February 1, 2025 • 22 mins
It's February, and with Valentine's Day right around the corner, Nicole, Drew, Killian, and Amanda are chatting about the bestselling book genre - romance! Love it or hate it, most people have an opinion about romances, so tune in to find out what the Distracted Librarians look for in romances, why they love them (or don't), and more!
Want to join the conversation? Email us at distracted@btpl.org
Many thanks to BCTV for their support in recording, editing, and releasing this podcast; and to the Friends of the Library for sponsoring closed captioning on every episode.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
- [Nicole] Hey there.
Welcome to "The DistractedLibrarians" podcast.
We're your friendly neighborhood bookworms
with a penchant forall things pop culture.
- [Drew] Picture thisas our digital campfire,
where we dive into our latest obsessions,
analyze our favorite distractions,
and rediscover the joy of reading.
- [Killian] Whetheryou're a media enthusiast,
(00:20):
a book lover, or just need abreak from the daily grind,
you've come to the right spot.
- [Amanda] So kick back, relax,
and get delightfully distracted with us.
- [Nicole] Hey, everybody.
On this episode, we willbe talking about romance.
- [Drew] Hey.
- [Nicole] I know we havesome romance lovers here.
(hosts laughing)
(00:40):
Definitely, and actually it's funny
because I started lookinginto some of the stuff
that I was reading and I'm like,
"I guess there's some romance on here."
It's all weird, but it'sstill romance, right?
So there are lots ofdifferent types of romance.
There's some like really, reallynichey, that's not a word,
(01:02):
but like some very specific things.
- [Drew] Yes, yeah.
- [Nicole] That you canlook for in romance,
pretty much anything that you could ever
possibly be interested in, right?
- [Drew] Yes, the one of thethings that I like the most
about romance is that it gives you
form tropes to a certain extent.
So if an author wants to writeabout literally anything,
(01:26):
there's something forher, for them to follow.
- [Nicole] Okay.
- [Drew] There's a wayto make that path happen,
and I feel like I read abouta lot of different things
than you find in general fiction,
because there's the pathway for it.
- [Nicole] Well, it isdefinitely a very popular genre.
(01:48):
When I worked in bookstores, oh my gosh,
there were these people,these women that would come in
and they would buy every single new book,
'cause they would come out like monthly.
They would get thesemonthly romance novels
and there would be a stack,sometimes two stacks,
and they would just be spending all
of the money on these romance books.
(02:10):
- [Killian] Well, don'tfully quote me on this
because I have not fullyfact checked myself recently,
but I do know that I've heard
from several differentplaces that romance is
the top selling genre.
- [Nicole] The number one genre.
- [Killian] Like it's thenumber one genre of books.
It is just that popular.
(02:30):
- [Nicole] Definitely.
- [Killian] And it's, that'salways interesting to me
because the way we viewthat sometimes gets
a little weird given how popular it is.
- [Nicole] Yeah, for sure.
- [Killian] It's almostlike we don't like it
because it's popular.
- [Drew] Or it gets a little gendered, or.
- [Nicole] Yeah, yeah, for sure.
All right, well, whatdo you guys like to read
when you read romance?
(02:53):
- [Drew] I stay pretty, pretty firmly
in the contemporary vein.
- [Nicole] Okay.
- [Drew] And often thequeer and LGBTQ vein.
I think there's a lot ofinteresting things to be found
in the, like the suspense,the lit-fic romance
where you don't reallyknow how it's gonna end,
the historical romance,and I'll dabble in those,
(03:15):
but my happy place isthe sort of contemporary,
drawn illustration covers.
- [Nicole] Okay.
- [Drew] Yeah.
- [Nicole] Cool.
- [Killian] Drew andI have that in common.
I will, I think I ventureoutside of that a little bit more
than Drew does.- [Drew] You certainly do.
- [Killian] But it's definitelythe very comfortable space.
(03:37):
It's the area where I knowI can, if I pick up a book
that I don't necessarily know a ton about,
I can still identify those books as like,
yeah, I'm probably gonna like this.
- [Nicole] Yeah.
- [Killian] Whereas youstart getting outside of
that contemporary queerromances and I'm like, hmm.
(03:58):
We have to look into it a bit more.
- [Nicole] Cool.
- [Amanda] So I like, becauseromances tend to be formulaic,
I like when they present something new.
So it's like, gimme a new factor, please,
which tends to be contemporary romance.
So something I read recently was,
(04:20):
"On The Plus Side" by Jenny L. Howe.
Did anyone read that?
- [Nicole] No.
- [Amanda] Very adorable.
Essentially it is someonewho is on a makeover show
for plus size people, larger people,
and it's just the idea thatit's very body positive.
(04:41):
It's very, you know, why are we even
doing like, a makeover show?
It sort of takes amakeover show and puts it,
turns it upside down, putsit on its head and says,
"Okay, it's really about ifyou're reaching your goals
"for your life and howyou feel about yourself
"and not about how you look."
(05:01):
So, and of course there wasa romance built into that.
- [Nicole] Yes, of course.
- [Amanda] And yeah, it was very cute.
Yeah, for when you want something cute.
- [Nicole] Nice.
I am a big fan of the romantasy
slash spooky romance stuff.
(05:25):
Everything's gotta be spooky.
I don't know what's going on with me,
(Drew laughing)
but like, I was tryingto pull a list together
for this topic today, and I was talking to
one of my coworkers and I was like,
"No one would ever thinkthat this book was a romance,
"but it is romantic to me,"
so I'm going with it.
It's "Heart-Shaped Box" byJoe Hill, which is funny.
(05:48):
This is me throwing it back to Emily.
Emily would agree, would'veagreed with me 100%.
It is like terrifying,absolutely terrifying,
but the relationship between the male
and the female character, like it is like
love like nobody else's business, so.
- [Drew] I love that for you.
(06:08):
- [Nicole] I got a twisted thing going.
I don't know, it's weird, but.
- [Amanda] Well, what'syour definition of romance?
I mean, how does it?
- [Nicole] They, inthis book in particular,
they go through some stuffbecause there's a ghost
that's trying to kill them.
Okay.
But the female, the girl, his girlfriend,
(06:31):
she is there with himthrough thick and thin
through the entire thing,
and there are atrociouslyhorrible things happening,
and she is still there with him.
At one point he is like,
"Go away, leave me todie because this ghost
"wants to kill me and me alone,"
and she's like,
"No, I'm not leaving you."
So there's like this loyalty there,
all the way to the very endthat is like, really sweet,
(06:54):
amidst all of that other chaos.
- [Drew] I will choose to accept this,
(hosts laughing)
and take your word for it.
- [Nicole] I know.
I'm just gonna start it off with that.
All right, anybody else?
What's a romance?
Let's talk about someromances you guys liked.
- [Drew] One of my morerecent favorites was
"Romantic Comedy" by Curtis Sittenfeld.
It is on the set of afictional version of "SNL,"
(07:18):
so the whole like oneweek to reset everything
and get all the storiestogether and get the actors
on board and everythingand just what it takes
to turn around a show like that,
but in the middle of it starts a romance
between one of the staff writers
and the host slash musical guest.
(07:40):
- [Nicole] Okay.
- [Drew] It is so interesting.
The first part of the storytakes place just over that week
and the, like late night writing sessions
and picking each other's brains
and realizing that there'san attraction there,
and then the story jumpsinto COVID lockdown.
- [Nicole] Okay.
(08:01):
- [Drew] And there's agood like 50, 60 pages
of epistolary emails back and forth.
Done so well because if you've ever done
that sort of communication,you know that those messages
just build and build andbuild because suddenly
you're responding to likeeight different things,
and it's a really, really cute story.
(08:21):
- [Nicole] Nice.
Anything else?
- [Nicole] I recentlyread "The Paying Guests"
by Sarah Waters.
- [Drew] Okay.
- [Nicole] Again, probablynot what anyone would consider
a romance, but it's romantic to me.
This was on the list thatjust came out recently.
(08:43):
It was the "New York Times"Best Books of the 20th Century.
- [Drew] Nice.
- [Nicole] And it was authorsand publishers and people
in the bookish realm of things
that all submitted their favorite books,
and then they compiled this list.
So "The Paying Guests," thisbook is really interesting
(09:04):
because it is set in England,
and I believe it's in likemaybe the '40s and the family,
it's a woman and her motherare living in this home
and it's in a nice area of London,
(09:24):
and the father dies and he leaves them
with a bunch of debt.
So they have to starttaking paying guests.
So basically they'reallowing people to come
and live in their home with 'em.
- [Drew] Nice.
- [Amanda] And a couple moves in upstairs
and they're very bohemian and different,
and like, they're stuffy downstairs
(09:45):
and they're cool upstairs.
So the female char, theyoung, the woman character,
she falls in love withthe woman from upstairs
who is married to this man,and they have this affair at,
that's going on while he's at work,
and at one point they bump,accidentally bump him off,
(10:07):
and then the whole restof it is trying to like,
figure out how to getout of being in trouble
for bumping off the husband.
- [Amanda] Accidentally, that alone.
And I'm interested, like I.
- [Drew] I love this.
- [Nicole] It's, like, it's really,
it's just a page turner.
Yeah, it's one of those like,
"Oh my gosh, what have you done?
(10:28):
"How are you gonna getyourself out of this?"
And it's fantastic.
I really loved it.
- [Drew] You know that meme of the mom
from "Arrested Development" saying,
"Good for her?"
- [Amanda] Yeah.
- [Drew] That's how I feel in this moment.
- [Amanda] Yes, yes, sothat was a good one for me.
Again, not like aromance, fluffy, whatever.
It's got murder and yeah,they love each other.
(10:52):
- [Killian] I'm gonna jumpinto tropey romances again
because my bread and butter.- [Drew] As you should.
- [Killian] So I like familiar characters.
I like the series ofromances that it's like,
it starts with these charactersand then the next book
is like somewhat adjacent to them,
because I also like seeing the characters
(11:13):
from the first book whenthey're happy and everything.
I like revisiting them.
So one of my favorites is the"Written in the Stars" series
by Alexandria Bellefleur,which when we've,
when I first boughtthis series, Drew and I
were at Barnes and Noble and it was like,
the staff pick recommendationwas just written for me.
(11:36):
It was just screaming Killian,
this is the book for you,
and then I bought it and thendidn't read it for months,
and then I read it and loved it,
and it starts out with a very like,
"Pride and Prejudice,""Bridget Jones' Diary"-esque
storyline about thesewomen named Darcy and Elle.
(11:58):
We see the connections already.
- [Drew] Sure do.
- [Killian] And I love"Pride and Prejudice."
I will, you tell me something's
a "Pride and Prejudice" retelling,
I will read it no matter what,
and it follows through with these two
on this fake dating journey and like,
it's so cute because they're so opposite
(12:22):
and, but they're tryingto convince everyone
that they're togetherand then it follows the,
you get their story and then the next book
you get stories from other characters,
and the third book you getstories from another character,
and I love tropes and Ilove familiar characters
and being able to justfollow through like that.
(12:43):
Another book that I had talkedabout in a previous episode
with the Ashley Herring Blake books,
her "Delilah Green Doesn'tCare" was the first book
in that series, and it's a similar thing
where you see characters throughout it
and trilogies like thatclearly are my thing
and always will be.
- [Drew] I think we would alsobe remiss to not talk about
(13:07):
the other aspect of romance,the trade paperbacks,
the Nora Roberts and theDebbie Macombers of the world,
because that's probably thebiggest reason that romance
is that genre in terms of publishing.
My mother was so, I don'twant to say addicted,
(13:28):
I'm just gonna say addicted.
She was addicted to those.
She had multiple bookcases devoted to it.
She has since become aKindle Unlimited person,
and has purged all of those books away,
and my father is veryhappy because he is not one
for the books as an aestheticmotif of homemaking,
(13:49):
but those were very muchher world for a long time,
and I think in some ways still are.
Maybe not the same authors, but yeah,
those are super popular.
We have patrons whocome in with their list
of 30 authors that they follow,and just run through them
(14:10):
every time they're in front of the catalog
looking for the next one.
- [Nicole] I always lovedthe, that they'd bring in
a notebook and they'd have the books
and they'd have everythingwritten down that they've read
so that they don't rereadanything on accident.
That used to happen at thebookstore all the time.
This lady would come in withlike, this bundle of like
paper and a pencil and she'dbe like marking everything off.
(14:31):
It's like, it's crazywhen you realize how much
you're actually reading and how much,
like how much you're spending.
Like, we use the library,but I can't even imagine
spending that much moneyon books 'cause, you know,
we're always there at the library but.
- [Amanda] Why do you think that is?
Like, why is romance such a thing?
I mean like, you clearlylike spooky stuff.
(14:54):
- [Nicole] I'm allowed tothrow some love in there too,
- [Amanda] Which is lovely.
- [Nicole] It's still the sameas what I usually read, just.
- [Amanda] But I mean, it'slike why go for the escapism
of romance versus escapism oflike horror or something else?
- [Nicole] Yeah, I don't know.
- [Drew] I think it has a lot to do with
the safety and the comfort of it.
Romance, almost more than any other genre,
(15:16):
relies on its tropes, and you sort of know
what you're getting going in.
You're getting best friends tolovers and enemies to lovers,
a fake dating, a secondchance, the only one bed trope.
You know what you're getting,and that's comforting a lot
to me in a way of like,I don't have to devote
(15:42):
as much energy to figuring out where I am.
I can just ride the ride.
- [Killian] Well and mostcommonly for something
to really be considered aromance, maybe it's getting less
that way as we start blending genres now,
but for the longest timeit was, you're guaranteed
a happily ever after or atleast a happily for now,
(16:03):
and so when you go into something knowing
it's gonna be okay,that's really reassuring,
'cause I don't know, there'sa lot of books out there
that I pick up and I am justlike, how have we gotten here?
I don't, this is not what I signed up for,
but we're here now, and with romance with,
(16:24):
especially in those contemporary romances
and in the more stereotypical romances,
it's, you know what you're signing up for.
You know what you're getting, and I mean,
for me I know, I just, I like love.
I like a love story.
They make me cry, butthey make me very happy,
(16:44):
and that's why I like them,and I think that's also
the case for a lot of people.
- [Nicole] For sure.
- [Killian] It's just, we like love.
- [Nicole] Yeah, and there'sthe, that cozy aspect
that I think is there too,and then there are books
that are like touted asbeing cozy, which I'm like,
but there's already cozy stuff out there,
(17:05):
but this is extra cozy.
- [Drew] Well you can also get
the other end of the dark romances
and the ones where they arenot so nice to each other.
The Mafia may or may not be involved,
as is customary.(Nicole laughing)
- [Nicole] Of course.
- [Drew] But then you canfind, much like the ones
you were listing, booksin the romance section
(17:25):
that will devastate youbefore they're okay.
- [Nicole] Yeah, for sure, yeah.
All right, do we have anymore that we wanna talk about?
- [Drew] Can I be a hater for a second?
- [Nicole] Yeah, please.
- [Drew] I loathe the third act breakup.
- [Nicole] Like they break upright before the end of it?
(17:45):
- [Killian] They've gotten together
and then they break up again.
- [Drew] So the third actbreakup is what a lot of
traditionally published romance will use
as like the final hurdleof the relationship
where they run against the thing
that has been teased the whole book.
One of the character'sanxieties or alcoholism
(18:07):
or something, you know, anoutside force, an ex coming back,
whatever, that causes one or both of them
to walk away from therelationship, and then you get
two or three chapters of,oh, was that the best call?
But I miss them.
Oh, what should I do?
And then they're backtogether and it's like why,
why did you put me through this?
- [Nicole] To torture you.
- [Drew] I just want to behappy with my little books.
(18:29):
- [Nicole] That's, it's torture.
- [Killian] Well and sooften those come from like
miscommunication tropes, which I know
a lot of people really, really dislike.
I also hate the third act breakup a lot.
- [Drew] Yeah.
Miscommunication is hard in general
because you can see the outline of where
(18:51):
the core conflict iscoming from, like 30% in
the first time one of the characters
intentionally keepssomething to themselves.
- [Nicole] Oh yeah, oh for sure.
- [Drew] Or assumesthe worst of the person
they're with of like,
well, yeah, they say they're interested
but it's just physical.
(19:11):
They're, they couldn'tactually be interested, right.
Talk to them.
- [Nicole] Yeah, well, and as the reader,
we are well aware of all the things
'cause we have the full picture,
so we're just screaming at the book.
Like, will you just cut it out please?
But, yeah.
- [Drew] Yeah, I can liston like maybe two hands
the number of third act breakups
(19:32):
that have actually worked for me
because most often they either fall
into two categories.
It is either this is stupid
or I'm picking sides
and then I'm mad whenthey get back together,
because one of them doesn't deserve it.
- [Nicole] Oh my goodness.
(19:53):
- [Drew] I have more feelings about this
than I thought I didcoming into this episode.
- [Nicole] It's good to have feelings,
but I'm also reallycurious 'cause obviously
we know what trope Drew hates.
What's your favorite trope?
- [Drew] Fake dating.
- [Nicole] Okay.
- [Drew] Fake dating is so much fun.
It's just the little gaslighting as like.
(20:14):
- [Killian] A littlegaslighting as a treat.
- [Drew] As a treat, yes.
- [Nicole] Oh my goodness.
- [Killian] I'm glad I knew exactly
where that phrase was going.
- [Nicole] That's, I alsothink we know what our title
for this episode may end up being.
My goodness gracious.
- [Drew] But it's fun to bein on the secret with them,
and to see the ways thatthey try and hide it.
(20:37):
It's a little bit forbidden,but also kind of not because.
- [Nicole] Are we talkinglike "Bridgerton?"
- [Drew] A little, yeah.
- [Nicole] Like first seasonwhen they're pretending to be
to like each other, but theydon't, but they really do.
Okay, gotcha.
- [Killian] Yeah, I alsolove a good fake dating,
(20:57):
I, when it is done well - andit's so hard to do it well -
love a second chance romance,but it's so hard to do it well
because it's, you have tobe able to overcome the
something happened and it didn't work.
You have to convince me thatit can now, and that's hard.
(21:18):
- [Nicole] For sure.
- [Drew] And not only youhave to convince me that
the circumstances have changedenough for it to work now,
you have to convince me thatboth of these characters
deserve to find lovebecause I don't believe that
of all of them.
I did say this was hater hour.
- [Amanda] You did.
- [Nicole] All right.
(21:38):
Well, thanks for listeningand we'll see you next time.
Thank you for joining us for this episode
of "Distracted Librarians."
- [Drew] Many thanks to BCTVfor their support in recording,
editing and releasing this podcast,
and to the Friends of the Library
for sponsoring closedcaptioning on every episode.
- [Killian] If you have anyquestions or suggestions,
feel free to reach out tous at distracted@btpl.org.
(22:03):
- [Amanda] Until then,keep those pages turning
and those screens lighting up.
We'll catch you in the next episode.
- [Emily] The views and opinions expressed
in the "DistractedLibrarians" podcast do not
necessarily reflect thoseof Bloomfield Township,
Bloomfield Township Public Library,
Bloomfield Community Television,
the Birmingham Area Cable Board,
or its producers or production staff.
- [Nicole] Hey there.
Welcome to "The DistractedLibrarians" podcast.
We're your friendly neighborhood bookworms
with a penchant forall things pop culture.
- [Drew] Picture thisas our digital campfire,
where we dive into our latest obsessions,
analyze our favorite distractions,
and rediscover the joy of reading.
- [Killian] Whetheryou're a media enthusiast,
(00:20):
a book lover, or just need abreak from the daily grind,
you've come to the right spot.
- [Amanda] So kick back, relax,
and get delightfully distracted with us.
- [Nicole] Hey, everybody.
On this episode, we willbe talking about romance.
- [Drew] Hey.
- [Nicole] I know we havesome romance lovers here.
(hosts laughing)
(00:40):
Definitely, and actually it's funny
because I started lookinginto some of the stuff
that I was reading and I'm like,
"I guess there's some romance on here."
It's all weird, but it'sstill romance, right?
So there are lots ofdifferent types of romance.
There's some like really, reallynichey, that's not a word,
(01:02):
but like some very specific things.
- [Drew] Yes, yeah.
- [Nicole] That you canlook for in romance,
pretty much anything that you could ever
possibly be interested in, right?
- [Drew] Yes, the one of thethings that I like the most
about romance is that it gives you
form tropes to a certain extent.
So if an author wants to writeabout literally anything,
(01:26):
there's something forher, for them to follow.
- [Nicole] Okay.
- [Drew] There's a wayto make that path happen,
and I feel like I read abouta lot of different things
than you find in general fiction,
because there's the pathway for it.
- [Nicole] Well, it isdefinitely a very popular genre.
(01:48):
When I worked in bookstores, oh my gosh,
there were these people,these women that would come in
and they would buy every single new book,
'cause they would come out like monthly.
They would get thesemonthly romance novels
and there would be a stack,sometimes two stacks,
and they would just be spending all
of the money on these romance books.
(02:10):
- [Killian] Well, don'tfully quote me on this
because I have not fullyfact checked myself recently,
but I do know that I've heard
from several differentplaces that romance is
the top selling genre.
- [Nicole] The number one genre.
- [Killian] Like it's thenumber one genre of books.
It is just that popular.
(02:30):
- [Nicole] Definitely.
- [Killian] And it's, that'salways interesting to me
because the way we viewthat sometimes gets
a little weird given how popular it is.
- [Nicole] Yeah, for sure.
- [Killian] It's almostlike we don't like it
because it's popular.
- [Drew] Or it gets a little gendered, or.
- [Nicole] Yeah, yeah, for sure.
All right, well, whatdo you guys like to read
when you read romance?
(02:53):
- [Drew] I stay pretty, pretty firmly
in the contemporary vein.
- [Nicole] Okay.
- [Drew] And often thequeer and LGBTQ vein.
I think there's a lot ofinteresting things to be found
in the, like the suspense,the lit-fic romance
where you don't reallyknow how it's gonna end,
the historical romance,and I'll dabble in those,
(03:15):
but my happy place isthe sort of contemporary,
drawn illustration covers.
- [Nicole] Okay.
- [Drew] Yeah.
- [Nicole] Cool.
- [Killian] Drew andI have that in common.
I will, I think I ventureoutside of that a little bit more
than Drew does.- [Drew] You certainly do.
- [Killian] But it's definitelythe very comfortable space.
(03:37):
It's the area where I knowI can, if I pick up a book
that I don't necessarily know a ton about,
I can still identify those books as like,
yeah, I'm probably gonna like this.
- [Nicole] Yeah.
- [Killian] Whereas youstart getting outside of
that contemporary queerromances and I'm like, hmm.
(03:58):
We have to look into it a bit more.
- [Nicole] Cool.
- [Amanda] So I like, becauseromances tend to be formulaic,
I like when they present something new.
So it's like, gimme a new factor, please,
which tends to be contemporary romance.
So something I read recently was,
(04:20):
"On The Plus Side" by Jenny L. Howe.
Did anyone read that?
- [Nicole] No.
- [Amanda] Very adorable.
Essentially it is someonewho is on a makeover show
for plus size people, larger people,
and it's just the idea thatit's very body positive.
(04:41):
It's very, you know, why are we even
doing like, a makeover show?
It sort of takes amakeover show and puts it,
turns it upside down, putsit on its head and says,
"Okay, it's really about ifyou're reaching your goals
"for your life and howyou feel about yourself
"and not about how you look."
(05:01):
So, and of course there wasa romance built into that.
- [Nicole] Yes, of course.
- [Amanda] And yeah, it was very cute.
Yeah, for when you want something cute.
- [Nicole] Nice.
I am a big fan of the romantasy
slash spooky romance stuff.
(05:25):
Everything's gotta be spooky.
I don't know what's going on with me,
(Drew laughing)
but like, I was tryingto pull a list together
for this topic today, and I was talking to
one of my coworkers and I was like,
"No one would ever thinkthat this book was a romance,
"but it is romantic to me,"
so I'm going with it.
It's "Heart-Shaped Box" byJoe Hill, which is funny.
(05:48):
This is me throwing it back to Emily.
Emily would agree, would'veagreed with me 100%.
It is like terrifying,absolutely terrifying,
but the relationship between the male
and the female character, like it is like
love like nobody else's business, so.
- [Drew] I love that for you.
(06:08):
- [Nicole] I got a twisted thing going.
I don't know, it's weird, but.
- [Amanda] Well, what'syour definition of romance?
I mean, how does it?
- [Nicole] They, inthis book in particular,
they go through some stuffbecause there's a ghost
that's trying to kill them.
Okay.
But the female, the girl, his girlfriend,
(06:31):
she is there with himthrough thick and thin
through the entire thing,
and there are atrociouslyhorrible things happening,
and she is still there with him.
At one point he is like,
"Go away, leave me todie because this ghost
"wants to kill me and me alone,"
and she's like,
"No, I'm not leaving you."
So there's like this loyalty there,
all the way to the very endthat is like, really sweet,
(06:54):
amidst all of that other chaos.
- [Drew] I will choose to accept this,
(hosts laughing)
and take your word for it.
- [Nicole] I know.
I'm just gonna start it off with that.
All right, anybody else?
What's a romance?
Let's talk about someromances you guys liked.
- [Drew] One of my morerecent favorites was
"Romantic Comedy" by Curtis Sittenfeld.
It is on the set of afictional version of "SNL,"
(07:18):
so the whole like oneweek to reset everything
and get all the storiestogether and get the actors
on board and everythingand just what it takes
to turn around a show like that,
but in the middle of it starts a romance
between one of the staff writers
and the host slash musical guest.
(07:40):
- [Nicole] Okay.
- [Drew] It is so interesting.
The first part of the storytakes place just over that week
and the, like late night writing sessions
and picking each other's brains
and realizing that there'san attraction there,
and then the story jumpsinto COVID lockdown.
- [Nicole] Okay.
(08:01):
- [Drew] And there's agood like 50, 60 pages
of epistolary emails back and forth.
Done so well because if you've ever done
that sort of communication,you know that those messages
just build and build andbuild because suddenly
you're responding to likeeight different things,
and it's a really, really cute story.
(08:21):
- [Nicole] Nice.
Anything else?
- [Nicole] I recentlyread "The Paying Guests"
by Sarah Waters.
- [Drew] Okay.
- [Nicole] Again, probablynot what anyone would consider
a romance, but it's romantic to me.
This was on the list thatjust came out recently.
(08:43):
It was the "New York Times"Best Books of the 20th Century.
- [Drew] Nice.
- [Nicole] And it was authorsand publishers and people
in the bookish realm of things
that all submitted their favorite books,
and then they compiled this list.
So "The Paying Guests," thisbook is really interesting
(09:04):
because it is set in England,
and I believe it's in likemaybe the '40s and the family,
it's a woman and her motherare living in this home
and it's in a nice area of London,
(09:24):
and the father dies and he leaves them
with a bunch of debt.
So they have to starttaking paying guests.
So basically they'reallowing people to come
and live in their home with 'em.
- [Drew] Nice.
- [Amanda] And a couple moves in upstairs
and they're very bohemian and different,
and like, they're stuffy downstairs
(09:45):
and they're cool upstairs.
So the female char, theyoung, the woman character,
she falls in love withthe woman from upstairs
who is married to this man,and they have this affair at,
that's going on while he's at work,
and at one point they bump,accidentally bump him off,
(10:07):
and then the whole restof it is trying to like,
figure out how to getout of being in trouble
for bumping off the husband.
- [Amanda] Accidentally, that alone.
And I'm interested, like I.
- [Drew] I love this.
- [Nicole] It's, like, it's really,
it's just a page turner.
Yeah, it's one of those like,
"Oh my gosh, what have you done?
(10:28):
"How are you gonna getyourself out of this?"
And it's fantastic.
I really loved it.
- [Drew] You know that meme of the mom
from "Arrested Development" saying,
"Good for her?"
- [Amanda] Yeah.
- [Drew] That's how I feel in this moment.
- [Amanda] Yes, yes, sothat was a good one for me.
Again, not like aromance, fluffy, whatever.
It's got murder and yeah,they love each other.
(10:52):
- [Killian] I'm gonna jumpinto tropey romances again
because my bread and butter.- [Drew] As you should.
- [Killian] So I like familiar characters.
I like the series ofromances that it's like,
it starts with these charactersand then the next book
is like somewhat adjacent to them,
because I also like seeing the characters
(11:13):
from the first book whenthey're happy and everything.
I like revisiting them.
So one of my favorites is the"Written in the Stars" series
by Alexandria Bellefleur,which when we've,
when I first boughtthis series, Drew and I
were at Barnes and Noble and it was like,
the staff pick recommendationwas just written for me.
(11:36):
It was just screaming Killian,
this is the book for you,
and then I bought it and thendidn't read it for months,
and then I read it and loved it,
and it starts out with a very like,
"Pride and Prejudice,""Bridget Jones' Diary"-esque
storyline about thesewomen named Darcy and Elle.
(11:58):
We see the connections already.
- [Drew] Sure do.
- [Killian] And I love"Pride and Prejudice."
I will, you tell me something's
a "Pride and Prejudice" retelling,
I will read it no matter what,
and it follows through with these two
on this fake dating journey and like,
it's so cute because they're so opposite
(12:22):
and, but they're tryingto convince everyone
that they're togetherand then it follows the,
you get their story and then the next book
you get stories from other characters,
and the third book you getstories from another character,
and I love tropes and Ilove familiar characters
and being able to justfollow through like that.
(12:43):
Another book that I had talkedabout in a previous episode
with the Ashley Herring Blake books,
her "Delilah Green Doesn'tCare" was the first book
in that series, and it's a similar thing
where you see characters throughout it
and trilogies like thatclearly are my thing
and always will be.
- [Drew] I think we would alsobe remiss to not talk about
(13:07):
the other aspect of romance,the trade paperbacks,
the Nora Roberts and theDebbie Macombers of the world,
because that's probably thebiggest reason that romance
is that genre in terms of publishing.
My mother was so, I don'twant to say addicted,
(13:28):
I'm just gonna say addicted.
She was addicted to those.
She had multiple bookcases devoted to it.
She has since become aKindle Unlimited person,
and has purged all of those books away,
and my father is veryhappy because he is not one
for the books as an aestheticmotif of homemaking,
(13:49):
but those were very muchher world for a long time,
and I think in some ways still are.
Maybe not the same authors, but yeah,
those are super popular.
We have patrons whocome in with their list
of 30 authors that they follow,and just run through them
(14:10):
every time they're in front of the catalog
looking for the next one.
- [Nicole] I always lovedthe, that they'd bring in
a notebook and they'd have the books
and they'd have everythingwritten down that they've read
so that they don't rereadanything on accident.
That used to happen at thebookstore all the time.
This lady would come in withlike, this bundle of like
paper and a pencil and she'dbe like marking everything off.
(14:31):
It's like, it's crazywhen you realize how much
you're actually reading and how much,
like how much you're spending.
Like, we use the library,but I can't even imagine
spending that much moneyon books 'cause, you know,
we're always there at the library but.
- [Amanda] Why do you think that is?
Like, why is romance such a thing?
I mean like, you clearlylike spooky stuff.
(14:54):
- [Nicole] I'm allowed tothrow some love in there too,
- [Amanda] Which is lovely.
- [Nicole] It's still the sameas what I usually read, just.
- [Amanda] But I mean, it'slike why go for the escapism
of romance versus escapism oflike horror or something else?
- [Nicole] Yeah, I don't know.
- [Drew] I think it has a lot to do with
the safety and the comfort of it.
Romance, almost more than any other genre,
(15:16):
relies on its tropes, and you sort of know
what you're getting going in.
You're getting best friends tolovers and enemies to lovers,
a fake dating, a secondchance, the only one bed trope.
You know what you're getting,and that's comforting a lot
to me in a way of like,I don't have to devote
(15:42):
as much energy to figuring out where I am.
I can just ride the ride.
- [Killian] Well and mostcommonly for something
to really be considered aromance, maybe it's getting less
that way as we start blending genres now,
but for the longest timeit was, you're guaranteed
a happily ever after or atleast a happily for now,
(16:03):
and so when you go into something knowing
it's gonna be okay,that's really reassuring,
'cause I don't know, there'sa lot of books out there
that I pick up and I am justlike, how have we gotten here?
I don't, this is not what I signed up for,
but we're here now, and with romance with,
(16:24):
especially in those contemporary romances
and in the more stereotypical romances,
it's, you know what you're signing up for.
You know what you're getting, and I mean,
for me I know, I just, I like love.
I like a love story.
They make me cry, butthey make me very happy,
(16:44):
and that's why I like them,and I think that's also
the case for a lot of people.
- [Nicole] For sure.
- [Killian] It's just, we like love.
- [Nicole] Yeah, and there'sthe, that cozy aspect
that I think is there too,and then there are books
that are like touted asbeing cozy, which I'm like,
but there's already cozy stuff out there,
(17:05):
but this is extra cozy.
- [Drew] Well you can also get
the other end of the dark romances
and the ones where they arenot so nice to each other.
The Mafia may or may not be involved,
as is customary.(Nicole laughing)
- [Nicole] Of course.
- [Drew] But then you canfind, much like the ones
you were listing, booksin the romance section
(17:25):
that will devastate youbefore they're okay.
- [Nicole] Yeah, for sure, yeah.
All right, do we have anymore that we wanna talk about?
- [Drew] Can I be a hater for a second?
- [Nicole] Yeah, please.
- [Drew] I loathe the third act breakup.
- [Nicole] Like they break upright before the end of it?
(17:45):
- [Killian] They've gotten together
and then they break up again.
- [Drew] So the third actbreakup is what a lot of
traditionally published romance will use
as like the final hurdleof the relationship
where they run against the thing
that has been teased the whole book.
One of the character'sanxieties or alcoholism
(18:07):
or something, you know, anoutside force, an ex coming back,
whatever, that causes one or both of them
to walk away from therelationship, and then you get
two or three chapters of,oh, was that the best call?
But I miss them.
Oh, what should I do?
And then they're backtogether and it's like why,
why did you put me through this?
- [Nicole] To torture you.
- [Drew] I just want to behappy with my little books.
(18:29):
- [Nicole] That's, it's torture.
- [Killian] Well and sooften those come from like
miscommunication tropes, which I know
a lot of people really, really dislike.
I also hate the third act breakup a lot.
- [Drew] Yeah.
Miscommunication is hard in general
because you can see the outline of where
(18:51):
the core conflict iscoming from, like 30% in
the first time one of the characters
intentionally keepssomething to themselves.
- [Nicole] Oh yeah, oh for sure.
- [Drew] Or assumesthe worst of the person
they're with of like,
well, yeah, they say they're interested
but it's just physical.
(19:11):
They're, they couldn'tactually be interested, right.
Talk to them.
- [Nicole] Yeah, well, and as the reader,
we are well aware of all the things
'cause we have the full picture,
so we're just screaming at the book.
Like, will you just cut it out please?
But, yeah.
- [Drew] Yeah, I can liston like maybe two hands
the number of third act breakups
(19:32):
that have actually worked for me
because most often they either fall
into two categories.
It is either this is stupid
or I'm picking sides
and then I'm mad whenthey get back together,
because one of them doesn't deserve it.
- [Nicole] Oh my goodness.
(19:53):
- [Drew] I have more feelings about this
than I thought I didcoming into this episode.
- [Nicole] It's good to have feelings,
but I'm also reallycurious 'cause obviously
we know what trope Drew hates.
What's your favorite trope?
- [Drew] Fake dating.
- [Nicole] Okay.
- [Drew] Fake dating is so much fun.
It's just the little gaslighting as like.
(20:14):
- [Killian] A littlegaslighting as a treat.
- [Drew] As a treat, yes.
- [Nicole] Oh my goodness.
- [Killian] I'm glad I knew exactly
where that phrase was going.
- [Nicole] That's, I alsothink we know what our title
for this episode may end up being.
My goodness gracious.
- [Drew] But it's fun to bein on the secret with them,
and to see the ways thatthey try and hide it.
(20:37):
It's a little bit forbidden,but also kind of not because.
- [Nicole] Are we talkinglike "Bridgerton?"
- [Drew] A little, yeah.
- [Nicole] Like first seasonwhen they're pretending to be
to like each other, but theydon't, but they really do.
Okay, gotcha.
- [Killian] Yeah, I alsolove a good fake dating,
(20:57):
I, when it is done well - andit's so hard to do it well -
love a second chance romance,but it's so hard to do it well
because it's, you have tobe able to overcome the
something happened and it didn't work.
You have to convince me thatit can now, and that's hard.
(21:18):
- [Nicole] For sure.
- [Drew] And not only youhave to convince me that
the circumstances have changedenough for it to work now,
you have to convince me thatboth of these characters
deserve to find lovebecause I don't believe that
of all of them.
I did say this was hater hour.
- [Amanda] You did.
- [Nicole] All right.
(21:38):
Well, thanks for listeningand we'll see you next time.
Thank you for joining us for this episode
of "Distracted Librarians."
- [Drew] Many thanks to BCTVfor their support in recording,
editing and releasing this podcast,
and to the Friends of the Library
for sponsoring closedcaptioning on every episode.
- [Killian] If you have anyquestions or suggestions,
feel free to reach out tous at distracted@btpl.org.
(22:03):
- [Amanda] Until then,keep those pages turning
and those screens lighting up.
We'll catch you in the next episode.
- [Emily] The views and opinions expressed
in the "DistractedLibrarians" podcast do not
necessarily reflect thoseof Bloomfield Township,
Bloomfield Township Public Library,
Bloomfield Community Television,
the Birmingham Area Cable Board,
or its producers or production staff.
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