Rachel Reads & Reviews

Here’s another question that will hopefully spark some discussion.

I’ve noticed as I read historical romances that the steam factor increases book by book.

I’ll use Joanna Shupe’s Fifth Avenue Rebels as an example as it’s the series that I really began to notice the trend. The first book almost always features a virginal heroine who has little idea of the hot, restless feeling she has when looking at the hero and absolutely shocked when he suggests giving her oral.

By the third book, the heroine is allowed to have knowledge of carnel relations or gasp, actually had previous lovers. This protagonist is usually the cool older sister/friend of previous books who provide much-needed guidence to the virginal character. They also prove the virginal character is a good person because they stick by their friend while rest of historical society shuns them for their shameless, uncaring attitude toward sex and rules.

This female protagonist also fears that she’ll never find love and has a facade of pretending not to care about rules because they don’t want to show how hurt they are by being shunned.

This rarely applies to male main characters because let’s face it, they’ve always been allowed to have sex and thus fewer hang-ups about it.

Grossman was a rare subversion as she has an experienced heroine in her second book in the Once Upon a East End instead of waiting for the third. Rodale’s heroines are usually virgins, but they’re more self-aware in that they masturbate and read books or some other information so they’re not totally surprised by the act of sex.

“But Rachel,” you say it’s a historical romance novel. Women just didn’t know about sex like they do today. To that I say, I believe high society women were pretty sheltered from it, but working women were not (but there’s very few working-class heroines in historical romance which is different discussion).

Also this is fiction. There’s plenty of anachronistic stuff we suspend our disbelief about so we can enjoy the story. So many of these heroines are charcterized as curious, and willing to push societal boundaries by trying to learn and ask questions, why wouldn’t they ask about this?

I also realized another trend where the author is willing to get a little more kinky as the series goes on in accompainment to the increased experience of the female protagonist. And by kinky, the hero mentions bondage.

Buuuuuuut. . . most series I read stop at showing it. They don’t follow through beyond coy mentions of it later on. This kinda drives me crazy because it feels like a nod to the fact that hey, sex can be more interesting than just p in the v, and people get turned on by different things, it’s human nature. Or like they want to seem cool because based on Fifty Shades of Grey, we know bondage is popular. But they’re too scared to actually show it.

The only mainstream romance that I remember reading that follows through on the kinky sex would be Eva Leigh where it occurs in the third book of her Union of Rakes trilogy and the third book of Last Chance Scoundrels trilogy. Same with the fourth book of Shupe’s Fifth Avenue Rebels like they have to ease the audience into it. Of course, there’s also Scarlett Peckham but her’s are not the traditional romance so I don’t count it, she never follows the formula.

So what do you think readers? Did you notice the trend from virginal heroine to society’s “slut”? Do you wish that the author would throw out the easing readers in and just go for a heroine who knows her spice levels and goes for it?

What do you think about kinky sex? Don’t want it in your romance because it turns a romance novel into an erotic novel? Is there a line? Wish they’d show it if they’re gonna mention it?

Comment below!!!!!