Everything I Know About Love I Learned From Romance Novels (14 page)

Author Teresa Medeiros has also received responses from readers about the sensual content of her books: “I’ve had friends at church tell me that their husbands would like to thank me because they’re so much more receptive to ‘romance’ after they read my books!”

Author Christina Dodd has similar reactions from readers: “Readers thank me for enhancing their sex lives. Single women (most of my readers who admit to being my readers are female) thank me for a good solitary experience. Women in long-time relationships tell me reading about good sex rejuvenates their sex drive, that they read passages to their husbands and Good Things happen, that their husbands buy them e-readers and gift cards so they can continue to read because the guys recognize that, even without reading the books themselves, they’re getting a huge benefit.

“When a reader comments that her husband is jealous or threatened by her reading, I think a couple of things: we’ve got a guy who’s pathetically unsure of his masculinity, and we’ve got a relationship that is not going to succeed. And that’s sad.”

Dodd also says that romances have created a warming trend for her own relationship: her husband has read many of her books, and “when he reads my books, it’s also great for our sex life. All men should read romances. ’Nuf said.”

Author Robyn Carr was worried about the sexuality of her novels until she asked a friend to read a manuscript for her: “One of the most important things romance novels do is create a feeling of healthy desire. As long as it’s not pathological (as in obsessive and unhealthy), desire is good for men and women. A long time back, when I thought the romances I was writing were getting lots sexier, I asked a good friend with decades of experience in books to have a look. She was eighty at the time and I wanted to write a sexier novel, but I didn’t want to cross the line and lose earlier readers and I asked her to give me an opinion before the manuscript was turned in. She called with many comments about the book, then finally said, ‘And Robyn, about that shower scene…’ I thought, oh damn, I’ve done it; I’ve gone too far. But she said, ‘That brought back wonderful memories.’

“She reminded me that even when our own private lives with partners aren’t benefiting from our reading, sometimes those sweet memories of the romance once enjoyed can be a bonus. I know that my friend had a long, loving, and happy marriage before she lost her husband.”

Steph discovered romances because her mother let her read them as an introduction to sexuality: “I started to read romance when I was around eleven or twelve. My mom gave me a couple of her books and said I might find them interesting. Boy, did I ever! When I was done she asked if I had any questions, which I of course did, and she answered every one of them. Reading romance books made it easy to talk about sex with her, what could actually happen, how a man really should treat me, and gave us something to actually talk about in my teen years instead of fighting.

“Even though they are not real people and the stories are fantasy, romance novels have been great companions through the years and something I am hoping to share with my daughters.”

Joanna Shearer’s upbringing was the opposite of reader Liz’s, but romance novels had the same effect: “Romance novels made me feel safe in my fantasies about sex before I was actually ready to ‘do it.’ My mother was a nurse, and so she and my father have a very healthy sex life (something she consistently tries to tell me about to this day no matter how much I run around screaming, ‘lalalalalalalalalala,’ with my ears plugged), so I always knew the dangers of sex (diseases, unplanned pregnancy, perceptions of sluttiness, etc.) and that sex with the right person is wonderful; however, apart from their teachings and example, romance novels helped me realize that, as long as I could explore sex in books, I did not have to have sex in real life no matter how much my friends talked about it or made me feel less ‘mature’ for not experiencing it, because I was experiencing it, just not in a way that made me uncomfortable.

“I know my mother worried that I would have unrealistic expectations about men, relationships, and sex because she introduced me to romance novels (in her mind) too early. Let’s face it, not all men are hung the way romance heroes are or can do the sexually dynamic things they do in romance novels, any more than it is possible for a real woman to orgasm fourteen times in one carriage ride as they are wont to do in the pages of the books we love.

“But my mother needn’t have worried. In reality, the heroes and heroines in romance novels taught me that I could own my sexuality on my terms, that I could respect myself enough to wait to find the right person to do all the romantic and naughty things I’d ever read about, and finally, they gave me the hope to know that, no matter how many failed relationships came before, when I found the right guy it would by no means be easy, but it would be magical. I am far from being a virgin, but the lessons about waiting for the right time and finding the right one still resonate with me. And now, as I am getting married for the first time at thirty-three years of age to the love of my life, I can tell you that it was well worth the wait on both counts!”

So romance, a genre that is often mocked and maligned as being riddled with sexuality, can be seen as a means to abstinence and waiting for the right person to experience sex? Yup! Anda has a similar story: “At the time where I was reading romance novels, the heroine was always a virgin and the guy taking her virginity was always her one, true, and forever love.

“So when my first boyfriend started pressuring me for sex, I said no because I wasn’t sure if he was Mr. Right (he wasn’t). He lost interest, dumped me, and I ended up keeping my virginity… until I met someone to whom it really was worth losing. So yes, I did learn from romance novels to wait and hold out until I was with someone I was really sure was one of the good guys.”

A reader who asked that she remain anonymous, so let’s call her Janet Smith, says that romances helped her understand that it was absolutely acceptable for women, as Blake pointed out, to have sexual desires: “Romance novels did have an influence on my relationships, and it was mostly a positive influence. My mom was open in talking about sex with me, so I knew all about it. And I’d decided that I was going to hold on to my virginity until I was married. And mom had made it clear that it was a boyfriend’s role in a relationship to push for sex and my role to say no. So you can imagine my surprise when
I
was feeling attraction. I hadn’t been prepared for the idea that
I
would want sex. I muddled through that mess on my own and decided that even though I was some kind of weird sexaholic (I thought) girl, that it was OK to do it with my boyfriend, because we were going to get married.

“I was in college by then, but didn’t have girlfriends who were having sex and sharing details. Then I discovered romance novels. And you know what? The women in the novels? They liked sex! They wanted it! I wasn’t a sexaholic; I was probably pretty darn normal. Go figure!”

Catinbody echoes Janet’s comments about discovering her own sexuality and hornypants: “Practical things aside, I think discovering your own sexuality is a healthy part of development that helps tremendously once you’re in a sexual relationship. For me, reading romance was a part of that development. I remember having it very clear in my mind at fifteen that while I didn’t want a man to love me for my body, I wanted to experience a man loving my body. This seemed to be a fairly subversive idea both for someone well-ensconced in her church youth group and who was growing up in an area with strong feminist influences. But it’s nothing more than what we all want—to be desired and to be loved. Romance got me honest about this and down off some of the pillars of ideology (both religious and feminist) I’d been standing on.”

Romance helped Nadia in many respects, especially in her marriage: “I learned a lot early on about what’s good for a female, and that sex can and should be good for the female, and applied it in real life. Now, in the middle of my second decade of marriage, we are still benefiting from my reading habits. Something new and interesting to try comes up now and again.”

Reader Elemental admits that he “initially read romances as a teenage boy for the naughty bits. But even then, there was something useful. They planted the ideas that women can be just as sexual as men, that things like oral or foreplay aren’t ‘unmanly,’ and a bit of sensitivity and willingness to communicate honestly can avoid a lot of aggravation later on. The actual sex-ed material I got elsewhere was all about the bare mechanics, so romances were largely my introduction to the emotions that accompanied the act, and confirmation that, yes, women actually enjoyed sex as much as men did.”

A reader who asked that I not reveal her name says that romance helped her get her adventure-sex merit badge (I only wish there were such a thing): “Reading romances really opened my eyes to the infinite possibilities of location. On more than one occasion my then-boyfriend-now-husband and I availed ourselves of the woods in a public park, in every room in every apartment or house we’ve had (including laundry room and kitchen), in parked cars (and vans), in swimming pools and hot tubs, on conference room tables (oh, if his bosses had any idea…), and, most memorably, multiple times in the attic window of a campus building at the Naval Academy with my bare ass perched on the window sill.”

Author Eve Savage found the sexuality of erotic romance had a lasting effect on her marriage, even before she began to write. Savage said that as her “life and reading tastes evolved, I started reading erotica which opened up a whole new world to me and my husband. Things we’d thought, but never had the guts to talk about or try, were now described in black and white. They helped us add new joys to our sex life and brought us closer together in the pleasure we give one another. Thirteen years of marriage and it’s only getting better!”

Even if the sexual possibilities seem impossible or downright uncomfortable in a novel, exploring your own sexuality in fiction can be very liberating—and, I won’t lie, quite titillating. Jess Granger says that she “started reading romances at the age of thirteen or fourteen, right when I started getting curious about everything, but I wasn’t quite sure what to do with myself, literally and figuratively.

“At the time, romances were fairly Old Skool, and some of them were over the top. One scene in Johanna Lindsey’s
Savage Thunder
in particular stuck with me, and it wasn’t until I was much, much older that I had the mental capacity to ask the question, ‘Where would the saddle horn go?’ Then I realized that probably wouldn’t be very comfortable.

“I love the idea that sex in romance novels encourages us to explore new places. Okay, I’m not in a hurry to be that couple caught on the JumboTron at the ball game humping in the stands, but there’s something to be said about a bit of controlled risk.”

One of the more empowering and, in my never-humble opinion, awesomely excellent things about sex in romance is that the woman is not punished or ultimately harmed for being curious or even assertive about her sexual needs. Even in the Old Skool days of forced seductions and other questionable scenes, the wages of sex were not death, ostracism, misery, poverty, and complete moral turpitude. Getting some didn’t mean giving yourself away—and it didn’t mean you were done for once you did the deed. Sex has always been one of the major focuses of romance, even if an individual book contained only the chastest of kisses, because romances are about the heroine, and about her self-discovery and her happiness. That has to include sex—and the exploration and enjoyment thereof!

Jess Granger says reading the spicier romances, even those with sexually aggressive heroes, helped her as a young woman in immeasurable ways: “As a young girl discovering her sexual self, it kept me out of a lot of trouble. Since I could explore those issues and feelings through the books, I did not have the urge to try to figure them out with some pimply-faced awkward boy in homeroom. Let’s face it. None of them were Fabio. Also, in a lot of those books, sex was scary! Oh, the pain! Not to mention the fact that so many of those poor heroines seemed to end up pregnant after one go.