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Printed from https://www.writing.com/main/newsletters/action/archives/id/11428
Romance/Love: June 29, 2022 Issue [#11428]




 This week: Not Qualified to be a Hopeless Romantic
  Edited by: GeminiGem of House Lannister
                             More Newsletters By This Editor  

Table of Contents

1. About this Newsletter
2. A Word from our Sponsor
3. Letter from the Editor
4. Editor's Picks
5. A Word from Writing.Com
6. Ask & Answer
7. Removal instructions

About This Newsletter



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Hello! I'm GeminiGem of House Lannister, and I am the guest editor of this edition of the Romance/Love newsletter.


Word from our sponsor

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Letter from the editor

Not Qualified to be a Hopeless Romantic

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When I was in 8th grade, I was befriended by a couple of 9th graders on the school bus. They were freshmen in high school and I was still in junior high school (that's how things worked back in the day). They seemed so much older and wiser than me. When the girls found out that I liked to read they decided to loan me a whole grocery bag full of paper-back books from their own collections.

The books were classic 1970s Harlequin Romances. https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/harlequin-1970s

This was an eye-opening experience for me because I had never read anything like these books before this. The ones I remember were centered around a younger sister that had a big crush on a gorgeous guy who seemed to prefer her older sister (much to the detriment of her tender heart). She would see them with their arms around the other, their heads bent together as they spoke intimately, etc. The younger sister would spend a lot of time feeling spurned. In the end, the gorgeous guy would confess that he had been in love with the younger sister the whole time, and they would live happily ever after.

But would they? Even at this early age I couldn't help but think to myself, why all the PDA (public displays of affection) with the older sister if he was really in love with the younger sister? How awkward would family gatherings be? Why would the gorgeous guy be in love with the younger sister if he had basically zero interactions with her and spent all of his free time with the older sister? Perhaps I became a cynic at an early age.

This reading experience may or may not have been the beginning of my avoidance of anything that is billed as a "romance."

Am I anti-love? Am I anti-romance? Absolutely not! I just feel that a strong, loving relationship cannot exist in a bubble. Love should be woven into the fabric of our characters' lives rather than occur as a separate entity. Although love can be a mysterious phenomenon, it still needs to be believable to a reader. This may be a better explanation of why I am uncomfortable with something that is strictly a romance story (besides being a lousy hopeless romantic). Please remember, these are my opinions, offered up only to give you something to swirl around in your brain rather than to criticize how anyone is writing (including those folks who write Harlequin Romances and probably make a fine living doing it).






Editor's Picks

FORUM
Awwwww - Romantic - CLOSED  (18+)
Seasonal Romantic Short Story Contest
#1877341 by Aennaytte: Free & Wild in GoT


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FORUM
Roots & Wings Contest  (E)
Can you capture the essence of an ancestor in one story? CLOSED
#1962161 by GeminiGem of House Lannister


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FORUM
A Newbie Poetry Contest  (E)
Presented by The Fox's Socks//OPEN APRIL 1 - 30, 2024
#2273703 by GeminiGem of House Lannister


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Gold Hearts

STATIC
Contest Clues  (E)
List of WdC Writing Contests, Challenges, Activities. Clues To What's Open, What's Closed!
#2221492 by GeminiGem of House Lannister


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 Invalid Item 
This item number is not valid.
#2274996 by Not Available.


My Cabin in The Woods  (13+)
A war veteran slips away from society. Will he make it back?
#2273805 by Bikerider



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I do my initial search for items to feature by genre. If you are not choosing the THREE genres your writing can fall into when you are in editing mode of that item, you may be missing out! It is never too late to update all the items in your port. Genre to avoid: OTHER.

 
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