Time travel romance. I’ve been told there are two ways to write one. One way has a character going forward or backward in time as themselves. The other way has a character going forward or backward and occupying another body. I recently read one of the latter premised romances and hated it. Honestly. I really, really did not like the idea at all.
In the book I read, a tall thin woman magically finds herself transported in time and comes to consciousness in the voluptuous body of a beautiful woman. The upstaged woman is married to a hunky guy who happens to be in love with his wife. She doesn’t love him. However, the heroine, in the other woman’s body, happens to think he’s yummy.
I have no idea what I expected when I picked up the book. As a writer, I have an active imagination, but for some reason it never once occurred to me to have a love story where one of the characters is in another person’s body. Not only that, but to have that other body be loved already by the hero. Once I realized the premise, I knew there was a problem.
Frankly, I didn’t find anything romantic about the story at all. To me, the premise comes straight out of the Stepford Wives. Gorgeous guy has a wife he’s not happy with and then one day she magically transforms into a sex maniac who thinks he’s God’s gift. I can see how this might appeal to a male reader (after all, don’t we make our heroes a little too perfect?), but how this appeals to a female reader eludes me.
The sex scenes were gross IMHO. The heroine was tall and slender in her own body. Every time the hero waxed poetic about how hot and horny the voluptuous figure of his wife made him and the heroine got turned on, I was like, HELLO? He’s not talking about you! When the hero wrapped his wife’s long hair around his fist and praised its silky texture and soft smell, and the heroine swooned, again I was like, What are you thinking? You have short blond hair. He’s NOT talking about YOU. And the “oh you feel so good” sex statements by the hero made me wince. I felt like shouting, HE’S NOT FEELING YOU!!
Yuck. Yuck. Yuck. *shudder*
I guess there are readers who like this type of story or else they wouldn’t be published, but I can say unequivocally that this premise is not for me. I’m not physically perfect by any means, but I still expect the guy who loves me to love ME. Let me tell you, if my husband praised my blonde hair (I’m a brunette) I wouldn’t get turned on, I’d get pissed.
Anyway, to finish the story, the transported woman ends up staying in the past in the other woman’s body. She has kids with the hero (which in my mind is like being a surrogate. Nothing wrong with surrogates, mind you. I’m just saying that you have to picture the child as the product of another woman and your man. Or actually another woman and her man.) and they live HEA.
The HEA for me was that the story was done.
Maybe I’m weird, but I don’t see the appeal. If this type of story is one you like, can you tell me why? Because truly, I can’t think of one thing to like about this premise. Or maybe you have another premise that’s like nails on the chalkboard for you. What is it?
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Hmmm. I have to agree with you, I want to see the hero and heroine loved for who they are. I like to see people appreciate themselves for who they are, too. This doesn’t sound like my cup of tea. Unless the whole idea was that the other woman really WAS her blowing her shot at True Love and she got a do-over with the time-travel body-swap?
So my first question is . . . did historical woman then end up with the tall, thin contemp body?
Kinda reminds me of a tv movie from the late 80s — two women die on the same day, beautiful one in a car accident, ordinary one of a brain aneurysm — and they transplat the beautiful woman’s brain into the body of the ordinary woman. Her husband has a hard time accepting his “new” wife. Kinda says something about his devotion to her.
Premises I hate . . . can’t really think of one. Unless it’s the whole “I hate you but let’s sleep together” kind of conflict. Irks when me when a woman, however fictional, falls into bed with a man she professes to heartily dislike. I love Sandra Brown — she’s an autobuy for me — but in one novel, she had the heroine fall into hot sex with the hero the first time she met him, when they’re protesting that they hate each other. Killed the book for me.
Yes, historical woman ended up in the future in the other body. I’m relieved to see I’m not the only person scratching their head at this idea.
So where can I buy this book then?
Seriously, it doesn’t actually sound that bad, in fact dare I say, it sounds DIFFERENT to what I’m used to, so it would probably be worth the money to find out if it’s a flush-down-the-loo type read.
Yeah, we all like the thought of the hero loving the girl for who she is blah blah blah, but don’t we have millions of romance books where this happens anyway?
What I’m saying is that a different spin on things can sometimes be a good thing.
It might even make you appreciate the same old, same old, a little bit more…
Apparently there is more than one book like this. Two of my friends read this column and both thought I was writing about another book I’ve never read.
But wait — does she never tell him that she’s *not* actually his wife? He never finds out that his wife hasn’t just changed, but is actually another person entirely?
I don’t read a tremendous amount of time travels, but I’ve read 2 that sound very similar to this and several in a series where the h/h jump from time period to time period into different bodies and need to find one another each time they jump (I’ve really enjoyed this series).
For some reason this doesn’t bother me. I guess the first premise is the heroine needs to accept she’s in someone elses body. How is she going to change this or why would she be offended by the hero loving the body she’s in? He has no idea it’s not really hers. Boy, I hope that didn’t come out too convoluted.
Wouldn’t a “Stepford” thing be a hero forcing her to change, isn’t this more like fate taking over?
I’ve read one story like this and it totally worked for me because the hero fell in love NOT with the physical heroine, but with who she was on the inside. He DID get to know the real her. His love wasn’t based on external qualities, but on the qualities that don’t fade with time. *g* It was, for me, a love that transcended the lush curves and hit straight at the heart.
I admit the premise of this particular book has a bit of an ick factor, although I’ve read much worse. And I did like this situation in Robin Schone’s “Awaken My Love” because it enabled the heroine to have a great up-yours scene (a literal takeoff on the ads from the early 20th century, “they laughed when I sat down at the piano”).
Like Alison said, I think stories like the one mentioned above are about someone falling for what’s ‘inside’, not on the outside. I’ve read similar tales and didn’t really think beyond the interesting twist. They work for some people and not for others.:wink:
I’m with Karen–I think the premise sounds fascinating. Doesn’t bother me at all. The only way it would end up a wallbanger was if by the end the hero hasn’t noticed any changes in the wife’s personality. That would bug me because that would indicate a level of obliviousness on his part that’s bothersome (and not very heroic). On the other hand, if the hero has some kind of revelation like “Oooh, previously I loved her because of her hot body, but now I love her for her hot body AND her hot personality”–that would not present any sort of problem for me.
I think it might have been different for me if the hero hadn’t cared all that much for his wife, beautiful or not, because who she was inside didn’t appeal to him. Then when the switch happened he could grow to appreciate the exterior because now her interior was wonderful. Then I could buy the whole “loving the soul” idea.
In this case, he totally had the hots for his wife and the heroine had a bit of difficulty convincing him that she wasn’t the same person. He just thought she was a bit touched in the head.
For the record, Amazon reviews for the story were filled with praise.
I’d have to check this out. If it reads like you say, then I would have to start the wood stove with it. If it’s pulled off a little better, who knows?
My ick factor for Time Travel would be something along the lines of someone going forwards or backwards and being attracted to one of his/her ancestors/grandchildren. Where’s the vomiting smiley when you need it?
Grins*
I remember a similar premise in a time travel, except the hero despised his wife, so the heroine who is transplanted into the wife’s body has a hard road to changing her “husband’s” feeling for her.
For a great book with this idea, read PC Cast’s Goddess of Spring – I doubt very much you’ll be disappointed. I can see the ick factor you’re talking about but PC’s book has none of that. It’s really well done and a great read!
Crystal, I read one like that, where the hero went back in time and become his own great-great-grandfather or something like that. Had a child with his great-great-grandmother who happened to look just like his present day wife. That really icked me out too. He treated his present day wife like total crap, but when he went back in time he fell in love with her past self. Then he came back to the present day and wanted to make things up to her. I didn’t like that premise at all either.
Actually, I was just thinking about this (sort of). I’m working on a novel where some of my major characters switch time periods and bodies in this weird historical/fantasy/alternate universe novel (strange, I know) One of the women is happily married with a two year old son when she switches bodies. The character who takes over her body falls for the other woman’s husband, but I don’t plan on her getting to keep the guy. I dunno…it’s sorta complicated at the moment novel (I haven’t worked out all the kinks yet
).
Anyway, to cut this short, I’d like to read it, mainly because like Karen Scott said, it’s different and I’ve never read anything like that.
I’m not a fan of body-swapping stories, but Jennifer Archer did an interesting spin. I think the title is BODY AND SOUL. An unhappy wife, who has three[?] children and a rocky marriage, looks at a college-age pretty girl in the other car and she wishes she could swap bodies with that girl. And it does happen. The story deals with both women’s POVs. I read this years ago and although my memories are foggy now, I still remember thinking that it was quite interesting. Does anyone remember this one?
The book I loved with a premise like this was written in the late ’70s by Marlys Millhiser and called The Mirror. A twenty-year-old woman switched bodies with her grandmother. It wasn’t a romance, per se, so the reality of a such a shocking turn of events was handled pretty honestly. Both women had to adjust, and neither expected to convince their husbands that they were really someone else. And the men knew their wives (or, in one case, bride) were not quite themselves.
Because it wasn’t strictly a romance, the women’s perspectives were the focus, and there wasn’t (as far as I remember) a true happy ending. As a plot device, it’s fascinating, but as a romance, I think I would have some problems with it, too.
“Kinda reminds me of a tv movie from the late 80s – two women die on the same day, beautiful one in a car accident, ordinary one of a brain aneurysm – and they transplat the beautiful woman’s brain into the body of the ordinary woman. Her husband has a hard time accepting his “new” wife. Kinda says something about his devotion to her.”
I saw part of that movie and hated it! Couldn’t even finish watching it. It gave me the heebiest of jeebies.
Constance O’Day Flannery has novels that are something like these, except that the women in question look like the wifes of these to begin with, and the body as well as the soul is transported through space and time. My favorite is Time Kept Promises, where the woman was a distant relative of the wife (making it ok, because the hero wasn’t genetically related to her
) I like it because he go back to the future with her, and ends up modeling colonge (and having to deal with an extremely flirty gay make up guy, oh God!).I liked it also because she has to find a way to convince him that she is not his wife, and has to deal with the same problem of “does he love me for me, or does he love me because I look like her?”
I wouldn’t care for the story as you related it. That he loved her for her body or for who she originally was – not who she is now. YUCK. But I did read one where the hero was sort of indifferent to his wife who refused to share his bed – until the heroine inhabits her body that is! The wife was beautiful but cold and did not want to marry the hero. When the heroine “shows up” she decides that this sulking in her chambers is going to stop and she seeks out the hero. From there she sets out to woo him and he, though initially suspicious, begins to fall for her. I really enjoyed it. It was funny and sexy and it was Kieran the Black by Julia Templeton.
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