As a romance writer, I’m fascinated by romantic relationships—the way they work, how people meet, what creates a spark or a connection, why one relationship lasts and another fails. However, perceptions of romantic love and how people feel, think, and behave are influenced by culture. I’m an open-minded heterosexual white woman in Australia.
I’m also a mere novice in this game. Psychologists, sexologists and relationship counsellors study relationships, write about relationships and counsel others about relationships. Analysing and advising on relationships are all serious business in today’s world. Looking at a random selection of titles, you can pursue any research direction that takes your fancy:
- Act with Love: Stop Struggling, Reconcile Differences
- The State of Affairs: Rethinking Infidelity
- How to Heal from Heartbreak: A breakup journey
- Finding Love After Divorce
- You are the one you’ve been waiting for.
I’m not sure if today’s focus on relationships makes them easier or harder to navigate, although all these books have insights to benefit some readers. I’d also add that this blog isn’t looking specifically at loneliness which plagues people of all ages and genders, including some in settled relationships.
In the olden days—back before social media perhaps—people in western cultures would date. Multiple dates would add up to courtship and relationship building.
A few years ago, I heard a talk by Dr. Jodi McAlister, who studies, among other things, representations of love in popular culture. She has an impressive body of research work, including researching The Bachelor. Jodi is also a romance author. Her topic that day was “the perfect date”, and I’m cherry-picking her words for this blog. For example, you respond with your heart in date 1, with your head in date 2, and with your genitalia in date 3. All sorted!
Jodi observed that many young people today avoid the terms date or dating. There’s a tendency to use non-dating terms: hanging out, talking to each other, seeing each other, getting to know each other. She noted the terms were deliberately non-committal, and groups of young people might hang out together.
There are other shifts. Dating, and its implication of a person being off the market, has been replaced for some by hook-ups and dating aps. There’s a bit of irony in the label—dating aps—when often the intention of one or both partners isn’t to have a monogamous relationship, or even a relationship that lasts longer than a few messages and a meetup. The impact of this trend has also become fertile ground for research.
Jennifer Pinkerton says she wrote Heartland: what is the future of modern love because in a world of dating apps, omnipresent porn and increasingly fluid identities the question becomes: what is the future of modern love? Her book is based on reportage, memoir and research, including 100 interviews with diverse people under 40 hearing about their values, preferences and anxieties about their dating lives. “From transgender Aboriginal sistagirls in the Tiwi Islands to conservative Catholics living in Sydney, this book explores … romantic relationships at a time marked by great expectations and far fewer rules.”
I heard Jennifer Pinkerton interviewed recently. I was struck by her comment that at one point during her interviews for Heartland, she took time out to interview some older couples who had had long and happy relationships and asked them the secret to their success. Three words: respect, reciprocity and equality.
In my romance writing, I’m trying to deliver a believable happily-ever-after as well as a good story with a satisfying smoulder. So for me those three words make a lot of sense, and are central to the characters I create.
You can find my books at major booksellers, or through the My Books page on my website.
- Taylor’s Law—The Anderson Sisters Book 1 (Romance Writers of New Zealand Koru Awards 2023—Best First Book-Second Place)
- Grace Under Fire—The Anderson Sisters Book 2
- Planting Hope, a standalone slowburn contemporary romance
- Lela’s Choice—Cover reveal & preorders 14 November, Release 5 December 2023.
Find me on
- Instagram https://www.instagram.com/romanceauthorjen/
- Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/jenniferrainesauthor
- Goodreads—https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/22577889.Jennifer_Raines
- Bookbub – https://www.bookbub.com/search/authors?search=Jennifer%20Raines
- Diana Kathryn Plopa’s Indie Reads Aloud podcast has recordings of me reading Planting Hope (episode 101 – 23 June 2023), The Anderson Sisters (episode 54 Taylor’s Law and 80 Grace Under Fire) http://www.dkpwriter.com/indie-reads-aloud-podcast.html
You can also contact me directly via the website if you have any questions.
Jennifer Raines 