romance novels

Last night, I found myself reading aloud an unhot virginity-losing sex scene from The Pirate Prince, my new favorite historical romance novel, as E did the dishes and L and DM chuckled uncomfortably.

I had not experienced the historical romance novel until a few years ago. A friend bought one at a Goodwill in preparation for a cross-country drive. Passion's Thunder, the story of a rugged engineer and a stubborn woman set in Wyoming during the construction of the railroad, gave all five of us in that crowded Saab something to chuckle about. Chicago traffic shall always remind me of a horrible horrible sex scene in which the heroine says 'no' and the hero keeps going because he knows she really wants it. And after it's over, she realizes she really did want it. D, who was on that drive gave me Cowboy Enchantment for my birthday last year. I read it aloud with friends while cooking dinner in my house & waiting in line for Fahrenheit 9/11 last summer.

These novels fascinate me. They are porn for women, as best I can tell, but I am not their target market. At least I hope not. They peddle fantasies foreign to me. I don't want to be swept off my feet by a cowboy with the help of a talking cat channeling the spirit of a dead priest. (That is the plot of Cowboy Enchantment.) Maybe I am wired differently or maybe the sex-positive feminist messages I have absorbed altered my personal fairy tales, but I have no desire for a ruggedly handsome man with a dark past to 'plunder my treasure.' (the euphemisms in these books also amaze me.) I prefer my heroes to be nerdy and not so virile. Reading these novel, aside from letting me rage at the historical inaccuracies, racism, & horrible writing, gives me a bit of insight into the culture that surrounds me, much like my post-election reading of the Left-Behind series did.