Recent reading

The Care and Feeding of Waspish Widows by Olivia Waite (2020)
For book club, my choice. An f/f Regency romance. There were various things I liked about it: the middle aged protagonists with other relationships in their pasts, the details of their professions (beekeeping and printing). The author clearly had fun with the latter. But still, it never quite gripped me, and I'm struggling to figure out why. I do wish more historical romances would lean into period language and writing style, because I just enjoy that more!

Our book club meeting turned into a discussion of the differences between romance in fan fiction and in published romance, because I was not the only one to enjoy romance in fan fiction but find it very hit and miss in published romance. Aside from differences in tropes and writing style, I guess there's the obvious point that often when I read romance in fan fiction I am already emotionally invested in the couple. Another point is that of course there's lots of fan fiction which I don't enjoy, but I know how to navigate fan fiction and find what I want to read, while I don't really know how to find romance novels I would enjoy.