Wednesday, June 2, 2010

Caught in a bad romance

I watched last week's episode of Glee last night, and the theme was Lady Gaga. They did a rendition of her pop song, "Bad Romance" and it got me to thinking about what makes a bad romance book.

I love romance novels, chick-lit novels, any book where romance and love play a central role. But I get weary of the formulaic approach of 'boy and girl hate each other but are hot for each other' that you often find in romance novels. I don't find that romantic at all, to be honest, though some books pull it off better than others. I also don't like books where the leading man is a total neaderthal. And why is it that in romance novels the hero can be a 'rake' while the heroine is almost always virginal? The books I love the most bring romance in a fresh way and focus on the love, not the fighting.

What about you? What characteristics do you think take a book into the 'bad romance' category?

No comments:

Post a Comment