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Books.RomanceBooksr1.3 - 07 Aug 2007 - 18:48 - HeatherShermantopic end

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Heather's Romance Fiction Links

General Romance Resources

Romance Readers Anonymous Listserv/Newsgroup: My romantic Internet life started with the bit.listserv.rra-l newsgroup. I'd been reading Usenet news for several years before I saw someone post on the more mundane rec.arts.books newsgroup asking if there was a group for discussing romances. And Lo! Jo Beverley responded! And she said yes! RRA-L closed in 2007, but dedicated list members moseyed on over to yahoo groups and the spirit of the original listserv lives on in at the Yahoo group

BYRON: I searched long and hard for a database to permit me to catalog my books without actually having to type all the information in. ``Books You Read, Old & New'' was just what I was looking for, plus a lot more. Definitely a great purchase! Bryon has a concept of plot points. I've started some of my own PlotPointLists. Thanks to Byron, all my genre fiction is now cataloged!

FictionDB: This looks like an extensive book resource and, unusually, appears to include complete lists of Series Romances. Some information is free, but covers/blurbs, personalized book tracking and an interface to sell your books costs a small annual fee.

Bookbug on the Web: Links, an extensive author directory and a list of romance-friendly bookstores.

Amusements

Ferri Tales (Romantic . . . er, prose): Lest we take it all too seriously, here's a site containing a monograph (Sex in the Romance) devoted to the more lurid accomplishments of the romance genre.

Good Sources of Romance Fiction

I'm still looking for the perfect on-line bookstore. I've yet to figure out just what qualities it will have, of course, but I'm confident that I'll know it when I see it. Good browsing and good searching, a shopping cart, and a huge selection of used books at low prices. What more could I ask for?

These first couple are more ways of finding books (especially paperbacks and genre fiction):

Book Store Junkies

A mailing list of amateur book searchers.

Book Sale List

A web page of library book sales across the US. I get most of my books from library book sales (when you have an addiction like mine, quantity is more critical than anything else!)

Addall.com price comparisons

a really useful price comparison (search by author, title, etc., get price of book including sales tax and shipping from various book stores).

These next couple are bookstores I've actually ordered from:

1romancestreet.com

Soda Creek Press produced the Manderley mail order catalog before opening up their web site. This is one of the few on-line bookstores I've actually ordered from (I'm a sucker for remainders).

bol.com

BOL was a British bookseller with, yes, flat rate shipping. Unfortunately they've turned into a book club, so they have fewer books and they don't ship to the US.

These all look like they might be interesting -- and seem to offer more than just current published books for sale (author information, sales of collectible romances, etc.):

Hard to Find Books Online Romance Catalog: Catalog of paperback collectibles which has quite a distinctive and easy to use search interface.
A Mystical Unicorn Online Used Bookstore: Contains Author Pseudonym and Bibliography sections
Steve Lewis Paperback Books: Lists of used Regency and Gothic paperbacks.

Romance Awards

RWA (Romance Writers of America)

Sadly, although they continue to list the finalists for the current year, they no longer list award finalists for previous years, as far as I can tell.

RWA Awards

RNA (Romantic Novelists Association, UK) I hunted for the RNA for a long time, because one of my favorite romance writers, Eva Ibbotson, won their major award. I figured it meant they had good taste . . .

Romance Authors

I used to list a number of individual authors here, but enough other lists exist that I now link only authors I've read and particularly enjoyed. Since I update this approximately annually, it tends to lag a bit behind what I'm actually reading and finding . . .

Here are a few sites which have a large number of links to author web pages:

And now for a few of my favorites:

Jane Austen

Certainly one of the earliest and most popular writers of romance!

Mary Balogh

Mary Balogh's Regencies and Historical Romances are highly emotional and sensual. Several of her Regencies such as The Notorious Rake and The Counterfeit Betrothal are brilliant. Her characters demonstrate that its possible to revise your world however you want.

Jo Beverley

Jo Beverley writes Regencies and historical romances for Zebra and Avon. I like her historicals best as a rule---my favorite is My Lady Notorious

Jennifer Crusie

Jennifer Crusie writes the most believable contemporary characters I've read. Her novels are funny, her characters are appealing and her books are great to read out loud. I've bought multiple copies of her books and given them away to all my friends, romance and non-romance readers alike.

Judy Cuevas/Judith Ivory

Judy Cuevas has a very distinctive, poetic prose style -- seemingly uncontrolled, but every word is perfectly placed. I particularly liked Bliss and Black Silk. Bliss contained an interesting pair of characters -- who weren't quite on the same wavelength as each other. Her older novel, Black Silk had echoes of the movie The Piano for me.

Georgette Heyer

The inventor of the Regency romance as we know it today, Georgette Heyer's novels are often comic, sometimes adventurous and always wonderful.

Edith Layton

One of my favorite Regency writers. One of her first books for Signet, The Duke's Wager, is strange and different and completely wonderful.

Nora Roberts

My favorite books by Nora Roberts are her early Silhouette Romances. I've not yet read any of her mysteries or longer, single title books, but intend to eventually.

Contemporary British Authors

In junior high I read a number of romances by Elizabeth Cadell. Lightly comic, single title, they were good. And in high school and college I read Jilly Cooper's short romances (Prudence, Harriet, etc.). They were comic, open about sex and fun. And then a few years ago, I found Katie Fforde and recently discovered that there's this whole genre of contemporary single title romances being published in Britain -- with that particularly British comic sensibility.

So, here's what I've found and liked:

Jilly Cooper

I've only read her short romances (rather than her longer potboilers). They're great!

Katie Fforde

Again, comic and delightful. I particularly like the first novel I read of hers, Wild Designs

Jill Mansell

Of the various authors I've randomly sampled from bol.com, Jill Mansell is my favorite. I started with Good at Games, but I think her most comic is Mille's Fling.

Works of Romance Fiction on the web

LionHearted Publishing: Electronic Publisher
The Reading Garden: Excerpts of fiction by various published and unpublished authors

Paper Publishers

The comments below are necessarily short -- and probably more true of the publishing world as it existed in the 80's and early 90's when I worked in a bookstore and paid more attention to the details of which publishers which buying which other publishers. While I've tried to keep track of which imprints are owned by which publishers, they do seem to wriggle around a lot.

Avon Books

Avon books was the pioneer of popular historical romances in the 1980's, publishing authors like Kathleen Woodiwiss. Nowadays they publish historical romances and some Regency romances (or a least they did. I think Regencies are enjoying another bust).

Although I haven't read many Regencies published by Avon, I have read and enjoyed all the Regencies they've published by <A HREF="http://www.dnai.com/~kmoore/">Kate Moore. My other favorite Avon authors are Laura Kinsale, <A HREF="http://www.geocities.com/~lorettachase/">Loretta Chase and <A HREF="http://www.booktalk.com/susanephillips/">Susan Elizabeth Phillips. The Avon Ladies web page is a good place to start.

Avon is, apparently, now owned by Harper Collins.

<a href="http://www.qksrv.net/click-1051444-534091" target="_blank">Harlequin/Silhouette/Mira

Harlequin and Silhouette are owned by the same Canadian company, but operate independently. Both are publishers of contemporary series romances, with a variety of ``lines'' which have different guidelines. These include one historical line (Harlequin Historicals) and two lines which focus on mystery and suspense plots (Harlequin Intrigue, and, to a lesser extent, Silhouette Intimate Moments) as well as the traditional romances, ranging from "sweet" to "sexy" and short to long.

Series romances are often called "category". My favorite category writer is Jennifer Crusie. She has a fabulous command of dialogue and comic prose as well as truly believable contemporary characters. She no longer writes for Harlequin (in fact, I think she's completely moved away from category and into "single title" novels), but do yourself a favor and find her older Harlequin Temptations.

Other favorites include Carole Mortimer, Dixie Browning, Margaret Way, Anne Stuart, Beverly Sommers, Nora Roberts, Kristin James, and

Linda Howard.

I've not read many of the Harlequin Historicals, but one of my favorite historical writers, Julie Tetel, has written some excellent novels for this line.

Harper Collins

Harper Paperbacks (and their apparently discontinued imprint Harper Monogram) used to publish single-title Regenciesand historical romances. See Avon Books for their current romance offerings.

They published the paperback of Chloe Cheshire's A Gypsy at Almacks and historical romance writer Christina Dodd, among others.

Penguin USA, Inc

Jove published a couple of category lines in the 1980's -- Jove "Second Chance at Love" and "To Have and to Hold" (romances about married people -- that didn't last!).

Berkley published regencies and the Diamond Homespun and Diamond Wildflower historical romance lines and later the Topaz romance line .

Berkley/Jove lives on today, publishing Laura Kinsale, Nora Roberts and Jayne Ann Krentz.

Meanwhile, the Signet/NAL imprint has long been publishing excellent Regency romances. Authors I enjoy are Carla Kelly, Mary Balogh, Allison Lane and Karen Harbaugh.

Random House

During a peak of Regency popularity in the early 1980's, Fawcett published a Regency series (Fawcett Coventry). This imprint continues to publish Joan Smith and Barbara Metzger, two of the more comic Regency writers.

Bantam jumped into the series romance market in the early 1980's with the ``Circle of Love'' sweet romance series---just as other publishers (Dell, Silhouette) were discovering sexy romances were where the action was. Bantam backtracked and soon after came out with Bantam Loveswept, one of the first contemporary romance series which incorporated humor and exciting, adventurous plots. Sadly, they stopped publishing them in February of 1999.

I read many of the early novels in this series. My favorite authors were Iris Johansen, Billie J. Green, Kay Hooper and the inimitable Tom and Sharon Curtis.

Bantam also publishes historical romances. Authors I enjoy include Laura Kinsale, Amanda Quick, and Theresa Medeiros.

Dell was one of the early series romances publishers, with the Dell Candlelight series. This series included a variety of different subgenres in the one line, including contemporaries, Regencies and gothics. In the early 1980's they started the Dell Candlelight Ecstasy series with such classic authors as Jayne Krentz (Jayne Castle, Amanda Quick), Diana Palmer (Diana Blayne), Joan Hohl (Aimee Lorin), and Elaine Raco Chase.

Simon & Schuster

Hardcover publisher Simon and Schuster publishes authors such as Jayne Ann Krentz and Judith McNaught?.

St. Martin's Press

Primarily a hardcover publisher, St. Martin's publishes novels by Regency and Georgian romance writer Patricia Veryan, and less easily categorized romance novels by the marvelous Eva Ibbotson.

Kensington/Zebra

The quality of Zebra books varies dramatically. They publish a variety of historical romances and Regency romances. Their Regencies range from dreadful to quite good. I read Borrowed Kisses, a Regency by Teresa DesJardien? and thought it was a wonderful romance, but as a Regency, my roommate complained that it contained a number of inaccuracies. Kensington also publishes entertaining single title novels by authors such as Jane Heller.

Newsletters and Magazines

The following should all be either electronic versions of paper publications (or sites associated with a paper publication) or sites which primarily include romance articles and reviews.

General

The Ultimate Internet Romance Book Site

Links, information for collectors, pseudonyms, etc.

Romantic Times

I started reading Romantic Times with the first issue, in 1982, I think. General reviews of all romance categories and some women's fiction, as well as general articles. I stopped subscribing a few years ago when I eventually found that the tastes of the reviewers didn't seem to match mine any longer.

Genreflecting

Genreflecting is a book I once ran across in the reference section of the Glendora library. The site includes many links that may be of interest to readers of romances and other genre fiction.

The Literary Times