In this week's adventures climbing the cliffs of insanity, I slip into romance novelist mode and talk about them in relation to geek girls, a subject I've covered before but it's a bit of a crusade of mine. Also included is the end of the controversy over Orson Scott Card writing Superman, more bloggers weighing in on the repeated fridging of Lois Lane, and a momfail moment as the eldest son and I watch Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Part 2.
As I've said before, I'm somewhat of an anomaly among writers. I'm a geek and a romance novelist. Oddly, it's far easier to explain to romance novelists that I'm geeky than it is to explain to geek girls why I write romance novels.
Why is this? Mainly because romance novels are often seen as not-female friendly by those who don't read them. The women get rescued! Fabio is on all the covers! They're formulaic and uninteresting! The sex is purple prose!
And, right now, Twilight is getting much of that romance novel hate, especially as it takes a geeky genre, the vampire tale, and spins it into a teenage girl's dream. There are some problematic issues in Twilight, articulated extremely will in this discussion on Gail Simone's forum at Jinxworld. For a defense of the book, check out The Mary Sue, "In Defense of Being a Fan of Twilight." The comments on that article are typical of the ones that are generated against the series.
For me, the big problem with the series is that the lead character turns away from a chance to find out what she can grow up to be and instead becomes a supernatural being forever isolated from humanity.
But the appeal of the story to teenage girls is easy to see. Bella arrives in town, lonely as the new girl, and the two hottest guys on the planet (at least to her) think she is the greatest thing ever. Fiction has plenty of girl/boy/girl triangles. Look at Lana/Clark/Lois, for example, but only a few boy/girl/boy triangles. A famous example of that is likely Ranger/Steph/Morelli from Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum series. It's no surprise that Evanovich started her career writing romance novels or that the Plum series has a fervent and dedicated female fanbase.
But romance novels are (fill in with the pejorative of choice). Right?
Most of the words chosen will be misconceptions. The question is why the misconceptions are so common. The video above does a terrific job of concisely outlining the history of romance novels and how they were almost instantly slapped down by men. Women devoured them anyway and still do. Why?
Because it's the only genre in fiction that focuses on the women's story.
It is generally a courtship story, yes. But the vast majority of romance novels show a woman going through a transformation to a stronger, healthier person and emerging from her chrysalis as a someone worthy and able to be in a romantic relationship. She isn't saved because she falls in love. She's saved because the story takes her through a journey to where she's emotionally stable able to fall in love with the person who sees all her potential.
I speak about this with the fervor of the converted because aside from some Victoria Holt novels as a teen, I avoided romance and I especially avoided "those" books, the dreaded category romances. Until about ten years ago, my opinion held. And then someone insisted I would love J.D. Robb's In Death series. Futuristic police mystery? Well, that looked interesting. But I wouldn't buy the book until I checked the end and made sure the heroine saved herself, instead of being saved by the guy.
I read Naked in Death, fell deeply in book lust with Eve Dallas (I could write odes and make shrines to Eve Dallas, thank you, Nora Roberts) and promptly ordered every book in the series that was published at that time. After that, another friend suggested Jennifer Crusie. But I said "I don't like contemporary romance!" But she persisted, I picked up Tell Me Lies, fell in love with that at the point in the first chapter where the heroine is stabbing a frozen brownie that represents her lying, cheating husband, and ordered the rest of Crusie's books later that day.
Yet sometimes, I still need to remind myself to check my prejudices at the door.
I just finished judging the Romance Writers of America's Rita Contest for published novels. This is the romance genre equivalent of a Hugo Award. One of the books I received to judge was a category–definitely one of "those books." It had a silly title. And the hero was struggling with a serious condition. No way would it ever do it justice, I thought.
Wrong.
It was the best-written book in the stack.
I'm not alone in enjoying romance novels. Romance fiction was the largest share of the U.S. consumer market in 2011 at 14.3 percent. Romance fiction sales were an estimated 1.336 billion in 2012. Behind that was Religion/inspirational stories at $715 million, mystery at $709 million, science fiction/fantasy at $579 million and classic literary fiction at $467 million.
Notice that the romance fiction figure has billion in it, while the others have money expressed in millions. When I worked as an assistant manager for Barnes & Noble years ago, my store manager said that if he ever opened his own bookstore, it would be a romance book store because, I quote, "those women buy a ****load of books."
Romance readers love all genres: suspense, paranormal (vamps and werewolves), science fiction, contemporary, steampunk, sweet hometown stories, stories of women making it in the big city. It's all there. And, yes, tons of them are geeky. Jennifer Crusie? The one who first interested me in Buffy: The Vampire Slayer.
So bash Twilight because the end of the story isn't right or because elements in it bother you. Not because it has girl cooties or "vampires" sparkle or because, heaven forbid, it's something teenage girls like.
If I gave someone the latest Superman crossover, H'el on Earth, I'm fairly sure their reaction would be to roll their eyes and decide superhero comic books are dumb.
To be sure, romance novels have it all over superhero comics for strong female characters.
Psst...also, Fabio is so over.
Marketing Fail: Are You Sure This Is Romance?
I had a chance to read, several times, DC Comics Young Romance Valentine's Special this week. It was a good marketing idea. Put together superheroes in love, especially for Valentine's Day. It might have a chance to attract more female readers, especially with Wonder Woman on the cover.
Except for two problems:
1. It's Superman with Wonder Woman but it's Lois & Clark who are beloved outside the comic book readers and the story featuring Superman and Wonder Woman in this book is okay but nothing special.
2. The book is a downer overall, despite a nice sea tale featuring the husband and wife team of Aquaman and Mera, and a story with Batgirl and a guy from her new series that's left-opened ended. The rest of them? Sad face. If this is romance, they're doing it wrong.
Did I mention how much money romance novels make?
And the first problem brings me back to Superman....
Stop the Presses! Protest Works:Orson Scott Card's Superman Story In Limbo
First, the artist picked to draw Orson Scott Card's story in the upcoming digital first Superman series, Adventures of Superman, pulled out of the project. DC issued a statement saying they "will re-solicit the story at a later date when a new artist is hired." That effectively means Card's story is in a drawer with no scheduled time for when it will come out. In limbo and possibly shelved, in other words.
Card actively works to limit gay right, including gay marriage, and has made a number of homophobic statement, as I covered in an earlier column.
And Now to Superman's Better Half. Yes, Of Course, Lois:
I wrote about the pattern of killing Lois Lane off to cause Superman angst in an earlier column as well. These are two more great articles on the subject of fridging Lois Lane. From Sequential Tart: "What the Fridge?" I'll quote from a part of the excellent longer article by Sheena McNeil:
"One of the things that really gets me about this Fridging in particular is that Lois Lane is an icon and a role model for women, including women who don't play video games, read comics, and / or watch any Superman-based shows or movies. They have heard of Superman and, thus, they have heard of Lois Lane. Her reputation precedes her. She is more well-known than Mary Jane (the romantic interest for Spider-Man). While she has been a Damsel in Distress before, she's usually depicted as very smart, tough-as-nails, quick-witted, and unafraid, making her a good match for Superman. Only in a few short-lived offshoots was she portrayed as anything but strong. Oh, and by the way, Lois Lane first appeared in Action Comics #1 in 1938, in the same issue as Superman himself debuted."
Hmm...maybe this is related to the failure of DC to seek out female readers who might buy comics?
And from Comics Bulletin, an article entitled "Lois Lane, Refrigerators and Superman's Dick," by kyrax2.
I've been trying to think of a way to describe how it feels to be a woman and watch a female character you love and respect be brutalized, tortured or raped. It's not as though this is a new phenomenon. Women have been brutalized in comics - hell, in all kinds of media - as a plot device for a very long time. It's so common that it's a trope: "Women in refrigerators", used to describe when a female character is brutally killed or sexually assaulted, often purely in order to give a male character the motivation to do something "extreme". Still, there's something about coming across it once again being perpetrated on a widely-known and beloved character that makes me sick to my stomach.
Kyrax's solution, in an attempt to explain why this makes women a bit sick to their stomach, is to have men imagine what it might be like to continually read about Superman's private parts being cut off. It's an interesting comparison and worth reading.
All I can say is...Amy Adams? Maybe you can save us?
Oh, Frank Miller. Never Change
But away from Superman and over to Batman. The eldest son and I watched Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Part 2, the animated movie based on Frank Miller, Klaus Janson, and Lynn Varley's classic graphic tale of an older Batman trying to stave off anarchy in Gotham.
It was interesting watching with my son because he could see where parts of it had influenced the Nolan Batman movies. He pointed out the police in this Gotham did better with anarchy unleashed than the police in Batman: The Dark Knight Rises. Also, we agreed Gordon is awesome in this movie.
But he also noticed Frank Miller's somewhat skewed view of women, from overweight and useless Selina Kyle to the criminal that my son instantly dubbed "Swastika Boobs."
In one sequence, a disguised Batman takes on a couple of modern day Nazis and their leader, a woman with swastikas literally tattooed in red on each of her boobs. In the book, I think there's some general point about fascism as part of this. In the movie, it's simply a gratuitous sequence. I forgot the scene was in the book, so I thought this was a big momfail moment but instead my son was vastly amused, especially since the movie took care to never show the half-naked women's nipples.
So, two lessons.
Definitely this movie version is at least PG-13.
And, second, the book is better, especially since the video really skimps on the backgrounds in some scenes, as if they didn't have the budget to add more than sterile backgrounds. The story retains its power, though diluted, and gives Bruce Wayne a happy ending (well, happy for Batman), still working to save Gotham. And Jim Gordon gets a happily ever after, which is more than in the comics, where his wife was killed off, at least pre-reboot. Now, he's divorced, never re-married, and has a son who is a serial killer.
Jim Gordon probably misses Frank Miller.
