Dear Author: Romance Novel Reviews, Industry News, and Commentary

more animals

Anne Mallory’s latest release, The Bride Price, involves the question of what is a true gentleman.  The hero is a bastard and not considered a “gentleman” by society standards.  The heroine’s sister at heart, Sarah, is a shy, retiring wall flower.  Sarah’s father wants her to marry well and sets up a tournament for men in society to compete for her hand:
“…The King sees the whole competition as an incentive to make sure one of his godchildren is married well.”

She took a deep breath before continuing. “I saw him a few days past. He has signed a document promising the winner a viscountcy After the competition ends, he’ll have the letters-patent drawn up and—” She waved a hand in a fatalistic manner. “I tried to beg him to revoke his blessings, but you know how I freeze up so terribly. He just patted me on the head and said the games were designed to weed out the unworthy. Only a true gentleman could win.”

“A true gentleman.”

“Yes.” Sarah tugged at the bow on her dress, mangling it further.

A man who was good at shooting, boxing, gaming, and wenching could …

more animals

“There’s an infantilising of women in these programmes – they fall off their high heels or are still obsessed with handbags in their thirties,” agrees Geraghty. “And there’s an acceptance of a completely feminine persona, while many women do not see themselves as pink and fluffy.

“If you go back to the 1930s screwball comedies, the women never stopped talking and they never gave into the men – they had that femininity and glamour but without the infantilisation.”

The likes of Carole Lombard or Bette Davis wouldn’t have stood for the vacillations of Mr Big, it’s true: they’d have socked him in the jaw.

Source: The Scotsman

Readers talk about the likeability of a character but I think that term is misnomer. I think what we are talking about is the favorability rating because you can dislike a heroine or her ethics and still find the character intriguing; still view her character in a favorable light. What happens in our romances far too often is what the article refers to as the “infantilising of women” or the dumbing down of female characters in order to achieve a certain effect.

Too often heroines place themselves …