Ah, summer, when the crowds head to the beach, carrying with them tote bags loaded with enough SPF to safely sunbathe on Mercury and those summer beach reads.
I’m always sort of mystified by the official lists of recommended beach reads, because they often seem way too serious for loafing in a lounger while sporting a stripe of zinc oxide across one’s nose. And then there are those inevitable review quotes that classify romance novels as “beach readsâ€, as if you couldn’t possibly want to read one during the winter while huddling over the space heater. I dunno about you, but it’s winter when I need that mental trip to the beach.
Romance novels are good all year long, sunny weather, snowy, stormy, or just pleasant. The world turns, days are good or terrible, but romance novels are consistent. Always there, offering a ready escape to another time, place, season, or mood.
The thing about romance is that it consistently offers a certain type of experience; true love found but difficulties loom, obstacles overcome, happily ever after. It never goes out of season, unlike white shoes after Labor Day, and it always fits, unlike summer wardrobe staples for everything above the ankles. (Okay, even below the ankles all bets are off once you’ve had kids, but that’s another topic.)
Sure, some of those contemporaries can seem pretty dated ten or twenty years later, and so can the attitudes and accepted norms of other genres (historicals published today reflect a different outlook from historicals published in the 70s), but the experience of romance doesn’t change much. The feeling of hope, renewed faith, affirmation, these things remain constant as seasons and fashions (and waistlines) change.
It’s always a good time to open up a romance novel and take a mental trip to the beach. Let the official list-makers relegate romance to the literary beach bag ghetto. Life is a beach! So what’s in your beach bag?
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[...] My column is up on Romancing the Blog! No idea what I said, I’m writing a chapter a day and can’t remember what I had for dinner, so let’s hope it’s coherent. [...]
Stacy, I want to swipe your beach bag!
My beach bag is too heavy to lift at the moment. I’ll be starting with some classic Crusie and Kenyon.
BTW, congratulations, Charlene! I saw The Gripping Beast is a top pick in Romantic Times Magazine!! I think I know something else I need to add to my beach reads.
Oh My God! Are you serious? I saw that it had a 4 1/2 Star review but I didn’t know it was a Top Pick. I don’t have my copy yet. WOWOWOW! Thanks for telling me!
I love seeing writers find out cool news via blog comments. Congratulations, Charlene.
In my beach bag is “I See You” by Holly Lisle, “Closer” by Jo Leigh, and “Lover Eternal” by J.R. Ward. I don’t get to go to the beach until my book is done, though, so I’ll be diving into them next week.
I’ve read I See You and Closer and Lover Eternal already.
I’ve also read HelenKay Dimon’s Viva Las Bad Boys.
The ones I want include Julie Leto’s Dirty Little Lies, Jennifer Armintrout’s The Turning and Alex Archer’s Rogue Angel.
I’m waiting for Lover Awakened. Isn’t it September yet? Closer is outstanding, best Blaze I’ve read all year.
I know I See You will be good, but I had to put Holly Lisle’s suspense books next to Sharyn McCrumb’s in “really amazing authors who scare me too much to read”. I’m such a wimp when it comes to suspense. The first three chapters of Midnight Rain kept me awake and I couldn’t read on.
Thanks, PBW, talk about a happy surprise!
I ‘fess up. My library has a shelf of free romance paperbacks, and I take those to the beach. It forces me to read out of my favorite sub genres, and if my floatie dumps me, well, it is not a financial ruin. Me, take a brand new paperback from Ralph’s Bookstore to the beach? No way!
Becca, smart! I love the library’s free paperback section too, and I’ve read lots of authors that way I probably never would have picked up otherwise.
When I’m lolling on the beach, I want a “fun” book. My hard and fast criteria is that they need to contain at least one of these following:
1) Explosions – as in things that go boom
2) Oodles of sex
3) Blood, guts and/or a rampaging serial killer
4) A “fun” and/or “silly” (in a good way) plot
I’ve read all of these below, but they all get Wendy’s Stamp Of Approval for beach reads that meet my discerning criteria.
SEX, MURDER AND A DOUBLE LATTE by Kyra Davis
MURDER IN THE HAMPTONS by Amy Garvey
PERSONAL ASSETS by Emma Holly
WICKED WOMEN WHODUNIT anthology by MaryJanice Davidson and a host of others
NAKED TRUTH by Amy J. Fetzer
Any book by Tess Gerritsen.
Anything by Matt Reilly. Serious action/adventure there.
Hunting the Hunter by Shiloh Walker
Edge of Danger by Cherry Adair
And Able by Lucy Monroe
Closer by Jo Leigh
So many terrific books and more to come in the fall…J.R. Ward, Christine Feehan, and Gena Showalter.:grin:
Oh, now I need to check out Matt Reilly!
Here’s what’s in my bag:
72 Hours by Shannon Stacey
The Distressing Damsel by Shelly Laurenston
The Red Heart of Jade by Marjorie M. Liu
Dark Side of the Moon by Sherrilyn Kenyon