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Valentines Day is, at its best, an excuse to do what you want.
Romance is written to be enjoyed.
It is fun, smart, savvy, increasingly inclusive, and a guaranteed good time.
(And I wrote you aguide of five booksto get started with right here!)
To clarify: Im not talking about love stories here, or romantic books.
Im not talking about erotica, either.
But it also includes worlds and worlds more.
If you give it a chance, you might sorry, its Valentines Day!
Most romance readers grew up reading romance.
It probably was, in part.
Reading about sex when youre a teenager is pretty exciting.
But beyond that, think about what you were reading when you were 14.
Boys, boys, boys, boys, a dead girl.
Maybe you read outside of school, too.
When I was 15 I read the entireDuneseries.
(No one had warned me, as I warn everyone, to stop after book three.)
To see in those pages possible paths forward, worlds and happy endings to imagine yourself into.
Thats not a thing we stop needing when we grow up.
But it can take deliberate effort to diversify our reading lists beyond straight white men.
You might not be missing women from your shelves today.
Women have been historically excluded from the canon, and that carries on through to publishing today.
Womens voices and stories as authors and characters have been systematically devalued in literature.
We see how a mans thinly veiled autobiographical musings are hailed as revolutionary, but a womans are dismissed.
Romance is full of womens voices and womens stories.
But wait, you, my straw man, might say.
Romance reduces womens lives to love stories.
Thats not empowering; thats practically telling them to get back in the kitchen!
Straw man, I promise you, romance makes no such reductions.
And, almost more important than these women falling in love, is them being fallen in love with.
For being strong, independent, vulnerable, honest, brave, smart, funny, and stubborn.
Those are stories about women that I think are extremely worth reading.
Im not going to take a stab at convince you that you should read books about women.
Im just going to tell you that if thats a thing you care about, read romance.
I didnt start reading romance when I was 14.
I started for work, but I kept going because it was 2016.
So there were two problems: bad things happening in books and the anticipation that they might.
Romance, like any other genre, has its genre conventions.
It can be happily ever after or happily for now, but it is happy.
2.2: neither do any pets.)
There is great power in a happy ending.
Lots of that suffering is real, though some of it is baked intonarrativetropes.
The best thing about romance is knowing how it will end.
Or rather, knowing where it will end up with the main characters happily together.
Because what you still dont know is how they will get there.
What obstacles will they face?
How will they overcome them?
What will they do or say?
Its the same pleasure we get from mysteries, Marvel movies, and rewatching movies weve already seen.
Romance, with its prescribed endings, lets you enjoy the journey without worrying about the destination.
And those journeys, I discovered once I started reading romance, are extremely good.
Theyre full ofbanterandbarely suppressed longing.
Theyre full ofmillionairesanddukesandstrippers with hearts of gold.
And, yes, sometimes they are full of sex.
Some romances end with a chaste kiss.
Some demurely fade to black when a couple makes their way to the bedroom.
And some are fun and hot!
Because heres one thing that hasnt really changed since we were 14: Reading about sex is fun.
Or it can be, when the sex itself is fun.
Literary fiction has plenty of sex, but its rarely about the characters pleasure.
In romance, people get to have sex, and its good.
As good as the sex may be, its not there (only) to titillate.
These are stories about love, after all.
And sex can be an important part of that.
In books and in life, sex is part of a story.
It advances plot, it reveals character.
Books dont need to be sad or challenging to be worthwhile.
