A bit intro: this post basically says how bad I am at giving a title for my posts. I'm terribly sorry T_T
Alright. I'm going to talk about what I think of romance in (Young Adult) novels.
Alright. I'm going to talk about what I think of romance in (Young Adult) novels.
I think I am the kind of reader who likes romance in novels. In fact, I think I'm a sucker of that kind of stuff. However, there are two authors (who are my favorites) who can't write romance nicely because of one particular reason: they write it in the way they're not good at. The authors are J. K. Rowling and Rick Riordan. That's okay if you disagree with me because people have different opinions. :)
As I've mentioned in my previous posts, I don't like what Rowling did in her Harry Potter books when she wrote romance. It is either she really can't write romance or she's bad at writing romance from a man's POV. In my opinion, Rowling tried way too hard in making her readers to like her romance writing or (as in fangirl's language) ship the couples she created. Not to mention her lame attempts in the INTERVIEWS (oh God... I kinda hate that word now because of her >_>); it's like she was screaming to her readers: "YEAH? HMMM??? DO YOU SEE IT NOW? YOU SEE WHY HARRY/GINNY AND RON/HERMIONE ARE PERFECT (in my head)?? DO YOU LIKE THEM AS COUPLES? I BET YOU DO; I KNOW I AM AWESOME AT THIS STUFF." Rowling even messed up Harry, Hermione, and Ginny's characterizations that she'd built from the beginning just because she didn't want to rewrite the epilogue and admit that she'd screwed up.
If I had a time machine and a ticket to where she lives, I'd go back in time and try to convince her that she should rewrite her epilogue. I'm not saying that an author shouldn't write the epilogue from the beginning; I don't know it's a bad thing or not anyway. However, Rowling has screwed up her ending in the epilogue by herself. I don't know if it's true or not, but there are some people who said that Rowling wrote the epilogue before she started writing Philosopher's Stone. In fact, they said that original epilogue was longer than the published one. The thing is, it feels like Rowling didn't want to admit that she had screwed up her story and characters in the romance part. She had written Harry Potter/Ginny Weasley and Ron Weasley/Hermione Granger in the epilogue; it turned out that the only couple who had the best chemistry was Harry and Hermione. And Daniel/Bonnie and Rupert/Emma's lack of chemistry weren't helping. At all. Or maybe it's just me. Well, I don't know about you, but I have shipped Harry and Hermione since I read the books-and-cleverness scene in Philosopher's Stone. The moment Hermione hugged Harry was the moment I was like:
They were still young at the moment, I know. However, there are many Harry/Ginny shippers who think that the moment Ginny fangirled when she saw Harry for the first time in King's Cross (which, in my opinion, is not a romantic scene at all :p) in Philosopher's Stone is a shippy moment, right? :p
If only Rowling rewrote the epilogue, I am absolutely sure that Rowling would've had one of the most memorable love stories/romances in literature history. I don't know if she knows about this, but in my opinion, she didn't have to work too hard if she chose Harry and Hermione. Rowling had had many Harry/Hermione moments in the first five Harry Potter books, so why didn't she write them as a couple? I have no fudging idea. As for Ron and Hermione, I think they have the potential as well. However, Rowling had screwed up again by making them bicker for... oh, I don't know, seven books. I find that bickering couples could be cute, but I won't if they keep bickering like they really hate each other and there's no closure. With Ron and Hermione, Rowling STILL made them bicker even until the sixth book, the book which is supposed to be the... I don't know, probably the romance book of Harry Potter series. I don't even think RoMione's bickering is cute or lovely. You think it's cute when Ron and Hermione bickered to the point Hermione just couldn't take it anymore and she cried at times? Well, that's okay if that's what you think of romantic couples. I just don't and will not find Ron and Hermione cute because of the way Rowling treat them.
Now let's talk about Rick Riordan. I really loved what he did in the first Percy Jackson series, Percy Jackson & the Olympians. When I read the romance part in the fourth book of the series, The Battle of the Labyrinth, I was like:
He did it perfectly that I cared about two things: what would happen to Percy and the others & who Percy was gonna end up with. He also did it perfectly that the romance didn't dominate the story. It was still there, but he made you care about other stuff happened in the story. He even convinced me that Percy was gonna end up with that girl instead of the girl I'd shipped Percy with. How did he do that? In my opinion, that (maybe only for me) happened because Riordan had mentioned and made her in the story in the previous book, The Titan's Curse. It's like what J. K. Rowling did with Harry and Cho Chang in Prisoner of Azkaban until Order of the Phoenix; the only difference was that Rowling handled it nicely in the beginning but badly in the middle and the end. Riordan managed to convince me that there was a possibility that Percy really would end up with this girl. It felt like he was saying,"Hey, you do know that Percy actually also has a crush on this girl, right? Not only on that girl? Because Percy's either too stupid to realize or is blind about love? Or maybe it's just me who's trolling you guys.".
Everytime there was a moment between Percy and the-girl-I-ship-Percy-with, I really love and appreciate it. By appreciating it, I mean that I was smiling and/or even giggling while reading the part. I would love to see it more, but not too much or all over the place. I appreciated the romantic moments between Percy and the-girl-I-ship-Percy-with because they didn't dominate the story. Like, there were not many shippy/romantic moments between Percy and her in one book, but in my opinion it was the best that way. It made me appreciate every moment between the two of them in each book of the series. Oh, I think I have to mention that Percy and this girl sometimes bickered, argued, or disagreed about stuff, but they had a kind of closure. Sometimes they would not talk to each other for a while or they still did but casually because they were still mad at each other. Still, they had a closure. Ooh yes, Rowling, I'm talking what you never did with Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger.
However, in the second series, Heroes of Olympus, I didn't like what Riordan did in Mark of Athena, the third book of the series. In fact, I kind of hate it. What did he do? Didn't I say that I like his writing about romance? Well, in my opinion, Riordan has the same problem Rowling has: writing the romance from the wrong POV. I think Riordan wrote the romance in Percy Jackson & the Olympians series nicely because he wrote it from Percy's POV. He's a guy (DUH), right? That's why I think he did it perfectly. He knows how boys would feel, react, or do when they have a crush on someone or are in a relationship. He also knows how a boy would describe his feelings toward a girl (the boy likes the girl, considers her as a friend, or still doesn't realize about his feelings) and he writes it perfectly.
In Mark of Athena, what happened was a disaster. Or maybe it's just me who exaggerate it. It was obvious that Riordan wanted to try to write the romance from the girl's POV that he tried to explore a girl's feelings when she fell in love with someone. However, it felt like Riordan browsed stuff about romance from a girl's POV or interviewed some girls about stuff they do when they fall in love. It did not feel natural at all. It was like,"Oh, I just found out that a girl does this thing when she falls in love or is in a relationship. Very well. I will make this girl does this in my novel. All the time. Every two or three pages.".
What Riordan did in Mark of Athena made me think,"Oh, no... again?!", "Haha, yeah, sure. Whatever. *rolls eyes*", "For fudge's sake, girl, there are more important things you need to solve and think about!!", etc. There were too many romantic moments in the book that I have a feeling this book would be the Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince of the series. This is unusual for me because technically, I should've loved every romantic moments of the couples in Heroes of Olympus series because I ship them except Jason Grace and Piper McLean, of course. I hope they will do me a favor by disappearing for no apparent reason. For good. In my opinion, even if Riordan still wants to write the romance from the girl's POV, he shouldn't write it too much. Just a bit. He needs to explore the romance part more from the boy's POV because that's what he's really good at. Riordan doesn't have to try too hard in writing the romance part from the girl's POV because he would screw up again if he does it.
It wouldn't be a big problem if Mark of Athena almost made me didn't want to continue reading the next two books. It was so bad that I was like,"Do I really want to read House of Hades? Would Rick Riordan screw up again?". I know that it could be Riordan's (lame) attempt to shut the shippers' mouths up, but it ended up badly. To be honest, the cliffhanger in Mark of Athena which involved a particular pairing did shock me but it didn't really affect me the way I reacted after reading The Battle of Labyrinth. I know Riordan would never mess with this couple. Well, he might kill one of them in the end (I don't know why, but I just have a feeling it would happen), but he would never mess with them at least until the end of the series. So I don't know why many people freaked out because of the cliffhanger. If there is a cliffhanger involving a couple that drove me crazy, it was the one Suzanne Collins wrote in the end of The Hunger Games: Catching Fire book. Still, I did care about other things as well that might happen in the last book, Mockingjay, not only who the main character would end up with. That's what I love; that's what Riordan did in the first series and I loved it.
The problem could be either the author writes the romance from the wrong POV or he/she just can't write romance. I don't know what would it be if Rowling writes romance from a girl's POV one day. I have a feeling, though, that she would still screw up because the way she handles and ends her romance story. I still ship Harry Potter and Hermione Granger, of course. To be honest, though, I don't think I would love it even if she chose Harry/Hermione because of the way she writes romance.
Thank you for your attention :)
