So I have to admit that I just read my first Harlequin Romance novel. And first of all, I have something really important to say about it:
I. WAS. DESPERATE. Clearly.
And apparently the grocery store down the street is not the place to find good literature, unless you desire blood, crime fiction or sex. And I just wasn't in a blood mood (one can only read so many cheesy wannabe vampire stories and every other cover had some kind of dripping red artwork which didn't exactly call out "I'm wholesome and not at all disturbing, read me!") Oh, and the crime fiction? Not my thing, too real life-ish, I get paranoid, husband threatens tranquilizers.
So I had a few choices for my first HQ novel, and I actually took the time to pick one specifically in an effort to at least get something with some sort of intellectual plot. (I'm not saying this book achieved the whole intellectual thing. Not that it was without plot, just that the plot was rather lacking until it came to naked body parts - or parts that wanted to be naked, which took up a lot more of the book than the actual nakedness.)
It was a late 1800's high end society based book. Kind of like Jane Austen, but trampy. It involved two murders, ancient tax laws, a highway woman, a couple of dutchesses, an illegitimate child, loveless marriages, grazing sheep and one of the main characters was a handsome muscular man with tousled blond hair and beyond natural abilities at pleasing women in bed (or couch, or wine cellar floor....whatever.)
That's the last time I buy a book at the grocery store down the street. Next time I'm heading straight for a Barnes and Noble.
I. WAS. DESPERATE. Clearly.
And apparently the grocery store down the street is not the place to find good literature, unless you desire blood, crime fiction or sex. And I just wasn't in a blood mood (one can only read so many cheesy wannabe vampire stories and every other cover had some kind of dripping red artwork which didn't exactly call out "I'm wholesome and not at all disturbing, read me!") Oh, and the crime fiction? Not my thing, too real life-ish, I get paranoid, husband threatens tranquilizers.
So I had a few choices for my first HQ novel, and I actually took the time to pick one specifically in an effort to at least get something with some sort of intellectual plot. (I'm not saying this book achieved the whole intellectual thing. Not that it was without plot, just that the plot was rather lacking until it came to naked body parts - or parts that wanted to be naked, which took up a lot more of the book than the actual nakedness.)
It was a late 1800's high end society based book. Kind of like Jane Austen, but trampy. It involved two murders, ancient tax laws, a highway woman, a couple of dutchesses, an illegitimate child, loveless marriages, grazing sheep and one of the main characters was a handsome muscular man with tousled blond hair and beyond natural abilities at pleasing women in bed (or couch, or wine cellar floor....whatever.)
That's the last time I buy a book at the grocery store down the street. Next time I'm heading straight for a Barnes and Noble.
Comments
When I was a kid I thought Harlequin Romance novels are what women were supposed to read. My mom had a stack of them in her nightstand. One day I asked them about her and she told them that my grandma Sharon would give them to her but that she didn't like them so she just stored them in there.