Genre is Bullshit, But Let’s All Read Romance

I am on a mission to reclaim the romance novel. 

Although great romance writers of the past like the Brontës and Jane Austen are now considered “literary fiction,” most modern romances and rom-coms are relegated to “chick lit” or “beach reads,” because it is a genre that is often written by and for women.

Said Virginia Woolf, of the way society embraces masculine values: 

“Speaking crudely, football and sport are ‘important’; the worship of fashion, the buying of clothes ‘trivial.’ And these values are inevitably transferred from life to fiction. This is an important book, the critic assumes, because it deals with war. This is an insignificant book because it deals with feelings of women in a drawing-room.”

My maternal grandmother was an obsessive reader. She was an intellectual who loved nothing better than to sit by the ocean, drink her favorite port in the evenings, and read everything. She read historical non-fiction, political texts, murder mysteries, humor, “literary fiction”, “pop fiction”, Harry Potter—everything she found engaging. She loved a good story. She was not a genre snob.

Genre snobbery—declaring some kinds of writing (traditionally realism, traditionally masculine and white) “literary” and others “pop” or “genre” is gatekeeping—it’ a way of deciding what’s in the “literary canon” and what isn’t. It’s a way for those in power (white men and sometimes white women) to elevate their own perspective, to reinforce their cultural and ideological power. 

The late, great Toni Morrison—and I hope I paraphrase her accurately— said that the “American literary canon” essentially upholds white supremacy. It centers white, mostly male perspectives, and dismisses different perspectives—those of Black writers (and other writers of color, LGTBQ writers, etc.) as “niche”—and lesser. Genre snobbery helps to uphold the “literary canon.”

I grew up steeped in the literary canon and with my fair share of genre snobbery. The idea that sci-fi, fantasy, crime novels, and romance are of lesser literary quality was an idea so ingrained in me that I am still working on undoing it. In my early twenties I proudly showed a friend of mine my bookcase that I alphabetized and sorted into genres with “literary fiction” on top, and “genre fiction” on the bottom. He was appropriately disgruntled. 

Some of these walls have begun to break down—both for me and in the wider literary community. The division between “literary fiction” and “genre fiction” is beginning to dissolve. Writers who play with genre (like Octavia Butler and Carmen Maria Machado, just to name a couple) show how expansive literature can be—how exciting magical realism, science fiction, horror, and other “genres” can be. How narrow and reductive the white, male perspective of literature can be. 

I want to read more romance and I want to see it embraced, the way these other “genres” have been. After all, Johnathan Franzen can write about women’s feelings in a drawing room and have it declared “The Great American Novel”—romance, written by women, especially women of color and queer women—needs more attention. 

This is partly a marketing problem, but it’s also a cultural problem. When I was younger, if I saw a book that was pink and green, had curly writing on the cover and was written by a woman, my initial reaction was to dismiss it. Once, in college, I became furious at a man for saying that Jane Austen was “chick lit.” I said something like it’s so much more than that! It’s witty and subversive and satirical! This is all true—but who cares? Even romance novels that are just romance novels (and not also expertly crafted social commentaries) shouldn’t be called “chick lit” because the term itself is derogatory. It’s a term that in and of itself is meant to deride women and their taste and intelligence. It’s misogynist and boring and we need to get rid of it. 

Recently I’ve been reading romance novels before bed because I am a bad sleeper and the world is a terrible nightmare. I prefer modern rom-coms with sweet, respectful male leads if the object of desire is a man. (The Mr. Rochester/lovable asshole male lead issue is a whole other essay.) Since the spring I’ve read The Wedding Date by Jasmine Guillory, The Royal We by Heather Cocks and Jessica Morgan, Evvie Drake Starts Over by Linda Holmes, and Red, White, and Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston.

I’m not going to pretend that I don’t have critiques. I’m not going to pretend that The Royal We is the same caliber of writing as say Persuasion. But I also don’t think it’s particularly useful to compare them. I’m arguing we should resist some of our desire to rank, and we should resist our urge to dismiss a book because its chief concern is its female protagonist’s emotions. We should instead embrace stories on their own terms. Romance novels are meant to be satisfying escapes—are meant to offer us the pleasure of experiencing a good love story. If you like romance—read them, watch them, enjoy them. Don’t worry about whether it’s highbrow or not. 

I wanted to love The Wedding Date because I liked the main character, and I was excited for a fun, fluffy, interracial romance (those need more representation!) However I only liked it—the prose, for me, didn’t trust its readers enough, and fell into the classic trap of “telling instead of showing.”

The Royal We was emotionally rich and gripping, but its male lead was slightly flat.

Red, White and Royal Blue had a compelling queer romance at the center, but the alternate universe with a Democrat female president was jarring to read in this reality, and took me out of the world when the plot became too political. 

My favorite was Evvie Drake Starts Over, which had a more somber, serious tone, two delightful but complicated characters, a beautiful rendering of small-town Maine, and Linda Holmes’s lovely, controlled prose guiding it along. If you’re wanting to dive into this genre—come borrow my copy of this book. 

The genre of romance itself has issues with representation and gatekeeping. Imitating the racist and sexist values of our society, it has centered white and heterosexual writers and stories. It has certainly participated in perpetuating internalized misogynist tropes. As readers of the genre we must make sure we break down those walls as well—that within romance all our different voices and perspectives are celebrated, especially those who are marginalized.

Fortunately, there seems to be a bit of a romance boom at the moment—and Black writers like Jasmine Guillory are writing best-sellers. There are so many different writers writing romance currently—I’m excited to read more, and I’m excited to see where this genre will go, what new and exciting romantic stories we will have the pleasure of reading. 

I hope that the distinction between the “romance novel” and the “literary novel” will get murkier, and that we stop calling romance novels “chick lit.” 

Next I’m diving back into Jasmine Guillory’s world to read The Proposal, but I’m new to this journey—if anyone has any suggestions for romance novels you think I would like, please send them along!

Finally, as one last knock against genre snobbery, please check out my brilliant friend Katie’s book-review website! Katie, like my late grandmother did, reads everything regardless of genre, and writes reviews of the many, many books she reads—“pop fiction”, thrillers, family dramas—and novels about women’s feelings in drawing rooms.