Romancing the Blog | Romance Authors and Readers Who Blog

I swear I start out with the best of intentions, but somewhere along the line things go horribly awry. I cannot for the life of me seem to focus on one genre. Yes, I know doing so would enable me to build a steady readership, expand my fan base, and keep my agent from yanking his hair out, but I can’t do it.

Believe me, I’ve tried.

I start out with a nice simple vampire idea, and then poof, a gargoyle ends up in my story. Actually, not only does the gargoyle invade my story, but it takes over like it owns the place. I truly envy writers who’ve found their niche and focus all their attention on it. What does that feel like? Bliss, I bet.

Me, I’m like a shotgun blast going off in a crowd, intent on hitting everything and everybody within firing range.

No, I’m not ADD, so I can’t even use that as an excuse. I’ve come to the conclusion that my mind prefers the scenic rural route over the bustling highway. The ride’s sure been pretty, but the behavior has hindered my newfound career.

Although I continue to build name recognition through my releases and my blog, readers don’t know where to ‘put’ me. When pressed, they say I write funny action-adventure stories. I suppose that’s not a bad description, even though it’s not entirely accurate. Unfortunately, funny/action-adventure won’t exactly forward my career if the stories are also time-travel, urban fantasy, contemporary and historical. And we won’t even discuss the dark humorless tales that I’ve yet to publish.

By now, I’m sure several of you are saying to yourselves, why don’t you just pick something and stick with it? Certainly sounds easy enough, doesn’t it? I swear I have tried. (Let the wails of frustration begin.) I thought focusing on paranormal novels would help. I love my new ideas, but even they don’t fall neatly into a specific category of paranormal. I’m like a genre-crossing magpie. Ooh, that looks shiny, new and interesting. Let’s add it to our story idea and see what happens.

Now I realize that as time passes the lines/genres begin to blur. Thank goodness. This makes me extremely happy. Or should I say it will, once they get to my category.

Any other magpies out there?

So we’ve finally arrived at the end of the first month of 2006. It’s the first month of contending with resolutions (and oh is the gym full!) and perhaps it holds an idea of what the coming year will hold.

So far, 2006 is shaping up to be an eclectic year. I’ve read romantic suspense, contemporary romance, some categories, historical romance, a medieval mystery, chick lit, cozy mysteries, thrillers, futuristic romance, dark/urban fantasy, erotic romance, and even a paranormal/time travel romance. Whew, that was longer than I thought it would be. I’ve enjoyed the majority of it and even found some new authors who I definitely plan to buy in the future. But despite the roughly twenty books I’ve read so far, only about a half dozen have been ones from my vast to-be-read pile.

One of my big resolutions for the year is to whittle down my to-be-read mountain range. And mountain range it rightly is, with probably over five hundred books in it. Now, I can’t stop buying books, so that isn’t the answer. Book-buying is important. I don’t obsess about shoes, or clothing, but I must buy books each month. Yet time and time again, I end up reading more newly bought and library books than those from the to-be-read pile. I’m like a kid, sometimes. New and shiny beats old and beaten most anytime. Well, and then there’s pure fickleness.

AngieW has taken over Keishon’s TBR Challenge and I plan to stick with that each month, yet that’s one book among hundreds. So I need a plan. Something to help get my butt in gear and reaching for those long forgotten books that I have to read before they leave the house. Besides the various reading challenges circling the blogging community, a few bloggers (Jay and Wendy, for example) have mentioned their ideas of tackling this problem and I plan to take their ideas to heart. But as always, I’m curious as to how others have addressed the to-be-read pile and survived. Or not. Perhaps some of those bloggers on hiatus are actually buried beneath piles of books, unable to reach their computers and signal for help.

So what reading resolutions did you make this year? And have you started to accomplish any of them yet? Or, like the resolution to use that gym membership, is it easier said than done?

By Misa Ramirez

There was a time in my life when I was sure of everything I did, every decision I made. Having finished college, I started a teaching credential program, positive that I would teach elementary school. It was my calling. I loved kids; I’d substitute taught in elementary school; I was meant to teach little ones.

But my degree was in English and I had more than enough units in my major to qualify for a secondary teaching credential in English. All I had to do was pay the fee–and student teach in secondary school. Yikes. I didn’t want to work with older kids! Hormones and attitude and opinions! Not for me.

But I had no choice if I wanted dual credentials. So I did my student teaching in middle school–and never looked back. Little kids? Who are they? Elementary school? What’s that? I’d found my niche, found I liked kids with attitudes and opinions, and once I’d discovered it, I wondered how I could have missed seeing it from the beginning.

What does this have to do with writing? I was an English major. Always loved reading and writing. Always wanted to write. The catch? I wanted to write–you guessed it–picture books for those same little kids I’d wanted to teach. And so I dove into writing story after story after story, all geared to the picture book market. But all my books unintentionally had advanced themes, all wrapped up in a story meant for young children. It wasn’t working. I couldn’t find my voice. Heck, I don’t even think I had one.

I did have a lucky break and had one book published. Not my best work, mind you, but it’s out there and spurred me on–for a while. But frustrated after years spent unsuccessfully trying to sell another story, I threw up my hands. Either I quit writing altogether–or I try something completely different to get my mind off my failure.

Enter Lola PI. The character came to me in a flash and I started writing. Within six months, I had a completed manuscript (that I spent the next year and a half revising). The time I’d spent writing stories for kids ultimately taught me about perseverance, how to take rejection, patience, and kept me focused on my goal–being a published author.

But all my energy had been directed in the wrong direction. I was meant to write for adults. Love, relationships, swearing…and sex. Oh my. It was a revelation, an epiphany, a completely exhilarating realization.

And I’ve never looked back.

Writing books with romance, albeit always intertwined with some intrigue, is what I love, is what drives me forward, up and out of bed each morning (oh yeah, that and my five kids…). This is what I want to write. It took me a long time to figure it out, and once I got there I wondered why it took me so long.

It’s all a process.

Now, instead of saying this is it, as I might have ten years ago, I’m open to what might be around the corner that I haven’t discovered yet. Try my hand at a romantic suspense? Definitely. A book is in the works. Completely different from the Lola PI series. But who knows what I’ll get out of it and where it will take me. I’ll go where the wind blows me and see what happens when I get there. It might just be my next meant to be moment.

*For information on how you can submit to Open Blog Night, click here.

By Candy Tan, originally posted 5/17/05

“Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday to Thursday
With Harry, Mark and John”
- Lou Reed, “Sattelite of Love”

Are you the kind of person who has a story (sometimes several) at the ready in your head at all times to keep yourself entertained should you be stuck doing something incredibly boring for long stretches of time? I am, and I’ve been that way ever since I was a kid. As a child, my favorite types of stories to work on were fantasy novels. Man, I created whole universes, languages and magic systems while attending weddings and formal Chinese New Year dinners, or waiting for my mom to be done handbag shopping. Once I hit puberty, though, my favorite kind of story became a lot spicier.

And I do mean a lot spicier. Once I figured out that sex didn’t have to only be between a man and a woman, I would occasionally imagine fun love stories involving more than two people. You know, Lord Tentinpanterson has two weaknesses: beautiful women and beautiful footmen. One balmy summer’s eve, he’s caught indulging in the latter by Lady Chesste-LaRue. The intrepid lady decides to join the fun, and in between having loads and loads of kinky sex Tentinpanterson finds himself falling in love with the winsome Chesste-LaRue. However, he doesn’t want to give up his hot footment–and, well, neither does her ladyship. Oh, what’s a sexual libertine to do?

I never imagined I’d ever read romance novels that featured storylines of this sort. Pornography, yes. The amount of group sex porn out there is legion, and so is the abysmal quality. Not so love stories centering around couples who are faithful, but not necessarily monogamous. Let’s be honest, here: although a genre known for being unabashedly sensual, sexual adventurousness isn’t exactly one of romance’s fortes. Just look at the massive number of romances in which the heroine is kept a virgin and/or orgasm-free at all costs, even if she’s been married for years and years. Old wiener, improperly plumbed wiener, drug-addicted wiener, hubby likes wiener–the excuses are manifold and sometimes quite hilariously creative. So I figured, in this sort of publishing climate, how can a romance novel be published featuring a swingin’ couple? There’s no way.

Enter Candy’s introduction to Emma Holly.

From what I’ve read so far (and mind you, it’s not at all extensive–yet) Emma Holly has taken most sexual taboos held dear by the mainstream romance community and trampled on them with great and evil glee. Anal sex. Man-on-man sex. Girl-on-girl sex. Man-on-man-on-girl sex. Girl-on-girl-on-man sex. Bondage. Manually-operated toys. Battery-operated toys. Remote-controlled toys. Voyeurism, with and without informed consent. Mutual masturbation. Cross-dressing. And perhaps violating THE cardinal rule of romance novel sexdom: The heroine has hot, sweaty, mind-blowingly awesome sex with several different people, people she doesn’t necessarily love (a romance novel privilege previously bestowed only upon heroes and skank-ass villains). Hell, oftentimes the hero is right there enjoying it with her.

But here’s the biggest shocker–for me, anyway: In between all the athletic boinking, there’s actually a love story. What’s more, the love story is pretty damn good, and the characters are well-written and extremely sympathetic. There’s a believable happily-ever-after, and so far all of the contemporary Emma Holly novels I’ve read have the hero and heroine making a commitment to each other, while also keeping another regular sexual partner (usually a man) in the mix, so to speak.

I, for one, think this trend is pretty damn cool. Don’t get me wrong, I love monogamy–in real life, it’s the only kind of romantic relationship I’m able to handle, and I’m so shy about my body that the very thought of strangers seeing me in my bare-assed glory makes me want to simultaneously laugh and cry. But the fantasy of having multiple sexual partners, of sharing the one you love with other people, is very appealing and I really enjoy reading these stories. I think acknowledging that monogamy isn’t always the be-all and end-all of a romantic relationship is busting through all sorts of interesting frontiers and taboos.

So what do you think? Are stories featuring couples who (ahem) play well with others romantic? Sexy? Both? Neither?

*Revisit previous comments on this post here.

Over the years I’ve had a lot of editors–a dozen at last count. I’ve had brand-new, fresh-out-of-school editors and seasoned senior editors. So I’ve seen all different kinds of editing styles.

My very first book for Silhouette involved an eight-page, single-spaced rewrite letter. I had to cut 12,000 words, kill off a major character and extract a subplot. I gleefully attacked those rewrites with the enthusiasm of a newly minted author, and the manuscript was much stronger for it.

But all that was a long time ago. I have to confess, I haven’t been asked to do a significant rewrite in many years–nothing that a quick-fix at the line-edit stage couldn’t address. When I saw other writers tearing their manuscripts apart on the advice of an editor (or even worse, an agent) I felt a bit smug. And I considered myself lucky, or smart, or both.

Until now.

I have a new editor, and the poor thing inherited me along with an entire trilogy of books that she had not even read, let alone acquired. Lo and behold, I got my first rewrite letter in … well, I don’t remember how long. Probably ten years. It was four single-spaced pages.

My eyes bugged out of my head. For a few hours, I was convinced my career was over. I’d been matched with an editor I wasn’t going to get along with. Or maybe I was just an awful, untalented writer who’d slid by until now.

But then I got a grip. She didn’t hate the book. In fact, she went out of her way to tell me how much she liked the concept. But she found the characters unlikable and inconsistent (I’m paraphrasing here). Yikes! You’d think after fifty books I’d know not to write unlikable, inconsistent characters! I jumped into those rewrites like I was a first-time writer again, determined to fix what was wrong. And all the while, I kept asking myself–have these problems always existed in my writing? Were other editors too complacent, too overworked to do a thorough editing job? Or is this book a fluke?

I still don’t know the answers to those questions. But I did discover something important. My new editor made me look closer at my work. She made me question every sentence, every scene. She forced me to work extra-hard on motivation and consistency. The book is better, stronger–partly because she had some spot-on suggestions and insightful observations, but partly because I did a better job policing myself.

I was the one who had become complacent.

I will probably always have a knee-jerk defensive reaction when an editor requests rewrites. But from now on, the first thing I’ll do is thank that editor for making me work harder. If the writing is too easy, I’m not growing and stretching as a writer.

Last year, I started a single title book and got the synopsis and about 60 pages written. I loved the concept, the characters, and the writing of it. It’s a high-concept novel, with a hell of a blurb. In fact, when I was in New York last year, I verbally pitched the idea to an agent who immediately asked for an exclusive read. Since she was the only agent I’d told about the idea, I was very pleased, and I sent it to her the moment I got home. This was a reputable agent at a large NY agency – someone I thought would be a good match for me.

A few weeks later, she told me she was “mulling it over.” Okay. Then…nothing. No email, no phone call. Not a word. She never got back to me, never answered a follow-up email. I know she’s still working. I know some of her clients. So…what? She hated the book so much she was unable to even think of it without shuddering? She was so overwhelmed with its brilliance, she felt unworthy of representing it? To say this freaked me out is an understatement.

I’ve been a working writer for a long time. I’ve had an agent, fired an agent, sold a bunch of books on my own, won awards. My expectation of this transaction was that she would either want to represent the book or not. I hoped for the former, but would have been fine with a rejection. I’ve had lots of those, and I’ve lived. But to hear nothing? That was a shocker.

I haven’t had many unpleasant surprises in this business. In fact, since I’ve been writing, I’ve come to highly respect those who work in different aspects of the industry. My editors (except for one non-fiction project) were extremely gracious and treated me with nothing but respect. Unlike working in the film industry, where you are as likely to get a knife in the back as a shake of the hand, publishing, well, romance publishing, has impressed me tremendously. Now, I don’t always agree with the directions of certain publishing houses who will remain nameless, but the individuals I’ve worked with have been top notch all the way.

Which means to me that my experience with this agent was an aberration. I have no explanation for it, but I should assume it was about them and not me, right? Seems as though that’s a no-brainer.

Well, I never said I was all that bright. Because I let this one experience take away my objectivity and my smarts. I haven’t sent that book out again. I haven’t worked on it any more. It’s sitting on my hard drive, neglected and sad.

I had a wonderful writing buddy (thanks, Jill!) kick me in the ass about this very thing just the other day, and it’s had me thinking a lot about the whole experience. It all comes down to…fear.

I took the worst possible interpretation of this little aberration and made it mine. Held it close and fed it and kept it warm. And I’ve ended up with no agent and no book out there with the possibility of making a sale. Just me, my fear, and my comfort zone safely in tact. Well, yippee.

I teach writing, and in every class I teach, I encourage everyone to get their work out there. Tell them they can’t succeed if they don’t try. That a rejection isn’t the end of the world. So why did this…thing…stop me dead in my tracks?

I’m not at all sure. Fear, yes, but of what? And why at this stage in my career? When I was first writing, I put my work in front of whomever I thought would read it. I started in romantic suspense, then moved into romantic comedy with no proof I could do it successfully. I was offered a chance to ghost write a celebrity biography and I dove right in. I taught my first workshop totally off the cuff when a speaker at a conference didn’t show up. Fearless, right? Uh, not so much.

But it’s a new year, and I’m the uber-challenge gal, right? So I’m dusting off the partial and sending it to agents. This week.

I would like to invite all of you who have let fear stop you from pursuing your dreams to take your projects off the back shelf with me. Get them out there. No matter what the consequences. And I invite you to do it this week. No excuses. No second thoughts. Screw the fear.

I have a philosophy about life. Truthfully, I have several…about too much…but that’s not here nor there. The thing is, my most general belief is a take on that old adage that when a door closes in one place, it opens in another. (Apparently, older generations thought a window would open, but I’m from Fresno, we put bars on ours.) It’s turned out to be true just about every time.

So, this weekend, a door closed for us. Our old home.

In the nearly 8 years of my son’s life, this is his seventh move. Believe it or not, we’re not in the military. Just a troupe of artists, apparently. We go where the work is, but interestingly enough, this is the very first time we moved without a job change. No one was laid off. No one was racing to the next job. We just found a better place in a better neighborhood for a better price. For the first time in our lives, a new door opened before the old one closed.

What does this have to do with writing? Well, they do say a picture says a thousand words, so I’ll let this one do the speaking:

My desk. The desk I looked for for months, saved for and put together myself. This is where all my writing happens and the last haven of true OCD in my home, thanks to chaos loving 7 year old. In case you can’t tell…it’s in shambles. Half of it broke into about six pieces. That picture is one of total desk carnage. Hubby came into the new place and braced me by saying, “Honey, we have wood putty!” (I have true fears about what he’s going to say if the kid ever breaks a bone.) I’m proud of myself, I didn’t scream or throw a fit. I didn’t even cry–though that was a close one.

You see, I am finally, in this new place, going to have a section of pure office. Not office/living room table/art supply shelf. I’m even getting a book case. It’s going to be beautiful. Writing Haven. Mine mine mine.

So you can probably tell how afraid I was that my dream was not about to be realized. Horror stricken, really. But in the end, hubby was right. Wood glue, lovingly applied, pressed into submission and a day later, the dream is here:

I like to think that I have incredible patience for romance clichés. I am sure they’re on the wane or today’s authors are clever enough to turn clichés on their pointy little heads. But this is probably because I cannot imagine any publisher out there who is willing to risk the ridicule that accompanies publishing a book that includes an unironic use of the word “manroot.” Of course, then I saw the evil word in print in a book published in this century (last year, but still). The manroot appeared twice, and not in a good way.

I am sometimes surprised at my continued optimism, especially since it’s crushed so often and so cruelly.

I have been making special note of clichés lately – you know, the sexually unsatisfied widow, the always ready-to-go hero, the miracle pregnancy, hate (accompanied by unfathomable lust) at first sight. I often think about these things during Golden Heart judging season. If there’s one piece of advice I can give all romance authors out there, it’s this: stops!

I started down this path long before I discovered that the manroot was alive and well (though I cannot help but think of the thing as pale from lack of light, shriveled, and covered in dirt). My fits of screaming and agony began the moment I encountered a character named “Wilde.” This character was part of an extended family, related to every Wilde, Wild, Wyld, and Wylde in the romance novel genre. Also every Wijlde, Whilde, and Wylld, among others.

The problem with characters named Wilde, of course, is the same problem as characters named Blaze or Flame (inevitably red-headed, hot-blooded chicks). You don’t need to meet the character on the page to know exactly what the author wants you to think about this person. Call them Wilde, and you think free, unconventional, crazy, not bound by the rules.

It is inevitable that these Wilde characters don’t fulfill expectations. My Wilde was supposedly sexually free; she certainly dressed the part. Let’s just say that she was all look and no action. I was geared up for a heroine who said, “Yeah, I’m hot, I like sex, and I’m not ashamed of it.” Instead, she turned into an asexual preppy.

This seems to be a common problem. My Flame (it’s been that kind of year: a manroot, a Wilde, and a Flame) was sex-on-wheels. And a virgin. I don’t know if the author was going for clever or just testing my patience, but that book very nearly hit the wall. A virgin. In light of the story, it made no sense at all. But yeah, the guy fit – there were worries there. Just my luck to get a virgin who doesn’t know the basics of biology.

I’ve been bouncing around the idea, that in its own strange way, the romance genre is a bit shy about women who claim their sexual natures with both hands, no shame, no excuses. I will exclude erotica for the sake of this argument. It’s the little things: the heroine doesn’t have good sex before the hero, the wild woman is really a virgin, the town slut really only slept with one guy. Where are the women who have had more than two partners – and are willing to look the hero in the eye and admit it proudly?

I know that I cannot single-handedly eliminate the romance cliché, but I can make a heartfelt plea: no more characters named Wilde (or any variation thereof) or Flame. Unless said Wilde or Flame lives up to his or her name. And I mean lives up.

And no more manroots. Especially no more manroots.

By PBW, originally posted 5/13/2005

I’m reading a romance novel. The heroine pops in to say Hi and give me some back story. There’s a calamity of some sort, which is the cue for the hero to enter. Here he comes, strutting down the chapter runway. He’s big-gorgeous, or dark-gorgeous, or rugged-gorgeous. Then the hero opens his mouth and says:

Forgive me for having a penis.

Okay, he doesn’t say that. He says and/or does something nice and PC, to facilitate bonding. Something the author thought was sweet. Something no man alive would say or do during such a calamity unless you were holding a .44 pressed against his head. Or someplace further south. Something like:

“I’m so sorry, Miss,” said Luke as he stepped out of the Corvette and knelt to pick up Bethany’s crushed groceries. He gazed up at her. “I didn’t see you, so please let me pay for everything I’ve ruined. Were these Shitake mushrooms? I should have gotten some for the stir-fry I’m making tonight.” He gave her a gentle smile. “Do you like Japanese?”

This doesn’t stop here. Throughout the book, the minute this guy opens his mouth or does something, he’s wrong. He sounds exactly like the heroine, or her mother, sister, aunt, or best girlfriend. That’s because our hero is a girl in a man suit.

No offense to any lesbians reading this, but I’m hetero, and two ladies don’t do it for me. I like man/woman romances. It actually doesn’t matter to me what the man looks like; tall, dark, short, blond, white, black, alpha, omega, whatever, I’m there. I like men, period. I also like men to sound and behave like men. Which they can’t do if they’re only wearing a man suit.

As writers, we women need to be aware of the differences between the genders, and get them on the page. Men and women are biologically programmed to look, act and speak differently, and that’s made our species successful. This is not something to mourn or homogenize; I think we should celebrate our differences.

This is how I’d write the fender bender scene: “You okay?” Luke said as he got out and looked at Bethany. He reached down to grab a crushed bag and saw the Corvette’s dented bumper. “Oh, great.”

Having your hero swagger around, adjust his package and swear in every other sentence won’t solve the problem of a girl in a man suit. True, some men are loud, aggressive, and blunt, but others are quiet, soft-spoken, and sensitive. There are all sorts of men in between, too. I live with a strong, silent type guy. While he is quiet and has yet to swagger, everything about him is undeniably masculine.

If you’re not sure how you’re depicting character gender, try this exercise: remove all the names, dialogue tags and gender giveaway words from a scene with the hero and heroine (for best results, don’t use a love scene.)

First, read the dialogue out loud. Can you hear the gender difference between the two characters, or do they sound like twins? Now, look at your action in the scene. Can you tell their gender from their physical behavior? If you’re not sure, do this exercise with another person and ask them to identify the genders of the characters.

If you find your heroes are sheroes, then you need to do some research into writing more realistic male characters. My advice is to go to the source:

1. Hang out with some real live men. Note their body language, speech, and mannerisms. Observe how their behavior changes, and what triggers those shifts.

2. Talk to men. If you want to know what men would say, do or feel in any given situation, ask one.

3. Go to places where men congregate, and watch them in action. Listen to how they talk and act with each other as opposed to women.

4. Ask a man to critique your work. It’s tough to find guys willing to read romance, but men are great at spotting and flagging sheroes.

More Research Sources:

Doreen Kimura’s Biological Constraints on Parity Between the Sexes and Sex Differences in the Brain

Judy Siennicki Gender Differences in Nonverbal Communication

Hara Estroff Marano’s The New Sex Scorecard

Laura Pope’s editorial Gender Differences Make Life Interesting

Edith Weiner & Arnold Brown’s What’s the Difference?

*Revisit previous comments on this post here.

Okay, not really. But if you looked at my bookshelves, you might think so. (And you might realize from the title that I managed to catch The Sound of Music over the holidays.) I’ve got tons of young adult fiction, and I make no excuses for loving each and every one of those novels.

A friend of mine once told me that people like me “read down,” and he didn’t understand why. Since he likes to read about serial killers, I could say the same. But I don’t think reading about teenagers is reading down. Teenagers are people, too. (And don’t think they’ll let you forget it.) And with YA on the upswing again, the books out there are funnier, smarter, and more original than ever – much more so than the tired old “issue of the week” books I remember from when I was actually a teenager, back when dinosaurs walked the earth.

And no, I don’t want to go back. No Freaky Friday moments for me, please. I’d much rather deal with the occasional gray hair than face problem skin again, not to mention SATs, driver’s license tests, and babysitting for those demonically possessed kids down the block. But I don’t mind taking a minute to remember when life was all about, well, me. Because that’s what teenagedom is when you get down it – self-absorption at its finest.

From my vantage point here, years down the road, I know that life was a lot less complicated then. There was no mortgage, no boss (unless you counted the demonic kids’ mom, or the slimy guy at the Steak ‘n Ale, where I waitressed for all of two weeks), no bills to pay other than whatever I could afford to spend on clothes and books and records (for, you know, me). I didn’t have to worry about where my next diet Pepsi was coming from, or what was going to happen to the leaky roof.

But when you’re sixteen (going on seventeen), life seems like one unending complication. Because no matter where you live, or where you go to school, you’re figuring out the biggest conflicts of all – who you are, what you want, and what you can do. It’s all about girl power, in its fledgling (hell, still in the egg) stages.

Libba Bray’s fabulous Victorian-set A Great and Terrible Beauty explores this beautifully. I’ve heard the book, and its sequel, Rebel Angels, described as “Harry Potter’s older, darker, sexier sister,” and it’s true that protagonist Gemma Doyle finds herself not only in boarding school but in possession of strange new powers that take her to the magical “Realms”. It’s all there – a girl teetering on the edge of becoming a woman, testing the boundaries of her world, exercising her sometimes dangerous new abilities.

And not without crushing pretty madly on the infuriating, fascinating gypsy boy, Kartik, who is her liaison to a shadowy group that protects the Realms.

Yup, romance always manages to make an appearance in YA books, smiling and flirting. And why shouldn’t it? Aren’t boys the reason we went to high school, anyway? Pauses. Thinks. Okay, maybe not, but they sure made it a lot more interesting.

Think about Meg Cabot’s adorable Princess Mia. Learning to rule a small country? Almost as important as a date to prom. All of Katie Macalister’s heroines sensibly decide that that world travel and goth fairs are one thing, but the right guy is definitely another. When Niki Burnham’s funny, angsty Valerie in Royally Jacked is swept off to a small European country with her diplomat dad, she thinks she has problems – then she meets the crown prince.

There’s something incredibly pure about the romance in YA, and I don’t just mean sexually (although that’s changing, too). It’s romance without the grown-up problems, without the mortgage or the career conflicts or all of that other pesky stuff that gets in the way of adult couples finding True Love. In a YA book, it boils down to a smile, a phone call, a kiss – that one sparkly, head rush of a moment when The Guy proves that he likes the heroine.

Is that anti-feminist? Is a guy’s approval the thing to wish for, rather than your own? I don’t know, although I’m sure there are people in the halls of academe somewhere discussing it. I don’t really care. I read romance because it gives me a thrill to tiptoe behind a great couple on their journey to happiness, eavesdropping and sighing. And I read YA because it fires up my girl power gene to cheer for a young woman discovering who she is – and when that involves being a young woman who wants to kiss a hot guy, I say more power to her. When it comes to YA, it’s all about learning to make your own choices – and figuring out how and when to make them, which is a lesson a lot of us could stand to learn again.

So there it is. I read YA, and I’m damn glad I do. How about you?