Latest / Radio 831: A Romance Podcast / The State of Romance Criticism, Rioghnach Robinson on Fictionalizing Criticism in Bad Words, and Best Sex Scenes of the Month

Transcript

The State of Romance Criticism, Rioghnach Robinson on Fictionalizing Criticism in Bad Words, and Best Sex Scenes of the Month · Radio 831: A Romance Podcast

• 0:06
  Speaker 1: Hi, and welcome to the Radio 831 Podcast.
• 0:09
  Speaker 2: We're your hosts, Sanjana Bhaskar and Tyler McCall, and we're
• 0:13
  Speaker 2: so excited to talk everything romance, from the novels and
• 0:16
  Speaker 2: the tropes to the book-to-screen adaptations and, of course, the
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: drama of it all. You know, unpacking what the genre
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: says about who we are and how we love. Sanj, hello.
• 0:27
  Speaker 3: Hi.
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: I have a question for you that I think is
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: going to brighten your day because I would like to
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: give you the opportunity... to pitch me on something that
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: I know that you have been trying to pitch me on.
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: Wow. I'm so excited.
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: I would really love for you to talk to me
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: about romance on Substack, specifically romance criticism on Substack, which
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: I know you're very passionate about.
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: I am indeed.
• 0:48
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: I am actually really excited about this because we spend
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: a lot of time talking about how there aren't a
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: lot of spaces for criticism in romance. And this is
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: a big pet peeve for me because I write a
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: little bit and I started on TikTok doing criticism. And
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: for a long time, I wasn't really sure what to
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: call my engagement with romance besides being like a diehard fan.
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: But in truth, I read a lot of criticism. I
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: love criticism. I find it to be this like generative, political, thoughtful,
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: interesting act of engagement with a text. And I think
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: it's also like kind of the relationship we have with
• 1:20
  Speaker 2: each other that like I'm a person who enters romance
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: that way and you enter it as a reader, but
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: also a writer. And so I think that's partially why
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: I'm so excited to have this conversation of like, I
• 1:30
  Speaker 2: don't think there are a lot of spaces for there
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: to be romance criticism online. And one of the spaces
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: where that does exist is in people's newsletters, which borrows
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: on a much longer tradition of blog writing and romance
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: blogs are a longstanding fixture of the community. They have
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: often been the only sources where people could pool together
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: interesting criticism about romance because these self-driven personal blogs were
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: willing to give romance airtime in ways that mainstream outlets
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: and mainstream critical establishments were not willing to. They didn't
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: see romance as a subject worthy of critique. Do you
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: have any experience reading romance sub-stocks? Are there any that
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: you already follow? Well, yours. Thank you. Very kind. Obviously.
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: And I followed The Loose Cravat. So The Loose Cravat
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: is written by Sawyer, who is a friend of mine,
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: who is a co-host on the Reformed Rakes podcast, which
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: is a historical romance podcast that I highly, highly recommend. Also,
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: in general, a really great source of criticism. But all
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: three of the co-hosts on Reformed Rakes have sub stacks
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: of their own. So Beth has one called Ministrations. Emma
• 2:36
  Speaker 2: has one called Restorative Romance. And Sawyer has The Loose Cravat.
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: And all three have like slightly different angles of entry.
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: But a lot of times they do talk about historical romance.
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: And Even if you aren't a historical romance writer, I highly, highly,
• 2:50
  Speaker 2: highly recommend subscribing to them because I think they will
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: just change the way that you think about engaging with
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: romance as a historical, cultural, sociological project. So I would
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: recommend subscribing to all three of those. And similarly, Andrea
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: Martucci has a sub stack called Shelf Love, where she
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: similarly does work in the romance space. I think the
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: work that she's really known for is she like peels
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: apart publishing statistics around romance like we love to tout
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: this thing of like romance publishing is a billion dollar
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: industry and it is the genre that makes all of
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: the money for the rest of publishing it's not necessarily
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: that we know that to be entirely false but we
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: also don't know it to be entirely true publishing statistics
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: are notoriously slippery and unreliable and she does a really
• 3:35
  Speaker 2: cool job of like anthropologically placing romance within a broader
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: publishing industry So I think that's maybe like a good
• 3:46
  Speaker 2: place to start.
• 3:48
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: I don't come from like a book criticism background. But
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: because I was a fashion editor for 10 years, I'm
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: obviously very invested in the idea of criticism. Because I
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: think it is very true that in today's media landscape,
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: the art of criticism is kind of going away. Because criticism,
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: whether it's fashion criticism, film, TV criticism.
• 4:08
  Speaker 2: That.
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: Stuff doesn't get clicks in the same way that celebrity
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: oriented or flashy more. I hate the word clickbait because
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: I don't think it's always used accurately, but like clickbaity
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: stuff does. But like there's nobody really in younger generations
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: doing it. It's becoming a lost art form. And so
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: the thing that I do love about Substack generally is
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: that it gives people the space to go deep.
• 4:31
  Speaker 2: On these topics.
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: So when we're talking about romance, we're talking about a
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: category that is, I think, largely reviewed by the sort of,
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: if we could call them like establishment media places that
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: cover book reviews, right? Like they're doing Marlon James, which
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: like great, but they're not doing like many romances, maybe
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: except one that like pops past the bubble, like an
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: Emily Henry or something like that. I'm so open to
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: this idea of people going really deep and getting like
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: wonky about romance because I think it's a category that
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: deserves that.
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: Well, it's also the thing of reading work by people
• 5:05
  Speaker 2: like Sawyer, Emma and Beth or Andrea. Part of what
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: is so special about it is that it reminds you
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: that this genre was not built yesterday.
• 5:13
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: By three people who hit the New York Times bestseller
• 5:16
  Speaker 2: list in 2020. which is something that one can become
• 5:20
  Speaker 2: guilty of believing if you do not seek out work
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: that curates a much more expansive understanding of romance. And
• 5:28
  Speaker 2: obviously romance community is large. There are people who have
• 5:31
  Speaker 2: been reading in this since they were wee children in
• 5:34
  Speaker 2: the 60s and 70s, like people who have a much
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: longer legacy of understanding romance than either of us do, right?
• 5:41
  Speaker 2: But in terms of public interesting writing that not only
• 5:46
  Speaker 2: positions romance across time, but also is willing to critically
• 5:50
  Speaker 2: dissect it. That is like a rare and precious thing
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: that I think is really special. I'm curious to you,
• 5:56
  Speaker 2: what makes for good criticism? I find it important for
• 6:00
  Speaker 2: a critic to be someone who looks with care, like
• 6:05
  Speaker 2: examines all things with care. And that doesn't mean they
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: constantly have positive feelings about something or that they are
• 6:13
  Speaker 2: only like experiencing things joy in reading but that they
• 6:17
  Speaker 2: are examining with a thoughtful careful eye that yeah there's
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: just some element of looking closely and part of the
• 6:24
  Speaker 2: reason why i emphasize this is because there's like a
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: whole genre of book youtube content that is like look
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: at this essay of me dunking on something for two
• 6:34
  Speaker 2: hours right and it's not that i think people shouldn't
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: or can't dunk But I do think that a lot
• 6:39
  Speaker 2: of work like that is not as thoughtful, as interesting,
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: as generative as it could be. Even the act of
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: hating on something can be something that one does with
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: a lot of devotion. And I don't know that people
• 6:51
  Speaker 2: always do that. But for me, that's really beautiful. Criticism
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: has always been that. If you're going to be a hater,
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: be a romantic, devoted hater.
• 6:58
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Otherwise, we run the risk of saying the same
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: thing over and over and over in ways that are
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: uninteresting each time.
• 7:05
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Or talking past and through rather than
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: with other people about things that we like and don't like. Yeah.
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: That's it. At least once an episode, I feel like
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: you say something that I'm like, that's the smartest thing
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: that Sondra will ever say. And then you say something else.
• 7:22
  Speaker 4: Okay.
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: You're so kind to me. Truly. Generous, open spirit. I
• 7:26
  Speaker 2: talked about a lot of this with our guest today,
• 7:29
  Speaker 2: Rianach Robinson, who is So brilliant. Ranak is the author
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: of Bad Words, which is coming out on October 6th.
• 7:38
  Speaker 2: And it is not her first work of fiction. She
• 7:41
  Speaker 2: also used to write young adult novels under a different
• 7:45
  Speaker 2: pen name, Riley Redgate. She wrote books like Come Home
• 7:48
  Speaker 2: to My Heart, Alone Out Here, and Final Draft. But
• 7:51
  Speaker 2: Bad Words is a very special romance between a literary
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: critic and the writer whose work she keeps panning and
• 7:59
  Speaker 2: the digital and in-person feud that they develop as a result.
• 8:02
  Speaker 2: So it's like truly delicious enemies to lovers work. We've
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: met a few times at this point before this interview even.
• 8:09
  Speaker 2: She's like one of the smartest people I've ever met.
• 8:11
  Speaker 2: She's so thoughtful about all things writing and romance. I'm
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: so excited to be chatting with her about criticism in romance. Rianna,
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: thank you so much for coming on the pod. Thank
• 8:32
  Speaker 2: you for having me. Okay, I am so excited to
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: have this conversation. I felt so connected to the characters
• 8:39
  Speaker 2: from your book, Bad Words, and Selina specifically, who is
• 8:43
  Speaker 2: the critic character in that novel. And I just want
• 8:47
  Speaker 2: to start by saying, why choose to write about a
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: critic and a novelist falling in love? And why make
• 8:53
  Speaker 2: so much of that novel about the art form of
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: criticism itself? What was the motivation for that?
• 8:59
  Speaker 3: It's something that provides a big, juicy plot engine, right?
• 9:03
  Speaker 3: I really love these sorts of enemies or antagonistic romances
• 9:08
  Speaker 3: for that reason. They provide a lot to work with
• 9:11
  Speaker 3: and a lot to kind of slowly unpack and reacquaint
• 9:14
  Speaker 3: yourself with. As the two people get to know each other,
• 9:18
  Speaker 3: they are becoming reacquainted, they are learning more, they are changing.
• 9:22
  Speaker 3: There's just a lot of evolution, which is fun. I
• 9:24
  Speaker 3: don't know. I think author-critic relationships are interesting because they
• 9:31
  Speaker 3: are deeply emotional and they're deeply charged. But I don't
• 9:34
  Speaker 3: know if you can necessarily say that one person is
• 9:38
  Speaker 3: morally correct. And I think a lot of the most
• 9:41
  Speaker 3: sort of acrimonious like enemies, romance frameworks, you very quickly
• 9:47
  Speaker 3: get into questions of who is morally spotless or whatever.
• 9:53
  Speaker 3: Whereas with authors and critics, I think both are completely
• 9:57
  Speaker 3: comprehensible positions in terms of, you've hurt my feelings, I'm
• 10:02
  Speaker 3: now hurt. But is it morally wrong to do that
• 10:05
  Speaker 3: in an atmosphere where we would like to have some discernment,
• 10:09
  Speaker 3: where people cannot read everything, where we would like to
• 10:11
  Speaker 3: have healthy discourse around books that includes negative responses to books,
• 10:18
  Speaker 3: which is a human thing to feel. We've all read
• 10:21
  Speaker 3: books that we disliked up to despised. So why should
• 10:25
  Speaker 3: there not be room for that?
• 10:26
  Speaker 2: Well, I'm curious how you come to this as a writer, right?
• 10:31
  Speaker 2: Do you have feelings about, and this is not your
• 10:33
  Speaker 2: first novel, it's your first adult romance, but you've written
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: predominantly YA before, is that right? Yes. I know the
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: YA criticism infrastructure is different, but I'm curious about your
• 10:44
  Speaker 2: own relationship to critics examining your work. And I think
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: it's a very generous and lovely position to hold that
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: neither person is in the wrong in a feud like that.
• 10:54
  Speaker 2: And also for you as a writer, has that ever
• 10:56
  Speaker 2: been a more complicated experience?
• 11:01
  Speaker 4: Yeah. I mean, I.
• 11:01
  Speaker 3: Think I try to stay away from reviews.
• 11:06
  Speaker 2: I do my best.
• 11:08
  Speaker 3: I am definitely interested in people's responses to different types
• 11:12
  Speaker 3: of art criticism. I feel as though you might expect
• 11:16
  Speaker 3: the most painful type of review to come from total
• 11:21
  Speaker 3: dismissiveness or misunderstanding, but I don't really find that to
• 11:26
  Speaker 3: be the case. I feel as though people are actually
• 11:30
  Speaker 3: quite good at dismissing reviews that seem clearly in bad faith,
• 11:35
  Speaker 3: but How does it feel when somebody clearly is coming
• 11:39
  Speaker 3: to the project in the spirit of wanting to understand
• 11:42
  Speaker 3: what you're doing and still just finds that you don't
• 11:45
  Speaker 3: measure up to what your ambitions were? That, to me,
• 11:48
  Speaker 3: seems like a much more painful situation for most people
• 11:52
  Speaker 3: I know.
• 11:53
  Speaker 2: That is the heart of the romantic tension in Bad Words,
• 11:56
  Speaker 2: that he is so upset with the fact that she
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: sees his work with such clarity and finds it not enough.
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: that she sees the gap between where he wants to
• 12:06
  Speaker 2: be and where his work actually is. And I think
• 12:10
  Speaker 2: that's what I found to be so narratively interesting is that, like,
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: I think there is often the mistake that criticism constitutes
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: an act of, like, destruction, that it is, like, a
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: fundamentally shattering process that, like, robs a work of its magic,
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: its mystery, its power by attempting to, like, dissect its
• 12:29
  Speaker 2: component parts. For me, personally, as... someone who has attempted
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: criticism in the past, that has been so far from
• 12:36
  Speaker 2: the truth that the most interesting things I think I've
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: ever had to say have felt quite generative, hopefully. I mean,
• 12:44
  Speaker 2: not to toot my own horn, but even when I
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: talk about other pieces of criticism that I find to
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: be beautiful, I think the most interesting criticism can be
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: such a generative process because it is revealing in some
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: new way. And I thought it was so clever to
• 12:59
  Speaker 2: make that the romantic tension of their relationship, that this
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: act brings them both together and apart at the same time,
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: all the time. There's no avoiding it, that he can
• 13:11
  Speaker 2: resent the clarity of her perception and she can feel
• 13:15
  Speaker 2: compelled to continue it. There's like an act of beauty
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: in there.
• 13:18
  Speaker 3: I love the idea of criticism being generative.
• 13:21
  Speaker 2: I agree.
• 13:22
  Speaker 3: I think it's like the best criticism that I read.
• 13:25
  Speaker 3: I always feel it adds, it contributes. Like even if
• 13:29
  Speaker 3: it is even if it's negative, it tends to contribute
• 13:32
  Speaker 3: a new understanding, a new perspective, a new dimension. I
• 13:37
  Speaker 3: guess there's a bit of a fantasy in Selena's reviews
• 13:42
  Speaker 3: in that I have written her to be somebody who is,
• 13:46
  Speaker 3: her reputation is somebody who has kind of the utmost integrity,
• 13:50
  Speaker 3: somebody who is astute, somebody who will basically always read
• 13:53
  Speaker 3: with good faith. When criticism feels destructive, it's funny because
• 14:02
  Speaker 3: that dimension of it, to me, has nothing to do
• 14:05
  Speaker 3: with the positive-negative axis. They're like two different axes where
• 14:11
  Speaker 3: it's like criticism being interesting, constructive, additive, something that makes
• 14:18
  Speaker 3: you think, something that brings a new dimension to the work.
• 14:21
  Speaker 3: That can be totally true of negative criticism.
• 14:24
  Speaker 2: They're unrelated.
• 14:25
  Speaker 3: We want to be loved and we want to be understood.
• 14:28
  Speaker 3: And that feels tied into the work being liked or
• 14:31
  Speaker 3: being seen as successful. But in reality, when it comes
• 14:35
  Speaker 3: to criticism, I don't feel that way. A really interesting
• 14:40
  Speaker 3: three-star review often brings so much to a work to
• 14:43
  Speaker 3: me and feels loving of the work.
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: I totally agree with that. And that's actually, I don't
• 14:48
  Speaker 2: know that that's an obvious assertion. And I think it's
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: one that I've struggled to articulate to people in the
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: past that the positive negative dimension is different from productive
• 14:58
  Speaker 2: and unproductive.
• 14:59
  Speaker 3: Yes. Yes.
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: Yes. Like those are the two axes of something can
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: be productive and negative as in it's still like contributing
• 15:07
  Speaker 2: to the quality of your thinking around a work, but
• 15:10
  Speaker 2: it can also be unproductive and positive that it can
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: be this like flattening love this that goes nowhere, does nothing,
• 15:19
  Speaker 2: adds nothing, but masquerades as like substantive things. Right, exactly.
• 15:24
  Speaker 3: It almost reminds me of workshop rules where if you're
• 15:28
  Speaker 3: in a writing workshop, often workshop instructors will be like,
• 15:32
  Speaker 3: please don't just say like, I really liked this because
• 15:35
  Speaker 3: what does that do for the writer? Even if you're
• 15:39
  Speaker 3: not asking them to change something, there's something deeper and
• 15:42
  Speaker 3: something more engaging that you can do than just expressing
• 15:46
  Speaker 3: that you loved something.
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I often have frustration personally with how people talk
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: about romance novels as commodities over art forms. And a
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: huge part of how I think that takes place is
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: where people see romance criticism as, in my self-insert experience
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: of this novel, did I want to be or fuck
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: one of the characters involved, right? Like, And I don't
• 16:10
  Speaker 2: begrudge people that reading experience, like that's accomplishing its own
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: thing in the romance landscape. It has in the past
• 16:19
  Speaker 2: been a really sort of consumer-driven genre. I have no
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: disdain for that, but I do think passing it off
• 16:24
  Speaker 2: as criticism is sort of a faulty assumption because it
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: is doing that thing of like, I felt like this
• 16:31
  Speaker 2: when I consumed this. This product did not work as stated,
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: which is different from I looked closely at this novel
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: and While I always bring my subjectivity to that novel,
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: my positionality to that novel, I'm able to see it
• 16:46
  Speaker 2: for what it is and identify with more clarity if
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: it works or not. And all of that is laden
• 16:53
  Speaker 2: with the same subjectivity. But for better or for worse,
• 16:56
  Speaker 2: there's something legitimizing about it that like a work can
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: stand up to the scrutiny of being seen on a
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: sentence level, a paragraph level, a chapter level as successful
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: or not successful, as opposed to this was wish fulfillment
• 17:08
  Speaker 2: for me. Which is inevitably some layer of it, but
• 17:13
  Speaker 2: maybe it doesn't have to be the whole kit and caboodle,
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: you know?
• 17:16
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 17:16
  Speaker 3: It's tough because like that sort of wish fulfillment aspect
• 17:19
  Speaker 3: is powerful and it's fun, but it makes everything seem
• 17:23
  Speaker 3: like luck. Because how do you know what someone wishes
• 17:26
  Speaker 3: to be? How do you know what someone wishes to
• 17:29
  Speaker 3: see in a partner and to feel and how they
• 17:32
  Speaker 3: wish to be loved? The kinds of reviews that are
• 17:36
  Speaker 3: tough for me as a reader and like somebody who's
• 17:38
  Speaker 3: trying to, I think, I think I have a really
• 17:40
  Speaker 3: hard time finding romance reviews, and maybe this comes back
• 17:45
  Speaker 3: to basically what you're describing, that guide me to find
• 17:50
  Speaker 3: or distinguish between romance novels. Because if I read a
• 17:54
  Speaker 3: review that says, oh, I found the main character so annoying.
• 18:00
  Speaker 3: She just annoyed me so much. I'm like, okay, well,
• 18:04
  Speaker 3: how am I supposed to know that I would be
• 18:05
  Speaker 3: annoyed by this person? I feel as though I have
• 18:07
  Speaker 3: trouble distinguishing between different types of romance reads because the
• 18:12
  Speaker 3: reviews tend to be so internal.
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: I'm inclined to agree with you. I think it's the
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: point you make about luck here too is so resonant
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: where I'm like, oh man, newcomers to this genre do
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: not realize the amount of technical skill required to pull
• 18:27
  Speaker 2: off the thing that they feel warm and fuzzy about.
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: Like the thing that has produced this subjective experience of joy, fulfillment, contentment,
• 18:37
  Speaker 2: pleasure is the consequence of enormous skill. And to suggest
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: that it's the happy accident of throwing tropes together feels...
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: so disparaging to this genre that I love very dearly
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: and so I think I'm inclined to see criticism as
• 18:56
  Speaker 2: something that elevates commodity into art form while recognizing that
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: romance will always be kind of both like by virtue
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: of what genre fiction is and when you're trying to
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: sell commodities it's okay to say this product is like
• 19:07
  Speaker 2: this product but more you know like you can say
• 19:10
  Speaker 2: this is this is this microwave is like this microwave
• 19:14
  Speaker 2: but with extra buttons but that's I don't want a
• 19:17
  Speaker 2: microwave I want to read a beautiful work of fiction.
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: That's ultimately the thing, isn't it? And it comes back
• 19:23
  Speaker 2: to that thing of criticism having the potential to be
• 19:26
  Speaker 2: a deeply loving act when cultivated.
• 19:29
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: But I so appreciate you chatting with us today. Of course.
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: And sharing some of your beautiful, wonderful mind. And I truly,
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: I cannot express how much I was delighted by Bad
• 19:43
  Speaker 2: Words and how much I loved both of them. Parker
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: was such a funny character for me because my best
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: friend in the whole world is Filipino. And I was like,
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: oh my gosh, there's so many character similarities between the
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: two of you. And she was like, I can't wait
• 19:56
  Speaker 2: to read it. And I felt so connected to Selena
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: that it was like such a, in this very self-insertive way.
• 20:03
  Speaker 2: I feel like the two of us feel very connected
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: to the two of them.
• 20:07
  Speaker 3: Incredible. I love that for both of you.
• 20:09
  Speaker 2: I'm so thrilled that it's going to be out in
• 20:11
  Speaker 2: the world. Thank you so much. Tyler, I had the
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: loveliest time talking to Rannoch. She's so wonderful. She's so thoughtful.
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: She's so smart. And I think people are going to
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: love her book, which I know you loved also. I loved,
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: loved it. And, you know, one thing about us, we
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: love when people argue and fight their way into sexual chemistry.
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: It's one of the best things in the world to
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: me personally.
• 20:41
  Speaker 2: But also, you know, we're coming up on a one
• 20:44
  Speaker 2: month anniversary since we did our last What's the Best
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: Sex Scene episode. that we've read this month. So I
• 20:49
  Speaker 2: think we're due for another. Oh, no.
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: Are you going to make me talk about great sex scenes?
• 20:54
  Speaker 3: I hate it.
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: Oh, no. I think I am.
• 20:56
  Speaker 4: Oh, no.
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: I hate it. What have you been reading? Okay.
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: Well, first of all, it was so tough because actually
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: the sex scenes in Bad Words were really up there
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: for me.
• 21:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah. But a book that I read this month was
• 21:10
  Speaker 2: Scandalized by Lauren Billings.
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: It's one half of Christina Lauren. It is a story
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: about a investigative journalist, Georgia Ross, who is coming back
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: from London from, like, honestly a pretty brutal assignment that
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: she's trying to figure out. And she runs in the
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: airport when her flight gets delayed into her childhood best
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: friend's older brother, Alec Kim.
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: I love best friend's older brother. Oh, it's so good.
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: And so she recognizes him and they get to talking.
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: And he's acting a little mysterious, but he's like, you know,
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: our flights got canceled. There are no hotels in the
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: area because there's a conference. You should just stay in
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: my hotel room. It's fine.
• 21:58
  Speaker 2: And that's how the book opens, like 40 pages in.
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: They go back to this hotel.
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: They're getting drinks. It becomes very clear that there's like
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: a very strong sexual chemistry there. They go upstairs and
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: they start fooling around, obviously. The first bit is so good.
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: Like they talk about how when they're hooking up, they
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: like don't even get past their base. But it's it's
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: just so, so good.
• 22:24
  Speaker 2: I kind of love that.
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: I kind of love that too. I should say that
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: every sex scene in this book is so good. Like
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: I was like, this doesn't happen to me very often, blushing.
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: Like I was like blushing reading this book because I
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: was like, oh my God, this is so. So I
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: should say that picking any sex scene from this book
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: was a real challenge for me. But then they do
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: what is my favorite thing, which is they fall asleep together.
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: And then they wake up in the middle of the
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: night and immediately just start hooking up again because they're
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: like I love that so turned on and he has
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: protection with him the best part is like okay I
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: need to find the line it's really important so they
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: they start having sex and he's like holy shit what
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: is this sex like just like holy shit it's so
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: good like they just keep being like the whole time
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: they're fucking it's like this is so good like god
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: it's so good like how is this so good like
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: we are two people who haven't seen each other In many,
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: many years.
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: And, like, never hooked up.
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: Like, they, you know, when they were younger, it was just, like,
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: a childhood crush thing. I love when a man is
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: in awe of how good the sex is. Because you
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: should be.
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: You should count your lucky stars.
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: You should count your lucky stars that, like, you're doing this.
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: But it's just, it's so much of the, like, not yet. Like,
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: I don't want this to be over. Like, holy shit.
• 23:45
  Speaker 2: Like, what is this? It's so good.
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: And that's on page 43 of this book. I should
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: say also as the added sell that these two people,
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: they run into each other. She calls him Alec, which
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: he hasn't been called in many years. They're both flying
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: to Los Angeles. When she gets to Los Angeles, she
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: finds out that, in fact, he's become like one of
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: like the most famous actors in Korea. OK, sure.
• 24:06
  Speaker 2: Of course that happens.
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: He's in town because he's in a huge BBC show.
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: And so he's famous. Like he's a really famous guy.
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: Oh, my God. It's all my favorite things. This is
• 24:16
  Speaker 2: what I'm saying, Sanjay.
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: It's like all my favorite things in one book.
• 24:19
  Speaker 2: It's so delightful.
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: So then it becomes them like sneaking around like they
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: were like, OK, well, it's a one time thing and
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: I'm not going to have your number and it's fine.
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: And we ran into each other and this is great
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: to like now I'm sneaking around with this famous person.
• 24:31
  Speaker 2: Cheers.
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: It's so good. But the sex is continuously just that
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: like it's so good, like in all like it's so good,
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: which is like, again, I cannot reiterate this enough. Exactly
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: how down bad I need a man to be about
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: getting to have sex with somebody. Well, I find moments
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: like that to be so interesting in a sex scene because, one,
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: not everyone does it, but, like, it is a really beautiful,
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: revelatory part about having sex with a new person and, like,
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: finding it to be, like, an endlessly interesting, engaging project.
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: Because even when we think about the sort of trajectory
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: of the happily ever after, the idea that these two
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: people will go on to, like, be engaged in a
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: continual process of discovery with each other is exciting and
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: romantically fulfilling.
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: It is incredible sex while it does still very much
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: feel like sex to people who've never had sex.
• 25:20
  Speaker 2: Would be having. Do you know what I mean?
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: Like, it's not like suddenly these feel like two different
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: characters type of thing. It's like, oh, this makes sense
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: for these people. This whole book was really hot.
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: I was like... I've got to read it. I haven't
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: read it before.
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: It's really good. What is the best sex scene you've
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: read this month?
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: I have... kind of a diabolical recommendation for you, Tyler.
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: So excited.
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: As you know, I have been on a stalker romance
• 25:46
  Speaker 2: kick in a way that I, I just, so I'm
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: going to pull something from the dark romance trenches that
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: I've been in. I read Midnight Message by Avena St. Graves,
• 25:58
  Speaker 2: which is a stalker for stalker romance, which is one
• 26:02
  Speaker 2: of my favorite setups where the She is a dark
• 26:05
  Speaker 2: romance writer who fixates on this hockey player and writes
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: him into all of her books. And somehow it becomes
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: known to the team itself. And she ends up getting
• 26:13
  Speaker 2: made fun of publicly for having done this. And that
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: draws her to his attention. And then he's like, well,
• 26:21
  Speaker 2: I'm obsessed with you, actually.
• 26:23
  Speaker 4: And they end up in this like kind of cat
• 26:27
  Speaker 4: and mousy sort of chase with each other where She's
• 26:32
  Speaker 4: absolutely nuts and deranged and obsessive, said with so much
• 26:36
  Speaker 4: fondness and respect.
• 26:37
  Speaker 2: And he is also. And so it's like a freak
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: for freak matchup of epic proportions. Amazing.
• 26:43
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 26:44
  Speaker 2: So she, I think, wakes up to him being in
• 26:49
  Speaker 2: their bed, which I can't remember if that's in his
• 26:52
  Speaker 2: bed or hers. They both spend time invading each other's
• 26:55
  Speaker 2: spaces thoroughly. Like, it doesn't really matter.
• 26:57
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 26:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah. What are boundaries? They don't exist. There's some invasion
• 27:00
  Speaker 2: of privacy happening here. And as you remember, he is
• 27:04
  Speaker 2: a hockey player. And what instrument do hockey players use?
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: Stop.
• 27:07
  Speaker 2: Oh, God. Oh, no. Is it perhaps what vaguely phallic
• 27:11
  Speaker 2: object do hockey players regularly use? In the course of
• 27:15
  Speaker 2: a sexual encounter, at which point, like, they've both sort
• 27:17
  Speaker 2: of arrived at a point where she's also aware of
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: the fact that he's stalking her, stalking him.
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: I love a mutual stalking.
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: It does actually use the handle of the hockey stick
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: in an erotic manner. I don't know how explicit I
• 27:27
  Speaker 2: can get on here about this, but I kind of
• 27:29
  Speaker 2: have to. He basically fucks her with a hockey stick,
• 27:32
  Speaker 2: and then he takes that hockey stick to work with him,
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: and on TV, at the post-game interview, kisses the handle
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: of the stick.
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: I'm slamming my desk.
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: I actually, and let me tell you, I was gagged.
• 27:45
  Speaker 2: I was gagged. Here's the thing. And I will say
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: this inside out, backwards, upside down. I don't think good
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: or hot sex is exclusively about choreography. I actually think
• 27:55
  Speaker 2: there's lots of stuff that people do that they see
• 27:57
  Speaker 2: as being like ridiculous, outrageous, crazy. Like there are dicks
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: everywhere and stuff's happening and people are flying everywhere. There
• 28:03
  Speaker 2: are dicks everywhere. Everywhere. I mean, yeah, that's actually not
• 28:07
  Speaker 2: even an exaggeration. No, I know it's not. People are
• 28:09
  Speaker 2: flying through the air onto penises, whatever. That doesn't really
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: concern me. That's not something that I think of as
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: being inherently erotic. The thing about it is that, yes,
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: the choreography for this is outrageous, ridiculous. I actually don't
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: totally know that a hockey stick could do that. nor
• 28:24
  Speaker 2: am I interested in finding out. Cheers to them. But
• 28:28
  Speaker 2: this was a case of the absurd choreography of it
• 28:30
  Speaker 2: being such a manifestation of their own diabolical obsession with
• 28:36
  Speaker 2: each other that it felt like such a perfect extension
• 28:39
  Speaker 2: of this premise. And something, again, I've been saying on
• 28:42
  Speaker 2: the pod a lot is that I'm craving absurdity in romance.
• 28:47
  Speaker 2: I want playfulness. I want unseriousness. And this is so
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: seriously unserious in a way that I I love I
• 28:56
  Speaker 2: I had so much fun I was like sure what
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: the hell why not.
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: I'm really sold there's something to be said for like
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: sometimes the erotic thing isn't the sex itself yeah like
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: in what you're describing to me the idea that you
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: the idea that you used the hockey stick in that
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: manner and then proceeded to use it in the game
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: And then kiss it.
• 29:17
  Speaker 2: That's hot. On film. That's hot. It's hot. Yeah. It's hot.
• 29:21
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 29:21
  Speaker 2: It's also that she's a dark romance writer who has
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: written this man into all of her stories. And then
• 29:26
  Speaker 2: he proceeds to like do a thing that would be
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: in her books. Basically. So there are layers. Layers. There's
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: layers to this shit. Of it.
• 29:34
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: There are layers to this shit. There are layers to
• 29:38
  Speaker 2: the degree of wish fulfillment that are happening too. Where
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: in world, it's not just like, oh, here's a spicy
• 29:43
  Speaker 2: thing that happened. It's look at this thing that this
• 29:46
  Speaker 2: character really loves. Like this character specific preferences would be
• 29:51
  Speaker 2: so dialed into.
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: I really need to read this. My thing about I
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: can fuck with a dark romance, but I like dark
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: romance to have a little humor to it.
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think this one does. Yeah, I need that.
• 30:03
  Speaker 2: I do think it's a little cheeky. That's why I
• 30:04
  Speaker 2: say it's seriously unserious where the premise is what it is.
• 30:08
  Speaker 2: And there is also like a B plot. a separate stalker,
• 30:13
  Speaker 2: not a good one.
• 30:14
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: You got to have the bad stalker to put into
• 30:16
  Speaker 2: illustration what a good stalker is.
• 30:18
  Speaker 3: Correct.
• 30:18
  Speaker 2: You know, I get that. I was like, sure, whatever.
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: That's not interesting to me. I want to see them
• 30:22
  Speaker 2: fuck again. But like it was one of those situations
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: where I was like, yeah, this is funny and absurd.
• 30:28
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 30:28
  Speaker 2: The degree of obsession is funny and absurd. And also
• 30:32
  Speaker 2: I'm all the way locked in. Yeah. I'm present. I
• 30:35
  Speaker 2: read it cover to cover and it took me Three hours, probably. Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: I'm really sold on that.
• 30:42
  Speaker 2: I will say, if people want to tell us their
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: favorite sex scenes, they can find us in person to
• 30:46
  Speaker 2: do it. And where can they do that, Tyler?
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: They can do that at RomCon in Brooklyn, October 24th.
• 30:54
  Speaker 2: It is a Saturday. We will be there.
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: You're welcome to come tell us about your favorite sex scene,
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: but like in.
• 30:59
  Speaker 2: A cool way. We're so chill and cool. We're so
• 31:01
  Speaker 2: chill and cool. And regardless of whether you want to
• 31:03
  Speaker 2: tell us that or not, it is going to be
• 31:04
  Speaker 2: a really great lineup. We have.
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: Brooke Averick, Hannah Brown, Regina Black, Sarah McClain, Casey McQuiston,
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: Nikki Payne, and many, many more confirmed to be there.
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: And it's going to be a really fun time. We
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: think you should come.
• 31:19
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 31:20
  Speaker 2: And that's the show. That's the show. Call us and
• 31:27
  Speaker 2: leave us a voicemail with your thoughts at 833-831-LOVE.
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: That's 833-831-5683.
• 31:36
  Speaker 2: If you fell hard for what you heard here, get
• 31:38
  Speaker 2: episode notes delivered straight to your inbox by signing up
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: at 831stories. substack. com and share your recommendations and topic ideas in
• 31:47
  Speaker 2: the post comments. Head to 831stories. com to keep up with
• 31:51
  Speaker 2: 831's monthly read-in-one-sitting romance novellas and sign up for a
• 31:55
  Speaker 2: membership to The Ones to get your hands on them
• 31:58
  Speaker 2: before anyone else. The Ones also get a 20% discount
• 32:01
  Speaker 2: on everything on the site, including 831's beloved trope hats
• 32:05
  Speaker 2: and pleasure reading merch. The Radio 831 Podcast is a
• 32:09
  Speaker 2: production of iHeart Podcasts, hosted by Sanjana Bhaskar and Tyler McCall.
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: The show is produced by Liz Smith. And for iHeart,
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: our supervising producer is Emily Marinoff. Special thanks to the
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: whole iHeart team and especially Allie Perry and Allison Cantor Graber.
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: Our executive producers are Claire Mazur and Erica Cerullo. Our
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: music is Domino by James Ryan Carr and Love Is
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: What You Do by Alibi. We'll be sharing the love
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: here again next week.