What I'm Reading: "Beyond Heaving Bosoms"
Fresh when it gets here from
Julie Barrett
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Welcome to a new occasional feature, "What I'm Reading." More accurately, it should be what I've just finished, but hey, let's not quibble.
The book: Beyond Heaving Bosoms: The Smart Bitches Guide to Romance Novels, by Sarah Wendell and Candy Tan.
I am not a big reader of mainstream romance, though I do enjoy other genre books that have a romance element. My early exposure to romance was the grocery store novels with the horrid covers and purple prose. Mainstream romance has grown up. One of my friends kept telling me I needed to visit a blog called Smart Bitches, Trashy Books. I finally relented, and was glad I did. The site proprietors, Sarah Wendell and Candy Tan, are smart, funny, and they are unabashed enthusiastic romance fans. Sites like this and Dear Author have done much to raise the profile of romance, and I'm glad for it.
So, when Wendell and Tan announced they had written a book, I knew that I had to grab a copy.
Start with the cover:
Note the woman searing a very feminine next-to-nothing, red tresses cascading down her back, head thrown back and fingers extended in semi-orgasmic delight, lips slightly parted to receive a kiss. The art playfully punches several cliché buttons.
The prose flits between snarky commentary and scholarly analysis, and it works. My favorite bit was the "choose your own adventure" romance novel, in which they simultaneously skewer all the tropes, and show why some of them are necessary.
And what discussion of the romance novel would be complete without "man titty" and "magic hoo hoo?" If you can say that with a straight face, you have my undying admiration.
Yet, there be some serious stuff here (she says, invoking the dreaded Pirate trope). The evolution of the romance novel echoes the changing role of women in society, and attitudes towards women. The heroine no longer has to take it lying down, if you'll pardon the awful pun. And yes, sex does take up a serious amount of space in the book. Some of the talk is serious and scholarly, and points to how the romance novel is a reflection of our changing views of sex and the role of women relationships. Not only does it make for interesting reading, but it puts some of the clichés into perspective.
Wendell and Tan are serious about romance, but certainly not above poking fun at the genre whenever possible. In doing so, they make Beyond Heaving Bosoms useful for both die-hard romance fans and those who just wonder what the heck all the fuss is about.
Who would have thought a scholarly tome could be such fun?
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