In Defense of Romance Novels

I suppose the title of this post is a bit misleading, as I in no way shape or form tend to defend the existence of romance novels. Rather, I will defend my interest in them, and as such, hopefully explain the premise of this blog.

The first thing one needs to know about me is that I am a sucker for free Kindle romance novels. That is how I acquire a solid 98% of the romance novels I have (the rest are from a library book sale I recently went to where all items cost 25 cents. There are worse ways to spend $1.50). I will purchase just about anything as long as it's free, because, let's face it, I'm not spending any money on it. I have thus ended up with a wide variety of novels, from science fiction to urban fantasy to Christian to historical, the majority of which are self-published or unavailable in print. Yes, they are that bad. This is not a blog for good romance novels.

My addiction to romance novels has begun to spiral out of control. At any given time, I have 80-100 romance novels on my Kindle, and so I have made it my task to clear them out until I can get them down around 50. This tends to backfire horribly, as I can only read one at a time, but I tend to download them in groups of 8-15. So...that plan is not entirely working out for me. But it works out well for this blog. 

I feel like I should share my reasons for reading romance novels. No, it's not because I'm a lonely, unfulfilled woman who dreams of being ravished by a reformed rake (no, thanks, I'll take a nice guy who treats me like a human being and not a walking, talking vagina). I read romance novels for several reasons:

1. They're entertaining. There's nothing quite like Celestia and Augustus and their frequent sexcapades to keep your mind off how boring your own life is. Plus, there are characters with names like Celestia and Augustus (DISCLAIMER: I have never actually read a romance novel with characters named Celestia and/or Augustus). You get to laugh at them, at their antics, and at their "true love", which usually comes about after a few bouts of rockin' awesome sex.
2. They're interesting. One of the things I have learned from romance novels is that they are a very good study of what idealized relationships look like for some people. It's interesting that what's popular (and also free) is relationships based on sex. It's also fun to study the relationships between men and women in the novel and make fun of how non-modern-feminist they are.
3. They're brainless. Surprisingly, you don't have to put much energy/concentration into reading a romance novel. You can easily skip a page and not miss anything. They're a lot easier to read when exhausted or on a long trip than, say, Anna Karenina. And sometimes, it's fun to read brainless things. How do you think Twilight became so popular, initially?

Finally, the object of this blog: I will dissect (insofar as I have the patience to think that deeply about them) romance novels in terms of writing, character development, and themes (particularly retaining to relationships and male v. female roles). I will try my very hardest to recollect some of the more ridiculous ones I have read in the past and review those without needing to reread them, but honestly, with so much nonsense out there, I'm bound to find equally ridiculous ones in the future.