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more New Amsterdam, plus a tl;dr entry on romance fiction
So the second episode threw out a huge twist: Amsterdam's older mortal buddy? Is his *son*. And in the flashback where we learn how he met his son's mom, he has a different mature mortal friend -- who turns out to be his *daughter*. That's a HUGE twist from Highlander, one that adds a ton of emotional complication. I think I like it.
Also -- he tells *everyone* he's immortal. He never bothers to lie, he just assumes they won't believe him -- and they don't.
Finally? I loved the Highlander shout-out in which someone asks him what happens if his head gets cut off.
Some folks might already have seen this post and many, many comments about romance novels.
I was really conflicted as I read it (and truth be told, I couldn't make it through the whole comment thread).
Here's the thing: I have read romance fiction for verging on 30 years, and I consider myself a defender of the genre, but I *totally* got what hilzoy was saying and did not find it offensive (though I think she overdid it when she said romance novels aren't books). I dismissed Gary Farber as a guy with his panties in a twist, but when La Nora chimed in I was kinda disappointed.
I have read Jan Radway's Reading the Romance, and I found it infuriating. Still, I think it is true that most -- maybe not all, but most -- readers are looking for something specific when they pick up a romance. Is there great diversity within the genre? Sure there is. But when I pick up a *specific* romance in a store, I am unlikely to be surprised by its contents, because I already know (from the author, and the cover, and the branding) pretty much what I'm getting, whether it's a Harlequin Regency or an Amanda Quick (which is *not* the same as a Jayne Ann Krentz), or a Nora Roberts or a JD Robb or a Harlequin Intrigue.
When I read a piece of literary fiction, I do not know what I'm getting -- I might well wind up with a story in which a retired couple go to a party and decide to kill themselves (it happened not long ago, and I am evidently not over it yet). This is not something I have to worry about when I pick up a romance novel. I do not think it is slamming romance novels to say that they are a different beast from literary fiction, or to say that readers have different expectations for them. Saying they aren't the same as literary novels doesn't mean they can't be well-written; saying readers have different expectations doesn't mean readers can't appreciate the difference between a well-crafted romance and a crappy one.
Romances are not the only genre that is predictable; mysteries have similar constraints and come in flavors, just as romances do (police procedurals, psycho thrillers -- heck, Dick Francis probably constitutes a flavor all by himself). Georgette Heyer was a *great* writer in both genres and wrote a few novels in which she deliberately challenged the conventions (a mystery that is never solved; another mystery in which the brooding, misunderstood character turns out to be a perfectly well-understood a-hole; and a historical romance in which the rake remains unreformed and the genial, bumbling friend turns out to be a hero in disguise). The last of these three experiments is, IMHO, the only success; the others were well-written but thoroughly frustrating, precisely *because* they violated the reader's (well, *my*) expectations.
Finally, people got all het up about the Jane Austen thing, and I get why the romance fans were offended -- I was ready to clock Margaret Atwood for insisting that Oryx & Crake wasn't SF -- but when I'm in the mood for a romance? I am not in the mood for Jane Austen. (When I'm in the mood for science fiction, Margaret Atwood might well satisfy me -- but that's not because romances are inferior to science fiction, that's because certain Margaret Atwood novels fit more closely within the constraints of contemporary science fiction than Jane Austen novels fit within the constraints of contemporary romance fiction.)
I have no real conclusion, I just wanted to get all this out in print ...
Also -- he tells *everyone* he's immortal. He never bothers to lie, he just assumes they won't believe him -- and they don't.
Finally? I loved the Highlander shout-out in which someone asks him what happens if his head gets cut off.
Some folks might already have seen this post and many, many comments about romance novels.
I was really conflicted as I read it (and truth be told, I couldn't make it through the whole comment thread).
Here's the thing: I have read romance fiction for verging on 30 years, and I consider myself a defender of the genre, but I *totally* got what hilzoy was saying and did not find it offensive (though I think she overdid it when she said romance novels aren't books). I dismissed Gary Farber as a guy with his panties in a twist, but when La Nora chimed in I was kinda disappointed.
I have read Jan Radway's Reading the Romance, and I found it infuriating. Still, I think it is true that most -- maybe not all, but most -- readers are looking for something specific when they pick up a romance. Is there great diversity within the genre? Sure there is. But when I pick up a *specific* romance in a store, I am unlikely to be surprised by its contents, because I already know (from the author, and the cover, and the branding) pretty much what I'm getting, whether it's a Harlequin Regency or an Amanda Quick (which is *not* the same as a Jayne Ann Krentz), or a Nora Roberts or a JD Robb or a Harlequin Intrigue.
When I read a piece of literary fiction, I do not know what I'm getting -- I might well wind up with a story in which a retired couple go to a party and decide to kill themselves (it happened not long ago, and I am evidently not over it yet). This is not something I have to worry about when I pick up a romance novel. I do not think it is slamming romance novels to say that they are a different beast from literary fiction, or to say that readers have different expectations for them. Saying they aren't the same as literary novels doesn't mean they can't be well-written; saying readers have different expectations doesn't mean readers can't appreciate the difference between a well-crafted romance and a crappy one.
Romances are not the only genre that is predictable; mysteries have similar constraints and come in flavors, just as romances do (police procedurals, psycho thrillers -- heck, Dick Francis probably constitutes a flavor all by himself). Georgette Heyer was a *great* writer in both genres and wrote a few novels in which she deliberately challenged the conventions (a mystery that is never solved; another mystery in which the brooding, misunderstood character turns out to be a perfectly well-understood a-hole; and a historical romance in which the rake remains unreformed and the genial, bumbling friend turns out to be a hero in disguise). The last of these three experiments is, IMHO, the only success; the others were well-written but thoroughly frustrating, precisely *because* they violated the reader's (well, *my*) expectations.
Finally, people got all het up about the Jane Austen thing, and I get why the romance fans were offended -- I was ready to clock Margaret Atwood for insisting that Oryx & Crake wasn't SF -- but when I'm in the mood for a romance? I am not in the mood for Jane Austen. (When I'm in the mood for science fiction, Margaret Atwood might well satisfy me -- but that's not because romances are inferior to science fiction, that's because certain Margaret Atwood novels fit more closely within the constraints of contemporary science fiction than Jane Austen novels fit within the constraints of contemporary romance fiction.)
I have no real conclusion, I just wanted to get all this out in print ...