Romance Quest!: oh dear.

[wolffyluna]

It is said that the worst six words a reader can say is "I don't care about these people." I have found a worse one: "I don't care about these rat-bastards."

In other words, I only got about 10 pages into The Kings Pleasure by Heather Graham.

One of the things that put me off the romance genre is because pretty much every novel I'd heard of (eg Fifty Shades or Twilight) the male lead was an abusive bag of dicks, but it was okay because he was protective (read: controlling) and really cared about her (read: still abusive, but the author hasn't noticed) and all the other male characters are worse (read: GAHHHH).

Adrien spends a large amount of his internal monologue thinking about how he really, really wants to strangle his wife-- and it's meant to be endearing, not a sign he might murder her?

But it's okay, because the only other named male character tried to rape her!

...I'm not against rape scenes, but seriously? In the first 10 pages? As a sort of generic peril for our leading man to rescue leading lady from?

The only good thing I got from this book was a chance to think about and articulate why I in particular don't like that attempted rape scene.

For one, I don't like rape scenes when they come across as "Quick, we need to put this female character in peril! What sort of perils do feeeemaaaaales get into?" I also find a lot of those generic-peril-attempted-rape-scenes break my suspension of disbelief. Maybe they shouldn't but they do.

And also, I find that rape scenes are something I need to trust the author with. I need to trust that the author will treat this with some sensitivity, that the author knows where they're going with this, that that scene is there for a reason and they thought about it-- and you don't get that trust in the first 10 pages. And putting a scene like that in the first 10 pages makes me trust the author less, because it means they don't realise there's a need for trust, if that makes sense? It's like they don't realise they're dealing with something heavy, and need to establish themselves as someone who can deal with heavy shit sensibly.

Also, I found it hella offputting that the author felt comfortable putting in an attempted rape scene, but not comfortable using the word 'penis' or any other non-euphemism for it.

Comments

[chocochipbiscuit]

Why We Still Call Them Bodice Rippers is an interesting article I've found about some of the norms of the romance genre (including that...yeah, I clearly remember seeing the super cheesy covers and the 'forceful' sex scenes) but uh.

The best I can say is that some romance novels are/were crafted with a very specific target audience in mind (or at least an imagined target audience) and really, really weren't great at flagging for that.

(and the saltier I can say is "fuck that whole shitty dynamic sideways")

[wolffyluna]

Ooh, thanks for the link!

And like, I don't get the appeal of "He's a bag of dicks, but he loves me/I made him stop being a dick to me!", and I can't turn off the part of my brain that goes "...that's some more evidence she's at risk of dying" , but I don't begrudge people who do find it appealing and don't have that brain widget, YKINMKATO and glass houses and all that jazz... I'D JUST LIKE IT TO BE MARKED.

(Ao3 and it's tagging has spoiled me, what can I say.)

(Also, being salty: I bet people would throw a fit if it started being marked, because how dare people imply that not everyone likes this fantasy/this thing I like, and that it is a fantasy! *eye roll*)

[chocochipbiscuit]

Man, I love tagging. I was just reading The Broken Earth trilogy and it's really good but also has a whole lot of stuff that deserves content warnings and tags. Even though the author did a good job IMO of setting expectations from the jump, it was a really heavy read and genuinely took me a step back because I had gotten so used to fanfic tagging conventions.

[lb_lee]

Yeah, I want to read Jemisin and have heard rave reviews about Broken Earth, but I also got WARNED and I know I'm not up to it yet. :\

The past few years, I've basically been reduced to reading nonfiction, because the genre conventions are totally different. Most nonfiction warns out the wazoo, because there's not really such a thing as plot twists or surprise rape when it's a book about the life spans of trees, or the sense of humor in Nazi Germany (THOUGH SOMETIMES YOU'D BE SURPRISED).

[chocochipbiscuit]

That is completely fair!!!! Everyone should be able to approach difficult material at their own speed, honestly.

And that's a really interesting point about nonfiction I hadn't considered! I've been reading more nonfiction lately (mostly due to listening to nonfiction podcasts, which like to boost books or interview authors) but my reading has been pretty scattershot based on whatever catches my interest.

[lb_lee]

Yeah, nonfiction owns my soul these days. I appreciate the ease in avoiding unpleasant surprises. Not podcasts though; processing audio alone is the WORST for me!

[wolffyluna]

Yeah, that's the nice thing about non fiction.

(Also, even in the non fiction I've read that has had 'twists', they've always been nice ones? Which may just be a combo of the non fiction I've read+how much of it I've read, but still.)

[empresszo]

I read the article, am glad I did, and wouldn't have otherwise - so! Thank you!

[chocochipbiscuit]

You're welcome! I'm always happy to share cool stuff I find. :D