by hollandrae | Jul 6, 2020 | Beauty, Characters, Heroines, Industry, Inspiration, Musings, Reading, Romance Novels, Women's Rights
I think there was a time when pop culture and mass media realized that women could be mean. They discovered the secret like it was the Holy Grail and turned it into a trope that would never die. The Mean Girl. The Villainess. The Bitch. The Witch. The Slut. The Prude....
by hollandrae | Jul 2, 2020 | Characters, Heroes, Heroines, Industry, Intersectional Feminism, Musings, My Books, Reviews, Romance Novels, Women, Women's Rights
I know, it sounds dirty. But DNF stands for ‘Did Not Finish’ and I don’t do it often. In fact, I didn’t even do it while I was reading this most recent book, by a famous, renowned romance novelist, whose work I’ve enjoyed in the past, but whose latest release is, in...
by hollandrae | Jun 15, 2020 | Characters, Heroes, Heroines, Industry, Musings, Regency, Romance Novels, Women, Women's Rights, Writing
Yes, I’m defending romance novels again. But it’s a little different this time, I swear! (I hope.) See, recently I’ve been coercing my new neighbor into reading romance novels. She’s been alive for more than three decades and she’s never enjoyed a single romance novel...
by hollandrae | Jun 8, 2020 | Industry, Intersectional Feminism, Musings, Research, Romance Novels, Women, Women's Rights
This panel was hosted in summer of 2018, before I moved to Nashville. I briefly considered making edits to this post, but the truth is that more remains the same than has changed in these years of fighting for equal representation, opportunity, and support, and so I...
by hollandrae | Jun 1, 2020 | Characters, Heroines, Industry, Inspiration, Reading, Romance Novels, RWA, Uncategorized, Women, Women's Rights
I initially wrote this piece almost two years ago and, while a lot has changed in romance and in politics, far too much remains the same. I am no longer a member of the Romance Writers of America community, which saddens me deeply, but I am working to create more...
by hollandrae | Jan 22, 2020 | Characters, Heroines, Musings, My Books, Reading, Research, Romance Novels, RWA, Statistics, Women, Women's Rights
There are some pretty distinct rules that separate romance novels from every other genre, including genres with love stories. The most obvious of which is the HEA, The Happily Ever After, where the reader is left with a sense that, not only is everything okay right...
