Is women’s lit a sub-genre of romance? That’s this week’s question.
Someone asked me a while back if my book, Burning Bridges, was romance or women’s lit? She said the description sounded like women’s lit, and she doesn’t review that genre. Gosh, this was something I hadn’t considered before. I thought of my book as romance. I think of women’s lit as centered around a woman and how she solves her life problems, but with elements of romance. In fact, so many books I read as “women’s lit” were actually (in my mind) romances. The woman’s problem was so often being alone (after a long-term breakup or a failed marriage) and finding a new partner while solving her problems. I fail to see how that is different from most romances.
So maybe if the book is about a woman (or women) and
there is very little romance or bonding with someone else? Is that women’s lit? Goodreads lists The Joy Luck Club, The Time Traveler’s Wife, Jane Eyre, Pride and Prejudice, Bridget Jones’ Diary and others as women’s lit books. So, okay, I see the difference. These are not considered romances (although maybe Bridget Jones disagrees?), and they are by and about women. But they follow a romance arc and many of these books do end with a love bond that provides a HEA, so… I’m still kind of confused. I will take a firm stand however, and say that true women’s fiction is not a sub-genre to romance but that some books cross over into both genre. There. That should settle the question.
What do you think?
Read the next blog in the blog hop by going here.
Burning Bridges by Anne Krist (that’s maybe women’s lit)
One Woman Only
Only a Good Man Will Do
Naval Maneuvers
Second Chance blurb:
While I know that eating healthy is best for all of us, and it’s darn hard to eat healthy and not cook the food yourself, I still like food that someone else cooks, serves up, and lets me eat at home without all the hubbub of preparation and clean-up. Plus, timing is always right. There’s no having the potatoes done at one time and the meat done at another. If necessary, I can stick the carry out container in to be zapped and have everything hot and ready at once.
restaurant, and their chicken parmesan is fantastic! For that dish alone, I’d have to say that’s our favorite and most used takeaway restaurant. When things were locked down pretty tightly, we could call in our order and they would bring it out to the car. Yummy!
Award-winning author Linda O’Connor started writing romantic comedies when she needed a creative outlet other than subtly rearranging the displays at a local home décor store. Her books have enjoyed bestseller status. When not writing, she’s a physician at an Urgent Care Clinic. She shares her medical knowledge in fast-paced, well-written, sexy romances – with an unexpected twist. Her favourite prescription to write? Laugh every day. Love every minute.
No, I’m all for comfort now and looking back, I must have been dull and boring because I was a middle of the road person with fashion. Let’s face it, hemlines and hair are the best barometers of social change and the sixties was dramatic. Women were demanding equal rights and hippies were demanding peace and love. Mary Quant, Twiggy, Marianne Faithful and Nancy Sinatra cast aside the prim fifties and the impact was huge. The model Jean Shrimpton sent shockwaves through conservative Melbourne when she wore a mini skirt to the prestigious Melbourne Cup Racing Carnival. Even worse, the outraged matrons huffed, her legs were bare! It didn’t take long for hems to rise and it didn’t matter if we were A-shape or pear shape, miniskirts and boots, black eyeliner and teased hair were in. When the four mop tops from Liverpool hit the music waves, the older generations threw up their hands. Not only were skirts growing shorter, hair teased higher, young men were growing their hair longer!
disco! We were letting it all hang out and the winds of change were not welcome in some Australian boys’ colleges. The threats of detention or expulsion if students refused to cut their hair were met with walls of resistance. Fashion was more important. After dark mutterings on this out of control generation, the schools gave in with dire warnings – keep the hair off your face!
When I was growing up, my mom would come home from work, strip off her hose and bra and get comfy in her bathrobe. I never thought anything of it. But when my dad and she got divorced (20 years later, so it’s not like it was a snap decision), the fact that Mom spent a lot of her home time in a bathrobe might have been mentioned once or twice. So I decided that not using my robe as home fashion might be a prudent idea. However… I have going-out clothes and stay-at-home clothes. One set is decidedly more comfortable than the other. Neither is what I’d call fashionable.
haven’t been to get it cut since COVID struck. Normally, I keep it pretty short, mostly because of ease of care and not because the latest cut says to do so. It’s driving me crazy right now. My pigtails aren’t straight and hair is straggled all over the place. No one would say I was stylish. But then, as long as hubby and I are okay with how I look and what I wear, what do I care?
