How much reality do you like in your romance novels?

I guess it depends, right? Obviously, if we’re talking a story with paranormal/fantasy elements in it, not as much as say a contemporary set in a small fictitious town, or a historical being played out in Victorian England.

In a contemporary, we’d expect at least mention of the current electronic accoutrements such as cell phones, computers and modern conveniences. Though the town may be fictitious the containing environs (state, country) would not. We’d expect our hero and heroine to display sensibilities of the current day as opposed to those of the 1950s.

On the other hand, in historical romances we tend to allow fiction a much freer reign. Our heroines and heroes, not surprisingly, display more modern sensibilities than they do for the day of their age. Women tend to be much more prone to independent thinking than their real counterparts of the time and men tend to be much more progressive in their thinking than theirs. While men prior to the onset of the 1970s tended to act the sole role as breadwinners and not nurturers (taking a equal hand in child rearing), our historical heroes would certainly be looked down upon if they didn’t express great delight in frolicking  with and caring for their children.

In  historical romances, we see women who are spies, seek adventure on the open seas, are intrepid almost to a fault. These heroines  may throw all caution to the wind–and sometimes a portion of common sense–putting themselves in harm’s way not unlike some of the people we see in those slasher films who come upon a dark and desolate house in the middle of nowhere. We, the movie watcher, tell them not to go in (somethings yelling it at the screen), but do they listen? Nope. They go in and get themselves killed. Of course, nothing so horrible happens to our intrepid heroine, but something bad happens nonetheless.

Some readers might gripe about the inaccuracy of an unmarried young women of aristocrat birth traveling a long distance without a chaperone. They’d tell you it just wasn’t done. Others don’t care about things like that and would underscore the word fiction and claim they aren’t looking for a recounting of history. I’ve even heard readers claim that vampires are nocturnal creatures and are seldom seen in the daylight, so such and such a book is a travesty. It appears we now have rigid rules around the fictional creatures we’ve invented.

In most contemporary novels I have read, the hero and heroine (mostly the hero) are almost like religious zealots when it comes to birth control. It’s not even enough that the heroine is taking birth control. Here is where political correctness and social responsibility comes into play. Do I believe that, on the whole, men are truly like this? No, not so much. But then this is romance fiction written by woman, on the most part, for woman, and we get to write about the kind of hero we want, not who necessarily exist in real life. And same goes for the depiction of our heroine, ten parts beautiful, gutsy and intelligent all rolled into one spectacular package.

Every once in a while though, depending on your internal acceptable use of fiction gauge, you come upon some characteristic, perhaps an incident, or a storyline that sets that gauge of yours beeping. It just doesn’t pass the smell test, so to speak. Mine, I know, are those too intrepid heroines, who in my opinion, are more danger to themselves and others than brave and daring. What are your ‘fictional’ pet peeves?

I’m still giving away books from my Anniversary stash. A comment will get you an entry to win 2 (two) of those books.

I’m not sure how much I’m influenced by hype. I know that enough good hype can make me pick up a book that wasn’t on my radar. Case in point is Jennifer Ashley’s THE MADNESS OF LORD IAN MACKENZIE. Prior to hearing lots of good buzz about it on Twitter, I’d never read or heard of Jennifer Ashley. But the buzz was so good, I had to buy the book and see what it was all about.

I was not disappointed. I truly enjoyed it, and I actually started reading it with an expectation that it wasn’t exactly my kind of book as the hero suffered from a disease that had people thinking he was mad. I was relieved to be happily surprised at the love story and the characters, both leading and supporting.

That hasn’t always been the case though. Books I was assured I would love because the general populous thought it the best thing slice bread, I’ve gone on to buy and read and been disappointed. No, I won’t name the books, but I wondered to myself and friends, whether my expectations were too high. Unfortunately for me, this happens more often than naught. Sure it could just be my very particular taste, because I know I’m very particular about my romances.  But could it be that I have these vaunted expectations these books have no hope of meeting?

What I’ve discovered is the books I end up falling in love with, are the books in which I have zero–and I mean zero–expectations. Case in point would be Rachel Gibson’s NOTHING BUT TROUBLE. I’d never read Rachel before and didn’t know that I would like her book. I prayed it would be ‘good’ at best. I ended up loving it. I mean LOVING IT! I then went on to read her entire back list. In her back list I discovered my August Fantastic Find, NOT ANOTHER BAD DATE.

Another such book was Sarah MacLean’s NINE RULES TO BREAK WHEN ROMANCING A RAKE. Sadly, I went into reading this book with even less expectation of liking it. I thought I’d read maybe three chapters and end up putting it down. I have to say I was shocked when I couldn’t put the book down. I loved the hero and heroine, and the plot had this very fresh twist. Then I met the hero’s brother and just knew he needed his own book,  so I’m champing at the bit to read TEN WAYS TO BE ADORED WHEN LANDING A LORD.

So what does that tell me about myself and buzz and hype? I think the only bad thing that can happen to me is I buy a book and don’t like it. What do I lose? Nothing really, except seven or eight bucks and the knowledge that such and such books are probably not my thing.  The best thing it can do is obviously, get me to enjoy a book I’d never have read and discover a new author to add to my auto buy list.

But in the end, I try not to buy into hype. If people I trust and know my tastes recommend a book, and I like the premise, I will buy.

How about you? Has hype (meaning good buzz, positive reviews from trusted review blogs, Publisher’s Weekly, Library Journal, Romantic Times, Amazon etc) ever gotten you to buy a book? Were your expectations high? Did it meet, exceed or fall below your expectations?