Raging Romantics

Happy mother's day to those who celebrate! Celebrate a little extra with these mom-azing reads.

• Finding Mayhem by Layla Frost
• Rising Tides by Nora Roberts
• Hitting the Wall by Cate C Wells
• The Soulmate Equation by Christina Lauren

Bonus mentions:

• Against a Wall by Cate C Wells
• Ruthless Creatures by JT Geissinger
• True Love Experiment by Christina Lauren

Happy Mother's Day to all those who celebrate! This might be a tough conversation, but let's talk pregnancy and motherhood in romance books, and just why these topics have historically walked hand in hand with romance plots. Buckle in, it's a full on Jen X Jackie conversation.

Content warnings: discussions of pregnancy and pregnancy loss, artificial insemination, motherhood, abortion and patriarchal views of motherhood and partnerships, and brief mention of eugenics

Questions/comments/concerns/want to join in the conversation? Email us at [email protected]!

Books we mention:

• Tied Up, Tied Down by Lorelei James (Rough Riders #4)
• Sunset Embrace by Sandra Brown
• If You Deceive by Kresley Cole
• Carpathian series by Christine Feehan
• Sookie Stackhouse by Charlaine Harris
• Fifty Shades of Grey by EL James
• Twilight by Stephanie Meyer
• Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros
• The Final Girls Support Group by Grady Hendrix
• Flamer by Mike Curator
• Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe
• Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
• All Boys Aren't Blue by George Johnson
• Yellowface by RF Kuang

Sources:

• "Growing share of childless adults in U.S. don’t expect to ever have children" (Pew Research Center, 2021)

Hankering for some more retellings/homages? We've got you with these Romeo and Juliet-inspired (and bonus tangential) tales!

• These Violent Delights by Chloe Gong
• Romeo and/or Juliet by Ryan North
• To Be Or Not To Be by Ryan North
• My Lady's Choosing by Kitty Curran
• Saga by Brian Vaughan
• Seduction of a Highland Lass by Maya Banks

CONTENT WARNING: This episode will mention various instances of suicide and attempted suicide and death through literary history.

To be or not to be...as much of a Shakespeare nerd as Jackie is! Join us for a textual transmissionary tale of just where Romeo and Juliet could come from. And no, it's NOT Verona, Italy!

Redhanded the Podcast

Montecchio Maggiore castles!

Questions/Comments/Concerns/Recommendations? Email us at [email protected]!

Other episodes we recommend:

• Dark Romance

Adaptations/stories Jackie mentions:

• Ovid "Pyramus and Thisbe" (Metamorphoses, 8 CE)
• Geoffrey Chaucer Legend of Good Women (1386)
• Masuccio Saleritano "Mariotto and Ganozza" (Il Novellino/Cinquante Novelle, 1476)
• Luigi Da Porto Historia novellamente ritrovata di due nobili amanti (1530/1531 pub. p.h.) - In Italian
• Matteo Bandello’s Giuletta e Romeo (1554)
• William Shakespeare "A Midsummer Night's Dream" (1591-1596 appr.)
• Shakespeare "Romeo and Juliet (1591-1596 appr.)
• Romeo and Juliet Before Shakespeare - Four Early Stories of Star-crossed Love (ed. Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies, 2000)

Other books we mention:

• I'm Glad My Mom Died by Jeanette McMurdy
• The Woman in the Library by Sulari Gentill

Other sources:

• “Metamorphoses” (Britannica.com)
• “Shakespeare and Chaucer: Influence and Authority on the Renaissance Stage” (Teramura, 2016)
• “Shakespeare’s Quartos: Romeo and Juliet” (British Library)
• “Ovid’s Pyramus and Thisbe.” (Duke, 1971)
• “Chaucer’s Pyramus and Thisbe.” (Spisak, 1984)
• “Midsummer Night’s Dream.” (Shakespeare’s Globe)
• “Pyramus and Thisbe Context” (Schmoop.com)
• “Pyramus and Thisbe,” (Britannica, 2023)
• The Original Romeo and Juliet (Pelkofsk, 2015)
• "The Basics" (The British Library, n.d.)
• "The Legend of Good Women" (The British Library)
• "Black Death" (History.com, 2023)
• "The True Story of Romeo and Juliet" (Veronissima.com, n.d.)
• "Romeo and Juliet before Shakespeare" (Levenson, 1984)
• "Luigi da Porto" (Thehistoryofromeoandjuliet.weebly.com, n.d.)
• "Sources: The Genealogy of Romeo and Juliet" (The Bill Shakespeare Project, 2010)
• "Pre- and Post-Shakespeare Romeo and Juliet" (Artsedge, Kennedy Center, n.d.)

It's always a good time to try a new author. Here are some of the ones we've had the pleasure of reading.

Books we mention

• Stalking the Coach by Mayra Statham
• Wait With Me by Amy Daws (mis-quoted the titled as Risking it All)
• Bonus - passionflix did an adaptation of this one!
• Coach by Alexa Riley
• The Nanny by Lana Ferguson

In the mood for romance, but your eyes are tired? Want to have something a little more...interactive? How about some games! Video games, board games, card games, Jen covers the lot!

Don't forget to email us for audiobook recommendations for Jen's FIRST EVER AUDIOBOOK! [email protected]

Books we mention:

• Dramatized version of the A Court of Mist And Fury by Sarah J. Maas
• The Ravenels by Lisa Kleypas
• Dame Barbara Cartland
• Princess Princess Ever After by K. O'Neill
• Blow Me Down by Katie MacAlister
• Georgette Heyer
• Legends and Lattes by Travis Baldree
• A Long Way Gone Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Ishmael Beah
• One Night in Hartswood by Emma Denny

Games we mention:

• World of Warcraft
• Catan
• Dungeons and Dragons (side note, NOPL has its first ever DnD league! Check us out here!)
• Courtship and Marriage
• Life
• Jumanji
• The Game of Love
• Barbara Cartland: a romance board game
• Roméo & Juliette
• Fog of Love
• Apples to Apples
• Red Flags
• Cindr
• Dream Daddy
• Plundered Hearts
• Sims
• Animal Crossing

Other episodes to listen to:

• #55 Sports
• #58 Poly Romance

Resources:

• Jackie's floppy disk
• "On a History of Love and Affection Games" (Grace, n.d.)
• "Dōkyūsei (video game)" (wikipedia)
• "Dating sim" (wikipedia)

Have you ever wandered the teen stacks at a library or bookstore and gone "I thought they wrote adult books?" Don't worry, you're not the only one. In fact, shelving female writers who write fantasy in the teen section regardless of material content/age is something of an issue...let's talk about it.

Questions/Comments/Concerns/Recommendations? Email us at [email protected]!

• "There's a weird, sexist problem in fantasy that we need to talk about," (Nunnally, 2019)
• "Women write fantasy for grown-ups, too" (Cain, 2019)
• "Virginia Judge Dismisses Case That Sought to Limit Book Sales" (Holpuch, 2022)

Authors/Books we mention

• Sarah J. Maas
• Trail of Lightning by Rebecca Roanhorse
• The Witcher by Andrzej Sapkowski

In honor of America's favorite green holiday, let's talk fantasy! Jackie takes us into the realm of fairy tales with stories of the sidhe, fae, and elves.

Questions/comments/concerns/recommendations? Email us at [email protected]!

Definitions:

• sidhe (correlated fairy for purposes of this episode and understanding) - taken from Aes sídhe or daoine sídhe ( meaning the people of the mounds). "In Old Irish we see references to síd, síth, síodh, sídh, sídhe, síodha, or sídbrugach as ‘a fairy hill or mound’, and later in a more general sense, to mean something wondrous, enchanting, charming, or delightful. Subsequently, we see the term being associated with supernatural beings themselves, or fairies specifically." (Irish Pagan School, 2022)
• Tuatha De Danu - "people of the goddess Danu," Danu being a Celtic land or mother goddess
• euhemerization - any interpretation of myths that derives the gods from outstanding men, and seeks the source of mythology in history
• seelie/unseelie - derives from the Anglo-Saxon (ge)sælig/ sællic meaning ‘happy’ or ‘prosperous," associated with "seely wytes" in 17th c. Scotland
• Álfheim - Old Norse, "The Homeland of the Elves”
• ljósálfar - Old Norse,  light elves (or bright elves)
• svartálfar/ dökkálfar - Old Norse, dark elves/black elves
• Svartálfheim - Old Norse, "home of the black elves"
• dvergar - Old Norse, "dwarves"

Other episodes to listen to:

• #33 - Exploring The Final Frontier with Science Fiction and Romance
• #37 An Homage to Retellings in Romance Books
• #38 A GRIMM Understanding of Retellings

Books/Authors/People we mention:

• Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift
• Arabian Nights / One Thousand Nights and One
• Beowulf
• Arthur Rackham
• The Faerie Queene by Edmund Spenser
• Folk of the Air series by Holly Black
• Fever and Highlander series by Karen Marie Moning
• A Court of Thorns and Roses and Throne of Glass by Sarah J Maas
• What Lies Beyond the Veil by Harper L Woods
• Married to Magic series by Elise Kova (Accidentally named her "Air Awakens" series)
• WinterSong by S. Jae-Jones
• The Halfling Saga by Melissa Blair
• A River Enchanted by Rebecca Ross
• The Four Winds series by Alexandria Warwick
• Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett
• Dragon Heart Legacy series by Nora Roberts
• Stitches by David Smalls
• Hell Bent by Leigh Bardugo

Sources:

• “Luck of the Irish: Folklore and fairies in Rural Ireland” (HRAF, Yale)
• “Fairies and Fairy lore: The reality of the Irish fairy” (Broderick, 2018)
• “The Sidhe – Irish Fairy Folklore” (Irish Pagan School, 2022)
• “Túatha Dé (Danann)” (CODECS)
• “Fairy in The Faerie Queene: Making Elizabeth Irish” (Severson, 2019)
• ‘A History of Elves” (Bradford, 2017)
• “The Seelie and Unseelie Courts” (British fairies, 2021)
• "Incredible History of the Tuatha de Danann: Ireland’s Most Ancient Race" (Connolly Cove, 2023)
• "Hallmarks of Fantasy: A Brief History of the Genre" (Pagan, 2020)
• "What Do Readers Want From Great Fantasy Fiction?" (BookViral, 2023)
• "What is fantasy fiction?" (Cliffnotes, 2023)
• "The Sidhe – Irish Fairy Folklore" (Irish Pagan School, 2022)
• "Everything You Need To Know About The Fae Folk" (Tea & Rosemary, 2021)
• "The Fae Meaning and Mythology Secrets You Need To Know" (Brethauer, n.d.)
• "The Seelie and Unseelie Courts" (Writing in Margins, 2022) 
• "Who Were the Celts?" (History.com, 2019)
• "Svartálfar" (Wikipedia, 2007)

Happy International Women's Day! Questions/comments/concerns/suggestions? Email us at [email protected]!

Books we mention:

• The Suffragette Scandal by Courtney Milan
• Astrid Parker Doesn't Fail by Ashley Herring Blake
• A Week to be Wicked by Tessa Dare
• Crescent City series by Sarah J. Maas (especially House of Earth and Blood, book 1)

We've covered fairy tales, sci-fi, a little bit of fantasy, and we've definitely covered historical. But what about the big cheese...contemporary? Confused as to what that genre heading even means? Don't worry, Jen and Jackie go hardcore librarian for this one and break down the contemporary romance genre just for you!

Questions/Comments/Concerns/want to weigh in on the great contemporary debate? Email us at [email protected]!

**A quick note on radiocarbon dating! Radiocarbon (C-14) dating is used to garner the age of organic and some inorganic materials (not metal) up to 60,000 years old. It was discovered as a dating practice in the 1960's and so the first calibration was used to dating something B.P. (before present date), which is used as 1950 in the dating community**

• "Carbon dating, the archaeological workhorse, is getting a major reboot" (Jones, 2020)
• "How Does Carbon Dating Work" (Beta Analytic, 2023)

Books/authors we mention:

• Pamela by Samuel Richardson
• Alien series by Michele Mills
• Nora Roberts
• Shamela by Henry Fielding
• Window Shopping by Tessa Bailey
• Beach Kingdom series by Tessa Bailey (lifeguards)
• Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood
• The Makeup Test by Jenny Howe
• Bridgerton series by Julia Quinn
• Finding Mayhem by Layla Frost
• Toby and Isabel series by Tessa Dare (horse racing)
• Siren of Sussex by Mimi Matthews
• Katee Robert ***Wicked Beauty** (Jackie said the wrong book)
• The Billionaire's Wake Up Call Girl by Annika Martin
• Deceiving the Corsair by Ruby Dixon
• House of Pleasure by Kate Pearce
• Hell's Eight series by Sarah McCarty (Texas Rangers series)
• Plated Prisoner series by Raven Kennedy
• Madness of Lord Ian Mackenzie by Jennifer Ashley
• Mortal Folly by Alexis Hall
• One Night in Hartswood by Emma Denny (Queer medieval)
• Morning Glory Milking Farm by C.M. Nascosta
• Bromance Book Club series by Lyssa Kay Adams
• Sarah MacLean
• The Matzah Ball by Jean Meltzer
• R'jaal's Resonance by Ruby Dixon (new Ice Planet book!)
• Beverly Jenkins
• Vanessa Riley
• Lotus House series by Audrey Carlan
• Fake It Till You Bake It by Jamie Wesley
• Mistakes Were Made by Meryl Wilsner
• Partners in Crime by Alisha Rai
• Loathe to Love You by Ali Hazelwood
• Hunger by Roxanne Gay
• Barrow of Winter by H.M. Long

Sources:

• "Down With Dewey" (Lindell, 2019)
• "Contemporary Romance" (Wikipedia)
• "About the Romance Genre" (Romance Writers of America)
• "6 Common Romance Subgenres to Guide Your Writing" (Masterclass, 2021)
• "Contemporary Romance" (Winnipeg Public Library, 2023)
• "The Five Most Common Contemporary Romance Tropes" (Grimes, 2022)