This morning I read an article in the Sydney Morning Herald reprinted from the Telegraph Magazine. The article by Louisa McKay stated ‘Mills and Boon enjoys 100 years of endless love.’ In the last year around the world, Mills and Boon romances sold ‘more than 160 million books,’ or ‘5.5 books a second.’ Staggering figures about the successful publishing phenomena of Mills &Boon romances.
As an avid library user I see females from teenage girls to little old ladies borrowing these Mills and Boon romances. What is it about the romance novel that has captured the public’s attention to such a degree?
I knew a woman and she and her single daughter devoured these novels every day. Did they see them merely as a light form of entertainment and an easy read? Or did this give them a skewed picture of what love and marriage is all about?
On the whole I’m not a big fan of the romance genre, but occasionally I dip into one. At times they get certain elements right. ‘Love makes us put other people first,’ a character said in a Mira romance by Debbie Macomber.
Then there’s this one from a male character in the Mira romance, Seaview Inn by Sherryl Woods. He says ‘Marriage is a huge leap of faith based on hope as much as love. In reality, though, it doesn’t mean they have the fortitude or the passion to make it work over the long haul, not with all the crises likely to crop up along the way. There are probably thousands of things – big and small – that can trip a marriage up and make it fail.’ There are indeed! And sometimes it is not the big dramas in life but the little everyday habits and hassles that can be the undoing of a marriage that is on shaky ground.
From the same novel a female character was thinking about building sandcastles ‘It had been her first hard lesson in the fact that some things didn’t last, no matter how well built and solid they seemed. Sometimes it was the foundation that mattered, not the structure, and sand had a way of shifting underfoot, much as her own parents’ marriage had crumbled a few years later.’ I agree, we need to have the foundation of our marriage right. Love is not always enough.
For many women having been fed a diet of ‘endless love’ do they then go into marriage with a blinkered view of what it is all about? How much have romance novel and romantic films affected society and its expectation of love? I’d love to hear your thoughts on this.
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