Tuesday, April 24, 2007

Reality in Romance

On another blog I read how a very vocal blog reviewer realized she often demands more "reality" from a book, but doesn't want the raw reality a male author injects into his heroes. I laughed and agreed with her. When I read for entertainment, escape is my goal. Not facing the ugly facts.

It seems men have a whole different view of entertainment time. They want to face the ugly facts when seeking entertainment. The uglier and rawer the facts are the better. Action movies are a great example. War movies. In fiction they want to know volumes of material that are of almost of no interest to a romance reader. Like how do you build an exploding paperclip? Okay, that's a stupid example, but you know what I mean. Those huge books that spend pages on details of how a thing works or is built. I don't care how the "thing" is built. I want to know what the "thing" does to plot and characters. LOL

I wonder why men need those lengthy explanations and construction scenes? Is knowing the author can build a nifty thing proof that he's a real man and one can continue reading the book without fear of "pansy" behaviour? How do guys even know the "build it" scene is real? That seems to matter to them. The author must "sell" them on the fact that all those details are correct.

Well, they laugh at us when we clutch the "girly" novel and sniffle back tears while reading the end. We can laugh at them for needing to snort in agreement when their hero creates a bomb out of mouthwash, bleach and super glue.
Happy reading.

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