What Makes This Manga Different: Sweet Room Romance

I mention the omniscient lover in a previous post. Sweet Room Romance has a sort of omniscient lover. In truth, thought, Albrecht simply has very good staff. He determines to make Haruto his boyfriend, but that determination originates in his personality, not in "I know best" assumptions. And he is often stymied by Haruto's rather wistful playboy act.

However, what makes the 2-volume series unique isn't the pursuit--though it helps that both men have distinct personalities. What makes it unique is the "hobby."

Granted, in this case, the "hobby" is work. However, for some characters--like Adachi and Kurosawa--work is simply work. They do their best because, well, why not?

For Haruto and Albrecht, however, the hotelier business (as well as travel and interior design) is something they both care about, find interest in. It's a great example of characters bonding over their passions. And it creates opportunities for them to relate to each other.

Consequently, one of the funniest sequences is when Haruto--convinced that Albrecht will be horrified by his choice--takes him to a love hotel in Japan. But Albrecht is fascinated by the "erotic cultural heritage" and starts objectively pondering how the concept of meeting customers' needs could be transferred to fancier settings. 

One of the most touching sequences is when Haruto buys Albrecht cufflinks from the pottery maker who supplies elegant work for the flagship hotel.

I happen to love staying in fancy hotels, when I can afford it. So the series not only works well, I can relate to the protagonists!

The Omniscient Lover: Bad Writing However Desirable

On Votaries, I comment on the problems caused by omniscient detectives.

Omniscient lovers cause equal problems. The best romances, though they may involve rescues, provide lovers who improve. Darcy learns to communicate outside of his man-cave. Elizabeth learns that she may--despite her quickness of thought--misjudge situations. They come to an understanding.

The omniscient lover overrides all that. This lover may sometimes express doubt, may occasionally--after knowing exactly what the significant other wants, borderline stalking the significant other, arranging the significant other's life--say, "But if you don't want to--"

But such token "I guess you have free will" statements don't suggest a personality in need of transformation or adaptation. Such lovers are rather dull.

However, I do understand the creation of the omniscient lover better than the creation of the omniscient detective--why it is such an attractive proposition. I believe that at the back of original sin or the natural man--the stuff that leads people to behave stupidly and meanly--is a desire for ease, for guarantees, for absolute and all-encompassing answers.

Life is just so hard! And people often wish it could be simpler. Label the bad guys. Force the perfect utopia on people. Go with the latest peer pressure/trend.

Dorothy Sayers called this behavior "snatch." And it's understandable--even if wrong (and explains the number of people who have convinced themselves that Chat GPT "borrowing" other people's work for their benefit isn't lazy, short-sighted, and unethical: what will humans do when the work becomes one mass of circular reasoning?)

In romance, searching and dating and breaking up and searching and dating and trying to make a relationship work is hard. It's exhausting. It's understandable that people sometimes fall back on a trope where the desired partner simply makes it happen.

Of course, few people truly want that "simple" solution when it does appear.

Shakespeare Couples: Richard II and His Subjects

Richard II doesn't really have a romance. It is one of Shakespeare's (extremely well-written and terrifyingly human) political plays. It's rather astonishing that he wasn't, at the time the plays were put on, accused more often of treason. But the plays can be interpreted in multiple ways, which may be what protected him.

Richard II is about what a king, however divine he perceives himself, should not do--not if he wants to prevent the War of the Roses. I watched The Hollow Crown version, which starts that series with a profoundly gifted set of actors!

The Hollow Crown presents Richard as believing fully in his mantle (unlike some of Shakespeare's other kings). He is nevertheless profoundly out of his depth regarding human behavior. What he assumes will be an object lesson (stopping the tournament) is perceived quite differently by the combatants. He appears waffling rather than decisive and understanding.

One of the most memorable scenes is when he attempts to face down the returning Bolingbroke. He is terrified, yet he once again attempts to respond through elaborate playacting. Bolingbroke--a far more pragmatic and down-to-earth guy (he becomes Henry IV)--is confused by this king whom he wants to follow but who seems mired in performances rather than actual statecraft. 

One of the most popular videos online is the scene where Richard gives up his crown to Bolingbroke and prophecies, in sum, that it is a burden that will destroy him.They want to understand each other yet cannot.

The most important relationship is not between Richard and a wife but between Richard and his subjects, which is, in many ways, appropriate to the time period and genre. An example on the plus side (despite an equally fraught relationship) is Aragorn and Boromir at the end of Boromir's life. 

 

X is for Xie Lian's Series: Couples Who Solve Supernatural Problems

X authors are not the easiest to find, even if one goes beyond American & English authors. 

Mo Xiang Tong Xiu is a great exception! 

So far I have read Heaven's Official Blessing, Vol. 1 and started Vol. 2. The reading is slow--the novels belong to "world fantasy," which, like "world romance," involves EVERYTHING that is going on around the characters. But the denouements are always quite gripping.

The series belongs to a romance/sci-fi/fantasy sub-genre: a couple investigate supernatural happenings. Basically, X-Files. Priest's Guardian series falls into the same category as does the Onmoyoji & Tengu Eyes series. 

I quite like these series overall though they can cross a line into nihilism. I always considered Death Note to be about 1000 times more interesting while Light was still alive than after Light died. That is, part of the draw of these books--whether romantic or non-romantic--is the push & pull, the banter, the constant readjustments between the two main characters. Working together to solve a problem IS the underlying structure.  

Heaven's Official Blessing is a decent addition since the personalities are complementary. In addition, though San Lang seems confident and powerful, a dominant partner, he has his own uncertainties and weaknesses. The characters balance each other. 

 

Detectives and Love: Some Transform, Some Don't

My version of Harriet and Wimsey

Mystery-Romance is one of my favorite sub-genres. It not only provides a mystery, it gives a couple something to do (or, it not only provides a romance, it gives a couple something to solve). 

On Votaries, I am examining characters who transform--or don't. A great many detectives are entirely static characters, such as Nero Wolfe. They don't transform, and that's okay! 

They also, often, don't fall in love. Falling in love suggests change. 

It doesn't, however, suggest transformation. Ngaio Marsh has Alleyn fall in love, but it doesn't transform him. He simply becomes more Alleyn-ish, which is likely true of relationships in general. In many of her mysteries, she supplies the token young-couple-in-love, but they are usually rather throw-away characters (the one delightful exception is Peregrine and Emily, a director and actress). 

The most remarkable detective who transforms through love, of course, is Sayers' Wimsey. Harriet realizes that over time, Wimsey has shed many of his self-protective layers and mannerisms. She came into his life--specifically, her case came into his life--at a point when he was either going to continue his self-transformation or retreat back into a self-protective position and role. 

She had the power to force him outside his defenses. Perhaps, seeing her struggling in a trap of circumstances, he had walked out deliberately to her assistance. Or perhaps the sight of of her struggles had warned him what might happen to him, if he remained in a trap of his own making. --Sayers, Gaudy Night 

Orlando from Charlie Cochrane's Cambridge Fellows Series falls into a similar category: he chooses to dive into a relationship with Jonty despite the outside-one's-comfort-zone requirement. 

The transformations are good for the romance AND good for the mysteries! 

 

Bromance: Murdoch and Pendrick

Murdoch has several close male associates. The Murdoch-Pendrick relationship is especially enchanting, in part because they share interests but also because their relationship comes with loads of plot! 

Murdoch suspects James Pendrick of crimes on a regular basis, while still applauding his inventions. In one of the best season openers, they fly a plane together. 

When Pendrick moves on to producing movies, he bases the first picture-with-a-story on Murdoch (the very first motion pictures were, as Murdoch Mysteries correctly shows, series of moving images: trains, carriages, shoot-outs).  

I wouldn't be surprised if, like Kirk and Spock, Murdoch-Pendrick were "shipped"--Pendoch? Murdrick? In a later episode, Pendrick--who is continually betrayed by his assistants--wonders if he could "change his nature" to get together with the one male assistant who defended him. 

He sadly decides, "No." And he is standing next to Murdoch when he comes to that decision.  

Jessica Fletcher: Rational Good Sense & A Great Role Model

I mention earlier that one of the dumber tropes is, Everything the good guys want is automatically good/right.

Along the same lines, I really appreciate when a character doesn't automatically know who is good/right (as mentioned earlier, Gibbs does but at least Bellisario established this "gift" as an established part of Gibbs' personality early on).  

I have always appreciated that Jessica Fletcher doesn't automatically like the good guys and detest the bad guys. When she defends the student, David Tolliver--creepily well-played by Andrew Stevens--she doesn't do it because she has fallen for him. In fact, she is quite stern with him and makes clear at the end that they are not close. 

With the far more charismatic Dennis Stanton, the moment she finds out about the theft and murder in a hotel, she tells the police about his cat-burglar ways. She doesn't wring her hands over a self-inflicted emotional dilemma: "Oh, he showed up so suddenly and romantically! I know in my heart he is a good guy! How can I give up such a handsome man? He TOLD me that he was innocent!"

She behaves rationally. And Dennis Stanton (unlike David) proves that he is a real gentleman because he doesn't hold her immediate non-waffling level-headed decisions against her. Of course not! 

Jessica is not silly.