Dot I love your post about the snapshots from hollanov’s first year of marriage and humbly I am here asking for more? What else do you see in the crystal ball?? Your headcanons are so warm but also so true to them 😭😢😭😢😭😢😭
OKAY I have been sitting on this and here's what I have for you:
Shane Hollander smiling so so wide after his first goal as a Centaur and it's legitimately pure coincidence that the camera angle captures his husband in the background, jumping up from the bench and pointing and grinning
Ilya Rozanov apparently comparing zucchini at the farmer's market in a manner that would look perfectly innocent if not for his husband's face
the pair of them, from the back, walking out of a bar with Shane's hand in Ilya's back pocket
chatting with Jackie Pike, Shane's chin on Ilya's shoulder and his arms wrapped around his middle while Ilya holds both their drinks
Ilya Rozanov on the bench with a medic taping his fingers, the other hand holding on to Shane Hollander's jersey while Hollander opens a bottle of Gatorade for him
Shane Hollander crouching to tie Ilya Rozanov's skates in the locker room before a game
stretched out on a blanket on the Boodrams' lawn, apparently deeply absorbed in watching Milo build a tower out of his toys
a blurry photo of Shane Hollander flailing as he is pushed into a hotel pool
lifting up their shirts and pushing down the top of their sweatpants to show off matching, dark purple bruises from hip to ribs
passed tf out on the Hollanders' sofa with Yuna just within frame holding a thick blanket
Rose Landry gracefully descending a set of stairs at a charity gala and completely ignoring both pairs of hands offering to steady her
Troy Barrett, Shane Hollander, and Ilya Rozanov all sweaty and in their practice gear standing behind Harris Drover, who is showing them something on his phone (this one becomes a meme)
I absolutely do! I am going to try and suggest a couple of different vibes so you can see what you're into, but all of these are books/authors I personally really enjoyed and are good examples of the genre.
Funny, silly, sexy? Try Tessa Dare's The Duchess Deal (m/f, Regency). Tessa unfortunately doesn't write anymore, but her books are delightful, over-the-top, and hilarious. Not where you go for historical accuracy, but always a good time.
Heart-wrenching, political, intense? Anything by Courtney Milan but specifically her Brothers Sinister series (m/f, Victorian). The Countess Conspiracy is probably my favourite historical romance ever, period. If you want to read about people of colour in the British Empire building diverse communities, try her Wedgeford Trials.
Queer? Messy? Tender? I adore Cat Sebastian's books; she's written mainly Regency m/m but I have never not enjoyed her. Personal recommendation for The Ruin of a Rake.
Sober, elegant, therapeutic? If you're looking for something more Jane Austen, you might enjoy Mary Balogh's Survivors' Club series. At 2.5 books a year for 40 years, not all are bangers and the less said about her sex scenes, the better, but this series and specifically Only a Kiss are really beautiful explorations of trauma and love and happiness in difficult times.
I really wish I had a recommendation for f/f (except Courtney Milan's Mrs Martin's Incomparable Adventure, which I adore, but it's only a novella). The f/f romance market seems to focus much more on contemporaries, and the few releases from the big publishers have not really done it for me, unfortunately. Lots of people enjoyed Olivia Waite's Lady's Guide to Celestial Mechanics, so I will at least mention it.
More potentially controversial thoughts about the current state of the genre under the cut:
It also appears that historical romance isn't really that popular right now. We all thought the Bridgerton adapation would lead to a revival, but I have some theories about why that didn't happen. I see the Bridgertons at bookshops but they tend to stand lonely in between contemporary sports romance, and I get the impression that there aren't really new authors coming up to keep the genre going. It's been a while since I discovered a new author I really vibed with, the people on reddit tend to suggest the same handful of older authors/titles...
There is also the issue that the historical romance is a bit tricky for modern audiences to navigate, I think. In contemporary and paranormal/fantasy romance I am observing a trend towards, for lack of a better term, political correctness, which readers clearly want and which is difficult to translate into a historical period built on multiple axes of inequality and oppression. Trying to play in the Regency sandbox means you have to deal with the gender roles, the homophobia, the racism, that are part of this setting and which unfortunately underlie so much of what is appealing about it. If you just enjoy the aesthetics of the ballrooms and tea parties but don't want your story to have sexism or homophobia in it, that unfortunately strips away quite a lot of the rules that make historical romances so compelling but which were also created to enforce the (sexist, racist, homophobic, classist) status quo.
One of the aspects I'm really interested in in my scholarship is how romance novels construct alternative Happily Ever Afters for protagonists who cannot do the marriage + kids thing for whatever reason, including homophobia. Authors like Cat Sebastian and KJ Charles imagine what could have been possible for queer people in the past, carving out safe spaces while having to carefully navigate the bounds of what was permissible. A very careful theory is that, in a post-marriage equality world (at least in the English-speaking world), this is less appealing to people. But if you just try to write historical storylines without the historical constraints, you're just playing dress-up; and you will keep bumping up against the fact that a lot of the tropes only work if there are social rules dictating who you can talk to, how marriage works, what kind of contact is permissible.
If we look at the Bridgerton adaptation and its choice of not-actually colourblind casting, the limits of this kind of re-interpretation of th epast become really obvious. They try to establish some kind of "racism was ended by love" timeline in living memory, but the owning of slaves was only made illegal in the real British Empire in 1833; what were the consequences in this alternate timeline? So much of the English Aristocracy's wealth was related to the slave trade and plantations, how would that not have caused an immediate financial crisis? I love what they did with Kate's character and backstory for S2, but not a single mention of the British occupation of India and the injustices and violence committed there? It's not that I believe that non-white, non-cishet people shouldn't get to play in the Ballrooms-and-Tea-Parties sandbox without always also having to think about The Implications, but it's really difficult to strike the balance between the escapist fantasy and a convincing degree of historical flavourings so that the story remains compelling and interesting.
I have a suspicion that this is one of the reasons fantasy romance is having such a moment instead. You can make up a whole new world without all this baggage, in which ballrooms and tea parties still exist but so do queer people, and you can introduce new conflict and etiquette that dictates why these two characters have to longingly gaze each other across the dance floor instead of just declaring their undying love in public. I've really enjoyed some of these alternate universe "historicals" and I completely understand why the "classic" Regency or Victorian romance isn't appealing specifically to younger readers, but I'm still a bit sad that this subgenre appears to be disappearing after decades as one of the biggest slices of the popular romance pie.
Sup. I'm wanting to get into learning about romance as a genre in a "scholarly" way. I have no idea where to start, and I was wondering if you had any pointers?
Hello! How exciting!
As with all things scholarship, a lot of the resources are inaccessible without institutional library access (and even then...). I'm going to recommend a couple of books anyway because they're foundational and really good resources, but bear in mind you might not be able to get your hands on them.
A Natural History of the Romance Novel by Pamela Regis: basic overview of how the genre works and where it comes from
Beyond Heaving Bosoms by Candy Tan and Sarah Wendell: very fun and accessible! Not all the observations are still accurate but the arguments about sex in the romance novel are still widely used
Making Meaning in Popular Romance by Jayashree Kamblé: why are romance heroes Like That? Kamblé explains the function of masculinity in romance really well. Her follow-up, Creating Identity, explores female protagonists
Happily Ever After: The Romance Story in Popular Culture by Catherine M. Roach: specifically explores what romance does for people and why the romance story is so entrenched in all kinds of Western cultural production
If you talk to other lit crit adjacent people about popular romance, there is a high chance they will bring up Janice Radway's Reading the Romance. Do not read Janice Radway's Reading the Romance.
Some really good free resources:
The Journal of Popular Romance Studies is the main publication in the field and entirely open access at jprstudies.org! Loads of excellent articles available here
Andrea Martucci's podcast Shelf Love
I have heard very good things about Fated Mates as well!
I already said Ted Lasso but actually also Taskmaster. If you have not watched Taskmaster, you are missing out on so much unhinged delightful bullshit, it's brought so much joy to my life?
The premise is really straightforward: five comedians* are taken to a secondary location and given tasks to do. They have to do the tasks The Best so the Taskmaster will give them points. The tasks are absolutely meaningless. The prize for winning is, essentially, bragging rights. Everybody (especially the fans) takes it really seriously. I have armchair quarterbacked the fuck out of this show. This is genuinely the closest I get to watching sports.
The official Taskmaster YouTube channel uploads every episode including backlog and international spinoffs (both the NZ and Australian versions are fantastic). If you have a favourite British comedian, chances are they've done Taskmaster. Comedians are begging to get to do this, legitimately. Jason Mantzoukas and Kumail Nanjiani have both said they lost money by going on and had to convince their agents to let them.
“I write self-indulgent character studies where maybe people are also doing stuff” is a really powerful sentence that I will be using to reframe how I think about how I write, thanks!
I really am primarily interested in character both writing and reading! I can't come up with a plot to save my life but my favourite writers are all people who are really damn good at constructing compelling characters and Putting Them In Situations specifically to see what they'll do. This is probably why I love romance so much, because it's alllll about characterisation, and also why I think Naomi Novik's Spinning Silver is one of the most well-crafted books I've ever read.
How does it feel to have the most correct hollanov takes on tumblr dot hell
see, the thing is that I don't. obviously I'm flattered! I love knowing that people agree with me! but tbh I think my main "take" is that I am a literary scholar first and foremost and that means I have had "cite your sources" drilled into my skull and drilled it into other skulls in turn. when I get into a fandom it's because I really love the canon material and that's going to be my base for interpretations and headcanons and whatnot, because I love it and I'm interested in playing within the confines of that sandbox (which can be bent to extremes while still being consistent with the themes and characterisation laid out in canon!). and that's not how everybody does it, which is fine, but probably the main thing is that I have been systematically trained to interpret text and construct a convincing argument about why my interpretation is correct
to be clear I am not saying that being an academic makes me a Superior Media Understander or anything, I am just as capable of getting it profoundly wrong as anybody else, but I am bringing ten years of Media Opinions Training to the Media Opinions Convention, whereas if you sent me to the Hockey Understander Convention I would have to hide in the bathroom the entire time because I am so disgustingly underqualified and anybody who has ever watched an actual hockey game would be justified in beating me with a stick
I had a landlord that wanted to charge us for fixing a stove that was at risk for a gas leak. I literally pointed out where the stove was mentioned in the contract as his responsibility and he still refused. He only backed down at literal legal threats
that's fucking wild. they really will just make you pay for everything as if it's not them who owns the fucking house
Peated Rivalry is the one where they are rival whiskey-makers, and Ilya discovers a bog woman.
oh I was THINKING about peated rivalry but I didn't remember that it's a whiskey word too! I was just thinking about the stuff you can burn! very good @girlcommaplease
