Romancers and Raincoaters

Last month I attended a Romance Novel convention is St. Louis, called “The Romantic Times.” I joked that I was going where pornographers fear to tread— but I was closer to the truth that I suspected...

I was asked to speak about erotica, an unprecedented invitation. Even though Romancers know that their genre is soaking in sex, the public impression is that romance is for ladies, while “erotica” is for hussies.

But the Romantic Hussies are getting brazen. Sex IS what drives the Romance field. That’s where I came in.  I was on a panel with Robin Schone, M.J. Rose,  Jacqueline Deval, and Laurel K. Hamilton.

Before I arrived, I quizzed Robin to explain the Romance jargon to me. They have dozens of words to describe their sub-genres. There’s “sizzling,” “spicy,” “sensual,” and “sweet,” — to name a few— which have just as distinct meanings as Gonzo, Pro-Am, and Classic porn.

Because Romances are written so tightly to genre, and the predictability factor is so important to their buyers, they can’t overhaul their image that much. The explicitness of the sex scenes is the only wiggle room they have. Now that every sexual taboo has been broken, they’re a little anxious, because if they add any note of realism or literary feeling, they won’t be “romances” anymore, and the genre will crack. It already has.

When a woman buys a traditional Romance, it’s like a hardcore porn fan buying a XXX video. She wants her money shot. She does not want distractions. She wants familiarity, to connect with "the childhood masturbatory feeling," as my friend and offbeat Romanticist Pam Rosenthal so perfectly described to me. I say this with utmost sympathy, but fans would probably feel exposed by that description. Still, I believe romances are stroke books— they are not so much read as used.

The tension between Erotica vs. Romance isn’t sex, it’s writing style.  Romance publishers are dishing out hardcore. They have fisting scenes and gay couples as major characters.  They are overt about interracial sex, rape, S/M, incest,  and every other top ten American taboo. Harlequin and the others are not shy about finding out exactly what their readers want; they’re notorious for their focus groups.

Let me examine one of these desires as an example: Inter-racial relationships. Even though they are an exploding statistic in American life,  they are still frowned upon- to say the least. There are few places that discuss these relationships outside the alternative media.  In the mainstream, there's nothing except a few Hollywood celebrities who are held up as a lofty ideal.

In real life, when it’s happening to YOU, there are confrontations with various racist hysterics and ultimatums among your family who  swear they’ll never accept you, never speak to you again, etc. etc. Of course,  sometimes it  works out for the best, but those of you with multicultural families know what I'm talking about!  We are not supported by the mainstream media or institutions.

However, in "Romance World,"  everyone is likely to be in bed with someone of a different “color” than themselves. White women with black men, and black women with white men, is a hot ticket. This year, "Mr. Romance" was black, and most of the attendees were white. The specialty line of Romances marketed to black women is also filled with these couplings that would be a total scandal in black literary circles.  Like all Romances, these love couplings completely unrealistic, stories in which the beauty and nobility triumphs... aided by pots and pots of juicy lust.

Another Romance fetish is overt bondage, and domination/submission. Rape/forced sex is de rigeur.

By comparison, “porno” has becom more politically correct over the decades. The mainstream stuff that you see on cable TV avoids the above-mentioned taboos, and the videos that focus on such material keep as low a profile as the naughty romances do.

The next time you are prepared to be scandalized by a  degrading bimbo fest in a X-rated DVD, please consider that the exact same thing is being described, from a female perspective, in Romances.  It’s just that the objectification happens in the opposite direction.

You know how women’s bodes are the ones that always have to be perfect in porn, even if the men are kinda droopy or overweight?  It's the same with romance, in reverse. The men’s bodies are all PUMPED— the women can be whatever. Her imperfections are irrelevant or sympathetic; the hero has to be an oiled stud muffin. Fabio is Jenna is Fabio.

The biggest difference between my Best American Erotica and one of the “Sexxxy” Romances isn’t the sex... it’s the style of the writing (genre vs. literary fiction). Every romance has a ‘happy, monogamous ending” while  BAE stories are more diverse, without that guarantee.

In the same way that sci-fi and mystery novels historically became more psychological and complicated, the same thing is happening to romance, which has been the infantile genre the longest. The women still love their romances-- like loving their Barbie Doll-- but they’re buying other things now too.

Romance readers are not remaining “monogamous;” their reading interests are diversifying.  Even the Inspirational (i.e., Christian) Romance readers read the sexy titles, too.  Romance is losing readers to Chick Lit, and mainstream women’s fiction. Those readers are the types who are likely to like erotic literary fiction as well.

Military, thrillers, mystery/PI/Cop  stories, are making a big splash too—another example of fusion. The most interesting group of writers I interviewed were all female Vietnam vets  who’ve become writers.  There were  lots of PI’s, cops, retired cops, cops’ wives, etc.

One  exception to the Dowdy Look was the goth-vampire crowd, which is openly into S/M. They were small in numbers, but visible.  Laurel Hamilton personifies this group. She appeared in a corset, with bodyguards who were also in corsets. She offered sex-positive encouragements one minute, but then made protective, conservative warnings in the next. She is in favor of S/M explorations, but against what she called “casual” sex. She was delighted to investigate kinky practices for her stories, but she warned her fans not to look at the web pages she’d devoured in her research.

I’ve never heard an author try to protect her fans like that before, while simultaneously titillating them. You’d never hear John Grisham tell his fans, “You’d better not look at the legal files I’ve seen, they’d be too much-- but wow, I can’t wait to show you my racy version.”

We had no dispute about sex— I appreciate their unapologetic fantasy life. It’s funny, no one finds it “dangerous” when women have taboo fantasies, only when men do. There’s this sense that women have realistic boundaries, no matter how cockamamie their fantasy life may be. But if a man reveals a taboo fantasy, everyone assumes that he’s about to run out and perform it.

No, what I found myself advising was rather contrarian— about writing, not about sex. I urged the authors with doubts to abandon ship—  to abandon genre-writing altogether.  When these writers find themselves in struggles with editors and agents over “formula,” I'd ask them to realize the stakes.

If they break formula, they’ll be a better writer. There is no literary future in subservience to cliches.  The commercial choice, to go with formulaic demands, may or may not prove to be a money-maker. You can’t count on it. I don’t know what the path to superstardom in Romance is, frankly.

I do know this:  if you write authentic, emotionally truthful, graceful prose, you won’t experience a moment of artistic regret— and you’ll have a reputation you won’t have to put a corset on to defend!