated a thing as a romance reader. You may or may not agree with the blanket statement that women are despised in our society, but it's certainly true that readers of male formula fiction, detective stories, westerns, action adventure, don't get stereotyped. So who are the women who read this literature? Carol Thurston has written a study of romance novels and their readers called The Romance Revolution. One of the things I did was get demographic statistics on women, and then I compared those demographic statistics with the American census data closest to.

I did two surveys of readers, one in 1982 and one in 1985, so that what you have is a cross-section of readers looks like a cross-section of the American population when you compare it with the census data. 16.3% had a university degree. Interestingly enough, among romance readers, 35% of those with a college degree had a graduate degree. I think that's a pretty straightforward breach of the stereotype. But in point of fact, the word romance novels, even as an academic person, I found some of my colleagues, some somewhat patronizing at times about the studies I was doing

because there's something that isn't even quite kosher about studying these books. And I think that's an extreme. I took the view that they are. Therefore, we ought to look at them, and we ought to really try to understand why women are reading the stories. Angela Miles. One summer when I was staying at a friend's cottage, and it rained all the time,

I began, I'm a print junkie, and what they had lying around were a lot of books, including romances. And I began reading. The first two were not particularly interesting, but by the third one, it was a very, very different experience and much more engrossing. Another time I went to stay with friends, and it was after dinner and everybody, you know, we were sitting around reading and relaxing, and it was a very nice, cozy space. And suddenly, a voice came through a kind of fog saying, Angela, why have you got that silly grin on your face? And I realized that I wasn't in this world, that I was completely lost in the romance.

You really do leave this world. You absolutely become so engrossed with the read that you totally forget about the rest of the moment. of your life. And readers of romances have testified to this over and over and over again, that it's escape, that you feel like you're on your magic carpet to somewhere else. And there's a fondness, there's a warmth in thinking about that experience. For just a moment, for just a mindless, reckless, wonderfully heedless moment, Samantha considered making love with him.

It would be heavenly she knew beyond anything she had ever experienced If this one kiss was anything to judge by And she knew instinctively that it was He sighed, reaching to grasp the hand still clutching his jacket He lifted it, cupping it in his It's too soon for you But I'll ask again, soon. His hot, coffee eyes wandered over her face.

His thumb brushed across her moist, hearted lips. Very soon. From the romance novel, Sophisticated Lady by Candace Schuller. I, I proofread that book. Best-selling author of historical romances, Bertrice Small. I think the reason that women read romance, and this goes for any of the sub-genres within the genre, is that women are looking for a happily ever after.

We give you, boy meets girl, they fall in love, and they end up one way or another happily ever after, and women want this, and I think men wanted to. No, I don't think romances create wild expectations. The wild expectations that most women have are to find the right man to have a happy home, to possibly have a good career. The one thing I think it gives them to shoot for is that they see in the better of the books written in this genre that there can be normal relationships between men and women,

and I think that's something in this day and age to shoot for. You promised to love me forever? her heart too full to speak. Samantha went up on tiptoe and pressed her lips to his, and then she turned and led him down the hall to her bedroom. Okay, so Nick and Samantha shoot for that normal relationship and live happily ever after, hot coffee eyes and all. This is formula fiction.

Okay, so I bet I could write a romance novel myself. And I actually thought it would be a cinch. The publishers even provide a tip sheet, a menu of the ingredients that go into the book. That's how Erica Blair was born, my nom de plume, and how my career as a romance novelist began. The publisher I chose to write for is called Silhouette Desire. Their tip sheet said my book should be sensual, compelling, believable, written for today's woman, and the heroine, someone we can identify with. So I gave my heroine a fear of flying.

Mandy Overholzer had never been on an airplane before. Well, she had once, but she was a baby back then when her parents moved from Los Angeles to the Boston area. Mandy looked around. She seemed to be the only one who was paying any attention to the emergency procedures. Oxygen mask drops automatically. Find my nearest emergency exit

Don't panic Don't panic How the hell am I going to remember all this? She said out loud absent-mindedly I shouldn't worry about it where are you Came a deep, melodious voice from the seat beside her Oh, I mean it's just this damn airplane's got me rattled Worrying is futile for two reasons

One, airplanes are safer than kitchens If there's an accident, it's almost always How shall I say, inclusive? Thank you, sir. so much. I'll remember your words of comfort as I'm falling out of the sky. So far, so good, right? How dumb is she?

That's my editor at Silhouette Books in New York, reacting to Erica's writing. My writing? Leslie Wanger. It starts off. She's sitting on the airplane. Mandy looks at the card with the emergency procedures and immediately thinks, how the hell am I going to remember all this? And I immediately thought, it's not that complex,

even for someone who hasn't flown before. So I know what you're trying to do. You're trying to build up her nervousness and that she's worried and so on. And obviously she had to say something aloud so the hero who's sitting next to her would speak to her. But you did it in such a way that most people are just going to think she's silly. I think what this was in a sense was an attempt. And you may not have heard this phrase before, but it's what the writers call the cute meat, which is when the hero and heroine meet very early in the book.

And it's in circumstances that are by definition, you know, funny or a little, offbeat or immediately put them at odds. The problem with the cute meat is that it's been overdone. So a lot of times what the author thinks is cute and different isn't. But also that it only suffices for the moment. It gets the characters into the same place, puts them in some sort of immediate conflict. But unless you go further, unless you deepen the characters in the conflict, the readers won't stay interested and you won't really have a story. The heroine I found too young both, I think, probably in terms of her actual age as a student, I'm guessing she's around 22 or so, but also too young in the way she acts.

Too silly, really. And a lot of the action undercuts her. Okay, okay. Mandy wasn't experienced flyer. She didn't even bother to read the emergency procedures. Mandy knew the routine inside out. She looked around. Her eye was caught by the man sitting next to her.

He was good-looking, but sweating. Excuse me, you seem nervous. You know, there's no reason to be nervous. Airplanes are actually safer than kitchens. Mandy was always direct when she found someone interesting. It intimidated quite a few of the young men she knew, but so what? She wasn't going to hide her feelings when there was no need to. Her mother said she had all that.

a footspah of a typical 22-year-old. Really, I don't think it's any of your business. I don't believe I asked for your help. Me for breathing. Mandy practically screeched. It was the word screech that really jumped out at me. I thought, you know, she could have yelled, she could have shouted, she could have been furious. I mean, that's really what you were getting at.

But screeching is the kind of word. It's a fingernails on a blackboard kind of sound. And so it undercuts her again. I once had an author a number of years ago, and she's still a very successful romance writer. And she always would have the hero smirking at the hero. And she didn't mean smirk. She really meant smile, grin.

She wasn't looking for the negative overtones that smirk has. And I would change it every time, and she never sort of picked up on the fact that I was changing it. And finally, I just put a little note in the margin, and I said, look this up in the dictionary. Your bad guy can smirk, but your hero wouldn't smirk. It makes him seem unpleasant, and that wasn't what she was intending to do.

even little bits of description you want to build up a character who's independent, who's interesting, doesn't have to be absolutely perfect. Neither the hero nor the heroine needs to be without vulnerabilities or else you couldn't identify with someone who's perfect any more than you could with someone

who was just a mass of insecurities or problems. But I would probably have picked a more mature word there. So writing a romance isn't a cinch after all. Historical romance writer, Bertreys Small. I've had a lot of women write me that they like the fact that the women I write about somehow rise above what other tough situation they've got and come through the other side one way or another they come out the

victor and I don't like victims because my heroines they they live like normal people live in the sense that they are happy they are sad they face tragedy they face success they face failure I think that means a lot to women. I've gotten letters from women who are going through personal family crises, who may have had a death in the family of someone very close to them, and the women relate to the characters in the book, and I think this gives them a great deal of comfort. From Bertrease Small's historical romance, The Spitfire,

Lady Arabella Gray, cousin to King Richard III of England, is speaking. What kind of woman does it make me, I wonder, that I would barter my virtue for land? A woman's weapon is her intellect, though many would not credit such a thing. When intellect fails, however, a woman has her soft, white body with which to fight. And if men have but one universal weakness, it is their lust. I don't know. Except for the idea of superior intellect, they sound like the same old stereotypes to me. the woman manipulates, the man's got his brains between his legs. Whether there's any room for real feminism in the paperback romance

depends on your point of view. Writer and critic, David Reef. One understands perfectly well that the feminist revolution, that is women in the labor force, women in the professions, is one of the great events of the 20th century, and even the romance novel is going to reflect it to some extent. That is to say, a new set of perhaps more progressive cliches have replaced an older set of more reactionary one. Seems to me, perhaps a

slight improvement, but scarcely anything to crow about. I think the interesting criticism of romance novels is not that they are a particular kind of fantasy, but that they are completely unreal. The trouble with this work is that it's psychologically reductive, that it peddles notions of how life works out that have nothing to do with how it works out even when it works out well there's no notion of the tragic there's the disaster you know he leaves her she doesn't get the job whatever the form is there's no notion that things are difficult that people age that that life is complicated that it's full of salt as well as sugar i i i it seems to me that that's what's wrong with these books, not whether they have the correct line on, you know, women becoming partners in law firms.

Yes, it's a fantasy for a lot of women, I think. Critic Carol Thurston. What happened in the 80s was that heroines in romances were portrayed as not being satisfied to be wives, mothers, and help meets. They wanted to have the love of a man they loved, but they wanted more. They wanted satisfaction in the work they do. They wanted independence, and they wanted some quality of equality, if you will, in terms of decision making, childcare, and all the rest of it, that it is possible for women to be winners, whether it's in their love lives, their encounters with men, in their careers, in their position in society, in their ability to control their own destiny,

that story will always be a fantasy for a lot of women because they'll never achieve it. The fact that they like to read about it means that that's what they'd like to have. These books were carrying feminist messages to women who would never read any feminist treatise. If you like, patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel, you could argue that feminism is the last refuge of Harlequin books, and all the books. I don't mean to single them out in particular, but of the romance publishing establishment, any publisher willing to invest the right amount of money can manufacture a bestseller, and you can create desires.

That's what the activity called marketing is all about. So I know these books are here to stay, and I think as long as you have this kind of culture, which is, you know, let's face it, a culture based on dream and illusion. These books are going to be popular. And they remain popular. When this episode first aired back in 1992, it was estimated that a romance novel was being sold every six seconds. Now it's every two seconds.

This is Ideas. I'm Nala Ayad. What's that noise? I don't know. I get that checked. Quickly. Yeah, good point. Point S, tires, and auto service. You think Point S has good deals on tires?

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that when you own a nail salon, everything needs to be perfect from tip to toe. That's why our agents go the extra mile to understand your business and provide tailored solutions for all its unique needs. You put your heart into your company, so we put our heart into making sure it's protected. Get insurance that's really big on care. Find an agent today at dejerdin.com slash business coverage. Paperback love is the title of this episode, meaning of course that romantic love is at the center of romance novels. It also has another accidental meaning that the readers of romance novels are themselves

in love with their paperbacks. Are they ever? Readers of romance have set up book clubs. They swarm to conventions, one of which happens to be sponsored by a magazine that caters exclusively to romance readers. It's called Romantic Times. The publisher of Romantic Times,

Catherine Fock. We have a network of thousands of stores called Bookstores That Care, and they get Romantic Times Magazine, they hold autographings for the author, they write to the authors, they come together at our conventions, and it's a growing movement.

I have a costume ball at mine, and these costumes are not Halloween. Last year, we had six women from one small town, and they found their favorite covers, and they got their local dressmaker, reproduced the gowns, and gave them big masks, and they got a miniature of the book cover, and they hung it from a gold bracelet,

and they walked around with the cover and this gorgeous dress and a math. It was spectacular, and we had like 700 people in every kind of gorgeous kash. I mean, there was nothing tacky at all, and it's almost like a friendship group. Barbara was wearing fine silk stockings and garters below her knees with bows,

so they would easily come. come undone. Her shoes were bright red kidskin, polished to a high glass, decorated with gilded bands and rosettes, and fastened around the ankle with pearl-set buttons. The lavishly bejewled and gilded gold. He was dressed in the highest fashion in a manner he loathed, brilliant in a gold surcoat, all sewn with red crosses over a crimson tunic. His broad breast was draped with gold chains, and his sword, with its plain wire-bound hilt, was hooked to a bejewed and gilded belt girded low on his hips. His shoes were gilded, too, and huge golden spurs were fastened on them. With apologies for liberties taken from Roberta Gellis's A Silver Mirror.

Clothing is often described in historical romances. It's as central to the romance fantasy as the love scene. It takes readers into another world. So costume balls for romance readers make perfect sense. Putting on a costume allows you to be someone and somewhere else for a while. The romance industry exists to fill a need. Like an organism, some might say virus, publishers have had to adapt to changing circumstances. The fantasy remains the same, but within it,

the heroine may be less submissive, she may have had sexual experience. As for the hero, well, far from the dominating, brooding figure he used to be, He's turned into the new sensitive man, Carol Thurston. As he became more expressive, more flexible perhaps, he became more faithful, he became more trustful, and he, in other words, came closer to what the heroines had been all along. And when I asked readers to describe heroes and heroines, in a book they had to, just finished reading. This is what showed up. And very often in the books in which it was more than one

man on the scene, the reader knew instantly which one was going to win the woman in the end. It was the one who respected what she did, who was willing to compromise and give, the man who was demanding, self-centered, never got the woman. Hmm. Mandy noticed his face, the oval shape, the high cheekbones, the light skin and light blue eyes that seemed to dance in the light. His hair, brown with little fronds grouping over his fore, over his intelligent forehead. His lips weren't full, but they did seem to be on the face. verge of a smile.

Are you a businessman? No, no, I'm not a businessman at all. I'm an academic and a writer. Oh, an academic? I'm on my way to Oxford to study. I can't wait to see those dreaming spires. You mean perspiring dreams. Frederick Raphael, a British writer of some repute,

used the phrase to describe Cambridge University, but I think it applies with equal force to Oxford. By the way, the title of my romance novel is Love Among the Spires, Oxford, that is. Editor Leslie Wanger Professors stereotypically, I suppose, you know, live in another world, and they think in other ways. And certainly lots of them really do. But this is fiction, not fact. So when you're setting up, if you're going to use a professor as your hero, you have to think about what is it that makes a hero in these books.

Not so much what is it that makes a professor in real life. So the hero, who's also set up in the same scene, comes across as too unappealing. He's too much the pompous intellectual. He's quoting at her instead of speaking conversationally. So it's just guaranteed not only to put her back up, and in fact, she may deserve it, but it's going to put readers' backs up as well. Too late. I see you're ordering a gin and tonic.

You really are getting ready for Oxford, aren't you? Except you must now learn to say G&T. Oh, must. die. Why don't you go... The flight attendant started to hand Mandy her drink, past her not so companionable traveling companion. Mandy took the plastic cup in her hand and... Turbulence! She lost her grip, then tried to regain it,

then all over his... well, all over his crotch! Oh, I'm so sorry! Why is she worrying that she accidentally spilled her drink on him? In fact, she probably should have thrown it at him, given some of the things that he said to her. That too would probably be a bit of an overreaction, but it would be one more in keeping with the kind of independent character the readers were looking for.

At one time, it was enough that the heroine be bullied and ravished by the hero, whether she were willing or not. This sort of romance is now finding a market in Eastern Europe. But in North America, readers objected to love scenes based on the male upper hand, and they let the romance industry know, Carol Thurston. That was the phenomenon of the 70s and the world. the early 80s. And it changed first in the historical romances that became known as the bodice rippers. This was sometimes also called rape sagas, horny hystericals, etc. They had many various names.

Sometimes they were referred to or called seduction. But there's no doubt at all that readers knew exactly what was going on. I mean, it was rape. The description was of an act of rape. And sometimes it was the hero. That was the worst of all, I think, because after a while, to readers, the hero was not he couldn't be rehabilitated as the hero anymore to readers. If a rape did occur, it had to be someone else who raped the heroine. Eventually, it just was dropped because it became really, truly unacceptable. The word seduction often was used, but I had readers who responded to a question I put to them about this and they said, yes, they called it seduction, but everybody knows very well what it was. So I don't think anybody was fooled by it.

Of course, those romances were supposedly reflecting the practices of less enlightened times than our own. But the story of sex and romance novels is more complex than that. They had an editor at Avon Books in those days by the name of Nancy Coffey, and she discovered Kathleen Woodywist. And the book was called The Flame and the Flower. and the book was published in April of 1972. And it was the most incredible success. The book just walked off the shelves. They reprinted.

They reprinted. They reprinted. We're almost 20 years down the line, and the book is still in print. Shortly thereafter, a manuscript came into the same house, and it was addressed simply to the editor of the Flame and the Flower. And that book was Sweet Savage Love, that was the first Rosemary Rogers book. Now, Kathleen Woodywist had written a very interesting historical novel with sex in it. Rosemary Rogers wrote a novel with sadomasochistic sex in it.

And the market for that was utterly incredible. In fact, I get letters sometimes on some of my earlier books that really startled me. and this really opened the floodgates for romance, and the books just started coming and coming and coming. It gets harder and harder to write graphic love scenes because, you know, you're trying not to repeat yourself, but you're using the same words and emotions. It's difficult.

From Bertrease Small's historical romance, the Spitfire, The Wedding Night. Arabella hated the helplessness she was feeling. He was so strong, and even though she knew the act of love between a man and his wife could be good and was certainly acceptable in both the church and polite society, she felt a small flame of resentment. A small whisper of fear still nagged at her,

and despite her good intentions to allow him his way, her arms flew suddenly up to defend him off. She would not yield herself to him. Tavis Stuart caught her wrists between one of his hands and firmly held them captive above her head. With his other hand, he guided his engorged manhood between her resisting thighs and directly to the mark. The Earl thrust hard into his bride's unyielding body

leaning forward as he did so to absorb her startled cry into his own mouth as he kissed her a most passionate kiss. In the historical romances of the 70s, sexual activity of all kinds tended to be very explicitly described, but it was described using euphemisms. You didn't call a penis a penis, you know? I mean, it just wasn't done because the view of editors, and perhaps they were right, I think women are more sensitive to harsh words. This was an interruption of the

romantic fantasy. It got to be kind of ridiculous after a while until I believe that the euphemisms became more of a break in the romantic fantasy than had you used ordinary terms because ordinary terms began to seem very commonplace to readers. After a while, it got to the point where it was less noticeable if you called a spade a spade. So that even the euphemisms either changed or because to fall by the wayside some, and in that way, a little bit more honest description. But the interesting thing was that the female took control, or at least had equal control, and became much more a participant and much more assertive in the sexual activity. You saw a gradual change in the sexual activity as portrayed in these books that reflected that as well.

You asked me if you ought to take off those droopy panties and I said yes. She flung out a hand in a dismissive gesture revealing one naked breast. She said in realization, Oh, well, yes, I did ask you that question, but it was a survey sort of thing and I didn't say anything about that. Are you teasing me? In order to reply, she had to clarify the question. Am I teasing you?

Hmm. While she pondered that, she stretched her arms up, moved around, and bent over as she made sounds of cogitation. She was amazed he kept his distance. At last, impudently, she again stood before him, moving enough to make her naked breasts shimmer. May I unbutton your shirt? Quint was in torment. His eyes watched her avidly. My God, Georgina, he murmured.

I have to have the actual word here. And it's yes. Yes. Very good. Still wearing the droopy panties, she went near him and slowly reached out to unbutton his shirt. She did that insidiously. Her fingers slipping inside and touching against his furry chest as she turned her head just a little, chewed on her lower lip, and licked the other one.

From Red Rover by Las Small. Rhyl. You can't chew on one lip and lick the other simultaneously. The human jaw and mouth is simply not. equipped for this particular purpose. Writer and critic David Reef. There's a pure sort of failure of kinetic and anatomical imagination. The droopy panties.

Now hang on a minute. She's looking for some image to go with panties, but droopy panties. How low are they hanging to her knees? Maybe they're, are they grazing the floor as they droop? I mean, is it something sort of stuffed in them to make them hang this low? this furry chest. Well, she's trying for some effect, of course, but chest aren't furry at all if you actually felt an animal's fur, unless you have a very hairy man indeed. I mean, unless she's sort of an orangutan. The romance writer's great vice is that these days in this more

pretentious and probably politically correct atmosphere is to desperately try to make you see. And of course, the way you make people see is not by piling on the detail as if it were a kind of, you know, surf and turf lunch, you know, attended by people who haven't eaten in a couple of days. You don't just sort of pile it high. It seems to be what distinct, one of the things that distinguishes good writing from bad writing in English is simply the good writer's ability to be spare with the details, to know when the reader can do the work. The romance writer will never do that. Well, let's see if I can do it differently. The scene, Graham's office. The door is locked.

An old couch is situated conveniently in the room. A bust of Shakespeare looks on. From Love Among the Spires. By Erica Blair, Monument. Come here, Professor. Mandy didn't take the same time on dressing Graham as she did herself. She went immediately for his zipper and tugged a downwards. She undid his belt and unclasped his pants, which dutifully obeyed the law of gravity

and fell to the floor in a heap. Feeling reckless? Without waiting, she grabbed the two bottom corners of his shirt, where the buttons met their holes. She tightened her grip, and then with one startling, bold movement, she brought both her arms out like crazy windshield wipers, and ripped open Graham's shirt. I knew as soon as I read the love scene, that a man had written this book. And the reason there are two things, well, three things, I suppose, really. The first is that the heroine is the aggressor and very much the aggressor. And, you know, the truth is, in terms of anybody's personal fantasies, male or female,

everybody would like to be pursued. But in terms of the books, because they're female fantasies and they're read mostly by women, what you're writing is the female fantasy of being pursued, not doing the pursuing. It's not that the heroine is never the aggressor in a particular scene, but in terms of being the one to initiate lovemaking for the first time, she might be his equal. She might want it as much as he did, but she wouldn't just come in and take charge.

She went immediately for his zipper and tugged it downwards. There are certainly love scenes written in these books, and some of the most popular writers write them, but they're very hard to do well that are very direct love scenes and that there's not a lot of foreplay, that the two just, they can't control themselves. But this feels, we don't feel that there's any emotional compulsion here. It's just physical.

She knows what she wants and it's behind a zipper and so she just goes for it. It's not romantic at all. What I really wanted to read about was emotion, was about response, was about the five senses, as opposed to just the facts of the scene. Love scene. Second draft. Mandy, I've been with other women before, but never. anyone like you. Oh, Graham.

Tell me I'm not dreaming. Tell me this will all be true tomorrow. Well, you know, don't you? You must know. What, Graham? I love you, Mandy. Oh, Graham. I love you too.

And with those words, Mandy lowered herself onto his body, becoming one with him. She could feel the waves of the sea rolling inside her, cresting, and finally reaching the shore. When I first got into the business, I was amazed at how many women told me they read the books in bed,

and their husband liked for them to read them out loud because it gets them sensually minded, and the man loves it. A lot of men tell me that their wives are warmer and more sensuous because of the books, takes their mind off the kids and all the problem and just puts them in a different mood. The books kind of turn you off of materialism

and turn you on to romance. And they have commitment. There's a big difference between what we call hot romances and pornography or softball pornography, and that's commitment. Otherwise, there may not be a whole lot of difference. And it's supposed to be a fantasy. Romances are adult fairy tales.

That was Catherine Fogg, publisher of Romantic Times. Adult Fairy Tales. fantasy. There's that word fantasy again. For centuries, romances were written for women and men, sharing the same dreams. Lovers met. They parted. They were reunited in the end. As story, romance is as ancient as classical Greece and as familiar as a Shakespeare play. So there's a line of descent to romance novels, all right? It's just that you can't create literature according to a one-size formula designed to fit all women. The question then becomes whether the fantasy is a harmful deception or a helpful illusion, Angela Miles.

I think we have to look at this fantasy and also look at the reading, the huge amount of romance reading that women do as a very successful coping mechanism in very, very difficult situations. And in dialogue with readers, I find that very often they will have periods. of intense romance reading. And they may coincide with the birth of their first child or having three children under five or being an undergraduate. And with women, the kind of pressure tends to be a pressure

where they can't justify taking time for themselves. Women have said to me, they're better than drugs and alcohol. They serve the purpose of escape. David Reef. I think if you look at these, not as books, but as products, or if you like, or if you prefer as comic books, you'll get a much clearer sense. No one is surprised that, say, in Japan, these thing called manga, which are these mass circulation comic books, sort of softcore porn slash adventure comic books, are read by millions

of people. It appeals to our baser natures. And that's what Hollywood does. And that's, That's what romance books do. You know, if you said unhappy people also like to eat vast quantities, they like to stuff eclairs into their mouths. I really don't think that anyone, except perhaps an Ecclare manufacturer, would suggest that this was very good for them or was to be encouraged or had some political justification.

I still maintain that they are, however consoling they may feel, feel they're a kind of false consolation. And like any opiate, they make you feel worse in the long run. One of the needs that women have is a need for nurture, really. It's something that I would say most women in this society are deprived of and really can't expect after a fairly young age. Our society is structured in such a way that women give that out.

to children and to men, and really can't have much expectation of getting that back. And the romances are full of males, nurturing females. The heroes are always independent, that is not dependent, and not requiring nurture or a lot of care and attention from the woman, but are in turn paying a lot of attention to her and nurturing her. Now, once you've said that the hero is a mother figure, it shrieks out at you. You read him being bossy and exasperated in ways that are very much like a mother. Occasionally, I'll find myself longing for that feeling of escape. I don't particularly resist that longing because what the romance fantasy shows when it's analyzed in terms of an understanding of the

hero as a mother figure is the depth of that need and the potential for social change when we can recognize that our nurture does come largely from women and that we need to in fact develop our woman identification and our woman power. I'll be honest with you. I couldn't decide whether the fantasy and romance novels helps or harms. I can't tell whether the hero is a mother figure. But I do know that the context is more complicated than I thought when I set out to turn myself into a romance novelist. It involves traditional power relations in love and raw sex. And if you think you've got it answered in your own mind what those relations are, just listen to what's happened to historical romances since they became popular.

Carol Thurston. There was a thought that one of the reasons rape was acceptable. in these earlier books was that the heroine simply could enjoy sex, defined as sex when it really wasn't, even though she was a good woman and she was participating in something she wasn't supposed to do outside of marriage. She didn't have to get permission this way because she was forced. You know the books have tip sheets. A lot of the publishers put out tip sheets for authors, which describe the characteristics they would like to see in the heroes, the heroines, and in the stories. And if you look at some of the tip sheets that have been issued since 1985, you can see a reversion to the past. You can see a reversion to old power relationships.

Let me give you an example. A late 1980 zebra, that's a publisher of historical romances. A tip sheet from that period says the heroine is opinionated and of a passionate nature, but only the hero can provoke her love as no other can. Rarely is she willingly untrue to the hero, but there are always exceptions. Well, when you have that kind of thing, what you've done is taken away from the heroine, the ability to control the situation herself. If we're going to go back to a situation where she may be untrue to the hero, but not willingly,

that means you have taken control out of her hands. This is an invitation again for rape. I want you to hear the final comments on my romance novel. From the editor at Silhouette Books, Leslie Wanger. I came up with two assumptions that were behind what happened, one of which is the out-of-date assumption, and yet we still see a lot of this because the books circulate for years. I mean, used bookstores carry books from 10 and 15 years ago. The assumption that she needs to be young and innocent, and he has to be older and, at the least, act superior and possibly even be superior.

Here's this 18-year-old orphan. She was always orphaned. She had no one to turn to, and she's ended up with the hero, and she's a high school student. And you know what they do at night. But you sit there and you wonder, what do they do when they go to breakfast in the morning? I mean, does she say, I have cheerleading triads today, and does he say, I'm off to Sumatra to take over another company? I mean, they just have nothing in common. And what you can do now is create characters who have something in common.

So I thought, well, why not just make them equals? Make them professors, say, in the same department, but I suggest having them take as professors, not as people so much, but opposite sides of an intellectual issue that can take on emotional implications, this whole psychological issue of, you know, are men and women different, or are they made different because they're raised differently? And that, given that one of them is a man, one is a woman, and the thing that's most crucial to them as their own male-female relationship, that can immediately take on a personal dimension. So, I'm supposed to make the hero and heroine equals, even though part of the

markets reverting to relationships based on inequality, take your pick, one man's pleasure is another woman's pain. The dark side of sex and power is always there for the exploiting. At first, I thought if I could just understand the romance novel, get inside it, I could write one, and like Barbara Cartland, maybe sell half a billion books. As you've heard, though, I'm not much good at writing from the female point of view. But since everyone likes a happy ending, here it is, from love among the spires. Would you marry me and love me and spend the rest of your life with me? Shut up and kiss me, Graham.

Mandy didn't wait for a response. She kissed Graham and felt her spirit sore. Years later, after the children were grown, after she'd gotten over her first gray hairs, Mandy would look back on this moment and remember the sweet smell of the grass and leaves, how the ground felt slightly wet under her knees, and how happy she was,

lying on top of Graham, kissing his beautiful face, and looking into his blue, blue eyes. I don't think I'm going to write any more romance novels. Rest in peace, Eric. Blair. We just heard paperback love, a documentary by Greg Kelly that aired on ideas back in 1992. Greetings by Anne Farquhar and Don Calle.

It was produced by Marilyn Powell. Lisa Ayuso is the web producer for ideas, technical production by Dave Field and Emily Carvezio. Nicola Luxchich is our senior producer, and the executive producer of ideas is not Erica Blair, but Greg Kelly. And I'm Nala Ayyad. For more CBC podcasts, go to cBC.ca.ca.com.