I'm asking for this trope for TWO reasons. Reason one: I'm on a mission to find a book that had two very unlikeable people getting paired together at like this summer party? Nobody liked them and so they were always put together for stuff. And of course, they disliked each other until they didn't. Reason two: I just love this idea, so please send me recs!
I tried reading a contemporary romance book the other day and I found that I couldn't. The writing quality felt like it had been stripped right out of one of the middle-school YA books I used to read as a child, yet - with smut and forced banter and terrible, terrible references. I can't help but wonder if historical romance getting pushed aside has anything to do with the unchecked anti-intellectualism and rampant consumerism happening right now in the book industry. For example, people not being able to read above a certain level of writing.
I don't consider the bulk of historical romance to be anywhere near difficult to read, but there are more difficult words thrown in from time to time. There's a tension to the romance that isn't present in contemporary, you know, due to social constraints. I recommended a book to a patron the other day that I felt was a little spicy: Eloisa James, I forget the title, she came back and declared it was the worst book she'd read in a long time. That it took 100 pages for them to have sex. I had to apologize and remind her that I did recommend others, but we just didn't have them in our system. You know, I told her to search out Minerva Spencer or Pam Godwin, but she just continued to scoff and berate my "harlequin romance" - like there's something demeaning about them.
I've just noticed that people want more smut, even if it means bad writing. Whereas, they're more likely to reject good, but less smut. I'm not against smut by any means. I love smut. I struggle to read books that avoid it. I just. I need a good story. I thought that was the whole point of reading. Where's the romance in romance if it's all tropes and smut, but with nothing in the middle? I think I'm just getting old (an ancient 24), because goodness, where's the quality? It feels like historical romance is the last genre I feel I can truly rely on getting good romances out of. Most dark romances, for me, read as if they're written by some tumblr edgelord. Most contemporary romances have become stale and dragged down by cut-and-paste YA writing (new adult). It just makes me sad. Like, we're the old ladies of the reading world. That's why we're getting dropped. It just makes me sad and disappointed.
Hello and good evening to all of you beautiful people, I’m back at it again with promoting my women’s server for crafters, readers, nerds, and nurturers of life in all its many forms. I like to refer to it as "the living pinterest" – there's always someone posting their decor, their clothes, the cute little mug they found while thrifting. There's a lot of artistic and creative people: especially now that AI is so inescapable and etsy stores are growing more and more unreliable. It's so nice to have this community of women who keep tabs on each other, who help each other, and we just kind of grow together.
It's a 20+ space. I'm an adult woman. I'm kind of getting too old to feel comfortable hanging out with teenagers, even if they are legal. We're inclusive to trans women and women who simply identify as she/they. Basically, as long as being a woman is a core part of your identity, then you're welcomed here. We're spiritually inclusive as well. We're ultimately a very cozy space. I'd love for it to grow more into something of a cute, little hub! We're about 100 ladies strong now!
Have you ever had a patron that is bound and determined to find a way to beat the system? Because we definitely do. And it is the most frustrating, most annoying thing ever because there's nothing we can do to stop it. So, let's say this Patron, we'll call her Smith. So, Smith has a distinct habit of putting about 30-50 books on hold. She also has a habit of never picking them up. She'll call and call again and ask us to extend it, but eventually, you just have to say no because we can't just keep leaving these books on indefinite hold. They need to be out in the stacks or could be used for displays, because usually these books are quite new or they're classics (Smith also has a habit of keeping them for long, extended periods of time and has paid probably about a thousand dollars worth in fines). Smith has found a system loophole. Smith has found that as long as she cancels the holds the day before the week is up for her to get them, she can simply re-put them back on hold. So, now she truly can just....keep them there...for weeks, sometimes months. Anyone else got any patrons that act like this?