Regency romance compare-and-contrast?

January 12, 2021 9:13 PM

Ring of Regencies?

Because of the Bridgerton TV discussion, I’ve been meaning to put up a post for Maria Edgerton’s book The Absentee, not least to look at how it does and doesn’t have features that made it all the way to the Bridgerton show’s take.

Anyone interested in picking Regencies to, you know, define and test the genre? We have the comfort-of-clear-rules tendency, testing-the-rules countertendency, wealth fantasies (is there something about Regency wealth specifically? ), Regencies in space or fantasy worlds — Heyer’s books being read by both men and women originally — which Korean popular dramas are parallel — the historical question of whether anyone was ever actually Ruined! by being seen alone with A Man — &c &c.

posted by clew (5 comments total)

I'm in for it!

These aren't really genre definers as much as reacting-to-the genre, but I think The Midnight Bargain would be an interesting addition. Maybe KJ Charles' A Seditious Affair - which questions the wealth fantasy by having one half of the pair being a radical.

It's a little early (takes place in 1796?), but The Rakess might work well, too - by putting a woman in the role of the rake who is then paired with a much more respectable man.
posted by dinty_moore at 5:22 AM on January 13, 2021

Genre defines are going to start with Georgette Heyer, I’d be happy to grab a few of the original tropes from there? I’m really interested in this group and am so down.
posted by corb at 8:31 AM on January 13, 2021 [1 favorite]

I am new to FanFare... how do we set up the individual posts so they link to each other? Can we make them act like a series? Can we use “Regencies” as the head word instead of “Book” (especially since we’re starting with a TV show!)
posted by clew at 12:02 PM on January 13, 2021

And - do we want to decide if we’re writing for people who already are reasonably familiar with the genre, or do we always want to include R 101, whatever that is!
posted by clew at 1:42 PM on January 13, 2021

So there's the chance to put something as fanfare club (search for start a club on this page), which will give you a tag that people can tag every post in (and allow people to go from one club post to the next) and allow people to subscribe to the club if they want. I think that's what you're looking for.

I don't really have an opinion on Romance 101, but I do think content warnings are appropriate (and maybe the publishing year), just so people aren't taken aback by anything that they didn't want to sign up for. Good news is that Romance is usually good about content warnings these days, so there's a good chance that someone has already done some of the work for us.
posted by dinty_moore at 3:31 PM on January 13, 2021 [1 favorite]