Pamela Mason
I can’t help but smile at the enthusiasm women are embracing E. L. James’ 50 Shades of Grey trilogy, but I think it shows that maybe,… just maybe…
Women should embrace their inner goddess a bit more and voice their desires in the bedroom.
That,… or just give their guy the book to read himself.
What? Guys reading romance novels?
Well, why not? What’s wrong with thinking that men might like to read and catch a glimpse of what we women find so irresistible in a genre overwhelmingly written by and for us.
There are few who walk among us, but four smart men who read romance, appeared in the comments’ section of last week’s HuffPo article – Why Smart Women Read Romance Novels, by Anne Browning Walker.
(Now, not all the commenters were fans. There were those who classified the romance genre as porn written for women by women, and not worth lowering their literary highbrows. To each his own, I say…)
The instigator volunteered that he started reading them to “seduce women better.” He went on to divulge that women are people too (!) and “the best way to find out what satisfies them in bed is to ask them what they like.”
Okay… sure, this guy wanted to get some. Admittedly, he wasn’t reading them for their literary merit or the plots or the Guys’ Night Out Bookclub.
But I say Points to him for figuring out an way other than the locker room, the bar, or the porn channel to learn what a woman wants in the bedroom and even – gasp! – how to get her to reveal it! (And kudos to the lucky lady who snagged this guy – I hope she’s opened his eyes to more of her favorite um… authors.)
When most teen girls discover romance novels in their mothers’ private stash, my mother’s yielded only mysteries and crime stories – not a bodice ripper in sight. I read Jane Eyre every summer for years, wanting my own Mr. Rochester. Just five years ago, when Amazon and my credit card made friends in the PK days (PreKindle), I discovered J.R. Ward’s Black Dagger Brotherhood and I was a romance virgin no more.
My husband couldn’t understand what made this vampire story so good that I’d stay up all night to finish it in one sitting. That is, until I bookmarked a certain scene between Rhage and Mary ( fellow fans are all nodding here) and slipped it into my husband’s briefcase one morning.
He came home early that day. The following week, I made sure to lock myself out of the house in plenty of time before the school bus rambled up the street. We started having lunch together.
Long. Lunches. Together. On weekdays.
We celebrate thirty years together next month, but my big, numero uno, major complaint is that he doesn’t listen to me.
Well…
He can’t listen when my Inner Good Girl has my Inner Goddess bound and gagged! (Ana and Christian fans are all nodding here.)
But GG doesn’t mind bookmarking the page and leaving it for my personal romance hero to read.
Trust me: long lunches are good.