Hopeless Romantic

For as long as I remember, I've always been a hopeless romantic.  I feel like that bear on the Simpson's, Sir Loves a Lot, "the bear that loves to love".

When I look for a good book, movie, video game, anime, or story of any kind, usually I prefer to look for a good love story in the mix.

But here is the problem... Most in the romance genre is geared toward women.  "Chick-flix" for movies.  Books are especially difficult to find geared toward men.  Often most of the books have female authors intended for a female audience.  The recent trend has been that if it isn't for women, then it seems intended for homosexual audiences.

I don't want any of that.  I have read that women don't care what point of view a story is from, be it male or female, but I think for guys, we prefer a male point of view.  At least I do.  So few fiction books with romance that I've found have a male protagonist, and those that do either are too adult or too childish.

Maybe I'm just picky, but I have a hard time finding what I want to read.  I have to go through hundreds of book descriptions just to find one or two that I even want to try.

Here is a pet peeve of mine:  Romance novels seem to be women's pornography.  I am fully opposed to porn, and I think that when often times men are judged by the images they view, women are far less judged by the books they read.  I don't think books should be sexually explicit any more than photos and videos.

Now that I've got that out of the way, I'll mention another pet peeve.  I have to filter through all of the junk just to find a good book.  Generally speaking, the tactic I've used is that if it's intended for YA (Young Adults), then it's not explicit.  Looking in YA general fiction frequently is the best way to find a cute romance.  Looking directly in the romance genre seems to yield results geared toward adult women.

I wish books had a keyword chain like IMDB does for finding similar themes.  Depending on the app or website, sometimes you have to enter the page just to get a synopsis, if there even is a decent one.  I'd like to be able to skip summaries, and categorize by point of view, age group, etc.

Here is what I look for: I want something cute.  Something where a guy likes a girl, and there is some suspense weather she likes him back.  I like awkward and flirty situations.  I don't want any sex scenes, just some sexual tension.  I prefer the guy to be a normal person, or maybe a geek.  One problem I have with many books written for women is how often the synopsis says the guy is the football quarterback, or a player, or some other jock type.  If a girl want to read that, it's her preference, but I don't want to read a book from a jock's point of view.  It just doesn't seem realistic to me that so many protagonists are athletic males.  I'm not saying they have to be a nerd, but frequently the people fit into the extremes.

As far as the girl interest of the boy in the book, she should be pretty, at least to the main character.  I don't want to read a book where the guy is taking pitty on a girl he doesn't even find attractive.  Other than that, I think it would be neat to see a "good guy, bad girl" story for a change, instead of the other way around.  That's why I liked Barry Lyga's The Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy and Goth Girl.  It's a good guy's point of view with a seemingly wild girl as his love interest.

I don't mind if the girl is good either.  I'm just giving it as a suggestion.

I also don't want a book that is skewed to all the ugly things of the world.  I don't know if I am just lucky where I grew up, but sometimes it shocks me how much drugs and partying there is in some books and movies.  I don't need nor want large numbers of expletives in what I read, nor do I car for homosexual references or crude conversations or topics.

In any medium, books or movies, it seems the author goes farther than they should or goes nowhere at all.  Now I realize the distance traveled is subjective, but to me, there is a point where they seriously derail a story.

Take, for instance, Maid in Manhattan.  I haven't seen this movie more than once and it's been a while, but what I remember is that after the couple slept together, we are supposed to continue to wonder if they'll be a couple.  Frankly, if they slept together, then all angst weather they like each other is pretty much void.  I'd much rather the book end with the couple getting engaged or married than have a love scene before a conclusion is made on the relationship.  Maybe you call me old fashioned, but a traditional value to waiting until marriage makes the book more romantic, and it's the moral thing to do.  If they don't wait, then what is there to look forward to in the marriage?  Simply the formality of the ceremony?

The least they can do is to keep the story clean by not being explicit.  That way I don't have to feel guilty after reading something, even if I don't agree with the decision of the protagonist.

One thing I love about Japanese culture, specifically in the form of anime and manga, is that they don't shy away from love stories from the male perspective.  I wish more books could be like that.  There are many anime and manga intended for male audiences, whereas in American culture they seem to only make romance a side-quest.  Granted, anime/manga can have "fan service",  but it entirely depends on the anime/manga.  They give many more options and sub-genres than I've seen in American films and shows.  Plus, since it's animated, they have the liberty of doing any theme from space to medieval times, whereas live action shows are usually strictly in their genre.  For example, you don't see too many romance movies that are science fictions in American film.




If anyone can think of a good book, movie, video game, or otherwise that has good romance elements in it like I describe above, please comment.  I think we need more resources to finding these stories.  I've googled and searched, but frequently I only find a small list of books that I like.





Here are some of my recommendations:

Books:

• The Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy and Goth Girl - Barry Lyga - A good normal teen boy who falls for a gothic, seemingly rebellious girl.
• Beautiful Creatures - Kami Garcia, Margaret Stohl - paranormal.  Boy falls in love with a witch while they are searching for answers about the past and visions they are having.
• Candy - Kevin Brooks - A good guy falls for a "bad" girl who is involved in prostitution.  Despite this, I don't remember anything explicit in the book.
• Sam's Winnings - Stan Morris - This one has the awkward situations I love.  A guy inadvertently "wins" the girl he likes as a possession in the eyes of the alien race that occupies Earth.  I will warn you that this is a little racy with the awkward situations, but I don't remember anything explicit.
• Out of Time: A paranormal romance - Monique Martin* - It has a male protagonist and it's even a forbidden love story between a professor and his student.  They do sleep together, but I don't remember anything explicit.  This story involves time travel, being stuck with the girl you are falling for, and a vampire in the real sense of the word.  None of this toothless vampires we've seen of late.
• Failing Test - J.M. Pierce* - A high school guy with super-powers falls in love with a high school girl.
• Hidden Steel - Doranna Durgin - A girl on the run who has lost her memory finds a gym owner that helps to protect her.  This one alternates points of view.
• Snowed in Together - Ann Herrick - Some teenagers and two teachers get snowed in at school.  Kind of an awkward situation.  I think there was a point that may have been suggestive of an intimate relationship, but I can't remember for sure.  It wasn't explicit though.

* Books I haven't finished reading.

Anime:

• Kimikiss Pure Rouge - PERFECT cute romance.  Little love stories of various teens in high school.  Well done.  I particularly like the story with the paper airplane.  It involves a really smart girl who feels numb and wants to feel something, so she kisses a guy as an experiment to know what love is.  The guy is willing to help her ;-) and is intrigued.
• Shakugan no Shana - Boy dies, falls in love with a "flame haze", a girl assigned to destroy evil monsters seeking to devour people from the spirit world.  Unlike most anime, I absolutely LOVE the opening and closing credits and it's music for the first part of the first season.