Just a slightly broader view of the publishing universe. During the more than fifteen years that I have been writing romance and romantic-suspense, I have watched the romance genre take its rightful place alongside the other genres of popular fiction such as mystery and suspense, horror, thrillers, fantasy, science fiction, etc. It has, as they say in the marketing business, been mainstreamed. The cover art at the bestselling end has become sophisticated and stylish. The books are now regularly reviewed in many newspapers and in such forums as Library Journal , Kirkus , Publishers' Weekly and even People Magazine .
Public libraries buy and catalog romance novels for their popular fiction collections.
Romance fiction has become the object of serious study in the academy. No, not everyone approves of romance novels. This bias begins in so-called creative writing classes taught in high school and college. Popular fiction has been around forever but rarely has society viewed it as important in and of itself. Rarely have we acknowledged that it has a crucial place in culture.