Romance Writing Problem: Dreadful Rhetoric and Lazy Writing

Sometimes the taciturn brute gets the matter-of-fact Wren. This is the ending of Taken At the Flood (Agatha Christie novel) in which the Wren turns out to be a kind of Watson figure from BBC Sherlock. She likes danger.

The taciturn brute who gets the matter-of-fact Wren is one reason "toxic masculinity" is such a vile phrase. Imagine if "toxic" was attached to any other generalized noun, such as "femininity" or "animal lovers" or "ballet dancers" or "crossing guards" or "classical music listeners."

The phrase usually refers to men of a certain type: big, gruff, supposedly non-emotional, supposedly overbearing and aggressive, supposedly trained to only like certain occupations and sports, supposedly adverse to "correct-thinking" politics. 

Brennan challenges Sweets' assumptions about

Booth's emotions.

It isn't that one can never object to any of those traits/behaviors. One can also object to "flighty" and "frivolous" and "tearful" (characteristics sometimes applied to women). The problem is (1) people are more complicated than any of these adjectives/traits (I know many "manly men" who enjoy discussing their feelings--and many "flighty women" who have trenchant insights about people) and (2) there is nothing inherently evil/negative about any of the traits I have listed. 

American culture is rapidly heading into "thought police" territory--but we haven't quite reached it yet. (Though we do seem to have descended into high school, name-calling territory.) What people do with their personality traits still matters. 

Billy Melrose always treats Amanda with

complete courtesy even when she is off-topic.

From the perspective of the romance, sometimes people fall in love with the taciturn brute. And sometimes they fall in love with the flighty chick.

The true lesson of romance is not "only acceptable people get to fall in love." The true lesson of romance is "there's somebody out there for everyone."

So--SHAME ON YOU, ROMANCE WRITERS, WHO USE SUCH RHETORIC WITHOUT IRONY IN YOUR NOVELS! You aren't writing romances; you are writing dreadful political polemics. And you are falling back on labels to avoid the harder task of characterization. Lazy writing.

Remember the lessons of the "divine Miss M."