by Isabel Swift, Editor Emeritus, Harlequin
I was in college visiting a friend at the University of Virginia when we first met. It was on a crowded shelf, among a hundred other white covers, but something caught my eye. I think it was the title: BRIDE AT WHANGATAPU. Who could resist picking up that Harlequin Presents novel, I ask you? Especially at a used book store.Â
But buying…that decision was made when I read the back cover copy. It was not only my first Presents, it was my first exposure to…The Secret Baby!Â
The basic biology just hadn’t really occurred to me, and all its delightful plot implications, not to mention social, moral, medical, personal and political. Wow, what a Pandora’s Box was opened with that purchase!
Many years later working for Silhouette and then Harlequin, we became cynical about the Secret Baby plot twist. That is until a conversation over lunch with an author had her volunteering that her son hadn’t met his father until he was twelve. Truth is often stranger than fiction.
I loved that Robyn Donald story. I never forgot the title. And I have always loved Presents for their intensity, for their grand gestures and willingness to just go for it.
Do you remember a favorite location in one of your early Presents reads like BRIDE AT WHANGATAPU?
I will always remember the book that launched me into reading romance. My sister was reading Anne Mather’s No Gentle Possession and wanted me to read the part where she bit the hero. I read that part but didn’t stop, I read the rest of the book and then turned around and read it from the beginning.
Thank you Harlequin and Anne Mather.
Oh yes, and I loved Robyn Donald and I read that book!
Hi Isabel.
You know, I don’t remember which was my first. I do know I was about 15 and I had pnuemonia that fall, and it was a very long, very cold winter full of snow days, so I did very little but sit and read from October until about May. I was such an avid reader back then that after I went through all of my own tbr pile I devoured my older sisters entire library, and since she’d been collecting Presents for more than a decade, I’d managed to tear through close to a thousand of them that year.
I did find this cool link earlier, while I was looking for older Presents titles to see if anything shook a specific memory loose.
Hi Isabel
Since I read your post yesterday, I’m ashamed to admit that I cannot remember the first one I ever read. I’ve been puzzling about this and its proved to be really difficult to pin it down.
The really first memorable book I read, (this would have been in the mid 70′s) and it still sticks in my memory now, is a title I cannot even remember. I think it was by Charlotte Lamb, it was based in Yorkshire, the heroine had left the area to marry a rich older man. She came back to her home town very wealthy and bought an old ramshackled house. She met up with a man she knew from years earlier and the story went on from there.
I have used Lorie’s link above to see if I can recognise the title. There are a few likely candidates, so my next obsession (oh no, if you knew me, you would groan, because I can be quite obsessive about M&B), is to find this book. I did have it on my shelf for years after. But I had a major clear out, about 15 years ago, purely because I had so many M&B’s, that I was finding difficult to sleep in my bedroom, HA HA!! You’ve guessed it, it disappeared in that clear out!
xx Karen
Hi, Lorie, tried that link before and though it’s really good, there is no synopsis to make it easier to recall. After searching for so long, I stumbled upon this website http://contemporaryromancewriters.com
If you’re lucky, and the author is listed, then you can read the synopsis of each book ever published by that author. I could spend a whole day just going through the synopsis of really old M&B books I loved but didn’t own or have already given away. Really brings back lots of good memories:) Enjoy! But be warned!!! It might make you gnash your teeth in frustration because it’s virtually impossibleto get a hold of a copy and read it again..AArrgggh!
Olivia ~ thanks for the link. I must confess that’d be much easier for me, since while I do remember authors I enjoyed as well as a great premise or character, I suck at titles.
If you do come across a title/author/series you’d dearly love to read again then stop by my Backlist Books thread on eHarlequin.com and let me know and I’ll pass it on to the eBook team to be considered for re-release.
Honestly can’t remember the title of my first HP — too many years ago. It was probably something by Ann Mather, Sally Wentworth or Violet Winspear.
Going back and re-reading some of the oldies brings make memories. Many of them would not be PC today, but if you keep that in mind as you read and accept that for the time that they were written it was OK, then you will have a great experience. Some of those oldies just stand out with the the type of emotional pull that they give.
Probably the biggest drawback to them is that they did not include the H’s POV. We could never tell what the H was thinking, why he was acting a certain away, etc… sometimes not even at the end. Including the POV helps go a long way towards accepting sometime ‘unacceptable’ behavior on the H’s part.
I started reading Presents in 1978. I was 7 months pregnant and had been brutally raped, at 7 months. While I awaited the trial and the birth of my baby I needed the escape route I had always taken as a child. Reading.
I cleaned out my local library and small bookstore in no time and still searched for more to read.
A friend brought me over a half dozen large cardboard boxes filled with Harlequins. I thought, Oh NO! The last thing I needed was this. But I began reading them. The first book was by Charlotte Lamb, but don’t ask me which one.
In no time I devoured all the books and searched all the used book stores in the area and found Presents back to the beginning of time. Used book stores were new then and not as picky about what they accepted.
I was wrong when I thought I Harlequins were the last thing I needed. It turns out they were the very thing I needed. It took over a year to go to trial and instead of dwelling constantly on the bad thing that had happened to me I was brought into stories where good triumpth over evil, love was something that did exist, and there was a happy ending.
Thank you all the wonderful authors of Harlequins and Silhouettes, but most especially the authors of Presents.
Carolyn
Hi Carolyn
Oh my gosh, I don’t know where to start. You don’t need perfect strangers like me, telling you empty phrases like I hope you’re ok. By reading your post, it’s planely obvious you sound like a strong person, who, I hope has managed to get through it all.
And I agree with you completely, Presents can be a huge help, when you’re looking for that complete escape from the reality of our lives. I’m not ashamed to admit, that many times over the years, I’ve needed that escape mechanism. I’m sure that has happened to everybody.
The world can be a horrible place sometimes, nasty and upsetting things do happen. My own dear dad died suddenly just over 2 years ago, after only a short 3 week illness. It left me and mum confused, as to how he could have been taken away from us so quickly. Our magic circle of three was broken. We’re still trying to come to terms with him not being there. Last weekend, I finally plucked up the courage to sort his wardrobe out and donate everything to charity. It was hard, but I did it, but it really hasn’t helped in any way, he’s still not here.
Anyway, lets get back to a happier topic. Presents do provide that happy ending we are all secretly looking for. They have given me countless pick me ups over the years, thanks to marvellous and talented authors that M&B and Harlequin have found. May they continue giving us all gorgeous men we long to encounter ourselves.
Can I finish Carolyn by saying that you sound like a very brave lady to me. Rape is a big news topic here in the UK at the moment, because of falling conviction rates in the courts. We all started talking about it here in the office this morning, isn’t it strange that I read your post on the same day?
Best wishes and kind regards to you and your family.
xx Karen
Wow, Lorie, you got me so excited! Is Harlequin really thinking of reissuing some past titles? Will it be a real book or an ebook? Offhand I can think of the ff. which I would love to read again. Titles like Rebel in Love, Spotted Plumes (Yvonne Whittal), Sirocco, Desire, Taggart’s Woman, Night Music, Two Dozen Red Roses. There’s another one the title of which escapes me but I remember the hero being something like a James Bond actor named Slattery, it came out as like a duo or duet book (2 stories in one).
Lidia, actually reading about the POV of the hero is truly refreshing. But sometimes it is still exciting not to learn about the hero’s thoughts just like what usually happens in real life wherein dating is like one big guessing but exciting game:) It is also nice to read a story not overly concerned about being PC, especially in this age of metrosexuals. It’s nice to read about a man being just a man. Strong, protective, vainless, chivalrous. Probably why sheikh stories are still so popular in this century.
Carolyn, sorry to hear something so awful happened but I’m glad to know you found some comfort in reading. I think most of us have, from time to time, turned to books to escape our realities.
Karen ~ Yes, let’s aim for more encounters with gorgeous men.
Olivia ~ Yes, Harlequin frequently re-issues backlist books as ebooks. Every month there are new… or older as the case is, titles available.
Lidia ~ I like the man’s pov as well although I also like the mystery sometimes. I also like it when the hero is realistic… well, somewhat anyway, there’s really nothing romantic about fart jokes and “what’s for supper?”
I don’t think of reading romances as ‘escape’ as though my life was something to run away from. True, life throws enormous challenges at us–I haven’t gone to see Beowulf yet, but we all face monsters. Sometimes of our own making, sometimes giant, sometimes smaller, sometimes physical, always mental. Monsters that sap our spirit, our sense of self, our optimism as well as impacting our well-being.
And as warriors, we must prepare and protect ourselves against that onslaught of negativity that can crush our spirit as well as our bodies. I see reading romances along the lines of meditation, of filling oneself up with the power of belief, centering oneself, connecting, repairing, validating. Not escape, but a way forward.