by MJ Scott
I’ve been reading fantasy for a long time. I started as a kid, then a teen in the eighties. These days there’s plenty of great romantic fantasy and fantasy romance around but back then, a lot of the books were written by men and while there might have been some nods to relationships, there was never much focus on romance. If I wanted romance, I read romances. But I always felt it was a bit unfair that the two couldn’t be better combined!
Sarah McLean, on her great Fated Mates podcast, talks about the books that blooded her as a romance reader, meaning the books that sucked her into the genre, so I thought that, in a month where we are celebrating all the great things about fantasy romance, I’d talk about a few of the older fantasy authors and series where I started to get at least a bit of a fantasy romance fix along with great fantasy stories. I’ll preface this by saying that these are older books and they’ll have some problematic things in them viewed from today so if you decide to go check them out, read a few reviews first!
The Pern series by Anne McCaffrey
The first series fantasy series I remember reading where I registered the romances was Anne McCaffrey’s Pern series. Dragonflight has a great heroine who has to navigate a society in trouble and find her own power. While there’s some stuff that’s definitely old skool viewed from today, I loved it back then and still dip back into the series now and then to read some of my faves.
There are quite a few romances throughout the books (Anne McCaffrey actual wrote some romances in the seventies) and series and the society changes and develops. There’s even the odd bit of on page sex which was something that wasn’t common, at least not in what I was reading, though it’s pretty tame by today’s standards. And then, of course, there are telepathic dragons. Who else is a sucker for a dragon?
The Valdemar books by Mercedes Lackey
The next fantasy series that stuck with me were Mercedes Lackey’s Valdemar books. There are a lot of these, and I don’t think I’ve read them all but I really loved them. The books share a world but the sub-series and trilogies move around in time and place within that world. There are more magical animals (I’m sensing a theme) but also, lots of relationships and romances, including queer relationships.
Dragon Prince by Melanie Rawn
Pern and Valdemar are both great worlds but the first book that springs to mind where the plot really centers around a relationship is Dragon Prince by Melanie Rawn. The hero is a royal who has to get married (hello, marriage of convenience) and doesn’t want to marry the obvious candidate being presented, chooses someone else and enlists them in some political scheming along the way while they fall in love. If you like things on the angsty side, there’s quite a bit of drama in these books.
Kushiel’s Dart by Jacqueline Carey
The last book I want to talk about is Kushiel’s Dart by Jacqueline Carey. This was probably the first fantasy I read where sex was squarely centred in the plot. The heroine, Phedre, is a natural submissive, and bisexual, and trains as a courtesan/spy. This is a big complicated world with lots of drama and lots of spice and goes to some dark places. But the romance that threads through is gorgeous and it’s a great world if you don’t mind the kink and it definitely played a big role in fantasy books getting spicier.
So let’s raise a glass to some of the books and authors who kicked this thing off. I have to say I’m looking forward to reading romantic fantasies for many more years and seeing where new authors take us!
About M.J. Scott
M.J. Scott is a RITA® Award nominated author of fantasy and urban fantasy. She is an unrepentant bookworm. Luckily she grew up in a family that fed her a properly varied diet of books and these days is surrounded by people who are understanding of her story addiction.
When not wrestling one of her own stories to the ground, she can generally be found reading someone else’s. Her other distractions include yarn, cat butlering, dark chocolate and fabric. Visit her at www.mjscott.net.