The Happy Ever After’s just lost its zing for me. I don’t read a romance and go all ‘awww….’ or ‘happy sigh’ when I turn the last page. It’s more of a ‘That’s it? That’s all?’ type of feeling.
Quite disappointing, especially when it’s the sixth or so romance that you’ve read in a row that gives you this feeling. So now, I don’t usually finish them any more. I just read until I start thinking ‘yeah, another hundred pages or so, there’ll be a HEA and that’s it.’ Hence my unofficial ban on buying romance novels not by authors whose grocery lists I’m desperate enough to read in between releases–it generally lasts for about seven days, until the next Fictionwise new releases email comes.
As drama queen-ish as it may sound, yes, I think it’s me.
I know the romances I’ve picked up recently aren’t bad, merely damned by mediocrity. Perhaps some are weak enough that I wouldn’t ordinarily finish them, but that’s par for the course since I only finish about 60% of the ones I start. Right now, for romance it’s more like 30%.
And I’m on vacation. Summer vacation. Three blissful months of having nothing to do. I should be blitzing through the romances I’ve stockpiled from the first half of the year–there is a seasonal pattern to my reading, and romances used to really hit the spot during vacation. Something about having nothing to do going really well with romance, the same way reading books with loads of action and people and creatures getting killed being great stress relief during exam hell.
Part of it’s probably just that right now, I want a career more than I want a HEA for myself. Having been a shoulder for a couple of girlfriends whose relationships broke down under exam and “we’re separating for the summer” stress kinda puts me off the whole thing too.
What am I reading now? Loads of non-fiction. My first year at university’s taught me to really enjoy those thick tomes–currently, it’s one book on the Medici family and the book’s that’s about living for a year without ‘Made in China,’ and hopefully soon, my textbooks on econometrics. Fiction-wise, every flavour of SFF. I’m planning to spend the summer catching up on Elizabeth Bear who possibly writes faster than I can read. There are a couple of new urban fantasy series that I really want to start, but can’t because my laptop’s being repaired. I love ebooks, but I have to say, it’s hard to curl up with a desktop computer.
I can figure out why I’m loving non-fiction. It indulges my need to know everything. Your guess is as good as mine when it comes to SFF.
Barb Ferrer, on the other hand, thinks that it’s the books that are being published. She might be right, at least in her case, and that’s what she’ll be talking about in tomorrow’s post.
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[...] info By miladyinsanity Categories: Blogosphere I’m at Romancing The Blog today: The Happy Ever After’s just lost its zing for me. I don’t read a romance and go all [...]
It’s okay. You’re just growing up and learning what’s right for you. Keep up the good work!
I’m going through a similar phase myself at the moment and I don’t have exams to blame for it. The last time I went to the book store, I came out with five books – 2 nonfiction and 3 women’s fiction. I have read 2 of the 3 fiction and only had a “meh” feeling at the end. Nothing I could put my finger on, so it’s probably just me.
Everyone needs a change of pace once in a while.
I don’t think what you’re experiencing is that unusual, May.
I usually flip between business books (non-fiction) and romance (fiction). I’ll go through stages where all I read is business and then flip to all I read is romance.
It is not so much the HEA but the fact that it feeds two parts of my brain.
May, I so relate to the action as stress relief.
I recently had that sigh out loud, tear in the eye feeling when I finished J.R. Ward’s LOVER ENSHRINED. She gave her latest installment the best ending I’ve read in a long time!
So that would explain why I’ve been gobbling up Steve Berry, Richard Doetsch, and Suzanne Brockmann like there’s no tomorrow.
I take my romance breaks with mystery. Can’t really stay hooked on non-fiction. I’m reading Robert Crais’ newest, Chasing Darkness now. And also all the JP Beaumont books.
I read my first Robert Crais over the weekend. Also some Jack Kerley and Robert Parker. Currently chugging through the third cyber-deity installment by Kelly McCullough.
Perhaps summer is simply more conducive to drug deals, serial killers, and the end of the world as we know it than romance.
[...] coming from? Apparently I’m not the only one. May K talks about a similar issue over on Romancing the Blog [...]
I’ve been reading romance for about ten years now, and I find that every couple of years, I have to “shift tracks”. As the title of your blog post says, it’s not the authors or the books — it’s me. My tastes change. I change. My hormones change.
That’s what’s so great about the broad offering of books out there. There’s so much to choose from.
I think we all go through “burn out” or “over load” phases. I usually set the books aside and read something completely different (mystery, science fiction) and let myself miss the romance.
BTW, if you want an escape from romance suggestion: WORLD WAR Z by Max Brooks (yep, he’s Mel Brooks’s son) is one of the best books I’ve read this year (and it hurts my soul a little to say that a book about a world-wide zombie war is really this good, but damn it’s well written, poignant, and just plain smack-down great).
Hmmm…. I don’t actually have anything to say, other than it would quite nice if it wasn’t permanent. I have quite a massive pile of romance to glom whenever the mood strikes me, and it’s still growing.
Kalen, thanks for the recommendation. It’s on my Fictionwise list already.
Not that I need recommendations but book reccs are never ever turned down. I just might miss something good.
I’m going through almost the exact same thing right now. I’ve been going through romances without finishing them because they’re either awful or just “meh”-worthy. I think I’m on a 6-book streak of this at the moment. And I’ve been thinking it might just be me, as well. I hope a book shows up to break this cycle soon.
I don’t read as many romances anymore-I admit. But I don’t think it’s for over sweetness of the HEA.
The other day I went to the store and picked up a loaf of La Brea Raisin and Walnut bread to go with my afternoon coffee. I was REALLY lookig forward to that little bit of sweet and the crunch of the nuts. Coffee’s ready, I open the bread bag and something is wrong. I accidently bougt the OLIVE bread. Man was I pissed! Olive bread doesn’t go with coffee!
It’s the same with my romances. When I want them, that’s what I want. I don’t want to buy a romance and get a WTF ending, I want an HEA. If I wanted something else I would have bought it.
And the bread was great for breakfast.
I definitely go through these phases, when I feel like there isn’t a book in the world that would grab me. I don’t necessarily think it’s because the books are mediocre either, although they might be; it’s more that I’m not able to enter into the book’s world–I’ve read too much and I start analyzing, reading the book as a writer/critic rather than an enjoyer of the story. Usually I take a break from reading for a few days/weeks and then I start again with a totally different genre.
I go through these phases too, and sometimes they last for a very long time. I want the heroes/heroines to SUFFER more for their happiness.
I just read Christie Ridgway’s HOW TO KNIT A WILD BIKINI. Great summer romance. Super hot and beachy keen. Loved it.
The two I’ve read since then I didn’t love. But I’m ready for more. The next great book is out there…