Rape and the Romance Novel

para · Jan 28, 2009

What is the appropriate way to handle this in a romance? Should it ever be in a romance? Is it just a plot device thrown in by lazy authors who haven't thought it through properly?

Today I was reading a new category romance novel and up popped the fact the heroine had been raped/coerced into sex by her agent or something. She says to the hero after they sleep together that is the first time she wanted it. Oh and she'd had a brief flashback of this coercion. When the hero meets the guy he says something along the lines of "Oh so you're the man who forced her to sleep with you and if you ever touch her again I'll break your arm" And that was it. Why bring it up if you are not going to resolve it? It wasn't even like her being forced into sex stopped her from sleeping with the hero at the first opportunity. Bah.

Brindle Chase · Jan 28, 2009

Often it depends on the publisher. Personally, if I encounter forced sex of any kind, I toss the book. I won't write it, won't read it. Publishers however, go both ways. Some will allow references to it, but not an actual scene. Some won't allow it all. very very few publishers allow it in full. Most every publisher of romance has very strict parameters when it comes to forced sex.

I agree with your example, why even mention it.

Lainey Bancroft · Jan 28, 2009

I agree: BAH.

It is a pretty serious topic just to toss in. If it's going to be included, it better have some major impact on the character motivation and be dealt with in a very sensitive way.

I've seen the 'oooh I was raped and I never wanted IT until you, you big shining hero' and it makes me want to roll the book up and smoke it!

Kathleen42 · Jan 28, 2009

I'm not a big fan of rape or abuse that's just tossed in, especially if it's used just to prove how protecting and strong the male lead is.

If it's a legitimate part of the plot and adds value to the story I'm usually okay with it but it often seems to be used as just a plot device.

brainstorm77 · Jan 28, 2009

Kathleen42 said:
I'm not a big fan of rape or abuse that's just tossed in, especially if it's used just to prove how protecting and strong the male lead is.

If it's a legitimate part of the plot and adds value to the story I'm usually okay with it but it often seems to be used as just a plot device.

Agreed! Its a subject I wouldn't touch in a romance novel.

Cathy C · Jan 28, 2009

I'm of two minds on the subject. While I feel rape is despicable, it does happen. And when it happens, there are profound mental and emotional complications that often last for years. Yes, if a woman is raped (whether as a child or adult) it can seriously strain future relationships, or it can have the opposite effect of sex addiction---which can also be relationship-straining, just of a different sort.

I guess I don't mind it in a romance if it's handled well. It's one more emotional hurdle to get past and when you think about it, when you're dealing with people past their 20s who have never found their "true love" there are limited options on WHY they haven't. It's just one of several, so I'd buy it as a reason, I guess. :Shrug:

BenPanced · Jan 28, 2009

I've seen rape/abuse used as a plot device to make the Twue Wuv between the heroine and hero much more speshul; I guess a couple of us have gotten that idea from the example.

Beach Bunny · Jan 28, 2009

There is nothing more annoying to read than a female character having been raped, molested or otherwise sexually violated at sometime in their past, they've done nothing to get through it, but five minutes in the hero's company is all that it takes to cure them of that trauma.

Guaranteed that I will hurl that book across the room and into a fireplace.

GirlWithPoisonPen · Jan 28, 2009

Beach Bunny said:
There is nothing more annoying to read than a female character having been raped, molested or otherwise sexually violated at sometime in their past, they've done nothing to get through it, but five minutes in the hero's company is all that it takes to cure them of that trauma. Guaranteed that I will hurl that book across the room and into a fireplace.

Cosign X _______________________

Hate, hate, hate it.

Marian Perera · Jan 28, 2009

I'm fine with the heroine being raped/molested in the past, but more or less coming to terms with it and dealing with it before she met the hero. So when they get together, while it may not be utterly perfect, they still have a good time. I wrote a romantic fantasy along those lines.

What I'm not fine with is the heroine being raped/molested and being emotionally or sexually frozen by it until she meets the hero, who provides Sexual Healing or makes her feel like a virgin, touched for the very first time.

IceCreamEmpress · Jan 28, 2009

BenPanced said:
I've seen rape/abuse used as a plot device to make the Twue Wuv between the heroine and hero much more speshul; I guess a couple of us have gotten that idea from the example.

Yes, this.

Rape should not be a prop.

Gillhoughly · Jan 28, 2009

What the others said.

I've got friends who were raped and coerced and it left them messed up. Some worked past it, others have not.

When I read a romance I want entertainment and two people falling in LOVE.

Mention of rape is an instant mood killer for me, and I drop that writer off my reading list. Most of them don't know how to handle it anyway, turning it into cheap plot device.

There was a vogue for it in the 80s. One of my writer friends was told to put a "rape" in her historical so the MC could "fall in love" with her rapist. She was horribly uncomfortable with that scene and it showed in her writing. Such books have an audience, but I'm not in it.

This is the age of Xena, Lora Croft, and any number of savvy, solid, butt-kickin' bitches.

I'd rather read about a strong woman winning out over the bad guy herself than some contrived piece where having sex with the right man makes everything wonderful again. YUK.

KikiteNeko · Jan 28, 2009

I don't really care if there's rape in a book, it doesn't bother me. But when people pick up a romance novel, they are often looking for an idyllic world and I don't know that many readers of romance novels would be receptive to the idea. Maybe it could be marketed as a different genre? Like dark erotica? I have heard of rape in erotica. My .02.

Nakhlasmoke · Jan 28, 2009

I also am offended by the "almost-rape" scene that often happens merely as a plot device for the hero to come rescue the poor overwhelmed and frightened wench.

So not my cup of rooibos, thanks.

I have used rape in a rather side-long way (in a book that while it's UF is to my mind a love story {but not a romance}).

However, I never actually out and out state the reasons for the MC's highly messed-up take on relationships. I know what happened, and it informs the character's actions, and that's enough for me.

Using rape as pity-card cheapens the reality of what many women and men have suffered through.

para · Jan 29, 2009

I think in this case it feels like the rape has been tossed in to show how much of a victim the heroine is. When she first meets the hero he tells her that she is lacking courage. We then meet her mother who is a first class showbiz pushy parent who tells her it doesn't matter that her future husband doesn't love her, love is meaningless. It doesn't bring you security. It is then she has a flashback of the hero holding her contrasted with her fiance "fingers digging into her thighs hard and insistent on that awful night in Vienna when he -" followed by. "She had survived by ruthlessly separating herself from the person who had endured all that." It then goes on to say that she was having difficult separating the two, she was forgetting who the real heroine was. She wanted to be someone who was courageous and secure.
She then runs away from her own wedding at the very last minute using the car her fiance bought her as an engagement present and magically arrives at the hero's house (she doesn't know it is his house) after being terrified her fiance would find her. The heroine is 23.

I'm going to read it again to see if I missed something the first time.

Stlight · Jan 29, 2009

Trust your judgment. Somethings just don't belong in romance. That's why there are other genres that deal with these things in detail. Romance is not the place to try to resolve heavy issues. I don't like them when horrible illness or deaths are included. Yes, these things happen, but think of the genre!!! You don't get that many words to get back into the fun, nice, cozy, love mood again.
Rape, incest, illness, death, abuse these things take 100K to deal with realiatically and well or not. There are those who thought they managed it and didn't.

Rarri · Jan 29, 2009

I've only ever seen rape handled well by people who've gone through that themselves; whether it's an autobiography or autobiographical fiction as it were. The reactions to rape are always different but frequently i've found that the relationships are very, very difficult and take years before they get to a comfortable sexual stage (where the 'victim' isn't totally disconnected as it were). It's a really really complex situation to cope with writing and such is the subject material that unless you could be confident of doing it 'justice' i'd stay away, but perhaps that's just my conscience, that i've known several people who've been raped and i'd feel 'disrespectful' not handling it properly.

Sorry, that's something of a ramble and tangents, apologies.

Gillhoughly · Jan 29, 2009

She believes everything her mother says??

I stopped doing that when I was 12. I figured out pretty fast I actually was smarter in some things, which included men.

It made for an interesting puberty.

she first meets the hero he tells her that she is lacking courage

Right there I'd bust his balls and feed 'em to the squirrels.

People who make snap judgments about me (coming to the wrong conclusion) never get a second chance.

I don't think I would make a very good romance MC, but just put me in a screwball comedy and I'll do just great!

The hero better look like Cary Grant.

brainstorm77 · Jan 29, 2009

I agree, being a huge romance fan I don't think I would bother reading a book with it in it..

scarletpeaches · Jan 29, 2009

Cathy C said:
...when you're dealing with people past their 20s who have never found their "true love" there are limited options on WHY they haven't...

Uh oh. That's me in trouble then.

(I'm 32).

Nakhlasmoke said:
...So not my cup of rooibos, thanks.

My new catchphrase!

para said:
I think in this case it feels like the rape has been tossed in to show how much of a victim the heroine is...

Call me brutal, but I hate, hate, hate reading about rape victims. Victims of anything, actually.

Rape survivors, on the other hand, I have respect for.

Rarri said:
...frequently i've found that the relationships are very, very difficult and take years before they get to a comfortable sexual stage (where the 'victim' isn't totally disconnected as it were).

Hmm. Well I jumped straight into bed with someone else in an attempt to 'get back on the horse' as it were and I've never, never felt disconnected while in bed with someone. Sometimes it's been good, sometimes it's been blah, but I've never had the feeling of "This is happening to someone else."

Nakhlasmoke said:
...i've known several people who've been raped and i'd feel 'disrespectful' not handling it properly...

If I was writing a book in which a character was abused in any way (and I have to clarify romance is not my default genre) my priority would not be avoiding offending real people, but staying true to my characters.

brainstorm77 said:
I agree, being a huge romance fan I don't think I would bother reading a book with it in it..

There's not a single subject I wouldn't read about as long as it was written well, and necessary to the telling of the story.

nevada · Jan 29, 2009

I read a harlequin in the 80's where the husband is abusive and extremely jealous. he hits her, at least once, and yes he actually rapes her. how does it end? why she goes back to him because he's "working" on that jealousy thing. I stopped reading harlequins after that.

If i read a mainstream romance where the character had been raped, i would read it only if the rape was part of the major plotline and was dealt with properly. if it was just oh and yeah when i was 17 i was raped,but falling in love with you has made it all better, i would dump that book asap.

brainstorm77 · Jan 29, 2009

nevada said:
I read a harlequin in the 80's where the husband is abusive and extremely jealous. he hits her, at least once, and yes he actually rapes her. how does it end? why she goes back to him because he's "working" on that jealousy thing. I stopped reading harlequins after that.

If i read a mainstream romance where the character had been raped, i would read it only if the rape was part of the major plotline and was dealt with properly. if it was just oh and yeah when i was 17 i was raped,but falling in love with you has made it all better, i would dump that book asap.

Somehow I don't think that would fly now anymore.

Brindle Chase · Jan 29, 2009

nevada said:
I read a harlequin in the 80's where the husband is abusive and extremely jealous. he hits her, at least once, and yes he actually rapes her. how does it end? why she goes back to him because he's "working" on that jealousy thing. I stopped reading harlequins after that.

If i read a mainstream romance where the character had been raped, i would read it only if the rape was part of the major plotline and was dealt with properly. if it was just oh and yeah when i was 17 i was raped,but falling in love with you has made it all better, i would dump that book asap.

Ahahaha, not sure I'd abandon a complete publishing company based on one book, but I understand... I would have chucked the book in the recycling bin if I couldnt get a refund for it!

para · Jan 29, 2009

I only abandon publishing companies when I get a string of badly edited, badly constructed books. Or if I hear things I don't like about the Owners.

I've now read the book for a second time and found something I hadn't noticed near the end. However the rape isn't ever really discussed between the hero and heroine. The only time the hero mentions it is when he goes chasing after the heroine and using his psychic or googlefu skills decides the guy in the room with her is the one who forced her into first sex, then an engagement. Of course he then leaves, we move on four months and he decides to go and see her in concert. The baby wakes up, he has to leave, she hearing this chases after him. They confess their love and all live happily ever after. Blah, blah, blah. Whatever.

I don't like this book and I don't think it is just because of the rape. The hero is too much of a crybaby. The heroine is far too passive. The blurb did not match the book (that book actually sounded interesting). The rape victim thread was just the icing on the cake. Author is now on my do not ever buy again list. Definitely not for me. However if this is your cup of tea, send me a pm and I'll send let you know the book.

nevada · Jan 29, 2009

do you still have the receipt? take it back to the store for a refund. last time i read a bad book, i did. the girl asked me why and i said cause it sucked. she laughed and gave me my money back.

Rape and the Romance Novel

Dancing on the edge

Cover Me!

crushing on fictional characters

practical experience, FTW

Ooo! Shiny new cover!

THE BLUEBERRY QUEEN OF HADES (he/him)

The Provocative One

Mata Hari

starting over

Hapless Virago

Grumpy writer and editor

.

yes

ideas are floating where they will

Grumpy writer and editor

practical experience, FTW

practical experience, FTW

Dancing on the edge