Why are HEAs necessary?

Just for grins, what's an HEA?

caw

blacbird said:

Just for grins, what's an HEA?

caw

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Happily Ever After. Some romances may instead have a HFN (Happy For Now).

As so the OP, I've been reading romances since the late 70's and I've never read a book that was marketed as "Romance" that wasn't HEA or at least HFN.

However, I've read plenty of Women's Fiction that had strong romantic elements, but were not HEA or HFN. Those books were not marketed as Romance, though. They might have been marketed as love stories, but the Romance genre is (and has been for a very long time, AFAIK) very specific as to the ending.

ETA: Oops, cross posted with Amergina.

RackinRocky said:

I remember reading romance novels when I was younger, and sometimes they were definitely not HEAs. Since when did this trend start, and WHY?

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RWA actually defines a romance novel as "having an emotionally satisfying ending." It's a bit more vague than a straight up Happily Ever After. One reaches the end of the book and feels optimistic about the ending.

ElleMason said:

RWA actually defines a romance novel as "having an emotionally satisfying ending." It's a bit more vague than a straight up Happily Ever After. One reaches the end of the book and feels optimistic about the ending.

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But I'll bet that no book with an 'emotionally satisfying ending' that involves the MC ditching the relationship for a new life and a career of her own, no matter how optimistic she feels, is going to be published as a Romance novel.

So either Romeo & Juliet wasn't romance, or it wasn't good... Hm. Please.

At risk of sounding rude, I'd say comparing 'Romeo and Juliet' to modern romances does a great disservice to both. They're different animals, meant to do different things to the human psyche.

Nobody's saying that it's right, or logical, just the way the romance genre has evolved. Bittersweet endings have their place; I know at least one M/M imprint has a section for bittersweets, and mainstream YA fiction has been awash in tragedy for years. So has mainstream science fiction and fantasy, women's fiction, and literary fiction.

Romance publishers insist on HEA or HFN because that's what their readers want and expect. It just is. Arguing about it or trying to change it dramatically won't have much positive effect. You *can* subvert from within the genre, as long as you are careful. My debut novel and its sequel are HFN stories. I've already written the ultimate chapter of that story, and it's logically and perfectly bittersweet. It will never be published in the versions from my first erotic romance publisher. Maybe after I get the rights back, I'll self-publish the whole story.

My first coherent fiction attempts were tragedies, and I still love a great smile-through-your-tears ending. I accept that I will get those from science fiction, fantasy, and mainstream lit fic. From romance I will get more positive, upbeat endings. I don't necessarily like it, because I think the freedom to include downbeat endings is a plus.

Maybe romance is still a 'new' enough genre that its conventions haven't evolved as far as SF&F. Erotic romance still has legitimacy barriers as far as state and country obscenity laws. Some unbreakable romance rules have been regularly flouted by literary fiction and SF&F for decades. I do see positive movement in the romance readership being willing to take chances and branch out, over the last 20 years.

It pays to know your genre and its general guidelines.

I don't see how the nature of the ending defines the genre for the entire book though. If there was romance before one or both partners croaked, that's romantic enough from an objective point of view... Like 199 pages of conquering hearts and smootching and wammin' and slammin', nullified by page 200 where they moon a rabid polar bear? Nah.

NaeimGiladisLegacy said:

So either Romeo & Juliet wasn't romance, or it wasn't good... Hm. Please.

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It's not a romance. It's a tragedy.

NaeimGiladisLegacy said:

I don't see how the nature of the ending defines the genre for the entire book though. If there was romance before one or both partners croaked, that's romantic enough from an objective point of view... Like 199 pages of conquering hearts and smootching and wammin' and slammin', nullified by page 200 where they moon a rabid polar bear? Nah.

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You can use the word "romance" however you want to.

But if you want to actually write and SELL a Romance, you should know the conventions of the genre. And a convention of the romance genre is a HEA or HFN ending.

That's the current reality. It's not a natural law or universal truth, it's just the way a label is used.

Why does "Science Fiction" have to be speculative fiction? Couldn't it just be a story about someone who does science? Sure, it could, but that's not how the phrase is used in book discussions.

NaeimGiladisLegacy said:

I don't see how the nature of the ending defines the genre for the entire book though. If there was romance before one or both partners croaked, that's romantic enough from an objective point of view... Like 199 pages of conquering hearts and smootching and wammin' and slammin', nullified by page 200 where they moon a rabid polar bear? Nah.

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An HEA or HFN as the ending of the book is the culmination of a book that focuses on the romance between the parties. It's a uniquely American concept. By older (and by many European still today) definitions, Romeo and Juliet was indeed a romance. The pair were nobility personified, and were fated to love forever, even beyond the grave. But they were pawns in a larger game. Even though Shakespeare didn't do a sequel, there are theories that the death of the young lovers taught the families the folly of their clan war and possibly even ended that war. So it taught a lesson.

But romance readers evolved to want an optimistic ending, one that they could smile at when the book closed. Realiy, readers (fickle creatures that we are) grew tired of larger than life, noble characters who had no say in their own fate. They wanted everyday people to fall in love and, more importantly, wanted "bad boys" to find their true love and redeem themselves. This is also uniquely American, and many scholars attribute it to Gone With the Wind. Think about Rhett and Scarlet. They were the bad boy and the bitch. But they grew and redeemed over the course of the book. Yet the book ended before their HEA, which is why people pressed Margaret Mitchell her whole life to finish the story. She never did (although an attempt was tried by her family in Scarlet.)

So publishers in America split the category. A romance shelved in the genre of Romance would now be happy, and a love story, shelved in General Fiction would be bittersweet, therefore satisfying both types of readers. The reader would know where to look for their favorite story and would know what they would get between the covers. It's also how the original definition of mystery was split into the subgenres of mystery, suspense and thriller, FYI.

Does that help?

Romeo and Juliet is not a romance and was never intended to be a romance. It's a tragedy. It's been called a tragedy since the First Folio.

Cathy C said:

An HEA or HFN as the ending of the book is the culmination of a book that focuses on the romance between the parties. It's a uniquely American concept. By older (and by many European still today) definitions, Romeo and Juliet was indeed a romance. The pair were nobility personified, and were fated to love forever, even beyond the grave. But they were pawns in a larger game. Even though Shakespeare didn't do a sequel, there are theories that the death of the young lovers taught the families the folly of their clan war and possibly even ended that war. So it taught a lesson.

But romance readers evolved to want an optimistic ending, one that they could smile at when the book closed. Realiy, readers (fickle creatures that we are) grew tired of larger than life, noble characters who had no say in their own fate. They wanted everyday people to fall in love and, more importantly, wanted "bad boys" to find their true love and redeem themselves. This is also uniquely American, and many scholars attribute it to Gone With the Wind. Think about Rhett and Scarlet. They were the bad boy and the bitch. But they grew and redeemed over the course of the book. Yet the book ended before their HEA, which is why people pressed Margaret Mitchell her whole life to finish the story. She never did (although an attempt was tried by her family in Scarlet.)

So publishers in America split the category. A romance shelved in the genre of Romance would now be happy, and a love story, shelved in General Fiction would be bittersweet, therefore satisfying both types of readers. The reader would know where to look for their favorite story and would know what they would get between the covers. It's also how the original definition of mystery was split into the subgenres of mystery, suspense and thriller, FYI.

Does that help?

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It does, thanks for the explanation. But the bolded part is the problem here. When accepting international submissions or serving the international market, the work shouldn't be expected to be written exclusively with america in mind. English fiction itself shouldn't be expected to come exclusively from an English-speaking country. I always write in English as it carters to a greater audience, but that audience is global.

I gag every time a movie ends with the camera spinning around the smooching couple, she skinny, pretty, and perfect, and he all roughed up and dirty and disgusting. How is that NOT getting old yet? Like The Lion King 2, like, dude just watched his mother die a horrible death and has a family reunion party the same morning? Everyone smiling? HELLO? MOTHER JUST DIED!?!?!?

Two points:

Never forget Disney has forged an empire off Bowdlerized versions of darker works.

I'm just glad when American publishers and readers realize there *are* other markets. But the central tropes of romance - happy ending to a romance arc, the main characters together - seem to be appreciated by other cultures. It's not just an American concept anymore, even in cultures with a much stronger acceptance of arranged marriages.

A story with a romance in it is not necessarily the same as a Romance story.

Tons of books have romances in them. That doesn't make them Romances as far as genre. Thrillers have romances. Urban fantasy has romances. Science fiction has romances. And so on. (Not all books in those genres include romances, but those are examples of genres in which some books do contain romantic relationships.)

But in a thriller, an urban fantasy, or a science fiction novel, the romance is NOT the plot. It exists *in addition* to the main plot, which may be a spy trying to stop the Atlantic Ocean from blowing up, or a werewolf hunting a vampire hunter, or a crew on their way to colonize the planet Brisbane.

In a Romance (capital R to designate the actual romance *genre*), the romantic relationship IS the plot. Things like spies, werewolves, and spaceships might exist *in addition* to the romance, but they are not the focus of the story. The development and resolution of the romantic relationship is.

A story that has a romance in it doesn't have to have a happy ending, because the story isn't about the romance.

A Romance story DOES have to have a happy ending, because the story IS about the romance, and readers want to see that the couple (or more) end the story in a happy, positive relationship with each other. That's one of the primary conventions of the genre, just like fantasy elements in the "real" world are a convention of the urban fantasy genre.

Trying to say that a Romance shouldn't have to have a happy ending as long as there's a romance involved is like trying to say that a story that takes place in Boston with absolutely no fantasy elements is urban fantasy because there's a city involved.

Genres have a function. The function of romance includes a certainty of successful romantic attachment.

People who get offended by this often seem to want romance level sales, without writing a romance.

Nothing in the world prevents you from writing a different genre of love story, Just don't expect the genre romance industry to be interested in it.

And as for whether Romeo and Juliet being romantic? Two children being psychologically pressured into suicide isn't especially romantic to me, to me it is a tragedy. Characters being in love is not the same as the story being a genre romance.

Cathy C said:

An HEA or HFN as the ending of the book is the culmination of a book that focuses on the romance between the parties. It's a uniquely American concept.

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I'm not sure how you're defining "American", but even if you mean the entire continent, I don't think this is accurate. The Harlequin/Mills & Boon formula is pretty wide-spread.

Captcha said:

I'm not sure how you're defining "American", but even if you mean the entire continent, I don't think this is accurate. The Harlequin/Mills & Boon formula is pretty wide-spread.

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It is wide-spread, but let's look at Mills & Boon (which was founded before Harlequin). It was started in 1908 as a primarily educational publisher - textbooks, literary, etc. It wasn't until the 1930s that it expanded the publishing base to include genre fiction. When was Gone With the Wind published? 1936. Is that coincidence? Possibly, but more likely it came out of a world in conflict, where happiness was hard to find and people sought out books that would help them escape from the harsh realities of the Great Depression, the end of WWI and the conflicts leading up to WWII. Frankly, the world sucked and people wanted to feel happy.

America (both U.S. and Canada) were the primary market for the 1930s M&B titles and were distributed by the predecessor of Canada's Harlequin, which was more a distributor than a true publisher at the time.

M&B embraced genre romance early on, along with adventure stories (ala Jack London) and considered both genres forms of literature, which was unique for the day. Remember that Jack London books were widely banned by European countries in the 1920s and 1930s. Both types of books were considered "escapist" which was a new concept and wasn't really taken to by the European audiences. But they were wildly popular in the United States.

Harlequin, as a publisher, wasn't founded until 1948 and didn't purchase M&B until the 1970s. So, yeah, I sort of stand by the idea of the romance genre being an American concept.

NaeimGiladisLegacy said:

I gag every time a movie ends with the camera spinning around the smooching couple, she skinny, pretty, and perfect, and he all roughed up and dirty and disgusting. How is that NOT getting old yet?

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*shrug* There's nothing preventing a viewer from watching a movie where the camera is stationary on the grieving or separated couple. Just don't expect that to appeal to fans of romance, whatever the sizes, looks or cleanliness of the couple happen to be.

Same goes for books. Is it old to have a happy-ever-after? Maybe. But that works for the genre and for the readers who enjoy it. Just as most readers of mysteries like to know in the end who committed the crime, even if it would be a startling new twist for the author never to reveal this.

^Yeah, that. I am not a fan of this spinning-camera, soaring-violins thing either, but that's why I write horror instead. (Well, one of many reasons.)

Know Your Genre. If your genre doesn't include or need an HEA--great! Do that. It's totally fine, and totally marketable. It's just not Romance.

I think you can say it is a concept originating in the US. But it is certainly no longer restricted to that geography.

I guess I'm sort of perplexed...capital R-Romance requires an HEA/HFN because that's what readers expect. I suppose there are historical reasons, and steps that led there, etc., but I'm not sure why it matters at this point. It is what it is.

Seems to me this is a semantics issue. There's a difference between Romance (the genre) and romantic (the story element). Love Story was romantic, R & J is romantic for many. Romantic sells plenty, so if that's what you want to write, as Rhoda and others here have said, there is absolutely no reason not to.

ElaineA said:

Seems to me this is a semantics issue. There's a difference between Romance (the genre) and romantic (the story element). Love Story was romantic, R & J is romantic for many. Romantic sells plenty, so if that's what you want to write, as Rhoda and others here have said, there is absolutely no reason not to.

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Exactly. And I read all kinds of books. On my keeper shelf are some fascinating and well-written books with love stories that don't end with a couple together and happy - Gone with the Wind, The Thorn Birds, Lace, Chocolat, A Woman of Substance, etc. I love these.

But I also love romances, and part of my devotion to them is the safety net of the happy ending. I know, going in, that things will work out in the end. This is a warm and comforting feeling that gets me through stress and uncertainty, so when I'm feeling down, I reach for books like these. That's why I want them to be a certain way, with no gut-punch surprises where the hero shoots himself on page 300 because this is an unexpected twist to the tale, or because the author is bored by romance, or whatever.

There are books to suit all tastes. People who don't find romance interesting don't need to read or write it.