February 19, 2025 • 33 mins
In this special edition of the Historical Romance Sampler, Meg and Laine from Plot Trysts read an excerpt from 'Mr. Impossible' by Loretta Chase and discuss the book's setting, characters, and unique elements. The episode features an in-depth conversation about the evolution of historical romance, the impact of the genre's conventions, and the roles that adventure and progressive themes play in modern historical romance. Later, they play a fun 'Love It or Leave It' game, sharing their personal preferences and hot takes on common romance tropes. Tune in for a delightful and insightful episode on all things historical romance!
00:00 Introduction to the Historical Romance Sampler Podcast
00:35 Special Guests: Meg and Laine from Plot Trysts
01:26 Reading from 'Mr. Impossible' by Loretta Chase
05:44 Discussion on the Book Excerpt
11:24 Exploring Adventure in Historical Romance
16:06 The State of Historical Romance Today
23:54 Love It or Leave It: Romance Rules
31:40 Where to Find More from Plot Trysts
32:54 Closing Remarks
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:05):
Welcome to the historicalromance sampler podcast.
I'm your host, Katherine Grant, andeach week I introduce you to another
amazing historical romance author.
My guest reads a little sampleof their work, and then we move
into a free ranging interview.
If you like these episodes, don'tforget to subscribe to the historical
(00:26):
romance sampler, wherever youlisten to podcasts and follow us
on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube.
Now let's get into this week's episode.
Welcome to a very special edition ofthe Historical Romance Sampler Podcast.
I am joined today by none otherthan Meg and Laine of Plot Trysts.
(00:46):
Plot Trysts, if you are not cool enoughto know, is an awesome podcast that
drops at least two episodes weekly andit's Meg and Laine who are two friends
who read romance novels and talk aboutthem publicly and always have something
interesting and sometimes divisive.
to say about the books.
So, Meg.
(01:07):
Meg and Laine, thank you so much forcoming on Historical Romance Sampler.
Yeah, thank you for having us.
So what we're doing on this specialepisode is you're gonna read a sample of
a book that you love and then we will talkabout that sample and more generally about
historical romance together afterwards.
You're reading Mr.Impossible by Loretta Chase.
(01:29):
Is there anything we should knowabout the book setup before we get
into the scene that you're reading?
Oh, absolutely.
Yeah.
So I'm, the scene we're readingis actually very close to the end.
It's very towards the end of the book.
This book is a Regency romance,but it takes place in Egypt.
So it's a, an unconventionalsetting, I would say, for a book.
(01:53):
Historical romance forRegency, especially.
And it is, the scene is fromthe perspective of the female
main character's brother.
So one of the things I love about LorettaChase is the way she uses perspective.
I was going to ask,how spoilery can we be?
(02:15):
I mean, this book has beenout for a very long time, so I
think it can be pretty spoilery.
Okay, so just in setting up the contextof the scene, Daphne is the heroine
of the book, and she is an expert inhieroglyphs, demotic, ancient Egyptian
languages, but as a woman, was notable to publish under her own name,
so she published under her brother's.
(02:36):
And the conflict of the book is he getskidnapped and she's trying to find him
and she enlists the hero, Rupert, toassist her in finding her brother, who,
as you can tell from all of the context,has sort of taken advantage of her.
Not like, you know, he's notlike the worst brother ever.
We've read worse in Regencies, buthe's, he has not appreciated her.
And he is benefiting from her skillsand that is their relationship
(03:00):
prior to, and obviously giveit away, they find the brother.
This scene is from thebrother's perspective.
So they found
him.
This is, this is really towards,this is like honestly the very end.
But there's, she does this thing thatI really think is super interesting.
The other thing to know aboutthis book is that Rupert is,
He's not a cinnamon roll.
(03:21):
He's not a golden retriever,but he is a himbo.
Like he is, he is the brawnand she is the brains.
Like that is the entiresetup of this book.
Love it.
So.
Love it.
Awesome.
Well, take it away whenever you want to.
All right.
So, so Rupert's starting and he's, he'stalking about a time when they were
(03:45):
stuck in a, a caved in tunnel in a tomb.
He went on to tell that tale while Mileslistened, wondering if he'd got drunk
again without realizing, because itcould not be his sister Daphne, of whom
Carsington spoke with so much enthusiasmand admiration, as though, as though...
(04:05):
"you're in love with her," Miles said.
"Then-" he said.
Because he hadn't meant to say it aloud.
He stared hard at the mongoose.
She licked his hand.
"In love," Carsing repeated.
"In love?" " No, sorry.
Don't know what I was thinking.
The heat, the shock.
Couldn't believe it was mysister you were talking about.
(04:26):
Brave and dashing and all that."
Carsington's countenance darkened.
"Not but what I expect she'd rise tothe occasion," Miles added hastily.
He was not afraid of Carsingtonexactly, yet he had to admit
the glare was a trifle daunting.
In any event, it wasn't good forthe man to become overwrought.
Daphne had said so.
(04:47):
"My sister is a plucky creature, ofcourse, continuing her work in spite of
all the discouragement and so forth."
"You've got it backwards,"Carsington said.
"It wasn't her rising to the occasion.
It's the occasion rising to her.
Egypt and this business with you andthe papyrus have finally given her
the chance to show what she truly is.
(05:07):
She's, she's a goddess, but human.
A real goddess, not make believe.
She's beautiful and brave and wiseand fascinating and dangerous.
As goddesses are, as you know,in all the best stories."
"I'll be hanged," Miles said.
"You really are in love with her."The black eyes regarded him steadily.
(05:28):
Then they regarded the cabinceiling, then the window.
Then they came back to him.
"Do you know," Carsington said mildly,"I've been wondering what it was."
The end of my
dramatic
reading.
I mean, that is such a yummy littlevignette of the, like, realizing
(05:50):
that you're in love, but not really.
Confessing it, protectingfrom the former protector the
goddess declaration, oh my gosh.
Laine, what do you thinkabout this passage?
I love it because it also incorporatesother pieces of the book, like you've got
the throwaway reference to the mongoose,but also the way that Rupert confesses
everything to Daphne is by saying, I'm somad you didn't tell me I was in love with
(06:13):
you, I had to hear it from your brother.
So there's this call out of like, he wasnever going to figure it out on his own,
and everyone should have known that.
And so the fact that it's Mileswho ends up being the one to tell
him, like, I just love the wayit ties the whole book together.
That's really interesting.
I would find that really annoying ifsomeone was expecting me to tell them
(06:35):
that they're in love with me, like,there's an emotional labor there.
That in real life, very unappealing.
But in the book
Sure, but in a book where the brainand brawn dichotomy is so deliberately
split, she has to do all the brain.
Yeah, yeah, and he trusts herto tell him how he's feeling.
And he'll accept that.
Yeah, the other thing that wasinteresting was the like, element
(06:58):
of danger that Rupert was emanating.
Like, he seemed friendly.
I haven't read this book, full disclosure.
I've read the one with the canals.
Yeah.
Also a himbo, but where like he'sprotecting, he's kind of being, you
know, he's like angry that Mileshasn't seen Daphne for her worth.
(07:18):
And then all of a sudden he's likereduced to the black eyes look around
the room and like that is like, oh,like he's, he's being more predatory
because Miles hasn't seen her theway he wants her to see him to see.
Well, and Miles is the one whoput her in danger, is also what
he's realized at this point.
So the fact that she had to be braveand daring and courageous in the
(07:40):
face of danger is Miles's fault.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Meg, is there anything from thescene that you want to call out?
I always like actually when I readromance, when I read just about any book
and you see the main character from athird person's perspective, So we have
a lot of Daphne looking at Rupert.
(08:01):
We have a lot of Rupert looking at Daphne.
We have a lot of their relationship.
They think about each other a lot.
And you know how Rupert sees himselfand you know how Daphne sees Rupert.
But here you see how other people see him.
And I really enjoyed it a lot becauseAnother part of the book is that he
has this reputation for being theHellion son of the, the Earl of Hargate.
(08:23):
So that's why he was like kind of sent toEgypt to get him out of the way, right?
Yeah.
But again, the whole time you seehim, like sure, he's a Himbo, but
he's very competent and he's verysupportive and he's there for Daphne.
And so, of course, you see whyshe falls in love with him.
But now you see Miles being like, whywould either of them be into the other?
So I really like that.
(08:44):
Yeah, that's interesting.
We don't often get athird person looking in.
You don't often hop into thatthird person's point of view
. It's very dual point of view.
You're getting the two loveinterests and no one else.
And she does, so Loretta Chase, at leastin this book, she doesn't do head hopping.
So you always know, like, whoseperspective you're reading the scene
(09:07):
from and, you know, you're not goingto jump from Miles to Rupert, you
know, back to Miles, but she doesincorporate those other perspectives.
So, like, in this book you alsosee the, the villain's perspective.
You read from hisperspective several times.
Which is kind of, kind of fun, you know?
Fun, and also I can see howthat could be really useful plot
wise to just get things going.
(09:29):
And you don't have to be like,this is how the heroine guessed
what the villain was thinking.
Yes.
Well, it's also nice too,because there, so in this book,
there's this element of mystery.
So Daphne and Rupert are on thisexpedition to find Miles, but the point
of the book is not whodunit, right?
(09:50):
So this is not a mystery.
And it's very clear from the beginningthat it's not a mystery, right?
Because we know from, I think the thirdchapter, who the ultimate villain is.
And that's kind of fun too, to see howDaphne interacts with, with the villain,
who I'm not, I'm not going to give awayfor you, but you see how, how, you know
(10:11):
what his his ultimate gain is, what hewants to do ultimately, but then you
see how... so Rupert resents him fromthe very beginning, but not because
he knows he's the villain, but becausehe's flirting with Daphne, right?
And so, I don't know, just all thedifferent perspectives sort of on
top of each other are really fun.
Yeah.
Do you like audiobooks?
(10:33):
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(10:54):
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(11:17):
Follow the link in my link tree to checkout the playlist and start shopping.
And now, back to this week's episode.
So this is an adventure book, likeyou said, it's not a mystery, but
it's definitely got adventure to it.
Do you have a preference forreading historical romances
that have high adventure?
So that, that's a good question.
(11:37):
I can answer for Laine here because we,it's not that we need adventure in the
book, but we really like it when the maincharacters are on the same side and on the
same page and working together to obtainor to, to get to, to get something, right?
So the conflict of the book is not themin conflict with each other, right?
(11:57):
But them trying togetherto overcome some conflict.
I was gonna say the exact same thing.
Well, and, so, to be clear, Meg andI bonded over this book because I am
a huge sucker for Ancient Egypt inany context, romance or otherwise.
And so, I was telling Meg about the seriesI love that is not a romance series.
(12:20):
She recommended this, and this is howwe learned we both loved romance novels.
So, while I'd certainly like plentyof romance novels without high
adventure, like, yeah, DashingArchaeologist, especially if it's
archaeologist spy in Egypt, is mynumber one favorite thing of all time.
No that makes sense.
(12:42):
I have, I have not read very muchromance from like the 80s and 90s
and a little bit more in the 2000s,but I am I haven't read a lot about
it, but I haven't read that many, butI have this sense that particularly
the 70s, 80s, there was a lot of thehistorical romance had to have adventure.
(13:02):
There were pirate ships.
There were, you know, Stolenhorses, they were like, they were
epic sagas with so much adventure.
And so I'm curious, do you feel like thereare still these high adventures being
delivered in historical romance today?
I want to defer to Meg, becauselike you, my context isn't great.
Like, I, I, I haven't read very muchwritten, even in the early 2000s,
(13:27):
that Meg hasn't put in my hand.
But I do think when high adventureappears, my sense from what I've read
about the earlier eras is that thewomen have a lot more agency, that the
adventures of the 70s and 80s and 90swere a lot of the man is a swashbuckler
and the woman is a damsel in distress.
(13:48):
And so I do think when.
There are conflicts likethat in more modern romance.
It's, it's less passive on thepart of the woman, but I defer to
Meg on the rest of your question.
Yeah, I mean, that's, it'san interesting question.
I, so I'm currently reading all ofLaura Kinsale's books, which are really
(14:10):
fascinating from a plot perspective,because they are just, there's so
much plot in those books, right?
Like, so much stuff just happens.
There are plenty of books, Ithink, that, that are quieter
and don't have as much adventure.
I, I will say that, I think thereare, I think there still are authors
writing those adventure books, right?
(14:32):
There are spy books.
There, like Emily Sullivan wrotea whole series with spies with it
that we both just absolutely adore.
I think a lot of road trip romances endup veering into adventure territory.
Yeah.
I will say, so one of the things I dothink is I think that a lot of historical
romance authors who are writing right noware more aware of the cultural context
(14:55):
of the era in which they're writing.
And so I think we're less likely tosee someone who's a blockade runner.
We're less likely to see piratesbecause we, we know like what,
what the pirates were selling andlike what they were smuggling.
So I think that there is alittle bit more awareness there.
(15:16):
And so we might be lesslikely to see these things.
It's not a sort of epic adventures.
For example, like we love Mr. Impossible.
It's like, I think it's one of thebest romance novels out there, but I've
certainly seen legitimate critiques ofit that say, well, it's very colonialist,
you know it's not problematized at allthat, that Rupert and Daphne are in Egypt.
(15:37):
And, and, and so.
You know, adventuring up and down andgoing into tombs and stuff like that.
So I think there is a little bit more
thought put into, okay, whatkind of adventure can they have?
And I think they may be a littlebit smaller and closer to home
(15:57):
because it's a little easier tocontrol for those circumstances.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And to not go into the pitfallsof othering these cultures.
So, so there's a lot of chatteron the internet these days about
how historical romance is dead.
And I think we know that's not truebecause we three are not dead, and we are
(16:18):
reading and writing historical romance.
Do you have any theories or perspectiveson what romance readers who don't
read historical romance should do?
Get wrong about historical romance.
Like what is keeping them frompicking up a historical romance?
I can tell you I don'tthink it's the covers
(16:39):
Yeah, I don't think it's the covers eitherYou know, I have a lot of theories.
I'm not an expert on this at all I thinkone of the things is you used to when you
went to the grocery store You went andyou would check out, you would see a mass
market paperback of historical romance.
So you could just grabone at the supermarket.
And I do think traditional publishersare going more for like that larger
(17:02):
size and it's more expensive.
If it's, if it's more than 10,you're not going to just grab
one and toss it into your basket.
You know what I mean?
So I think, I honestlythink that's part of it.
I think there was a feeling that it was,I don't, I don't want to say disposable,
but like mass market paperbacks weresupposed to be disposable, right?
They were supposed to be, that'swhy they're called pulp novels.
(17:23):
They're, they're pulp paper, youbuy it, it's not supposed to be
kept forever, even though now,of course, people are collecting
step backs and things like that.
But I think, I think that's part of it.
I think there's a pricepoint issue, honestly.
I think.
That a lot of social mediadoesn't focus on it and to be
100 percent honest with you.
I think historical romance is moreprogressive than contemporary romance
(17:46):
so I do think some people who arenot as comfortable reading books that
have to think about the politics ofthe era in which they're written.
I think people might beless comfortable with that.
That's just my opinion.
I have seen people write posts orwrite arguments that say, Oh, you
might think that historical romanceisn't progressive, but guess what?
(18:07):
It's really great.
And I'm like, well, yeah, but I don'tthink that the people who aren't
reading it are looking for a really,like, diverse progressive genre.
They want to read a bookabout a billionaire who buys
you everything and that's it.
Yeah, that's a very interesting take,and it makes me think about how, in
historical romance, we understand thatthe structure of marriage is something
(18:32):
that, there wasn't a lot of room around,like if you wanted to have property,
or have wealth, or have anything,Well, you couldn't do it on your own.
Hopefully you'd find a husbandwho'd be generous and nice to you,
and then maybe he'd die, and thenmaybe you could do it on your own.
In contemporary America, you don'tneed to find a partner to be fulfilled
(18:57):
in any way except for romanticfulfillment, if that's what you want.
So when we're in historical romanceand the stories are centered around
finding someone you love and oh,it's going to end up in marriage.
I mean, obviously there areexceptions where it doesn't end up
in marriage, but you're still likevery much within that structure.
You're either doing it or you're not doingit and that has to be part of the plot.
(19:17):
That's not like reaffirming thispatriarchal structure as good.
It's just saying this, these arethe limitations you're stuck with.
How are you going to deal with it?
But when we are still using thatas the main plot for a contemporary
romance, in a way, it's actuallynot problematizing the patriarchy.
(19:37):
It's reaffirming the patriarchy.
And so it's calling to different readers.
Maybe.
Yeah.
Well, and specifically Mr.
Impossible, which is, asyou mentioned, very old.
She's a widow.
And so part of what's textualis, she doesn't need to marry
to have economic stability.
And to have respect in society.
She's, like, in her late 20s andcan make money in her own name.
(20:02):
She's not respected because she can'tpublish her intellectual findings.
But it's got nothing todo with her being a widow.
A man's pawn specifically in her personallife, and I think you're right, there's an
inherent acknowledgement of that inequityin historicals that contemporaries, I
don't like contemporaries, so I like,I'm the wrong one to sort of ask this
question to you because I don't understandwhy people aren't only historical.
(20:26):
But you're right, I think contemporariesdon't problematize our society to
the extent that historicals arewilling to problematize not just their
own context, but our society too.
Yeah.
And I think also, I don't think darkromance used to be its own genre.
I think the place where you found darkromantic themes was in historical romance.
(20:46):
There was kidnapping, there was piracy,there was, you know, like all these
Dubcon.
Yeah, all these like wildthings that would happen.
And I think you could I can still readsome of it in a historical context
because I'm like, okay, well, you know,this is It's a historical context, so I
(21:07):
can kind of distance myself from that.
But when I read it in a contemporarycontext, for me personally, I'm like, this
is too, it's a little too close to home.
I'm not interested in readingabout a stalker romance.
Whereas, I mean, we talkedabout, we talked about a
Cleopas book, what book was it?
One of the ones in the Hathawayseries with Harry Rutledge.
(21:27):
And we were like, why didhe fall in love with her?
I was like, if he had only stalked her alittle bit, I would like maybe understand.
You know, but I was like, whywasn't he watching her from afar?
Why wasn't he like, youknow, researching her?
And so I can do that in thishistorical context, right?
So I think, I honestly think that thereare, there are like dark Romance readers,
but now they have their own dark genre.
(21:48):
They don't have to go tohistorical to find that.
Well, is there something specificabout historical romance that
you think just delivers for youdifferently than any other genre?
Meg and I've had this conversation.
For me, it's the I don't like readinganything contemporary or too close
to contemporary because for methat is like, not escapist at all.
(22:11):
Like, I'm too busy rationalizing how Ithink something would actually happen.
So I need something to either beso far in the past or in another
world, be it sci fi or fantasy, toactually immerse myself in the text.
Not to say I have never liked acontemporary ever, but on the whole I
find them a lot harder to get lost in.
Fair.
(22:32):
Yeah.
I mean, that's, that that isdefinitely part of it for me.
I don't know.
I'm just not, I, I was talking tosomeone else about it and I was like,
why does a Duke work for me, but abillionaire doesn't work for me, right?
And I'm just not interested ina, in a billionaire romance.
I'm like, what did he do tohis employees to get there?
I mean, Dukes did the same thing.
(22:54):
I get it.
Like Dukes are also not likeethically amazing people.
But I refuse to accept
the
concept of an ethical billionairewhere I'm willing to accept
an ethical 18th century duke.
Like I'm willing to suspend disbelieffor that, but I'm not willing to suspend
disbelief for an ethical billionaire.
But the, the other thing for me thatI really like both about historical
(23:14):
romance and also about sciencefiction specifically, is that I
think they can take a, an outsideview of current society and make
you think about it a different way.
So it's something I likeabout both of those genres.
Yeah.
For me, I also... you're ableto see patterns from your own
(23:36):
life on an individual leveland also on a societal level.
And I don't know, it somehow givesyou the distance so that it's not, it's
more of like an intellectual exercise.
Yeah.
For me, personally.
[Musical Interlude]
So these are like romancerules do you like them or not?
(23:58):
Love it or leave it?
The protagonists meet in thefirst 10 percent of the novel.
Love Oh, love it.
Love it.
What's gonna happen ifthey take longer than that?
Is it still a romance?
Like, no.
No, thank you.
First three pages, please.
Look, there's a, I, I have readlike all of Amanda Quick books.
I love her books so much.
And literally she has a formula.
(24:18):
It works for me.
They kiss.
In the third chapter.
By the third chapter,the protagonist kissed.
That's what I want.
If they haven't met yet, theremight be a damn good reason.
I
don't want to read about their separatelives, that's not why I'm in this.
Love it or leave it, dualpoint of view narration?
(24:41):
Love it.
Love it.
And I think, Meg, you wouldeven at least add multiple.
You'd love even more than dual.
I definitely want bothmain characters on page.
I'm also fine with more, yes.
Yeah, unless it's like ElizabethHoyt style, in which case
that's stupid fucking maid.
(25:02):
No, I skip Bridget.
Every time I read that book.
Bridget can
go.
No.
Leave Bridget behind.
I told someone that, I told someone thatwhenever I read Sweetest Scoundrel, so
Sweetest Scoundrel is actually one of,this is terrible, one of my favorite
books in the Maiden Land series.
I love it.
It's so much fun.
Such a good book.
(25:23):
Elizabeth Hoyt does this thing inthat series where she sets up the
next book by writing scenes from thecharacters who are going to be the
main characters of the next book.
Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.
I'm going to go out on a limb and saymost of the time it does not work.
And in sweetest scoundrel.
Does not work.
Every time it's in Bridget'sperspective, I skip.
(25:44):
I like skip to the next scene.
I have reread this book many, many times.
I skip it.
Every time.
She like has straight up forgotten
how much of that book isfrom Bridget's perspective.
I was like, Bridget?
What are you talking about, Bridget?
Yes to dual.
More than that, I, I've got some quibbles.
Depends.
You better do it well.
(26:05):
I similarly, I, I honestly, Iwould on my first read start
skipping those perspectives.
As soon as I, like, pick up that it'snot actually, moving the plot forward
and it's just for series service, I'dbe like, no, I'm not reading that.
So I,
I respect that choice.
Love it or leave it?
Third person, past tense narration.
(26:26):
Love it.
Love it.
Don't give me a first person.
It reads like a teenage girl'sdiary, which is really weird when
it's like a 35 year old dude.
That's why they're all, they'resingle perspective, first person,
present tense, single perspective.
I'm not, I just can't.
Not saying I have never liked a bookwith first person present tense.
(26:50):
Because when I do, I'mlike, what did I just say?
There's a famous quote byJonathan Franzen, about how you
should only use first person.
if you can really justify that it isthat character's very specific voice.
Like, you can't just usea generic first person.
And when I first heard that, I was like,okay, stuck up literary author, but
(27:12):
I have come to really agree with him.
I, I agree with him.
I agree with him a hundred percent.
I hate it when I'm, so I just saidthat I, like, my number one hate is a
single POV, first person present tense.
However, if you give me a dual perspectivefirst person present tense and I can't
(27:32):
tell them apart, I hate it even more.
Yes.
Okay.
Love it or leave it?
The third act, break up or dark moment.
So the breakup, I can leave it.
Dark moment, you need to havea moment where it's dark.
You don't know how they'regoing to work it out, right?
(27:53):
So dark moment is fine with me,but breakup, I can leave it.
Like in Mr. Impossible, I'm going tospoil it guys, but what happens is
she thinks he gets shot and gets eatenby crocodiles and they get separated.
So, Yeah, break up
. It's fine.
I don't know what you mean by dark moment.
Sure.
I'm fine with the conflict continuinginto third act, but I would like it
(28:16):
if my main characters are still trueto each other and sure of each other.
Thank you so much.
The dark moment is usually therelationship is in peril, so in
your example, it's in peril becauseshe believes he's been killed
by an alligator or crocodile.
Well, like, he also, he, he asked herto marry him, and she says no, like,
(28:37):
that could be the dark moment, too.
So, like, that's, there, there hasto be a relationship conflict, right?
Yeah.
You have to doubt thatthey're gonna end up together.
Right.
You're like, how are theygonna end up together?
But
Okay.
Alright, okay.
Love it or leave it?
Always end with an epilogue.
Leave it.
You can leave it.
I, I don't, I mean, good either way.
(28:58):
Yeah, I'm, I'm actually a littleover the pro forma epilogue.
Like, if you're not actuallyadding anything, if there's
nothing I wanted to see come tofruition, like, leave it behind.
If there's a sex scene in theepilogue, and it's not about
having kids, Laine's fine with it.
I'm not saying I've never, like, ifthey've, I don't know, if the whole
book is about whether or not she's gonnaget to found a company and the epilogue
(29:20):
is her and her president's office orwhatever, great, like, I'm, I want to
see what the characters want to come tofruition, but when the epilogue is just,
like, three weeks later, a normal morningat home, I'm like, this did not need to
be here, like, epilogues should not bethe default, like, use them when they
But I want them, I want it to be,look, I like epilogues, they're
fine, but I want them to be good.
(29:40):
I just read one of my mostfavorite romance novels.
I skipped the epilogue because I hate it.
Name names, Meg.
It's For My Lady's Heart, and theepilogue has neither of the main
characters in it, so I'm like, no,
That's not an epilogue,that's a new story.
Correct.
I was like, no thanks, I'm, I'm good.
(30:01):
All right.
Love it or leave it?
Always read the author's note.
Leave it!
Those exist?
I like it.
I love it.
I don't need it, but I, I, Ienjoy them when they're there.
(30:22):
All right, I usually ask authors, arethere other romance rules that they break?
Are there romance rulesyou wish were broken more?
I want more heroines who are openabout having sex with other people.
Like,
at the same time in the relationship,or previous to the relationship?
Previous to the relationship,but like, on the page textually.
(30:45):
Like, no, not cheating.
Like, I'm not saying I want thereto be more cheating in romance, but
I do feel like even as the virginalheroine trope has been more and more
done away with, there's still anaversion to like, heroines who have had
previous positive sexual experiences,especially with non dead husbands.
I can, more of that would be great.
(31:08):
We already talked about how wereally like, like I really, really
like when they're on the same page.
I personally I don't likelove enemies to lovers.
It's just not that interesting to me.
I want to see them workingtogether and being together more.
So I don't know if it's a rule, but it'sjust something that I, that I prefer.
(31:30):
Awesome.
Well, thank you for playing Love It orLeave It and sharing your hot takes.
Fresh takes.
It's super, yeah.
Steamy.
So, Plot Trysts, you have Newepisodes every Monday and Thursday
of your traditional podcast.
And then Meg, I know you haveall these other projects going
on, like a Laura Kinsale readingproject with Alexandra Vasti.
(31:54):
So where should our listeners go tofind you and get up on the podcast?
I mean, you could just search forPlot Trysts and it will come up.
We have a WordPress site.
So Plot Trysts.
wordpress.
com can also find us onInstagram at Plot Trysts.
But, like, honestly, goodreadsslash Plot Trysts, we, we managed
(32:17):
to, to get the Plot Trysts name.
So we're, we're good.
If you search for Plot Trysts, thenyou will find the Kinsale podcast,
and there's a discord on there.
Also, if you love science fiction,I did a project about Lois McMaster
Bujold, which was really great.
There's a discord there, so youcan join the discord as well.
So if you're listening to thispodcast, you're on a podcast app.
(32:38):
So all you have to dois look for Plot Trysts.
I will also put a link in the show notesto make it really easy for listeners.
Please check out Meg and Laine's podcast.
They are amazing.
And thank you, Meg and Laine, forcoming on Historical Romance Sampler.
Thank you so much for having us.
That's it for this week!
Don't forget to subscribe to theHistorical Romance Sampler wherever
(32:59):
you listen, and follow us onInstagram, TikTok, and YouTube.
Until next week, happy reading!
Welcome to the historicalromance sampler podcast.
I'm your host, Katherine Grant, andeach week I introduce you to another
amazing historical romance author.
My guest reads a little sampleof their work, and then we move
into a free ranging interview.
If you like these episodes, don'tforget to subscribe to the historical
(00:26):
romance sampler, wherever youlisten to podcasts and follow us
on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube.
Now let's get into this week's episode.
Welcome to a very special edition ofthe Historical Romance Sampler Podcast.
I am joined today by none otherthan Meg and Laine of Plot Trysts.
(00:46):
Plot Trysts, if you are not cool enoughto know, is an awesome podcast that
drops at least two episodes weekly andit's Meg and Laine who are two friends
who read romance novels and talk aboutthem publicly and always have something
interesting and sometimes divisive.
to say about the books.
So, Meg.
(01:07):
Meg and Laine, thank you so much forcoming on Historical Romance Sampler.
Yeah, thank you for having us.
So what we're doing on this specialepisode is you're gonna read a sample of
a book that you love and then we will talkabout that sample and more generally about
historical romance together afterwards.
You're reading Mr.Impossible by Loretta Chase.
(01:29):
Is there anything we should knowabout the book setup before we get
into the scene that you're reading?
Oh, absolutely.
Yeah.
So I'm, the scene we're readingis actually very close to the end.
It's very towards the end of the book.
This book is a Regency romance,but it takes place in Egypt.
So it's a, an unconventionalsetting, I would say, for a book.
(01:53):
Historical romance forRegency, especially.
And it is, the scene is fromthe perspective of the female
main character's brother.
So one of the things I love about LorettaChase is the way she uses perspective.
I was going to ask,how spoilery can we be?
(02:15):
I mean, this book has beenout for a very long time, so I
think it can be pretty spoilery.
Okay, so just in setting up the contextof the scene, Daphne is the heroine
of the book, and she is an expert inhieroglyphs, demotic, ancient Egyptian
languages, but as a woman, was notable to publish under her own name,
so she published under her brother's.
(02:36):
And the conflict of the book is he getskidnapped and she's trying to find him
and she enlists the hero, Rupert, toassist her in finding her brother, who,
as you can tell from all of the context,has sort of taken advantage of her.
Not like, you know, he's notlike the worst brother ever.
We've read worse in Regencies, buthe's, he has not appreciated her.
And he is benefiting from her skillsand that is their relationship
(03:00):
prior to, and obviously giveit away, they find the brother.
This scene is from thebrother's perspective.
So they found
him.
This is, this is really towards,this is like honestly the very end.
But there's, she does this thing thatI really think is super interesting.
The other thing to know aboutthis book is that Rupert is,
He's not a cinnamon roll.
(03:21):
He's not a golden retriever,but he is a himbo.
Like he is, he is the brawnand she is the brains.
Like that is the entiresetup of this book.
Love it.
So.
Love it.
Awesome.
Well, take it away whenever you want to.
All right.
So, so Rupert's starting and he's, he'stalking about a time when they were
(03:45):
stuck in a, a caved in tunnel in a tomb.
He went on to tell that tale while Mileslistened, wondering if he'd got drunk
again without realizing, because itcould not be his sister Daphne, of whom
Carsington spoke with so much enthusiasmand admiration, as though, as though...
(04:05):
"you're in love with her," Miles said.
"Then-" he said.
Because he hadn't meant to say it aloud.
He stared hard at the mongoose.
She licked his hand.
"In love," Carsing repeated.
"In love?" " No, sorry.
Don't know what I was thinking.
The heat, the shock.
Couldn't believe it was mysister you were talking about.
(04:26):
Brave and dashing and all that."
Carsington's countenance darkened.
"Not but what I expect she'd rise tothe occasion," Miles added hastily.
He was not afraid of Carsingtonexactly, yet he had to admit
the glare was a trifle daunting.
In any event, it wasn't good forthe man to become overwrought.
Daphne had said so.
(04:47):
"My sister is a plucky creature, ofcourse, continuing her work in spite of
all the discouragement and so forth."
"You've got it backwards,"Carsington said.
"It wasn't her rising to the occasion.
It's the occasion rising to her.
Egypt and this business with you andthe papyrus have finally given her
the chance to show what she truly is.
(05:07):
She's, she's a goddess, but human.
A real goddess, not make believe.
She's beautiful and brave and wiseand fascinating and dangerous.
As goddesses are, as you know,in all the best stories."
"I'll be hanged," Miles said.
"You really are in love with her."The black eyes regarded him steadily.
(05:28):
Then they regarded the cabinceiling, then the window.
Then they came back to him.
"Do you know," Carsington said mildly,"I've been wondering what it was."
The end of my
dramatic
reading.
I mean, that is such a yummy littlevignette of the, like, realizing
(05:50):
that you're in love, but not really.
Confessing it, protectingfrom the former protector the
goddess declaration, oh my gosh.
Laine, what do you thinkabout this passage?
I love it because it also incorporatesother pieces of the book, like you've got
the throwaway reference to the mongoose,but also the way that Rupert confesses
everything to Daphne is by saying, I'm somad you didn't tell me I was in love with
(06:13):
you, I had to hear it from your brother.
So there's this call out of like, he wasnever going to figure it out on his own,
and everyone should have known that.
And so the fact that it's Mileswho ends up being the one to tell
him, like, I just love the wayit ties the whole book together.
That's really interesting.
I would find that really annoying ifsomeone was expecting me to tell them
(06:35):
that they're in love with me, like,there's an emotional labor there.
That in real life, very unappealing.
But in the book
Sure, but in a book where the brainand brawn dichotomy is so deliberately
split, she has to do all the brain.
Yeah, yeah, and he trusts herto tell him how he's feeling.
And he'll accept that.
Yeah, the other thing that wasinteresting was the like, element
(06:58):
of danger that Rupert was emanating.
Like, he seemed friendly.
I haven't read this book, full disclosure.
I've read the one with the canals.
Yeah.
Also a himbo, but where like he'sprotecting, he's kind of being, you
know, he's like angry that Mileshasn't seen Daphne for her worth.
(07:18):
And then all of a sudden he's likereduced to the black eyes look around
the room and like that is like, oh,like he's, he's being more predatory
because Miles hasn't seen her theway he wants her to see him to see.
Well, and Miles is the one whoput her in danger, is also what
he's realized at this point.
So the fact that she had to be braveand daring and courageous in the
(07:40):
face of danger is Miles's fault.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Meg, is there anything from thescene that you want to call out?
I always like actually when I readromance, when I read just about any book
and you see the main character from athird person's perspective, So we have
a lot of Daphne looking at Rupert.
(08:01):
We have a lot of Rupert looking at Daphne.
We have a lot of their relationship.
They think about each other a lot.
And you know how Rupert sees himselfand you know how Daphne sees Rupert.
But here you see how other people see him.
And I really enjoyed it a lot becauseAnother part of the book is that he
has this reputation for being theHellion son of the, the Earl of Hargate.
(08:23):
So that's why he was like kind of sent toEgypt to get him out of the way, right?
Yeah.
But again, the whole time you seehim, like sure, he's a Himbo, but
he's very competent and he's verysupportive and he's there for Daphne.
And so, of course, you see whyshe falls in love with him.
But now you see Miles being like, whywould either of them be into the other?
So I really like that.
(08:44):
Yeah, that's interesting.
We don't often get athird person looking in.
You don't often hop into thatthird person's point of view
. It's very dual point of view.
You're getting the two loveinterests and no one else.
And she does, so Loretta Chase, at leastin this book, she doesn't do head hopping.
So you always know, like, whoseperspective you're reading the scene
(09:07):
from and, you know, you're not goingto jump from Miles to Rupert, you
know, back to Miles, but she doesincorporate those other perspectives.
So, like, in this book you alsosee the, the villain's perspective.
You read from hisperspective several times.
Which is kind of, kind of fun, you know?
Fun, and also I can see howthat could be really useful plot
wise to just get things going.
(09:29):
And you don't have to be like,this is how the heroine guessed
what the villain was thinking.
Yes.
Well, it's also nice too,because there, so in this book,
there's this element of mystery.
So Daphne and Rupert are on thisexpedition to find Miles, but the point
of the book is not whodunit, right?
(09:50):
So this is not a mystery.
And it's very clear from the beginningthat it's not a mystery, right?
Because we know from, I think the thirdchapter, who the ultimate villain is.
And that's kind of fun too, to see howDaphne interacts with, with the villain,
who I'm not, I'm not going to give awayfor you, but you see how, how, you know
(10:11):
what his his ultimate gain is, what hewants to do ultimately, but then you
see how... so Rupert resents him fromthe very beginning, but not because
he knows he's the villain, but becausehe's flirting with Daphne, right?
And so, I don't know, just all thedifferent perspectives sort of on
top of each other are really fun.
Yeah.
Do you like audiobooks?
(10:33):
How about your localindependent bookstore?
If your answer to either of thosewas yes, then you should make sure
to check out the official HistoricalRomance Sampler playlist over on libro.
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(10:54):
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(11:17):
Follow the link in my link tree to checkout the playlist and start shopping.
And now, back to this week's episode.
So this is an adventure book, likeyou said, it's not a mystery, but
it's definitely got adventure to it.
Do you have a preference forreading historical romances
that have high adventure?
So that, that's a good question.
(11:37):
I can answer for Laine here because we,it's not that we need adventure in the
book, but we really like it when the maincharacters are on the same side and on the
same page and working together to obtainor to, to get to, to get something, right?
So the conflict of the book is not themin conflict with each other, right?
(11:57):
But them trying togetherto overcome some conflict.
I was gonna say the exact same thing.
Well, and, so, to be clear, Meg andI bonded over this book because I am
a huge sucker for Ancient Egypt inany context, romance or otherwise.
And so, I was telling Meg about the seriesI love that is not a romance series.
(12:20):
She recommended this, and this is howwe learned we both loved romance novels.
So, while I'd certainly like plentyof romance novels without high
adventure, like, yeah, DashingArchaeologist, especially if it's
archaeologist spy in Egypt, is mynumber one favorite thing of all time.
No that makes sense.
(12:42):
I have, I have not read very muchromance from like the 80s and 90s
and a little bit more in the 2000s,but I am I haven't read a lot about
it, but I haven't read that many, butI have this sense that particularly
the 70s, 80s, there was a lot of thehistorical romance had to have adventure.
(13:02):
There were pirate ships.
There were, you know, Stolenhorses, they were like, they were
epic sagas with so much adventure.
And so I'm curious, do you feel like thereare still these high adventures being
delivered in historical romance today?
I want to defer to Meg, becauselike you, my context isn't great.
Like, I, I, I haven't read very muchwritten, even in the early 2000s,
(13:27):
that Meg hasn't put in my hand.
But I do think when high adventureappears, my sense from what I've read
about the earlier eras is that thewomen have a lot more agency, that the
adventures of the 70s and 80s and 90swere a lot of the man is a swashbuckler
and the woman is a damsel in distress.
(13:48):
And so I do think when.
There are conflicts likethat in more modern romance.
It's, it's less passive on thepart of the woman, but I defer to
Meg on the rest of your question.
Yeah, I mean, that's, it'san interesting question.
I, so I'm currently reading all ofLaura Kinsale's books, which are really
(14:10):
fascinating from a plot perspective,because they are just, there's so
much plot in those books, right?
Like, so much stuff just happens.
There are plenty of books, Ithink, that, that are quieter
and don't have as much adventure.
I, I will say that, I think thereare, I think there still are authors
writing those adventure books, right?
(14:32):
There are spy books.
There, like Emily Sullivan wrotea whole series with spies with it
that we both just absolutely adore.
I think a lot of road trip romances endup veering into adventure territory.
Yeah.
I will say, so one of the things I dothink is I think that a lot of historical
romance authors who are writing right noware more aware of the cultural context
(14:55):
of the era in which they're writing.
And so I think we're less likely tosee someone who's a blockade runner.
We're less likely to see piratesbecause we, we know like what,
what the pirates were selling andlike what they were smuggling.
So I think that there is alittle bit more awareness there.
(15:16):
And so we might be lesslikely to see these things.
It's not a sort of epic adventures.
For example, like we love Mr. Impossible.
It's like, I think it's one of thebest romance novels out there, but I've
certainly seen legitimate critiques ofit that say, well, it's very colonialist,
you know it's not problematized at allthat, that Rupert and Daphne are in Egypt.
(15:37):
And, and, and so.
You know, adventuring up and down andgoing into tombs and stuff like that.
So I think there is a little bit more
thought put into, okay, whatkind of adventure can they have?
And I think they may be a littlebit smaller and closer to home
(15:57):
because it's a little easier tocontrol for those circumstances.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And to not go into the pitfallsof othering these cultures.
So, so there's a lot of chatteron the internet these days about
how historical romance is dead.
And I think we know that's not truebecause we three are not dead, and we are
(16:18):
reading and writing historical romance.
Do you have any theories or perspectiveson what romance readers who don't
read historical romance should do?
Get wrong about historical romance.
Like what is keeping them frompicking up a historical romance?
I can tell you I don'tthink it's the covers
(16:39):
Yeah, I don't think it's the covers eitherYou know, I have a lot of theories.
I'm not an expert on this at all I thinkone of the things is you used to when you
went to the grocery store You went andyou would check out, you would see a mass
market paperback of historical romance.
So you could just grabone at the supermarket.
And I do think traditional publishersare going more for like that larger
(17:02):
size and it's more expensive.
If it's, if it's more than 10,you're not going to just grab
one and toss it into your basket.
You know what I mean?
So I think, I honestlythink that's part of it.
I think there was a feeling that it was,I don't, I don't want to say disposable,
but like mass market paperbacks weresupposed to be disposable, right?
They were supposed to be, that'swhy they're called pulp novels.
(17:23):
They're, they're pulp paper, youbuy it, it's not supposed to be
kept forever, even though now,of course, people are collecting
step backs and things like that.
But I think, I think that's part of it.
I think there's a pricepoint issue, honestly.
I think.
That a lot of social mediadoesn't focus on it and to be
100 percent honest with you.
I think historical romance is moreprogressive than contemporary romance
(17:46):
so I do think some people who arenot as comfortable reading books that
have to think about the politics ofthe era in which they're written.
I think people might beless comfortable with that.
That's just my opinion.
I have seen people write posts orwrite arguments that say, Oh, you
might think that historical romanceisn't progressive, but guess what?
(18:07):
It's really great.
And I'm like, well, yeah, but I don'tthink that the people who aren't
reading it are looking for a really,like, diverse progressive genre.
They want to read a bookabout a billionaire who buys
you everything and that's it.
Yeah, that's a very interesting take,and it makes me think about how, in
historical romance, we understand thatthe structure of marriage is something
(18:32):
that, there wasn't a lot of room around,like if you wanted to have property,
or have wealth, or have anything,Well, you couldn't do it on your own.
Hopefully you'd find a husbandwho'd be generous and nice to you,
and then maybe he'd die, and thenmaybe you could do it on your own.
In contemporary America, you don'tneed to find a partner to be fulfilled
(18:57):
in any way except for romanticfulfillment, if that's what you want.
So when we're in historical romanceand the stories are centered around
finding someone you love and oh,it's going to end up in marriage.
I mean, obviously there areexceptions where it doesn't end up
in marriage, but you're still likevery much within that structure.
You're either doing it or you're not doingit and that has to be part of the plot.
(19:17):
That's not like reaffirming thispatriarchal structure as good.
It's just saying this, these arethe limitations you're stuck with.
How are you going to deal with it?
But when we are still using thatas the main plot for a contemporary
romance, in a way, it's actuallynot problematizing the patriarchy.
(19:37):
It's reaffirming the patriarchy.
And so it's calling to different readers.
Maybe.
Yeah.
Well, and specifically Mr.
Impossible, which is, asyou mentioned, very old.
She's a widow.
And so part of what's textualis, she doesn't need to marry
to have economic stability.
And to have respect in society.
She's, like, in her late 20s andcan make money in her own name.
(20:02):
She's not respected because she can'tpublish her intellectual findings.
But it's got nothing todo with her being a widow.
A man's pawn specifically in her personallife, and I think you're right, there's an
inherent acknowledgement of that inequityin historicals that contemporaries, I
don't like contemporaries, so I like,I'm the wrong one to sort of ask this
question to you because I don't understandwhy people aren't only historical.
(20:26):
But you're right, I think contemporariesdon't problematize our society to
the extent that historicals arewilling to problematize not just their
own context, but our society too.
Yeah.
And I think also, I don't think darkromance used to be its own genre.
I think the place where you found darkromantic themes was in historical romance.
(20:46):
There was kidnapping, there was piracy,there was, you know, like all these
Dubcon.
Yeah, all these like wildthings that would happen.
And I think you could I can still readsome of it in a historical context
because I'm like, okay, well, you know,this is It's a historical context, so I
(21:07):
can kind of distance myself from that.
But when I read it in a contemporarycontext, for me personally, I'm like, this
is too, it's a little too close to home.
I'm not interested in readingabout a stalker romance.
Whereas, I mean, we talkedabout, we talked about a
Cleopas book, what book was it?
One of the ones in the Hathawayseries with Harry Rutledge.
(21:27):
And we were like, why didhe fall in love with her?
I was like, if he had only stalked her alittle bit, I would like maybe understand.
You know, but I was like, whywasn't he watching her from afar?
Why wasn't he like, youknow, researching her?
And so I can do that in thishistorical context, right?
So I think, I honestly think that thereare, there are like dark Romance readers,
but now they have their own dark genre.
(21:48):
They don't have to go tohistorical to find that.
Well, is there something specificabout historical romance that
you think just delivers for youdifferently than any other genre?
Meg and I've had this conversation.
For me, it's the I don't like readinganything contemporary or too close
to contemporary because for methat is like, not escapist at all.
(22:11):
Like, I'm too busy rationalizing how Ithink something would actually happen.
So I need something to either beso far in the past or in another
world, be it sci fi or fantasy, toactually immerse myself in the text.
Not to say I have never liked acontemporary ever, but on the whole I
find them a lot harder to get lost in.
Fair.
(22:32):
Yeah.
I mean, that's, that that isdefinitely part of it for me.
I don't know.
I'm just not, I, I was talking tosomeone else about it and I was like,
why does a Duke work for me, but abillionaire doesn't work for me, right?
And I'm just not interested ina, in a billionaire romance.
I'm like, what did he do tohis employees to get there?
I mean, Dukes did the same thing.
(22:54):
I get it.
Like Dukes are also not likeethically amazing people.
But I refuse to accept
the
concept of an ethical billionairewhere I'm willing to accept
an ethical 18th century duke.
Like I'm willing to suspend disbelieffor that, but I'm not willing to suspend
disbelief for an ethical billionaire.
But the, the other thing for me thatI really like both about historical
(23:14):
romance and also about sciencefiction specifically, is that I
think they can take a, an outsideview of current society and make
you think about it a different way.
So it's something I likeabout both of those genres.
Yeah.
For me, I also... you're ableto see patterns from your own
(23:36):
life on an individual leveland also on a societal level.
And I don't know, it somehow givesyou the distance so that it's not, it's
more of like an intellectual exercise.
Yeah.
For me, personally.
[Musical Interlude]
So these are like romancerules do you like them or not?
(23:58):
Love it or leave it?
The protagonists meet in thefirst 10 percent of the novel.
Love Oh, love it.
Love it.
What's gonna happen ifthey take longer than that?
Is it still a romance?
Like, no.
No, thank you.
First three pages, please.
Look, there's a, I, I have readlike all of Amanda Quick books.
I love her books so much.
And literally she has a formula.
(24:18):
It works for me.
They kiss.
In the third chapter.
By the third chapter,the protagonist kissed.
That's what I want.
If they haven't met yet, theremight be a damn good reason.
I
don't want to read about their separatelives, that's not why I'm in this.
Love it or leave it, dualpoint of view narration?
(24:41):
Love it.
Love it.
And I think, Meg, you wouldeven at least add multiple.
You'd love even more than dual.
I definitely want bothmain characters on page.
I'm also fine with more, yes.
Yeah, unless it's like ElizabethHoyt style, in which case
that's stupid fucking maid.
(25:02):
No, I skip Bridget.
Every time I read that book.
Bridget can
go.
No.
Leave Bridget behind.
I told someone that, I told someone thatwhenever I read Sweetest Scoundrel, so
Sweetest Scoundrel is actually one of,this is terrible, one of my favorite
books in the Maiden Land series.
I love it.
It's so much fun.
Such a good book.
(25:23):
Elizabeth Hoyt does this thing inthat series where she sets up the
next book by writing scenes from thecharacters who are going to be the
main characters of the next book.
Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.
I'm going to go out on a limb and saymost of the time it does not work.
And in sweetest scoundrel.
Does not work.
Every time it's in Bridget'sperspective, I skip.
(25:44):
I like skip to the next scene.
I have reread this book many, many times.
I skip it.
Every time.
She like has straight up forgotten
how much of that book isfrom Bridget's perspective.
I was like, Bridget?
What are you talking about, Bridget?
Yes to dual.
More than that, I, I've got some quibbles.
Depends.
You better do it well.
(26:05):
I similarly, I, I honestly, Iwould on my first read start
skipping those perspectives.
As soon as I, like, pick up that it'snot actually, moving the plot forward
and it's just for series service, I'dbe like, no, I'm not reading that.
So I,
I respect that choice.
Love it or leave it?
Third person, past tense narration.
(26:26):
Love it.
Love it.
Don't give me a first person.
It reads like a teenage girl'sdiary, which is really weird when
it's like a 35 year old dude.
That's why they're all, they'resingle perspective, first person,
present tense, single perspective.
I'm not, I just can't.
Not saying I have never liked a bookwith first person present tense.
(26:50):
Because when I do, I'mlike, what did I just say?
There's a famous quote byJonathan Franzen, about how you
should only use first person.
if you can really justify that it isthat character's very specific voice.
Like, you can't just usea generic first person.
And when I first heard that, I was like,okay, stuck up literary author, but
(27:12):
I have come to really agree with him.
I, I agree with him.
I agree with him a hundred percent.
I hate it when I'm, so I just saidthat I, like, my number one hate is a
single POV, first person present tense.
However, if you give me a dual perspectivefirst person present tense and I can't
(27:32):
tell them apart, I hate it even more.
Yes.
Okay.
Love it or leave it?
The third act, break up or dark moment.
So the breakup, I can leave it.
Dark moment, you need to havea moment where it's dark.
You don't know how they'regoing to work it out, right?
(27:53):
So dark moment is fine with me,but breakup, I can leave it.
Like in Mr. Impossible, I'm going tospoil it guys, but what happens is
she thinks he gets shot and gets eatenby crocodiles and they get separated.
So, Yeah, break up
. It's fine.
I don't know what you mean by dark moment.
Sure.
I'm fine with the conflict continuinginto third act, but I would like it
(28:16):
if my main characters are still trueto each other and sure of each other.
Thank you so much.
The dark moment is usually therelationship is in peril, so in
your example, it's in peril becauseshe believes he's been killed
by an alligator or crocodile.
Well, like, he also, he, he asked herto marry him, and she says no, like,
(28:37):
that could be the dark moment, too.
So, like, that's, there, there hasto be a relationship conflict, right?
Yeah.
You have to doubt thatthey're gonna end up together.
Right.
You're like, how are theygonna end up together?
But
Okay.
Alright, okay.
Love it or leave it?
Always end with an epilogue.
Leave it.
You can leave it.
I, I don't, I mean, good either way.
(28:58):
Yeah, I'm, I'm actually a littleover the pro forma epilogue.
Like, if you're not actuallyadding anything, if there's
nothing I wanted to see come tofruition, like, leave it behind.
If there's a sex scene in theepilogue, and it's not about
having kids, Laine's fine with it.
I'm not saying I've never, like, ifthey've, I don't know, if the whole
book is about whether or not she's gonnaget to found a company and the epilogue
(29:20):
is her and her president's office orwhatever, great, like, I'm, I want to
see what the characters want to come tofruition, but when the epilogue is just,
like, three weeks later, a normal morningat home, I'm like, this did not need to
be here, like, epilogues should not bethe default, like, use them when they
But I want them, I want it to be,look, I like epilogues, they're
fine, but I want them to be good.
(29:40):
I just read one of my mostfavorite romance novels.
I skipped the epilogue because I hate it.
Name names, Meg.
It's For My Lady's Heart, and theepilogue has neither of the main
characters in it, so I'm like, no,
That's not an epilogue,that's a new story.
Correct.
I was like, no thanks, I'm, I'm good.
(30:01):
All right.
Love it or leave it?
Always read the author's note.
Leave it!
Those exist?
I like it.
I love it.
I don't need it, but I, I, Ienjoy them when they're there.
(30:22):
All right, I usually ask authors, arethere other romance rules that they break?
Are there romance rulesyou wish were broken more?
I want more heroines who are openabout having sex with other people.
Like,
at the same time in the relationship,or previous to the relationship?
Previous to the relationship,but like, on the page textually.
(30:45):
Like, no, not cheating.
Like, I'm not saying I want thereto be more cheating in romance, but
I do feel like even as the virginalheroine trope has been more and more
done away with, there's still anaversion to like, heroines who have had
previous positive sexual experiences,especially with non dead husbands.
I can, more of that would be great.
(31:08):
We already talked about how wereally like, like I really, really
like when they're on the same page.
I personally I don't likelove enemies to lovers.
It's just not that interesting to me.
I want to see them workingtogether and being together more.
So I don't know if it's a rule, but it'sjust something that I, that I prefer.
(31:30):
Awesome.
Well, thank you for playing Love It orLeave It and sharing your hot takes.
Fresh takes.
It's super, yeah.
Steamy.
So, Plot Trysts, you have Newepisodes every Monday and Thursday
of your traditional podcast.
And then Meg, I know you haveall these other projects going
on, like a Laura Kinsale readingproject with Alexandra Vasti.
(31:54):
So where should our listeners go tofind you and get up on the podcast?
I mean, you could just search forPlot Trysts and it will come up.
We have a WordPress site.
So Plot Trysts.
wordpress.
com can also find us onInstagram at Plot Trysts.
But, like, honestly, goodreadsslash Plot Trysts, we, we managed
(32:17):
to, to get the Plot Trysts name.
So we're, we're good.
If you search for Plot Trysts, thenyou will find the Kinsale podcast,
and there's a discord on there.
Also, if you love science fiction,I did a project about Lois McMaster
Bujold, which was really great.
There's a discord there, so youcan join the discord as well.
So if you're listening to thispodcast, you're on a podcast app.
(32:38):
So all you have to dois look for Plot Trysts.
I will also put a link in the show notesto make it really easy for listeners.
Please check out Meg and Laine's podcast.
They are amazing.
And thank you, Meg and Laine, forcoming on Historical Romance Sampler.
Thank you so much for having us.
That's it for this week!
Don't forget to subscribe to theHistorical Romance Sampler wherever
(32:59):
you listen, and follow us onInstagram, TikTok, and YouTube.
Until next week, happy reading!
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