Musing Mondays asks you to muse about one of the following each week…
• Describe one of your reading habits.
• Tell us what book(s) you recently bought for yourself or someone else, and why you chose that/those book(s).
• Tell us what you’re reading right now — what you think of it, so far; why you chose it; what you are (or, aren’t) enjoying it.
• Do you have a bookish rant? Something about books or reading (or the industry) that gets your ire up? Share it with us!
• Instead of the above questions, maybe you just want to ramble on about something else pertaining to books — let’s hear it, then!
Romantic Differences
So, one of my favorite things about many YA books is that the stories have the wonderful ability to combine a really interesting plot with a little bit of romance. I love the romance in YA books because even when it’s insta love, I feel like a foundation is being built (most of the time) and a relationship is strengthened before anyone falls into bed with each other (if that ever happens). Somehow, I can’t get the same thing from adult paranormal romances. They tend to have the graphic scenes and awesome physical connection, but not much else in the romance that I feel connected to. I’m always like “Wow, that was an awesome scene. Too bad I can’t stand this know it all meathead you’re falling in love with, heroine.”
It isn’t that the focus on romance in adult paranormal romance bothers me or even the fact that there are graphic sex scenes. Nothing like that bothers me. It’s just that a lot of time, Alpha male meets woman, one of them is paranormally inclined, insta love, insta sex, and then cue adventure… where in YA romance, I feel like there’s a lot of time to sort of feel around and fall in love and there’s a bit of a story with a good foundation there. And the characters end up being less cookie cutter type of characters and people I start to like, care about, and understand.
I love YA for many reasons, but I wish I could enjoy more adult paranormal romance novels and leave the halls of high school without sacrificing my relationship standards. They are just so different in the way they approach romance. I try to pick up an adult paranormal romance from time to time and I’m always left feeling like the romance is so beyond plausible. I think the Sookie Stackhouse books are the only ones I’ve read that aren’t over the top for me. At least she and her love interest at the moment have some sort of history and she’s not all swoony over some big dude she just met. And it’s not that I don’t love a good graphic scene. I do. I just hate that in order for the romance to be graphic, the actual storyline or falling in love area has to be lacking so much. Am I the only one that feels like so many adult paranormal romances have this over the top alpha male insta love situation?
I’m hoping the NA label (f it’s going to focus mainly on the sex in the first place as it seems to be doing right now) will help bridge the gap for readers like me who just can’t do the alpha male insta love insta sex crap and need a little bit more. I feel like YA books give me the KIND of romance I want, but they never give me the scenes I want afterwards. And adult books give me all the scenes in the world without the type of relationship I want or can connect to.
Any adult paranormal romances you’d recommend for someone like me?
Labels: blog meme, Musing Mondays
