Confessions of a new reader
I have a confession to make: I’ve recently started reading in the romance genre, and I like it.
Most genre fiction is gender-coded, but none more so than romance. According to the Romance Writers of America (whom I trust to have a good handle on this), more than 80% of romance readers are women. And while romance is by far the largest fiction market, and romance readers are notoriously voracious, it’s a category that manages to fly under the radar of the mainstream fiction review industry (at least the outlets I tend to notice) and seems to get precious little respect outside its primary audience (no doubt in large part because of the gender coding).
I’ve been a voracious reader myself for most of my life, but until very recently I rarely dipped into romance. Whenever I looked at the romance shelves at the library or bookshop, I just assumed they were “not for me”: those pastel covers, those blurbs pulsing with passion, those shirtless hunks and dewy-eyed damsels (at least on the ‘80s “bodice ripper” paperbacks that were popular when I was first starting to read genre fiction). While I wasn’t adverse to a little romantic plotting in my science fiction and fantasy, I imagined that most of the books on the romance shelf were frivolous, slight, lightweight reads.
About a year ago, though, I started listening to the truly lovely “It’s a Clue” podcast, dedicated to Nancy Drew — it was featured in a New York Times article, and sounded fun and quirky, and once I got into the loving rapport between the sister hosts, Kelly and Karen, I was absolutely hooked. Karen is also one of the hosts of the Libro.fm podcast, which is also a fun and informative listen — I’ve been a Libro.fm monthly subscriber since 2020, getting an audiobook a month, and the podcast has been great for recommending solid selections.
The “It’s a Clue” podcast features a “recommendation station” where the hosts talk about their current reading, and it tends to be wide-ranging: I’ve picked up some leads on great horror and thriller stories, as well as general fiction. A few months ago one of them was gushing about a new romance series, “Lovelight Farms” by B.K. Borison, and with a Libro.fm credit to burn, I picked up the first book on a whim.
And I was hooked.
I’m sure that the performance by Pippa Jayne helped — audiobooks are definitely one of my favorite ways of reading romance — but it was also a really good story for a first-time romance reader. It’s a friends-to-lovers fake-dating story (I’m taking the crash course on romance tropes …), moderately spicy, with a great cast of characters in a small Maryland town. There was enough interesting plot and characterization to keep me listening, and I enjoyed spending time with the couple at the center of the story.
Having enjoyed my first foray into romance, I’ve decided to keep sampling the genre. I’ve got that Libro.fm membership, after all, a library card to a good branch within walking distance, and there’s even a new romance bookshop in the neighborhood, Tropes and Trifles (to whom I’ve shifted my Libro.fm indie bookshop support). I’m going to use this space to review the books I’ve read, and to discuss things I’ve learned about the genre: it’s fun to explore a genre that’s new to me, but has a deep and rich history and language all its own.
Are you a romance reader? Especially a male romance reader? I’m definitely interested in hearing your recommendations, observations, quibbles, and delights with these books!
Photo by Kristina Litvjak on Unsplash