Anyone here wanting to share the names of the authors whose novels (romance only, please!) they gobble up anyday, anytime, anywhere?

My favorites :

Julia Quinn (historical)
Judith McNaught (contemporary, historical too...)
Lisa Kleypas (historical)
Julie Garwood (historical only)

Catherine Coulter (historical, present day)
Jude Deveraux (historical, present day. Her Montgomery/ Taggert series are to die for!)

You named my other two favorites. I have others that I flirt with but those are my main romance authors.

I enjoy romance, especially historical - but for me it's got to be properly researched and (a)containing few anachronisms and (b) appropriate dialogue and vocabulary for the characters - in other words, if they're English aristocrats from the nineteenth century, please don't have them sounding like contemporary Americans. Just a couple of examples from Writers Whose Work I Will Never Read Again:

• the heroine in a Regency novel travels - by coach - from London to Derbyshire and back in an afternoon. You'd be hard-pressed to do it NOW by CAR in an afternoon.
• the hero in a Regency novel eats biscuits (ie the American sort) for breakfast.
• the heroine, also in a Regency novel, is a single lady who lives alone; invites her neighbours, all of a lower social class to her, around for tea every day and they all first-name each other; and she even invites her butler (who's an aristocrat in disguise, but she doesn't know this) to use her first name and dine with her.
• the hero is illegitimate - without a doubt born outside wedlock - and yet inherits the title on his father's death because there's no legitimate son.

I'm not saying that I approve of the social values here; I'm simply (ranting) pointing out that in the era concerned none of these things would have happened. And... well... Catherine Coulter and Judith McNaught are both on my 'never again' list for reasons (a) and (b) above. Well, plus that McNaught wrote a book in which rape and spousal abuse is clearly considered to be okay if the hero is rich enough and claims to love the heroine enough.

My own never-to-be-missed authors in the historical genre:
Mary Balogh
Jo Beverly
Mary Jo Putney (before she went all paranormal)
Joan Ross Ewing/Julia Ross
Loretta Chase
Carla Kelly
Edith Layton

I do like a limited amount of paranormal, in particular:
Maggie Shayne (vampire series only)
Sherrilyn Kenyon


Wendy

Well... she does portray the heroes as a hard-bitten, rough, dominating, cynical people and the heroines totally in love to overlook these flaws and easily forgive their men.

But I really love the angst in her stories. She's good in characterizing the aristocrats of the past.

Most aristocrats in the past have been known to treat their women cruelly causing a huge scandal. Pity, the women had to suffer without opening their mouths and divorce was not a solution!

The differences between rape, sex, consensual sex, lovemaking and exercise-of-husbandly-rights have been brought to spotlight only recently. They were probably considered to be the same and done for the same reason in the yester-years - for begetting the heir!

Romance novels aren't something I read a whole lot of, but I have a small number of authors/books that have been recommended to me over the years that sit on my book shelves among all the horror and thrillers and SF and which I've read more than once.

My favourite ever has to be Lord of Scoundrels by Loretta Chase.

Not only is it steamy and WAFFy, but it had me ROTFLing all the way through and I read it in one afternoon. I was literally crying with laughter at points. The banter between heroine and hero is hilarious and she drives the poor soul to utter distraction. It reminded me a lot of LNC.

I also loved Mary Jo Putney's Thunder and Roses.

I can see why Wendy (and I assume many others) would have issues with Judith McNaught, but I do have to say that her A Kingdom of Dreams and most especially Whitney, My Love are huge favourites of mine. I do understand the problem with her novels, but I, too, enjoy the whole angsty path her characters have to take to true love. Even though part of me does usually want to kick the hero somewhere delicate along the way.

I've also got two novels by Elizabeth Chadwick in my collection - The Love Knot and The Marsh King's Daughter - which are set in medieval times and which I enjoyed very much.

Hey, this was fun. Maybe we need more threads like this for other genres. <g> Thrillers, anyone?

LabRat

I think I've never heard of most of the authors you all mention except

• Jude Deveraux (love "Sweat Liar") and
• Sherrilyn Kenyon (just finished book 2).

Otherwise my taste in authors most probably is pretty boring:

• Susan Elizabeth Philips
• Nora Roberts / J. D. Robb (at the moment I'm reading book 3 of the Circle-Trilogy and a good Eve & Roarke book never can be wrong )
• Maeve Haran

Start one, Labby!

Georgette Heyer is the only romance novelist I will read. *hearts*

The ones that I love have already been mentioned:

• Jude Deveraux - totally love her Montgomery/Taggert series, but I'm not a fan of the Forever & Eternity trilogy. She writes anywhere from old Scotland and before (Jura) to modern times
• Julia Quinn - My mom gave me a bunch of her books, and I devoured them
• Julie Garwood - Same as above, though I don't enjoy them quite as much.

There's a few others that I've discovered through Harlequin's Love & Laughter series and Duets, but my bookshelf is currently behind my Christmas tree, and I can't get back there very well. I did notice Susan Mallory, who had a triplet series that I enjoyed.

Georgette Heyer - forgot her, but I have every single one of her Regency novels. The first and best of the genre

And, in contemporaries, Susan Mallory is one of the few I'll make a point of buying; also Maureen Child and Kathryn Shay. I loved Shay's two firefighter series, and also enjoy her political romances very much.


Wendy

Wendy, I very much liked Susan Mallory's Hometown Heartbreakers. In fact, , that was my first romance type book and I actually got tricked into it. I didn't realize it was a Harlequin romance until after the storyline had cpatured my interest.

I much prefer Lois and Clark n-fic to romance novels. "Clark sigh." Lol.

Mona

That's the thing about Harlequin - or any line of 'genre' books, though. Most of them are what you'd expect: formulaic and not exactly memorable. But every so often an author will come along who just makes you want to devour every word and look for more when it's over. They're my keepers, and they're the reason I pick up Harlequins and similar books at my local second-hand bookshop every so often. Because every now and then I'll come across an author who does leave me awed.

That's where I encountered Kathryn Shay; although she writes full-length novels for Berkley now, she also writes for Harlequin. The depth of emotion and character development in her firefighter quartet had me so gripped that I actually ordered the one book I was missing. She's now a must-buy for me, one of the very few in contemporary romance I'll say that about.


Wendy

I can't believe Johanna Lindsey hasn't been mentioned. Warrior's Woman is dear to my heart especially. There's also Jean Auel of the Earth's Children(Clan of the Cave Bear) series. I know that it's mostly a series of books about primative man, but the love scenes are wonderfully over the top. *That* lady has foreplay down to a tasty science. and call me shallow but I've got a thing for tall sexy primative men...

I forgot to mention Laura Lee Guhrke.

She has written quite a few nice historical novels, and unlike the others she concentrates not only on the peer realm but even common ( in other professions) heroes.

I liked her 'She's No Princess', 'And Then He Kissed Her' and 'Guilty Pleasures'. Not the best, but definitely not bad!

My favorite would have to be Jayne Ann Krentz. She writes contemporary-era stories (often set in Seattle). Under the psuedonym Amanda Quick, she writes Regencies which would no doubt drive Wendy insane Under the pseudonym Jayne Castle, she writes futuristic/sci-fi themed novels.

Her heroines are all spunky and interested/expert in various quirky things. Her heros are all a bit dark but only in a sexy way, they're all smart, and they adore spunky and intelligent women. One or both of them have large extended families who pose various problems. Her later books tend to have various paranormal elements.

As you can tell, her stories all tend to resemble each other. There's definitely a formula going on, but hey, I enjoy the formula, so they're a safe bet.

PJ

I love Nora Robert's books. She has been a long time favorite of mine.

I love all books by Lisa Kleypas, Kristin Hannah, Nicholas Sparks and Johanna Lindsey.

I've read one by Janet Tronstad. This book was full of romance too but you can only get her books in english in Germany.

Pam: I too love Amanda Quick. The best thing about her historical novels are the crazy names she comes up with for her heroines.

...which is another reason why I hate her books, because I sit there going 'no way'

And I can't read more than a couple of pages of Nora Roberts before being driven mad by her POV flipping, otherwise known as head-hopping.


Wendy

I just finished re-reading Julia Quinn's 'How to Marry a Marquis' but this time something made me laugh!

Guess what? The hero's named James and the heroine's Eliz(s)abeth!


Waiting for FoLCs (especially two) to comment on that!

I adore Whitney, My Love! I reread it every few years. For me a romance novel has to have a good story.

I also reread The Gift by Julie Garwood. I am attempting to slough through a book a teacher said at school was "wonderful" but 100 pages in I am still not seeing the wonderful.

I'd like to reccomend an author who i suppose
wouldn't fall under the "romance author" label
but romance is a such a strong element in her books i think some of you might enjoy her books.
Charlaine Harris is the author. She has several
series, some fall under the mystery series label.
But my favorite and the one that will soon have a HBO series called True Blood is the Southern
Vampire series. They began with Dead Until Dark
and there are i believe 5 other novels in the series with a new one due out in May. Don't let the vampire part put you off. Sookie Stackhouse
the protagonist is not a vampire by the way. I really don't know where to start to describe the novels except that Sookie is a marvelous character with a wonderful sense of humor. They are so fascinating i've read each one several times and am eagerly awaiting the new one. Here is a link to the authors' website if you would like to read more about the books.
http://www.charlaineharris.com/
There are a couple of Yahoo lists devoted to the novels too. You can find the books at the public library if you want to take a look without buying one first.
Patti

I read and re-read the following authors. Most of these stories have a component in addition to romance. Some of them have already been mentioned:

1. Nora Roberts / JD Robb
2. Amanda Quick / Jayne Ann Krentz / Jayne Castle
3. Linda Howard
4. Karen Robards
5. Karen Rose (more Thriller than Romance, tho)

By the way many of Nora Roberts' books have a Superman reference

I usually don't read a lot of romance, but I recently finished reading I Do (But I Don't) (yes Dean starred in the movie if you have seen it) and it's sequel I Did (But I Wouldn't Now) by Cara Lockwood which I found enjoyable and actually really hysterical. Though if you read the book Denise Richards looks nothing like how Lauren is described in the book. Fireman Nick on the other hand well any man (not just Dean, but he adds an extra sexiness to it) looks good dressed as a fireman.

*sigh*



The Southern Vampire novels are just fantastic. I only found them last month, but at the moment I already read book 6 and book 7 I'll buy next month. Book 8 though has to wait until it's published in May this year . Ever since I've read the 1st book I have a totally different view on Elvis Presley . I only say ... Bubba

I found a new one of my favs. Louise Allen. I love her books especially Model debutante or bride's seduction.

I like Mary Balogh and Amanda Quick
But if you can find Elizabeth Mansfield,snatch it up. Her books are really well written but harder to find as they are a bit older -- ten years or so.

Mary Balogh is great too and Nicola Cornick and Anne Ashley.

I LOVE romance/time-travel books.

One of my favorite authors is Jo Ann Simon. She wrote "Love Once in Passing" and "Love Once Again"; SUPER books.

As a young girl I loved all of Lillian Peake's stuff from Harlequin. I still have all the books in my home library!

Bobbett

I've caught the romance book bug and recently have enjoyed books by:

Karen Rose Smith
Karen Sandler
Raeanne Thayne
Janice K Johnson

A romance novel related question, does anyone know if or when the reprint of Susan Mallery's book Quinn's Woman is coming out? All amazon.com and my local Borders says is May of this year.

Thanks,
Mona

P.S.S. of sorts lol..I recently went to eharlequin.com and it appeared that you could get 2 free books with no obligation-I was wondering if anyone has found this to be actually the case?

Yes, but... There's a catch, though it's minor. By asking for the books, you're actually signing up to their Reader Service, which is a subscription - they'll send you four books a month (or however many they do now) and you pay for the books plus shipping. I think the books are discounted.

When you get your parcel of free books, you have some time - maybe it's two weeks, I'm not sure - to return the invoice, marked CANCEL. You can phone up, too, and ask them to cancel your subscription. They'll ask for a reason - just say you don't want to subscribe right now. So, yes, you do get two free books, but you MUST remember to cancel the subscription otherwise you'll get more books sent to you and you'll be billed for them.

(Yes, I have got free books from them a couple of times ).


Wendy

Thanks, Wendy! I will have to sneakily try that.

Mona

Of course, if you keep the subscription, they usually send free gifts with the books. I've gotten a whole bunch of pink wine glasses that way. Now if only I drank wine...

You reminded me of something, Karen. I think I have seen an insert in books I've gotten before that has a scratch off panel for "2 mystery gifts" in addition to the supposed 2 free books. I never checked into it but I will if I see it again. Also, I went to eharlequin this morning and it looks like the "free" books cost $1.99 shipping-not bad though.

I'm with Karen on those wineglasses, as I do not drink either. Maybe you could "trade" them for 2 more books, lol?

Mona

At the moment I read book 2 of "the MacKade Brothers" by Nora Roberts

Some of you mentioned her name here and so I bought the first book of this series and read it in February when I was on vacation in only 2 days. You say I don't have to tell you that I really enjoyed it. When I was back home I bought the other 3 books. And now I almost finished book 2 and will take book 3 to my next vacation

My favorites are:

Katherine Kinglsey (historical)
Catherine Anderson (mostly contemporary)
Sharon Sala/Dinah McCall (same author-contemporary)

I used to read a ton of romances, but I've slacked off the last couple of years after discovering fanfiction (SW and LC mostly).

My sister absolutely loves Janet Evonavich (sp?).