shel

The Transsexual Chofetz Chaim

Mutant, librarian, poet, union rabble rouser, dog, Ashkenazi Jewish. Neuroweird, bodyweird, mostly sleepy.


I write about transformative justice, community, love, Judaism, Neurodivergence, mental health, Disability, geography, rivers, labor, and libraries; through poetry, opinionated essays, and short fiction.


I review Schoolhouse Rock! songs at @PropagandaRock


Website (RSS + Newsletter)
shelraphen.com/

What I am learning about romance novels is that the reason they always need really convoluted premises is because you want to figure out a way to basically make your characters go on dates together without actually admitting that they like each other so you can have both the cute date activities and the suspense of them being all embarrassed and not knowing that the interest is mutual and wondering how the other person feels.

Fake Dating is perfect for this since they literally just have to pretend to date. In the Brown Sisters trilogy they had Chloe's "get a life" list, Dani and Zaf fake-date for social media clout, and Eve has to not only run a Bed and Breakfast with her love interest but also help him with some basic things since she broke his arm. In Book Lovers our lovers-to-be were coworkers editing the same manuscript and made a bet that if our heroine accomplished an arbitrary list of ten vacation goals (which included "go on two dates with locals") that the guy would give his rent-stabilized apartment to her pregnant sister (which is kind of an insane bet) and this somehow always ended up with them accidentally on a date.

But Beach Read's premise is just... omfg a literary novelist and a romance novelist make a bet to see who could sell a book they wrote in the other's genre first, and the loser will promote the winner's book using their existing clout in the genre. That's fine. Cute concept. But they decide to have twice weekly "research excursions" which are all just fucking dates because they're supposed to "teach the beauty of romance" and "inspire writing a romcom." And I just truly don't understand how these characters agreed to do this without just being like... wait we're just agreeing to go on twice weekly dates... these are dates...

very fun book and I'm enjoying it but it's just so funny every time they're like "OK for a Research Excursion we are going to get dinner together at a restaurant" "For this week's Research Excursion we are going to intimately watch drive-in movies squished together in my car." these are dates!!!!!


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in reply to @shel's post:

I think the best thing about writing smart people is how incredibly dumb they can be. An average person would instantly recognize the Beach Read premise you describe as dates but I know for a fact that if you put two nerds together and give them a challenge in something they are interested in, both will immediately forget what it would entail (though that might just be neurodivergence and special interests lol)