Never underestimate the commercial value of mental illness.
The Virgin Heroine has always been (and remains, IMO) a staple of genre romance. It’s getting not so much that way anymore, but as time goes on and society gets freer with its sexcapades, it’s harder for a writer to justify the Virgin Heroine, especially beyond, say, college age. On the other hand, we still have historical writers who are perfectly capable of pulling off the “wicked virgin widow trope,” which I have to admit is cracktastic and I never ever get tired of it. (Kind of like “I had to do it to fulfill the will” plots, but that’s another post.)
I don’t believe I’ve ever read a contemporary romance (other than an inspirational or sweet) that used religious beliefs as a solid, if not defiant, reason for the heroine’s virginity. And in any case, religious or not, if the heroine does lose her virginity before she marries the hero, she still marries (or commits to) the hero, so it’s all good.
For Mormons, the matter of celibacy until marriage is an expectation, a requirement. You don’t have sex with your one and only twu wuv before the vows are said no matter the commitment level. This also means you can’t have sex with yourself since, well, you aren’t married to yourself. Masturbation’s a no-no, folks.
Oh, yes, I just now heard all 4 of you non-Mormon readers gasp in shock and dismay. I know. Me, too. Think about being 29, 37, 46 and still a virgin. It’s a bitch. You think I’m kidding or talking about a very small minority of single women in the church who had no plans for default nunnery? I assure you, I am not. There’s a lot of ’em. I will never find a non-Mormon romance with a Virgin Heroine who’s 29, 37, 46 without some trauma or serious psychological issues that requires therapy. Nobody’d believe it.
So. For the more adventurous of LDS women who read genre romance of the steamier variety, I have written the unapologetic 37-year-old Virgin Heroine as a tribute to you (and when she finds her one and only twu wuv, she takes one for the team so you don’t have to); if you’re older than that and still can’t relate to Giselle’s celibate angst, I apologize from the bottom of my heart (although if you disagree with her choices, well, not apologizing for that).
For the non-LDS women who can’t relate to such a thing at all, I hope I’ve written for you a decent reason she is the way she is and a realistic picture of the way she deals with it. If you still can’t believe it, my only defense is that I know these women—a lot of them.
Jasmine or honeysuckle, if you’re offering. Lavender and gardenia make my nose itch.
A resident of the Ivory Tower, who apparently called dibs on A’isha (child bride of Muhammed) as her personal and exclusive domain of study and forgot to send the memo, raised a ruckus about a book she didn’t like and managed to get Random House to pull it after the author had been paid her $100k advance and the presses were rolling. I say it’s an academic hatchet job.
I was over on Dear Author talking about Breaking Dawn by Stephenie Meyer, which I have not read. One commenter expressed disapproval of Meyer on the basis that she’s a Mormon mother and shouldn’t be writing stuff like that anyway. I will go so far as to guess this commenter was not Mormon because she spelled it “Morman.”
I could crack on Meyer for a couple of different things, but when the religion gets broken out as a generic weapon to say “You can’t write that because you’re a Mormon,” I’m on Meyer’s side. Period.
This post is for the non-Mormon readers of this blog who come from (most likely) the genre romance corner of the net.
Backstory: LDS fiction (aka Mormon fiction) is analogous to, say, what Steeple Hill puts out or any other run-of-the-mill Christian/evangelical inspirational romance. No swearing, no sex, very clean. No taking the Lord’s name in vain, no smoking, no drinking, no allusions to any of these things. For all intents and purposes, the term “LDS fiction” has come to be defined informally in the same milieu as inspirational romance category fiction.
Always Listen to the Ravings of a Mad Woman
(A Story of Sex, Porn, and Postum in the Land of Zion)
by JulieAnn Henneman
published by Draumr Publishing
This book was mentioned to me as something different (especially as regards Mormon characters), so I went a-seeking. And boy, did I get.
Corinne Young is having an affair with her dentist. Kinda. Sorta. She’s not sure why, but there’s gotta be a reason, right? Her husband, Brent, holes himself up in his office with his computer all night long, working on the software training company he built. And then, well, all hell breaks loose. It doesn’t take long to understand why Corinne’s diddling the dentist, even if it takes her longer than the reader to figure it out. (Because, well, what does “husband holed up in his office with his computer all night long” say to you? Okay, after much thought, it occurred to me he could have been gaming.)
This morning I’m listening to Simply Red (flashbacks from freshman year at BYU) and the song “Money’s Too Tight to Mention” is a good song. If it weren’t, I wouldn’t have it in my library.
It also trashes things I believe in. Does it bother me? On some visceral level, yes, but that doesn’t make it difficult for me to listen to it and it certainly doesn’t keep me from listening. I’d miss a whole lot of good music (and that voice!) if I took umbrage at other people’s opinions and the way they state them (usually the way they state them is more off-putting than what they say).
So it started me thinking about how I read fiction,
In the last week or so, it has become clear to me that the basic understanding quite a few people have of libertarianism is that of greed and selfishness. This surprises me because I thought most people had us figured for proponents of legalized marijuana and prostitution.
Angel Falling Softly
by Eugene Woodbury
published by Zarahemla Books
Perhaps I should admit upfront that I consider myself an undemanding reader. I’ll happily go wherever the author wants to take me as long as it’s logical, consistent, and interesting. Let me add that I don’t even particularly care whether a story is plot-driven or character-driven; give me something to chaw on intellectually and I’m good to go. Make me laugh and I’ll forgive almost anything.
This is one reason why, when I read Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight, I was highly annoyed [private link]. I like vampires. I’ve studied vampire myths since I fell in love with Vlad the Impaler somewhere in the early ’90s, so her inconsistent worldbuilding, her habit of telling rather than showing, and her mostly flat characterizations grated.
By contrast, Eugene Woodbury’s take is haunting. Poignant, even.
I started a new book a couple of days ago. It’s easy when you start ripping off plots on purpose instead of trying to reinvent the wheel and then finding out someone else did it before you. First Hamlet, now the New Testament. Next thing you know, I’ll be rewriting Moby Dick.
Now, I can write for a Mormon audience. Or I can write for the romance audience. Or I can write for the general fiction audience (whatever that is). Well. I wrote for all three, because that’s what I like.
So I went a-seekin’ keywords for my website header information and, naturally, plugged “Mormon romance” into Google and what did I get? This:
Mormon romance novels seduce book buyers
Germane point:
“I realized that there was a big hole in the LDS market for women’s fiction and I felt like I could do better,” [author Anita] Stansfield said. “I couldn’t find anything to read that satisfied me.”
Several years ago Stansfield wrote about a woman recovering from breast cancer. An important part of the book was the woman’s relationship with her husband, which included their relations in the bedroom, Stansfield said.
The novel’s bedroom scene dealt sensitively and obscurely with the topic of sex, referring more to the woman’s feelings than the couple’s activities. And yet Stansfield doesn’t believe those scenes would make it through the editing process today.
“I know I couldn’t write that now. They have cracked down,” she said.
WTF?