And a year later some comic said something like, “Have you ever tried to watch chariots of fire with the sound turned off? Whoa. Snore.” and the audience hit the roof with laughter.

Janet: I can’t stand that one either. Blerk.

Margaret C: Don’t know those books but they seem to fit solidly in the wish fulfillment category.

Liliya: Yes, Gwyneth Paltrow—always the mark of quality. Not!

I very much enjoyed Possession (though I confess I skipped a lot of the poetry—I’m bad!). Definitely my favourite of Byatt’s books.

Chris S.: Zackly. Fer instance, I reckon my Scott is dead beautiful!

‘a beautiful woman, simone weil said, seeing herself in the mirror, knows ‘this is i.’ an ugly woman knows, with equal certainty, ‘this is not i.’ Maud knew this neat division represented an over-simplification. the doll mask she saw had nothing to do with her, nothing. the feminists had divined that who once, when she rose to speak at a meeting, had hissed and cat-called, assuming her crowning glory to be the seductive and marketable product of an inhumanely tested product.’

you should add ‘possession’ to your romance reading list. wonderful book (and nothing whatever to do with the film, which was a total, dreadful travesty and had gwyneth paltrow in it).

I share your turnoff in everyone’s reactions being the same. but what really chaps my chitlins is when attraction is equated with love. As well as when it is implied there is one kind of love. Or the assumption that mutual attraction is the same degree of intensity. Reading and writing romance seems most fun when one explores around the overlaps and gaps between differing degrees of attraction and how those can evolve–or not evolve. And, as you say, writers who handle it with wit and insight (instead of the tired old superlatives) go on my favorites shelf.