I want my Romance hero to...

TheFLuff wrote:

Patricia wrote:

And believe me, you so don´t need to worry about any of her heros abducting their heroines. after all, the ladies all are very well capable of dumping their man in the jungle and going on by themselves

I read the books and didn't like them and this particular trope. It wasn't about their strength, but about the abduction itself. Do. Not. Like.

What5 I very much like in Kresley Coles books, is, that it isn´t about the male/female thing most of the time.
The abductions aren´t about "if we´re alone, she´ll have to love me"
They´re about subtracting an adversary from the equation without outright killing her and pissing off her friends.
True gender equality

It´s just normal interaction and not some neanderthal love thingie. Which absolutely works for me.
Oh.. and there are plenty of guys abducted as well.
It´s a dangerous world

I'll read Lothaire and I'll see. : ) But yeah, that's something I like there, too. Women and men are, at least in a way, not that different. BUT I don't like the abduction, because it's an abduction. It's a crime. It's taking another person's freedom. As if fucking mating bonds aren't enough already. Those guys, they don't have a free will. Destiny chose their mates. And now they also don't have physical freedom, because said mate abducted them.

If they wouldn't have been abducted their relationship would never have worked out. They're committing a crime, yet in the end get their happy end. They don't DESERVE their HEA if that's how they get it. You can't abduct people, you simply cannot. No matter where or when or under which circumstances, it's a crime. (Except probably for the Lothaire thing. Still a crime, but it's more of an escape, I suppose?) To be rewarded with a happy ending for doing such a thing is a no-go for me. I know it's fiction but the worth of a book is what you can carry away from it, right? What do people see there? Mittel zum Zweck and I really cannot stand the concept. Reminds me of Hush, Hush. *searches for review* Ah, here:

I once wrote:I know it's fic­tion but YA always affects the reader, it teaches us some­thing and this some­thing shouldn't be: "Trust the bad guy, who admits to do real evil stuff, maybe even die for him and then hope that you were right and he isn't so bad after all. Get rewarded for being fool­ish!" Fitz­patrick didn't man­age to make it justifiable.

It's much like that.. There are things I just don't like.

It´s very female to go over the same problem again and again and again and then start over.
But in romance, that´s what alot of men do... and.. that´s my total turn off.

Really? I never got that impression. It's a human thing in my opinion. :/

Men who are so fixated about something, they can't see anything else.^^ Yeah, I can definitely see that in romance heroes, I just didn't associate it as a female trait.

Me neither, but society often does. I think I even called it an "allegedly female" charactertrait somewhere. But maybe it's really depending on where you come from, how old you are etc. I'm not sure, though. My grandfather'd say it's a female thing - while he is doing exactly what we're talking about. My mom would start referring to some of her psychology classes in university and explain why it is or isn't true, then give me two books and tell me to read them. My sister wouldn't care at all, but she's six. My father wouldn't even think about it, because he's too busy whining and fixating about something. My life is either full of paranormal romance male leads or it's a common human (or male!) thing to do, which is called female, because female apparently means emotions.

But the whole whining thing isn't female and it's not about emotions like love. It's about being afraid of change and about being frozen. If you're contemplating your past mistakes, you don't have to move on. It's the 'easy way out'. It hurts and it might make you depressed, but you don't really need to change yourself. I think this is a typical human behaviour.

I can get perfectly well get around the "but it´s evil" thing, in Kresley Coles books, because.. well.. basically.. it´s a beautifully brutal world. And evil with them has it´s very own definition...
Which is far from our own.

The only victim in all of the books has been Holly... and she wasn´t abducted, she came along of her own free will. Granted, the hero lied to her, her own aunt lied to her and basically everybody just set her up to be impregnated by that uber-evil socerer... but hey... in the end, her hero didn´t betray her, she kicked some asses, rocked some bad guys, until they lay in the corner weeping and put a leash on her guy.

It really depends on the world.
In normal romance abduction is so much of a no go... bleh...
But Kresley COles is no normal world, it´s brutal, bloody, bad and there are no helpless females.

I mean... heck.. it was Myst the coveted who in the very first pages of the very first book had Nikolai blooded, half bonded and then dump him like so much trash, because she didn´t like Vampires.



As for that emotions thingie... I will think up of a better explanation