I was walking to work earlier this week listening to audiofic of Sherlock/John slash. Really good Sherlock/John slash by Wordstrings.
More on that, perhaps, at some later date.
And as I was walking and listening I was thinking about the stories we tell about relationships in our culture. Romantic, sexually-intimate relationships to be precise. So I thought I’d share a few of my all-time favorite love stories with y’all and then throw upen the comment thread for sharing.
So starting with the classics, I have to vote Persuasion my favorite Jane Austen novel — even above Pride and Prejudice. I like that it’s all about second chances, I like the maturity of the protagonists, and the way in which Anne’s marriage at the end is not about domesticity as much as it is about adventure — a life on the open sea. Another classic would be E. M. Forester’s Room With a View, which in contrast to the Austen is very much a story about the turmoil of youth. Yet it does have one of the sweetest, most passionate kisses in all of English literature. I also like the fact that George, as well as Lucy, is swept away by feelings of romance and passion. Too often in hetero romance, the woman is the romantic and the man is playing hard to get. I like that in Room With a View the characters are equally desirous of one another (and slightly frightened of their own deep feelings).
Even though she’s slightly over-played at this point, I have to say I feel a deep fondness for Sara Waters’ fiction, particularly Tipping the Velvet and Fingersmith, which are both Victorian melodrama at their highest pitch but with a lesbian twist. And how could I dislike the novels that first suggested to me I might have, well, a thing for queer sex? She made it so hot and so loving at the same time.
Annie On My Mind by Nancy Garden was the first lesbian love story I ever read (the only one my public library had in their YA collection … but if you’re going to have one, I don’t think Annie is a bad one to have!). It has incredibly tender moments and is remarkable for queer fiction of its era in that it has a happy ending.
I harbor a deep love for sexually-explicit young adult fiction on the whole, even if the sexually “explicit” scenes are less about negotiation of body parts and more about metaphors for orgasm. Still. Not a Swan by Michelle Magorian is about a bookish young English girl who comes into her own, sexually and romantically, during the Second World War. Sherryl Jordan’s The Raging Quiet is set in a quasi-fantastical Medieval landscape and involves a young woman who falls in love with the much-abused village idiot and, as a result, is accused of being a witch. Both have some incredibly tender love scenes, as well as (mild trigger warning) the young women having to come to grips with coerced sexual experiences. The Pillow Book of Cordelia Kenn by Aiden Chambers absolutely infuriated me with its cop-out ending and could have used some editing. But the central romance is tender, physically detailed, and actually deals with the messy negotiations of having safe sex and not quite getting it right the first time.
Even though it’s not to everyone’s taste, I love Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander cycle not only for the epic multi-generational saga but also for the romance and the copious, often light-hearted sex. Gabaldon was the author who taught me that you could write sex scenes with a sense of humor — and still make them incredibly tender and sexy as hell. (Note: Not all the sex scenes or relationships are particularly lighthearted or loving; there’s sadistic violence and coerced sex in the novel as well. At times by the same characters who also engage in loving relationships. So if you just don’t want to go there, which is completely understandable, consider yourself warned.)
In the realm of mystery fiction, Gaudy Night by Dorothy Sayers has got to be one of my all-time favorite intellectual romances with a feminist sensibility. Likewise, Laurie R. King’s A Monstrous Regiment of Women (#2 in the Mary Russell / Sherlock Holmes series) is really, really well done. Both of those books are achingly sensual without being explicitly sexual — a delicate balance to achieve.
I could throw out some more … but I think I’ll leave it at that for now and encourage everyone else to share their own favorites in comments. It’s time to swap reading (or viewing) suggestions!
Completely agree about Persuasion! It’s my favorite of the Austen novels for all the reasons you mention.
Also seconding the Sarah Waters love. Tipping the Velvet in particular is very sexy and really hits all the right notes about first love, heartbreak, casual sex and finding the true love. The BBC mini-series is terrific and faithful to the book, and has sex scenes that were too hot for American TV, so get it from Netflix.
Jean Auel’s Valley of the Horses and Mammoth Hunters are also super-sexy, and they were the first novels I read as a teen that truly glorified woman-centered hetero sex, with very masculine characters who worshipped female sexuality and made women’s pleasure their top priority. I know so many women who had some kind of sexual awakening reading those sex scenes. SRSLY. It’s some hot stuff.
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@beckysharper – I LOVE the Jean Auel books, and definitely had some awakenings with that series. To the point my friends from senior year of high school refer to it as “cave man porn”.
She is due out for another book March 29th, “The Land of the Painted Caves” and I cannot wait!
@annajcook – “Not a Swan” blew my mind away when I first read it at 15, and is still one of my favorite books.
And for me, I don’t know why, but I tend to like tragic love stories, where the characters are horrifically flawed and there are not really happy endings. Hence my deep love and view of “Anna Karenina” as a romance, and as one of my all time favorites. It is just my go to book for every mood I am in.
GAUDY NIGHT
GAUDY NIGHT
GAUDY NIGHT
Sorry, I’m not really capable of being coherent on this topic. I really love Gaudy Night, y’all. I love that Sayers devotes a *whole book* to her heroine’s fear of losing her independence to a relationship, and that she takes that fear seriously, and really investigates what it means for a woman to embark on a relationship with a man in a sexist world. Plus Peter Wimsey is a total boss. (Opinion totally unbiased by the fact that I’m writing this from my room in Balliol..)
In re. Jean Auel: there was a period at school when we were about twelve when we passed those books around like they were contraband drugs. ‘Just read them! …you’ll see why.’ At the time I thought the five-page sex scenes were totally hot. Now they’re hilarious. Serious overuse of the word ‘cleft.’ And ‘manhood’.
I’m a serious sci-fi junky, and my favorite love story is of course from a sci-fi book. I adore _A Civil Campaign_ from the Vorkosigan sage by Lois McMaster Bujold.
The main character, Miles, has been around for many books. He’s a military spy, despite being having multiple congenital disabilities. He falls in love with a married woman. Complexity ensues. Husband dies (he was conveniently a jackass), and Miles spends 2 books wooing this brilliant skittish woman, while dealing with his own panic over being an unsuitable spouse.
If you love sexually explicit YA fiction, I recommend Graceling and Fire by Kristin Cashore. I mean, the love stories are entirely secondary (one reason I love them so much), but they’re both very well done. Also the novels in general are fucking amazing.
I also really like the way Terry Pratchett does romance. I don’t particularly like love stories that are just about relationships. They’re boring to me. But whenever I read a story about something else–dragons, witches, wizards–in which there is a subplot love story, it’s usually my favorite part. I love Same Vimes and Sybil Ramkin’s love story, and Carrot and Angua’s love story. And in the Tiffany Aching quartet, the love story is done perfectly.
I can’t think of any grown-up love stories that I like.
See, I clicked on ‘read more’ thinking ‘I’ll recommend Gaudy Night’ and I’ve been beaten to it twice!
So instead, I’ll say Tom and Polly in Fire and Hemlock by Diana Wynne Jones. It’s not explicit and it’s very much pre-relationship, but it’s just beautifully done. And Tom and Hester in the Mortal Engines quartet by Philip Reeve. Amazing dark, bleak books and Hester is one of my favourite heroines/antiheroines. She’s not attractive, she’s not even awfully nice, but she’s amazing.
In a classic vein, I love Much Ado About Nothing. It is such a classic love story- Beatrice and Benedict are prickly and antagonistic, but manage to overcome their antagonism and establish a relationship. I like to imagine their married life was full of quick-witted arguments, then making up spectacularly.
I loved Graceling also. Also loved the Tiffany Aching story arc. OK, I love YA romance plotlines. I just read the “Speaking to Dragons” series and enjoyed Princess Cimorene running away to live with dragons rather than marry the Prince. She eventually finds a good man in a subsequent book, who doesn’t expect her to fit into a stereotype.
It’s been a long time since I’ve read ‘Persuasion’, and I think last time I wasn’t mature enough. I’ll have to give it another try. I do love ‘Pride and Prejudice’ though.
Others:
‘The Lover’ by Marguerite Duras. A beautifully-written story about a transgressive first love (teen/older man, white girl/Chinese man) in 1930s French Indochina, based on Duras’s own experience.
‘Sylvie’ by Gérard de Nerval. It’s quite short – a novella really – but perfection, about lost love and the passing of time.
‘The Pursuit of Love’, by Nancy Mitford. It’s not so much about love as the search for it, but it’s laugh-out-loud funny.
I’ve found others that prefer ‘Persuasion’ to ‘Pride and Prejudice’? Alas! I am not alone!
Es – yay I love Tom and Polly. Fire and Hemlock is my go-to-comfort read. Plus I also second the Gaudy Night love.
As to any other recommendations – well I have a real soft spot for Dorothy Dunnett – Nicholas and Gelis from her Niccolo chronicles have the more mature relationship but part of me will always love Francis Crawford and Philippa Sommerville, it’s high romance, albeit well written, and meant to be, and my inner 15 year old will always love it.
Jean Auel totally passed me by btw, although I’m amazed by how many Americans I know love her. I remember being bored rigid by her books as a teenager, I was obviously missing out.
Oh meant to add I also worship Persuasion, my favourite Austen as well (Northanger Abbey apart – I have a bit of a thing for silly gothic and like the fact that that book is so tongue in cheek)
Since we all love Persuasion so much, why are all the movie versions so bad? The one with Ciaran Hinds wasn’t too bad, if I remember correctly, but I just watched one made in 2007 (?) that included in the final scene, Anne’s promise to Wentworth that she would be more decided in the future! Exactly the opposite of Austen’s conclusion!! It did have Anthony Head playing Anne’s father to perfection, I’ll give you that.
I want a Persuasion that’s the equal of the Colin Firth Pride & Prejudice.
I used to love Persuasion the best, too. But I reread it recently and found it… awkward. It might be because many of the things I liked about it now seem a bit… mawkish. Things that are totally era appropriate, like her staying at home and basically waiting around, read as too passive to me, now. But I am going to wait a bit and read it again, because I did love it so. I loved Anne’s character, I would like to love her again. I love that she is not overblown, but she is sensible and realistic. My favourite character in P&P is Charlotte Lucas, if that tells you anything. I want to read HER story.
Also, I FREAKING LOVE Gaudy night. I reread it regularly. It is one of my favourite books ever, so beautifully paced, so thoughtful, so emotional and intellectual all at once. I also loved the Laurie R. King books.
I enjoyed the middle three Auel books – the multiple rape scenes in the first were just too much for me, and the last book seemed rushed to me. Agree on the Outlander cycle, too! I love the complexity and realism of the characters. And she REALLY sticks close to the actual history.
I’ve been reading the Mercy Thompson books, by Patricia Briggs. It’s up to 5 books now. Werewolves, vampires, fae, and mechanics. The romance is part of the story, and really shows how life gets messy – she has adventures while trying to figure out her sex life. Mercy and Adam’s relationship develops slowly, and is very authentic. Warning though – Mercy is raped in the 3rd book, and the next two deal with the aftermath – PTSD, flashbacks and panic attacks. I like them because these are realistic relationships. So many SciFi/Fantasy books make relationships far too easy and formulaic.
[...] my recent Friday Fun Thread about favorite love stories, commenter Shadow Boxer recommended the Mercy Thompson series by Patricia Briggs as a fun example of genre fiction that offers a [...]