Will the anti-traditionalist male lead in my romance novel offend too many readers?

LAgrunion · May 6, 2012

I’ve probably read about 20 popular novels that are either romance or story with love as the main theme. Covered many of the prominent names: Sparks, Steele, Giffin, Kleypas, Quinn, Crusie, Gibson, Phillips, Brockmann. . . .

The male lead is typically an alpha-male who is mainstream. Usually, the author reveals little about the man’s political/social views.

When I began writing my love/romance novel, I set out to write an unconventional male lead because I thought it would it would:

1. Be a refreshing deviation from the archetype.
2. Produce an interesting (hopefully) conflict with the female lead who is traditionalist.
3. Show that love can exist without traditional social trappings.

My male lead:

1. Doesn’t believe in commitment or marriage (He wants to live in the moment).
2. Is a feminist (He doesn’t like that only women get engagement rings or change their names after marriage).
3. Dislikes diamonds (because its popularity is largely due to the De Beers marketing machine).
4. Is vegan.

(I don't harp on those things, but they do pop up sporadically - less than four pages' worth in a 90,000 word draft.)

Given that the audience for my book would be overwhelmingly female, and most of them would probably be mainstream, I’m afraid my male lead’s views would make my novel commercially not viable.

Not my preference, but I’m tempted to cut out all the anti-traditionalist views, and just make the man bland (philosophically). Make the novel a pure romance/love story with nothing controversial, so it’s more likely to sell.

What do you think I should do?

(Are there any commercially successful romances where the man is similar to mine?)

Thanks!

Captcha · May 6, 2012

There are readers who only want traditional alpha males, and they probably won't be attracted to your MC. But there are other readers who are looking for something different, and they'd be fine with him.

You may have trouble getting your HEA, though. I guess there's potential for a HFN, but if he doesn't believe in commitment, and STILL doesn't believe in it by the end of the book, I'm not sure readers would be satisfied by the ending.

LAgrunion · May 6, 2012

Captcha said:
You may have trouble getting your HEA, though. I guess there's potential for a HFN, but if he doesn't believe in commitment, and STILL doesn't believe in it by the end of the book, I'm not sure readers would be satisfied by the ending.

Thanks for your input, Captcha.

HFN = Happy For Now?

The current ending is happy. Intellectually, he still believes commitment is not attainable (because we don't know the future). But emotionally, he is pretty much there (cuz he sees her as a soulmate). She's okay with it by the end, because she loves him enough to want to be with him, even if it's just day-to-day. The ending is optimistic, and I think of them as staying together thereafter.

KellyAssauer · May 6, 2012

The very last thing in the world I personally want to read is yet another bland and boring Alpha male lead. Ho-hum. So from my perspective, you're great - but I'm probably in the minority. =)

VanessaNorth · May 6, 2012

LAgrunion said:
Thanks for your input, Captcha.

HFN = Happy For Now?

The current ending is happy. Intellectually, he still believes commitment is not attainable (because we don't know the future). But emotionally, he is pretty much there (cuz he sees her as a soulmate). She's okay with it by the end, because she loves him enough to want to be with him, even if it's just day-to-day. The ending is optimistic, and I think of them as staying together thereafter.

Well, here's the thing. Romance publishers are looking for HEA/HFN. Your story may very well have a happy ending that doesn't spell out the HEA, but it might be a hard sell as a "Romance."

Here's the thing about writing genre fiction: some laws of the genre are inviolate. For the romance genre that's the HEA/HFN.

Now, you could pitch it as women's fiction with romantic elements or something else, but spell out that HEA/HFN as more than day-to-day if you want to sell it as a romance.

(Non-traditional male MC is a strong selling point, a good thing. An ending that doesn't fit the genre is a dealbreaker.)

girlyswot · May 6, 2012

I don't care about his eating habits or his views on jewellery. I do care that he doesn't believe in commitment. To me, there is absolutely nothing romantic about being with a guy who might disappear tomorrow. I would need him to change that by the end of the book. I need him to know (and for her to hear him say) that he is in it for the long term. And, to be honest, I think romance readers would be up in arms if you don't give them that ending. That's the bargain you make when you sell your book as a romance - you play by the rules of the genre.

girlyswot · May 6, 2012

LAgrunion said:
She's okay with it by the end, because she loves him enough to want to be with him, even if it's just day-to-day.

That makes me hate her, I'm afraid. Why should she settle for a lifetime of uncertainty just because he's a prat?

BunnyMaz · May 6, 2012

I'd find him interesting, at the least. I'm a feminist myself, so a romance in which the male lead is feminist himself would intrigue me. So long as he was convincing, interesting and sexy.

Your character will always offend someone, no matter how you write them, so I'd be more worried about how large a market there would be for romance about a character like him. There's a fairly large feminist mass out in the world, but I don't know how many of us read romance. Maybe that'd be worth looking into.

*edit*

But yeah, that no commitment thing... the way you're planning on ending it makes it all seem less feminist. So she goes along with what he wants even though she wants more because she just wuvs him sooo much? That would piss me off - both because she'd feel weak and needy, and because I'd be frustrated that he'd enter a relationship with someone knowing they want something he can't/won't offer. That's assuming he knows what she wants?

Captcha · May 6, 2012

I might believe a HEA where they BOTH want to live day-to-day and not make a formal commitment, but where they both sort of acknowledge that they can't see themselves ever being apart.

But if she wants a commitment and he doesn't? It's a societal cliche, really, the woman trying to 'catch' her man and keep him hooked, and I wouldn't like it as a Romance ending.

LAgrunion · May 6, 2012

The male MC thinks that commitment is illusory because the future is uncertain. People change. Life changes. Everyday people commit/marry, but many of the same people will end up breaking up/divorce. A promise of commitment is meaningless. Anyone can say it. The only way to prove it is to be there day after day. Only time can prove love. Until you’re dead, you have no credibility to say you were committed. As long as you’re still alive, talk is just that, talk.

By the end, the female MC still likes commitment (but it's no longer a deal breaker), because she comes to appreciate the reasoning of his view. She loves him like a soulmate, and he loves her back equally. There is emotional parity. They may have some differences in philosophy, but she thinks that being together, even if it’s one day at a time, is more important than insisting on a verbal promise with no guaranty anyway.

They are together at the end. He doesn't say commitment, but there is no reason to think the couple will breakup ever. We're talking soulmates here. At least in my mind, that's HEA.

I’m not hung up on the genre - selling my novel as romance or as women’s/general fiction with a strong love element. I don’t need to be a bestseller. I just want to sell enough so that I can scrape by as a writer because I like it so much.

Whatever category my novel falls in, women will likely be the bulk of the audience. I hoped my male MC, with his alternative worldviews, would give a voice to philosophies I'm sympathetic to but rarely heard in fictions of love. But if it would offend so many people that I can only sell 5 copies, then I’m willing to change.

Thanks to all who commented, even if you hate my female MC.

Celeste Carrara · May 6, 2012

KellyAssauer said:
The very last thing in the world I personally want to read is yet another bland and boring Alpha male lead. Ho-hum. So from my perspective, you're great - but I'm probably in the minority. =)

I agree with this. I've read a lot of paranormal romance and lately I find myself rolling my eyes at the male lead. It's always the same thing.

I find it refreshing that you are writing a non traditional character and I would say stick to what you want to write. Don't change it just to fit into a certain mold! There are plenty of us out there who are looking for something different to read.

veinglory · May 6, 2012

The views you describe seem within the norm to me. Alphas males, in my experience, are generally not seeking marriage and don't adore (or indeed care at all about) diamonds and there is nothing to prevent them from being feminist or vegan (these are not primary character traits)

JanDarby · May 6, 2012

None of these matter:

1. Doesn’t believe in commitment or marriage (He wants to live in the moment).
2. Is a feminist (He doesn’t like that only women get engagement rings or change their names after marriage).
3. Dislikes diamonds (because its popularity is largely due to the De Beers marketing machine).
4. Is vegan.

Heck, the heroINE in Crusie's Bet Me -- which I believe is her bestselling novel -- doesn't want children (when pregnancy/childbirth is often used as shorthand for HEA), and I don't recall if the h/h plan to get married at the end of the book. Also, pretty much ALL of Crusie's heroes are what's usually referred to as a beta hero -- laid back, definitely NOT alpha.

Being a feminist -- I can't recall reading a romance where this was even an issue. Pretty much ALL of the romances I've read in the last ten years, it was an assumption (i.e., that the heroines were AT LEAST the hero's equal), rather than an issue.

The diamond thing -- meh. Doesn't seem like it would even come up. She says "I'm going out to buy a diamond necklace." He says, "I can't believe you'd support blood diamonds." She says, "Okay, then a sapphire neckalce." And he says, "You'll look lovely in blue." That's the sort of scene that ends up on the cutting room floor because it doesn't matter to the plot.

A vegan -- there's a really wonderful Jayne Ann Krentz book (might have been in her Stephanie James pseudonym) that's AT LEAST twenty years old, possibly closer to thirty, where the hero is some sort of bad-ass fighter, but he's also a vegan. It's a running joke between the h/h for the entire book.

None of this stuff matters any more than the brand of jeans they wear or the career they have or where they went to high school. They make up part of the character's personality, but that's all. It's neither a deal-maker or a deal-breaker when it comes to the story.

Just tell the story. Don't try to be different for the sake of being different. Figure out who the characters are and how it affects the relationship, and include only the bits that affect the relationship.

job · May 6, 2012

girlyswot said:
That makes me hate her, I'm afraid. Why should she settle for a lifetime of uncertainty just because he's a prat?

Oh dear. I'm afraid that's my reaction.

There are plenty of untraditional Romances where a permanent HEA is not clear cut. In these cases, however, it's the woman who isn't looking for marriage, 2.3 kids and a house in the burbs. The HFN ending is just fine with her. She doesn't go along with what he wants because of her great self-sacrificing lurv.

Romance genre is aimed mostly at women readers, after all. Women will not generally want to read about a man ending up with all the power in a relationship.

Even in Womens Fiction or General Fiction, a FMC who wholly commits to a man while he keeps his manly 'freedom' would be seen as a troubled woman with self esteem issues.

LAgrunion · May 6, 2012

JanDarby said:
None of these matter:

Heck, the heroINE in Crusie's Bet Me -- which I believe is her bestselling novel -- doesn't want children (when pregnancy/childbirth is often used as shorthand for HEA), and I don't recall if the h/h plan to get married at the end of the book. Also, pretty much ALL of Crusie's heroes are what's usually referred to as a beta hero -- laid back, definitely NOT alpha.

SPOILER ALERT FOR BRIDGES OF MADISON COUNTY!!!

Funny you should mention Cruisie's Bet Me. I read that, and now that you've mentioned it, I do vaguely recall that Min did not want to have kids.

Susan Elizabeth Phillips's Match Me if You Can is probably one of my favorite romances because I like her writing, even though the alpha-male MC marries her and gives her a huge diamond ring. Another love story I really like is Bridges of Madison County.

SPOILER ALERT!!!

In that book, Francesca gives up being with her real love because she is committed to her husband.

But I still like those two books. So go figure...

My impression is that commitment, explicit or implied, is the predominant formula in romances. It seems to be what the market wants.

Maybe it's because this is my first novel, I'm nervous about sabotaging my chances even before I get started. When I look around, I see that a good majority of women want commitment and a diamond engagement ring, and change their names after marriage. So, when the statistically-representative female reader gets to that part where my male MC opposes those things, she might think, All those things apply to me!, and stop reading. Reject.

job · May 6, 2012

LAgrunion said:
commitment is illusory because the future is uncertain. People change. Life changes. . . . A promise of commitment is meaningless.

Leaving aside the balance of power issues, this would make me wallbang the book.

I know you will present this as a mature and reasoned philosophy of disengagement from uncertainty when you write the story.

But to the mother of teenagers it just sounds emo.

Life is uncertain, but we still sign contracts, marry, have kids, acquire mortgages, fulfill our obligations, own pets, and plant trees that will not bear fruit for a decade.

And because life has never been neat and tidy and full of certainties, but instead nasty, brutish and short,
we generously gift those we love with promises now, rather than making them wait fifty years in suspense to see whether the great hazard worked out.

That's why your hero would annoy me. For a niggling of philosophy, he does not give the woman he loves what she wants and needs. He is ungenerous.

Katrina S. Forest · May 6, 2012

To me, a hero committing to the relationship = "I love you unconditionally." Wanting to only pursue the relationship on a day-to-day basis = "Well, conditions might change tomorrow and I might not love you anymore."

The former is naturally going to make me feel like he's more romantic, though like everyone else, I wouldn't mind seeing him reach that attitude over the course of the book, rather than starting off with it.

BenPanced · May 6, 2012

He just doesn't sound like the hero in a romance, to me. He might be the heroine's BFF that she's crushing out over but she doesn't realize it's going to work. If he's not willing to make a commitment then the idea sounds more like women's fiction than romance.

It might not be the MMC that offends readers, but the FMC's reaction to him that might (as evidenced above). She sounds too much like the "heroine" in a Lifetime Movie of the Week: she sees the unattainable guy as a project that SHE KNOWS SHE CAN CHANGE SHE JUST KNOWS IT. Bleh. If he's happy with his life the way it is, he's not going to "let" her change him, no matter how much she tries. Unless somebody's ready and willing to change, they aren't going to. If he loves her enough, he's going to have to make the decision to commit, not her.

Captcha · May 6, 2012

But I'd be fine if he just didn't want to get married or something. It doesn't have to be a ceremonially-endorsed commitment, for me, it's just got to be him saying that while he knows that crazy stuff could happen, none of that crazy stuff will be coming from him waking up one day and deciding that he's not interested in being with her anymore.

I'm not saying I believe that in real life; in real life, I totally accept that lots of relationships don't last, and we can't really PROMISE anything. But I read Romances to get away from at least that aspect of real life. In a Romance, the main characters NEVER fall out of love with each other. Never.

Bubastes · May 6, 2012

LAgrunion said:
Thanks for your input, Captcha.

HFN = Happy For Now?

The current ending is happy. Intellectually, he still believes commitment is not attainable (because we don't know the future). But emotionally, he is pretty much there (cuz he sees her as a soulmate). She's okay with it by the end, because she loves him enough to want to be with him, even if it's just day-to-day. The ending is optimistic, and I think of them as staying together thereafter.

That would be a wallbanger ending for me. In a romance, I expect (hope) that both characters grow because of the relationship. I want to see them be better together than apart. The way you've described it, the hero doesn't grow at all and the heroine actually regresses to being a doormat, at least the way I'm reading it.

BenPanced · May 6, 2012

Captcha said:
But I'd be fine if he just didn't want to get married or something. It doesn't have to be a ceremonially-endorsed commitment, for me, it's just got to be him saying that while he knows that crazy stuff could happen, none of that crazy stuff will be coming from him waking up one day and deciding that he's not interested in being with her anymore.

I'm not saying I believe that in real life; in real life, I totally accept that lots of relationships don't last, and we can't really PROMISE anything. But I read Romances to get away from at least that aspect of real life. In a Romance, the main characters NEVER fall out of love with each other. Never.

Yeah, I understood that. It doesn't have to be a wedding or anything fancy. He can make the commitment by just agreeing they buy a house or rent a condo and just be together.

job · May 6, 2012

Katrina S. Forest said:
To me, a hero committing to the relationship = "I love you unconditionally."

I do see the appeal of exploring the philosophical issues of commitment.

It occurs to me --
One way to look at the philosophy and still write a genre Romance would be to switch roles. Thus, the woman won't make a formal commitment. The man wants the promises but is willing to go without them because he loves her.

LAgrunion · May 6, 2012

job said:
I do see the appeal of exploring the philosophical issues of commitment.

It occurs to me --
One way to look at the philosophy and still write a genre Romance would be to switch roles. Thus, the woman won't make a formal commitment. The man wants the promises but is willing to go without them because he loves her.

Job - You're brilliant, even though we seem to have different views.

I was JUST thinking about this like 10 minutes ago: For all the people who dislike my FMC's evolution, would it make a difference if I flipped the genders? Better or worse?

p.s. Just to clarify, while my MMC doesn't believe in commitment, he also doesn't expect it from her either. He is fair. The way he sees it, although neither MC has the intention to ever walk away, the (philosophical) possibility exists for either person.

Captcha · May 6, 2012

LAgrunion said:
Job - You're brilliant, even though we seem to have different views. I was JUST thinking about this like 10 minutes ago: For all the people who dislike my FMC's evolution, would it make a difference if I flipped the genders? Better or worse?

p.s. Just to clarify, while my MMC doesn't believe in commitment, he also doesn't expect it from her either. He is fair. The way he sees it, although neither MC has the intention to ever walk away, the (philosophical) possibility exists for either person.

He may be fair, but it'd still be a problem for the relationship, because she wants something pretty important from him, and he's not willing/able to give it to her. And if she settles for that, I lose respect for her, and for the relationship.

And I'd be fine with a gender-reversed version because it wouldn't be such a stereotype, but I'd still need the non-committing party to be willing to commit by the end of the book in order for me to consider it a happy ending. Women's fiction with a footloose heroine who stays that way? Sure. But not romance, by my standards.

Sorin · May 6, 2012

Do you have any beta readers? Preferably betas who read broadly in the genre? They are going to be your best gauge as to how your characters are perceived. You could also post a section in the romance SYW subform to see how certain passages are interpreted.

Will the anti-traditionalist male lead in my romance novel offend too many readers?

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