Confessions of a Romance Writer: I Don’t Really Like Hunks

There, I said it. I’m not taking it back, either. I get so sick of romance covers with men like this on the cover, as if bulging muscles are somehow a signifier of all the qualities that matter, like loyalty and honesty and humor and self-awareness and intelligence.

I get that romance is often considered the lazy woman’s fantasy, i.e., letting someone else do the work of creating a scenario and story for you. I get that cover artists (and publishers, and marketers) seem to think this means books need the visual cues of she-porn. I also get tired of a constant parade of images that are either (or both) inappropriate to the content within or shorthand for a fantasy I don’t happen to share.

I’m not saying I don’t like attractive men.  I like men with nice faces who are in decent physical condition–not emaciated, not obese. But there is just such a range in between, that is entirely ignored in favor of the “perfect” hero with broad shoulders, a six-pack, veiny forearms, and narrow hips.  I dare you to name me five romances off the top of your head where the hero did not have three of the four. I can’t do it.

And I know I can’t do it, because so many writers spend so much time describing the hero in all his physical glory. It’s always the same, and it’s always unexciting because the descriptions of perfect manliness do not allow the heroine to be appreciative of what is special about her man. And all I can think when I read those descriptions, especially if the hero is not like 22 and is any kind of dissolute, is how? How is he so perfectly muscled and has no hint of a beer belly and has these huge muscles even though he’s a fencer (if he is shown exercising at all)? It’s not realistic, and I am supposed to believe he just magically has that body while doing everything he can to wreck his health via his lifestyle? I guess it’s the same magic that allows the heroine to never put on a pound or be starving in a garrett but still voluptuous.

And I don’t buy it as a reader, and I never have.

I also dislike the expectation that that is the man I am supposed to be attracted to, as a woman. I have always preferred runners, swimmers, soccer players–men with sleek, athletic bodies but not a lot of muscle. And I like nerdy guys who are naturally thin because they forget to eat while they’re gaming/reading/playing their instrument…I like guys who are natural teddy bears, a bit overweight but also strong, capable dudes, and I like guys who are naturally big-muscled because they are big-boned burly dudes. Honestly, about the only guys I’ve not found myself attracted to in real life over the years are the ones described in romance novels!  I have just always looked at guys with the big bulging muscles and no fat and the slim hips and six-packs and just been…kind of grossed out. It doesn’t look natural. It looks like something a man works for, and to me it’s a big red flag that a guy is stuck on himself or stuck on appearances if he puts that much effort into his own appearance. What’s he going to demand of me, or what are his priorities going to be, or is he going to be as much fun to be with as a guy with 20 more pounds but a hobby I like more than working out?

I think what especially bothers me about the way men are described in romance is that women are supposed to be turned on by things like humor and not so much by appearances…I know I am much more attracted to mental qualities. There’s a certain level of attractiveness I need, but it can take many shapes and sizes, and beyond that it’s about the person. I know romance is part fantasy, but must the fantasy always be the same?

Beyond that, even, these men are all…the same. They are interchangeable. It’s kind of demeaning, really. And, again, unrealistic, especially if you have a group of friends all getting their turn at being a hero. Take any group of friends, and there’s going to be some natural variance. If there’s not…it’s like Stepford Wives, except in this case Stepford Heroes.

I’m sorry, I’d prefer a real man.

I’m going to let Longmire be my last word on over-developed masculine physiques in romance:

Novel-In-Progress Status Update

My draft thus far just topped 60K words. Twice as long as the longest thing I’ve written till now. 

I have pretty much hit the point where all the set-up is taken care of, and from here on it is action that pulls in one strand or another until or knocks out one situation that has been foreshadowed or another. So that’s good.

What’s bad is that I was so very far off my initial estimate of this being a 75K word story…yeah, my document word total (which includes all notes and pre-drafted scenes) is up to that already.  Oops.  Either this will end up being a romance at the long end of average (100K), or I am going to have some serious trimming to do when I get into edits, or both.

On the up side, I haven’t really run into any situations where I realized I have to go back and re-write a character’s motivation or an earlier incident. That’s a direct effect, I think, of knowing the entire story going in.  So while I may have a few scenes where I need to make the motivation more (or less) visible, that’s just…basic revision. For the most part I think revision will not be rewriting or restructuring so much as tightening.

On a curious note, I’m realizing that I have very little of the content that hallmarks so many romance novels–hardly any descriptions of the hero’s tight bum or rock-hard abs, and almost no references to the heroine’s bosom, of either the heaving or the quivering variety.  I don’t know how much of that will get added in later when I do the “sexual tension” swoop. Perhaps I really do simply write like Jane Austen plus a sex scene or two.  Or perhaps it is simply that these characters are too busy becoming friends who trust and rely on one another to spend that much time dwelling on their physical attraction?

In terms of how much more I have to write, there are at minimum 18 separate scenes still to go, and that number might expand with a few more bridge scenes (although perhaps not).  Of those 18, fully half are pre-drafted in full or in part, so I would say that at this point I am probably 2/3 of the way through writing the first draft. I would really love to have it finished by the end of March–that would meet my goal of spending a quarter of the year on each project I plan to publish in 2012–and while that’s not unattainable, it is not perhaps the most realistic of goals. It would require something close to NaNoWriMo level dedication.  Perhaps I will find it…or perhaps I will need April, as well, on the excuse that my other planned publications are all novellas.

I think seeing the end in sight (seeing the 18 scenes listed out makes me realize how little else but those scenes I will need to write, and how easy most of them should be) will be inspiring.  And perhaps one of these days my muse will pull himself out of the gutter. Then again, when he does that it might well come with a storm of new ideas for new projects, and for now I need to focus on finishing up what I’ve started!

So Sick Even My Muse Is Turned Off

Faithless bastard. Here I have had a wonderful 2 days at home, and he is nowhere in sight! I could have written so many words…instead my thoughts have been trickling and wavering and falling off cliffs like a derailed train.

Le sigh.

The good news is I’m feeling better enough today to slog through a boring bridge scene that I don’t need Musie for, and hopefully back to normal writing AND blogging tomorrow. If not, then by next week.

“And Your Bird Can Sing” about Why Artists Shouldn’t Judge Their Own Work

I’ve been on a Beatles kick lately. It’s beause I have recently acquired 90% of their albums–I had Sgt. Pepper’s since high school on CD, but not any of their others, and the tapes I had previous to that had long since been lost/disintegrated/become obsolete by the means I have to play them–and I’ve been working through their entire catalog of songs, many of which I hadn’t heard despite growing up listening to them with my dad, on my own, and with my best friend’s dad who is an archetypal Beatles Fanboi. I have somewhat unwillingly found myself picking up pieces of trivia about the band members themselves, their attitudes, their inspirations. I don’t care about that stuff (but that’s another post)–I just sometimes see it when I pull up a youtube video of a specific song and it’s in the description, or if I’m skimming their Wiki page to remind myself the year of release for a given song or album or something.

Anyway, one of my new favorite songs is “And Your Bird Can Sing,” and it’s one of the songs about which I accidentally saw some background.

The Wiki entry says something to the effect of “John dismissed it later, called it a throwaway song or a box of nothing in bright packaging.”  One youtube video I watched (just to listen to it at work) lists theories of what inspired the song, and the theories sort of back up Lennon’s point–they are all so lame. The most memorable was ”Mick Jaggers’ girlfriend who was in a band.”

Both of those pieces of information (Lennon’s words and the fan theories) reinforce my belief that, as a consumer of art, you never want to know what actually inspired a piece or what it meant to the artist, and that as an artist you shouldn’t try to judge your own work. It doesn’t matter what it meant to the artist; what matters is what it means to the people who invest themselve in it.

Being dismissive of one’s own work when people love it reminds me a bit of Kaylee in theFireflyepisode “Safe House”:  “If that’s what you think of this life, then what must you think of them that choose it?”  I mean, if “nothing in bright packaging” was what Lennon thought of that song, and presumably some of his other songs, then what did he think of the people who loved them and found meaning in them? Did he dismiss them, too, find them easily fooled by the pretty words and prettier guitar licks?

I mean, I kind of get the whole “I don’t want to be worshipped” thing. In high school I had classmates who talked about me like I was someone special for being smart, but to me, it wasn’t something special. It’s what I was born, it’s what I had always been, and in my own eyes grades or test scores I got as a result of being smart enough to remember facts without studying was not something to be proud of, because it was easy for me. I didn’t want to be admired for what I couldn’t help being. So I can understand the perspective of an artist who sees their work as disposable, as not something to be admired or lauded because it came to them easy, and to see the people who look at it and think it meant something or is something worth admiring you for creating are just…fools. I can see that.

But the flip side is, when someone doesn’t know what depth (or lack thereof) created a piece of art…when they don’t have anything but that piece to look at…it might mean something to them. Its value to them is entirely separate from its value to the artist; the observer cannot see the effort (or lack thereof) that went into the piece. All they have is the piece, and what it makes them as observer think or feel or see.

In my opinion it’s arrogant for an artist to be dismissive of their own work once they have published it. Once it’s in the world, interacting with people other than yourself and those who know you well enough to guess where the work came from, it’s beyond your reach. Whatever meaning it had to you, it can still have for you…as an observer of the piece.  But you can’t control what others find in your work, and you shouldn’t try. I appreciate the authors and directors who create ambiguous or obtuse works and just smile when people ask what it meant. What matters is not what it meant to them that created it…what matters is what it means to those who observe it.

I know for me this song has a helluva lot more meaning to it than nothing in a bright package.  Sorry, John–that wasn’t for you to decide, my love.

Excuse me, the Oxford comma is SO still necessary

I am an unabashed enthusiast of the Oxford comma. The reason is simple: punctuation exists to make your meaning clear. The Oxford comma–for you grammar heathens out there, the Oxford comma is the comma that precedes “and final item in a list of three or more”–is a tool of disambiguation, and as such deserves to be retained in common usage.

I find examples like this one in reviews I read fairly often:

As a follow up to the excellent Under Witch Moon, I expected more interesting adventures of the witch Adriel, her friend the shifter and her more than friend, White Feather.

We’ll just ignore the dangling modifier that begins the sentence and look directly at the list. Is she talking about two people here, or three?  We have the witch Adriel, and then we have…her friend the shifter (unnamed) and White Feather, who is more than a friend, or do we have White Feather her shifter friend who is actually more than a friend?  Part of the problem there is the inconsistent application of names, but mostly the problem is the lack of disambiguation between items 2 and 3 in the list. THE OXFORD COMMA SOLVES THIS PROBLEM.

For those of you who prefer visual humor, this illustration sums up the issues quite perfectly:

I stand strong in support of the serial comma!

I need a blog badge for that. Oxford comma 4-evah!