'I feel pretty, oh, so pretty, I feel pretty and witty and bright! And I pity any girl who isn't me tonight.'

And so, you've created a twenty-seven year-old woman as the idealised version of your-twenty-seven-year-old-self and then given her a quirk, such as cooing at babies in supermarkets (but only supermarkets, for anywhere else is creepy), and a physical flaw, such as frizzy hair on especially hot days. Then you've created your ideal man from a possibly embarrassing photograph of Hugh Jackman and loaded him with the kinds of characteristics and physical traits all women agree upon as desirable in a man. Once you have your heroine and hero the next step for your Mills & Boon romance is the story and location. Location is important. The romance genre has a history of exotic and glamorous settings, the sorts of places where running into an enigmatic, ruthless and handsome sheik is a plausible occurrence. After all, the perfect man is a well-hidden breed, and rightfully so. We can't have the manifestation of the perfect partner swanning around urban shopping malls. He must be chopping wood in isolated snow-covered landscapes or flying overhead in a helicopter building a multi-million pound empire to use to lovingly force a woman into his marriage bed.

Fortunately for those undecided on such issues as location Julie Elizabeth Leto is here to help. You may remember her from The Domino Effect, that terrible book Bewildered Heart read and hated. Well, as with so many authors of terrible books we have read and hated, she posts essays on her website explaining how to write terrible books we will someday read and hate. There are many essays, but for now let us concern ourselves with  Where Am I? The Importance of Setting to Your Romance Novel. 'A lush tropical island. A dark, candlelit restaurant by the ocean. A remote cabin in the foggy mountain tops. With little imagination, romantic fantasies bubble out of settings such as these. What better place could possibly exist to set your romance novel? Plenty of better places - trust me. Those listed above are easy and no one ever said that writing well was easy.'

If you're not going to say it, someone should. Writing romance isn't the same as writing well. However, an early point to Julie Leto, as most of her examples are tired and formulaic. Still, a remote, foggy candlelit restaurant on a tropical island sounds delightful, although the service would be poor and the menu mostly fish and coconut. 'Your job as a writer is to create settings that will not depend entirely on images and emotional responses the reader already possesses, but those that will take her literally to a whole new world.' Well, not literally. 'Do I mean science fiction? Not necessarily.' It's not necessarily sci-fi. It's not sci-fi at all. You're misusing the word literally. Stop that.

Leto's reference point is Make That Scene: A Writer’s Guide to Setting, Mood and Atmosphere by William Noble, and according to Noble setting is vital for three reasons, 1, it adds vividness to the story, 2, it influences the characters and 3, it plays a vital role in the story. Now, while this may sound like the nonsensical throwing around of technical words for the benefit of no one, there is something worthwhile to be gleamed for this and that is, location is vital. Without it your characters would wander a desolate world of existential blankness with no dimensions or gravity. Except that itself would be a location. In fact, it is the location of the Tron movies. Leto goes on, 'If a setting you’ve chosen doesn’t interlock this tightly with the story you’re about to tell - if it’s just a backdrop as changeable as stage scenery - you may not have chosen the right place for your story to occur.' We appear to be hammering on about the importance of setting, but it's worth remembering. Setting a tender love story in a futuristic world of bareknuckle-boxing on an oil rig made from cardboard would be stupid. Although tender love can blossom anywhere, so let's not rule out inspired bursts of originality, eh, article?

'West Side Story is essentially Romeo and Juliet set in a different time and place. Fourteenth century Verona becomes 1960s New York City. The circumstances and plot remain the same, but the audience doesn’t seem to mind. The changed setting meant changed characters, and together they flushed out fresh elements to the basic plot of forbidden, star-crossed love.' West Side Story is one of the most romantic American movies ever, according to our friends at the AFI, so good example, Julie. West Side Story is a silly film, where the forbidden element of the love isn't credible or particularly well-thought out. Then again, the silliness might have had more to do with the constant singing, homo-erotic dancing and egotistic vanity.

'Contrary to popular myth, Poe was not a drugged-out weirdo who wrote gross stories about blood and gore. On the contrary, he was a master craftsman whose attention to detail in his tightly woven narratives contradicts any possibility of a steady use of hallucinogens.' At this point it is easy to become concerned for Julie Leto's grasp on reality. But thank God she's here to defend Edgar Allen Poe from the vast majority of literary experts who revile him as nothing more than an old-timey version of Eli Roth. With Poe's reputation restored, let's see what the drugged-out weirdo had to say. 'In the whole composition there should be no word written, of which the tendency, direct or indirect, is not to the one pre-established design. And by such means, with such care and skill, a picture is at length painted which leaves in the mind of him who contemplates it with a kindred art, a sense of the fullest satisfaction…' Let us hope Leto didn't take Poe's review of Hawthorne as a personal attack on her own novels, but we can surely sleep peacefully under the notion that she doesn't consider herself a skilled literary artist.

'In our novels, the preconceived or single effect is romance, coupled with the overall mood of the book (i.e., suspense, a historic richness, or humor). Genre and sub-genre - your targeted market - must be taken into consideration when you plan your overall effect.' We appear to have narrowed our choice down to either Modern, or Romance. The single effect, therefore, is romance, with the mood being romantic. Romance plus romance equals double romance, thus Romantic Romance, our preferred sub-genre. Thus the setting must be evocative of romance, the sort of place people go to fall in love, which also has the effect of helping people fall in love. Suitable locations would include a lush tropical island, a dark, candlelit restaurant by the ocean or a remote cabin in foggy mountain tops.

'Should the setting enhance the single effect, or contrast it?' It turns out that there are unlimited choices open to an author when choosing location. Perhaps a contrasting background would work more strongly, for example somewhere that does not instantly produce love make might the impending love even more powerful, through contrast. How about finding love in the most unlikely location? But surely, you cry, a remote cabin in foggy mountain tops is unlikely. What kind of single man will hang out there with anything other than murder on his mind? You're right, and possibly a little paranoid. In The Domino Effect, our spy heroine was thrust into the surprisingly easy-going locale of a Chicago nightclub, with all the mystery, sexiness and poor lighting one would expect from such a place. Clearly Leto wanted to enhance the effect. Had she contrasted it, her tough-talking, hard-living, sexy spy might have had to seek out traitors at a nursery school, or a petting zoo. Quickly, Google, write that idea down.

Leto moves onto how to set a scene, saying, somewhat curiously, that a writer must use words to describe things. 'To most of us, there is only one way to establish setting - through description by the author.' Most of us, Julie? We can assume the rest are illiterate, or screenwriters. If the writer has decided against inference through story and dialogue, instead insisting on straight description, we return to William Noble, who has another list of three things. 1, Colours, 2, Shapes and 3, Textures. Well, that is hard to argue with. Noble asks us to, 'Imagine ourselves in the scene: it is we who do the looking and the absorbing, and we know what will strike us most forcefully. We seek ‘key details’ with this method, ever mindful that use of detail can overrun us if we aren’t careful.' Indeed. Readers don't read Mills & Boon for the fancy language and poetic insights. If they want good writing there's a much smaller shelf a few rows down. We're here to serve them with a straight-forward story of romance with lashings of romance against a backdrop of romanticism. What does it matter if we don't know any appropriate words besides romantic?

“Maybe you're only alloted a certain amount of tears per man and I've used mine up”

Anyone who enjoys cinema and female companionship will be disappointed to learn that the column Girls on Film is merely a bunch of essays by women on the topic of movies. False advertising on the internet, who knew that occurred? Well, you won't find any of that on Bewildered Heart, where we're true to our original goal, posting photographs of Hugh Jackman in embarrassing poses. No one is tricked onto this blog, no one is invited either, it seems. The point is, please click on the adverts.

Girls on Film is one of the more vocal exponents on the decline of romantic comedies, a subject Bewildered Heart is also dedicated to uncovering. From the AFI list of the hundred greatest romantic films, only a handful are comedies, and the finest of those include The Princess Bride, The Goodbye Girl, Harold and Maude, The Lady Eve and Casablanca. Of those there aren't many traditional romcoms, as we've grown to expect them. Possibly the reason for this is that the AFI is solely interested in great movies, and The Way We Were, whereas we have grown to expect romantic comedies to be as terrible as The Way We Were. After all, when Ernst Lubitsch died William Wyler sensed the end was near, and Hollywood never replaced the likes of he or Preston Sturges. Girls on Film have decided that this issue is worth filling their essay quota on, and so over at their Moviefone website you can read what's wrong with Hollywood and more importantly what's wrong with you, the audience, who lap this toilet water up. Monika Bartyzel makes numerous mentions to The Bechdel Rule, an idea taken from a twenty-something year old comic strip where a character asserts she will only see a film if it adheres to three strict rules. 'One, there are two women who Two, talk to each other about Three, something other than men.'

Because of this rule, the strip argues, the only film that woman has seen is Alien, where two lady characters speak of the phallic metaphor chasing them down narrow corridors. Now, perhaps it is misguided to blame Hollywood for seeing females as a niche audience with limited interests, as critics contend. Women make up the majority of the population, but not the cinema-going public. Is this because there are no films that specifically appeal to women? After all, Sex and the City and its sequel made hundreds of millions of dollars. Sex and the City has become a hugely successful franchise, with a television series, two films, a line of cocktails and it is likely they have a cut of the shoe market, to boot. What's curious about its success, however, is that the films are horrible, insensitive, awful and sexist. Female audiences forgive this, mind, either because they're so starved for representation they'll take what they can get, or women are stupid and have no self-respect or taste, something they probably learned from Sex and the City.

Now, it is perhaps worth bearing in mind that while women are stupid, the wider point is that people are stupid and women are people. Furthermore, many of these same women are aware that Sex and the City 2 is an abysmal, xenophobic and oddly misogynistic movie, but they enjoyed it anyhow. So Girls on Film, what the hell? 'While I can't fathom forgiving all of the flaws of SatC on the big screen, forgiveness is an essential part of the experience for any moviegoer eager to see real-life women. There are, quite simply, too few films that are interested in reaching beyond the typical stereotypes.' Huh. Women call it SatC. Interesting. 'Studios don't see this success as an example of moviegoers wanting more diverse and awesome women on the big screen, or more women in general. They see it as a simple equation: Romance + sexy women + comedy = Goldmine. Female friends + fashion + money = Goldmine. Women obsessed with men = Goldmine.' She misused the word awesome, but for discerning film-goers desperate for the beauty to be put back into romcoms it makes for a worrying trend. Unless the studios are onto something, which they are, because that equation makes a lot of sense. If we continue down this decline then eventually romantic comedies will be in as bad shape as most other Hollywood genres. Skyline was a rubbish sci-fi alien invasion film and made no money. If the next rubbish alien invasion film also makes no money will Hollywood listen and go back to the safe-haven of remaking classic alien invasion films?

Moviefone points its angry finger at SatC, SatC2, Mamma Mia and Valentine's Day as a sign of this threat to quality. These films are critically-ravaged, yet each made a lot of money. Is this because women lack representation on screen but forgive the movie's faults because it has been made with them in mind? Do they blindly support 'female' films even when they're insulting to women? This is a flawed argument, of course, because Sex and the City had a loyal built-in fanbase, Mamma Mia had previously been a huge success on stage and Valentine's Day had a lucrative history as a day long before it cashed in as a film. It is akin to arguing that just because Spiderman 3 made a fortune at the box office teenage boys will pay for abysmal superhero films just to see Spiderman at the cinema. Well, everyone rightly hated Spiderman 3 and despite its profits Hollywood listened, going to great lengths to trick the audience into watching another one. Surely nobody wants to make atrocious films. None of the people involved in Valentine's Day intended it to be that bad. Yes, the female characters are made up of, 'the sweet-as-pie grade school teacher, the airhead blonde high schooler, the perpetually single girl who wallows in candy and panic attacks, the rich wife who tries to ignore her husband's infidelity,' but the men didn't come off any better. There was a professional football player who turns out to be gay, a smarmy doctor cheating on his wife and an Ashton Kutcher. It isn't a matter of Hollywood folk lazily trading on stereotypes, but just a bunch of hacks doing the best they could.

The New York Times film critic Manohla Dargis says different. Asked why romantic comedies are in such straits, she helpfully pointed out that, 'One, the people making them have no fucking taste, two, they're morons, three, they're insulting panderers who think they're making movies for the great unwashed and that's what they want.' Clearly this can't be correct because that would mean a Hollywood producer would have to be an insultingly pandering moron with no taste and an arrogant, superior attitude to the public. Maybe Dargis means filmmakers can be one of the three options. Choose carefully, Hollywood.

'So where's the line between fighting for diverse representations, feeling anger over stereotypical crap, rebelling against bubbleheaded fluffdom, and being a supporter of female achievement?' asks Monika Bartyzel. 'That's not something I can quite figure out yet.' Well, Monika, you're lucky there's a big strong man around to help you answer that. After this Bewildered Heart will take care of that spider. Dargis makes an obvious point when she refuses to judge female-directed films differently from male-directed ones, even though it begs the question as to what difference it makes to have a female director. A female writer and director with a female cast telling stories about women for female audiences seems to compartmentalise women as not only niche audiences, but niche filmmakers too. Why would you celebrate a film being made, or being seen by a lot of people just because it was made by women? It's a shallow victory that limits the threshold of potential achievement. Don't check the credits to see who wrote and directed the film, just rebel against stereotypes and bubbleheaded fluffdom as much as others will rebel against journalists making up words.

“Her tongue thickened. Here it came. She tried to prepare herself. 'Oh?'”

When we left The Dad Next Door he was beginning to fall in love with our protagonist, Alison, but remained concerned how this new relationship would effect his daughter, Tory. Alison, meanwhile, was beginning to fall in love with the single father neighbour, Gavin, but was concerned he was obsessively stalking Tory's mother, Marianne. Tory, on the other hand, was still coming to terms with the death of her sister, Samantha, in a motorcycle accident (Sam was hit by a motorcycle), and the move to Squam Lake, but at least now has Alison, her adoring new mother figure and a general disinterest towards the feelings of others, because she's a child.

The easily resolved issues don't stop there, however. First there is Alison's divorced father, named something fatherly yet distant, such as Frank (it's actually Seth, how inappropriate), and then there's Marianne, a bohemian version of Megan Fox, with black hair, pale skin and facial features so chiselled a man could cut a finger on them. Marianne is an artist and Tory's estranged mother, disappeared for years. A bad woman, a bad mother, a lousy girlfriend and, though the author doesn't acknowledge it directly, an inept painter of moody, esoteric pictures with little commercial value. Alison is the Julie Bowen alternative to Megan Fox, all smooth lines, safe for children, warm autumnal colours and blonde hair. Her shop, The Perfect Thing, is a tourist trap of popular nic-nacs obtuse visitors and locals immediately adore.

All this homely pleasantness and reasonable reactions to everyday occurrences is soon shattered by the return of Marianne, with a secret so dark and unlikely no one may ever be the same again, except Tory who glides through life with a childlike apathy towards the feelings of others. The use of 'may ever be the same' is apt, because Marianne's secret doesn't change much irrevocably, it merely serves to extend the story for a further one hundred or so pages. Marianne's secret is nothing compared to Seth's secret. That's a secret that should shatter everyone's lives, but somehow doesn't, resulting in something eerily close to incest. Yep, The Dad Next Door is the first Mills & Boon to contain 'sorta incest'. Add that to the list, Google.

Our delightful heroine, Alison, is a modern woman of standard neuroses. Her recent broken engagement to Tyler isn't important in the grand scheme of things. Her future is fixed from the moment Gavin and Tory move in next door and the adult problems soon to plague her quiet house of middle class domesticity only serve to regress her back to childhood and the same selfish outlook that bonds her so quickly to Tory. She grew up with Marianne and everything was a competition. Every boy Alison liked was stolen by Marianne and Seth always took Marianne's side. Some father, the reader thinks, unaware how right they are. With her feelings for Gavin growing the arrival of Marianne threatens to upset their newfound love, especially as it takes place shortly after The Dad Next Door's only sex scene, on a sofa and involving metaphorical melting.

Despite this, CJ Carmichael has no intention of figuring anything out, instead using Marianne as an unrealistic plot point. Her sudden reappearance reveals the devastating secret no one wants to hear. Oh, please allow this weblog to reveal the secret, because our Bewildered Heart cannot contain itself any longer! Seth had an affair with Marianne's drunken whore of a mother and is, in fact, Marianne's father. Holy cow, yes! Alison and Marianne are half-sisters and always have been. Not only that, but Alison slept with her niece's father. Phew! You have no idea how long we've been wanting to tell you that, indulgent reader. Can you believe it? Alison Bennett always seemed like such a nice, simple woman of autumnal colours and Julie Bowen congeniality. It must be that child that looks eerily like how Megan Fox presumably looks. Everybody knows what bad influences the child-incarnations of Transformers stars are.

You're gosh darn right, non-existent alcoholic Squam Lake busy-body. How will this mess of crap be sorted in the remaining ten or so pages? Really, there are only ten pages left? What, is Carmichael just going to call a taxi for Marianne, remove her from the picture and then have the characters never again mention this sordid chapter of their lives, much to the dismay and annoyance of the reader, who had patiently concentrated on her words for two hundred and eighty pages awaiting something dramatic to take place? Nah, of course not. That would be rubbish and deeply infuriating.

The Dad Next Door positions itself as a Tender Romance and the sexual element, while present, is subtlety excised, the editor moving on as the couple move into the bedroom, leaving the awkwardly timid descriptions of penetration, thrusting and orgasm (we all know it happens) on the floor of the writer's equivalent of the cutting room. Clipboard? Unlike Modern and Blaze! there includes a noticeable plot centred around a compelling protagonist. There is a child old enough to speak and influence the narrative and Carmichael cleverly uses Tory to push Alison and Gavin together, their intimacy brought about by a resolutely pampered kid. This is no different from other romance stories that use a gimmick to hurry along the romance, but a child brings a heightened emotional significance to any potential coupling. This relationship has more riding on it than a wasted month of crying, eating ice cream and watching reruns of Murder, She Wrote.

Furthermore, there is the introduction of Marianne, a villain. A woman whose selfish apathy towards the feelings of others isn't as adorable or as tolerated as Tory's. Marianne is a cold, conniving artist-type who never wanted children and was forced to give birth to twins when she would have preferred an abortion. In another writer's hands Marianne could have been portrayed as human, weak and confused, a victim of circumstance, poverty and poor parenting, while also suffering from a proper illness that is wrecking her life and destroying any chance she has of making contact with her only daughter. However, Carmichael takes a different route. Marianne is a manipulative bitch with a made-up disease who stands between Alison and her man, undeserving of happiness she has not earned and cruel and drunk and inconsiderate and a bitch and I hate her.

Fair enough then, but Marianne represents little more than Alison's own deluded sense of entitlement. We here at Bewildered Heart love a happy ending and as the word count is reached Alison, Gavin and Tory are complete, a loving and happy family. Woo-hoo. Yet if there is one thing even better than a happy ending it is a good ending, with all the story strands resolved in a satisfying and rewarding manner. The Dad Next Door has a happy ending, but a disappointing one. Gavin and Alison's contentment has left a trail of damaged people in its wake, but because those people brought their shame, loneliness and misery on themselves the reader is expected not to mind. If Romance Romance has the opportunity for more complex scenarios, darker character history and less easily-obtained romance than the usual Mills & Boon sub-genres, then Romance Romance owes itself deeper emotional resonance than The Dad Next Door.

Please note that this review refers to CJ Carmichael's The Dad Next Door, and not Kasey Michaels' The Dad Next Door, published by Silhouette and featuring an author with a worryingly similar name.  We also do not mean to criticise Virginia Myers' The Dad Next Door, or any living or deceased male neighbours with children, although you probably have your own narrative issues that a few rewrites and sex scenes would take care of.

"I'm very grateful she's a woman, and so easy to forget!"

The follower of Bewildered Heart must be curious as to how the attempt to watch every romance movie on the list of American Film Institute's 100 Years 100 Passions Top 100 Most Romantic Movies Ever Made in these United States has been going. Though the comment boards have been typically silent on the matter, we can only assume readers have been asking incessantly, and so as we near December and the beginning of the month rightfully set aside for Christmas movies and Christmas-themed Mills & Boon's, it is with great delight and much relief that we can announce it is almost over. Many of the films featured are much admired by anonymous internet critics able to stomach such things as swooning, bursting into song and Barbara Streisand. However, Bewildered Heart is not such a blog, and as we have recently had to endure The Way We Were and Funny Lady it is with thankfulness that we note the end has arrived.

There was a time when Audrey Hepburn existed and ran around on cinema screens in wonderful clothes pretending to fall in love with actors who were much too old for her. Those lean years are a glory to look back upon. Naturally, many of those films don't hold up today and yet five of her films feature on the AFI's most romantic films list. Her total of five is bettered only by two stars, Cary Grant and Katherine Hepburn. Audrey Hepburn's career began, in earnest, with Roman Holiday, where she was paired opposite Gregory Peck's American journalist, playing an escaped princess shirking her regal responsibilities to have a free-spirited jaunt around Rome and a hair-cut. Tsk, another journalist! Of course Roman Holiday is a mighty fine film, one of the most romantic of all time, according to the AFI, with two strong central performances and a handful of inspiring set-pieces in a well-used location. Tellingly it also has a bittersweet ending because journalists are not deserving of happy endings as they are journalists. To say bittersweet is misleading, mind. The journalist is miserable and an Audrey Hepburn character remains single

A year later and there came Sabrina Fair, an awkward film and only the 54th most romantic of all time, but Audrey manages to imbue a dignified credibility into her supposed idolization of William Holden, a romance given further creditability by the offscreen romance between the pair. With all this hard work done, however, Billy Wilder goes and squanders it by having her instead fall for Humphrey Bogart, who looks as uncomfortable as someone can when wearing trousers pulled up past the belly button. Ten years after Sabrina, Hepburn and Holden would appear together once again in Paris When it Sizzles, but Audrey couldn't carry the effect of Sabrina into this new film. Her marriage to Mel Ferrer and Holden's deteriorating health due to his alcoholism made for a problematic set and despite a cameo from Marlene Dietrich and a tongue-in-cheek performance from the late Tony Curtis Paris When it Sizzles stands up today as only a fitfully amusing comedy, thanks largely to a tongue-in-cheek performance from Tony Curtis, and, of course, Audrey Hepburn being adorable.

Love in the Afternoon works whenever Gary Cooper is offscreen, but these sequences are few and far between. Nothing against Gary Cooper, though. He's just Gary Cooper. When Audrey says he looks like a cowboy this ends up as perceptive criticism rather than referential in-joke. Billy Wilder intended Love in the Afternoon to be a tribute to his mentor, Ernst Lubitsch, but Lubitsch never miscast like this, beyond putting Melvyn Douglas in anything (Look at his moustache, it's smug). May to December romances aren't fit for stories of eternal love. When the narration tells us the lovers were later married we say, Sure, and roll our eyes. Unlike some critics whose dislike of Billy Wilder means they won't find their names printed here, no casual human being should feel anything but great affection towards Billy Wilder, but his romantic comedies work best when shot through with his patented cynicism for mankind. The Apartment, Number 62, is a beautiful and touching romance, but his frothier offerings such as Irma La Douce pale in comparison to his best work. Sadly, Sabrina and Love in the Afternoon are among his weaker films, although it is fair to say that Audrey has never looked as gorgeous as she did in these movies.

Now Funny Face was lovely, although it's hard to get over Fred Astaire telling Audrey Hepburn that she isn't conventionally beautiful, but he loves her anyway. She should have slapped him for that comment or offered him a mirror, but it is infuriating whenever an Audrey Hepburn character appears on screen and is not followed by a horde of men and women carrying bunches of flowers. One above The Apartment comes Breakfast at Tiffany's and here's a perfectly acceptable film with a leading man close to Audrey's age. Audrey is cast against type, in a role brimming with self-confidence, far from the shy ingénue of her other characters. Breakfast at Tiffany's is her most iconic role and her most believable romantic-comedy romance.

My Fair Lady is over-long, weighing in at almost three hours, which is a slog for even a viewer who can tolerate musicals. Hepburn is miscast and ten years too old for the role. Still, there are a handful of likeable songs and pleasant sequences, but George Cukor shoots the film as a theatrical production, merely transporting the play to the screen without the benefits of the adopted medium. Furthermore and most importantly, perhaps, My Fair Lady isn't a love story despite the AFI declaring it the 14th most romantic American production ever. Oh, Film Institute, where is the romance? From the young man when he sings the song of stalking, or are we led to believe Audrey and Rex Harrison fall for each other, in an almost as credible a coupling as Rex and Gene Tierney, in The Ghost and Mrs. Muir, Number 73? After all, admitting you've grown to tolerate someone is hardly the fourteenth most romantic gesture open to a man. The ending is subtle, to the point of ambiguity, but we assume Eliza and Henry marry and live as happily as the viewer can imagine them living, yet if there is an implied relationship in My Fair Lady the audience has the right to refuse to acknowledge it. This is a satisfactory compromise, for having seen Audrey pretend to love Bogie, Gregory Peck, Fred Astaire, Gary Cooper, Burt Lancaster, William Holden and Cary Grant it is difficult to manage Rex Harrison to boot.

This leaves us with her Stanley Donen double bill, of Charade and Two for the Road. As Charade doesn't figure on the 100 Passions list, we can quickly skip over it. Suffice to say, Charade is a fine thriller and Cary Grant takes a shower with his clothes on, which is easily more romantic than admitting you've grown accustomed to a lady's presence. Two For the Road, meanwhile, features at Number 57, and earns its place as a surprisingly tender, painful and insightful observation of a marriage, and pairs Hepburn with Albert Finney, a man seven years her junior, a nice change for Audrey, the saucy minx. Two For the Road is smartly-written (by Frederic Raphael) and cleverly edited to show a relationship in its beginning, its honeymoon stage and as it breaks down. The same year Audrey Hepburn was impressive in Wait Until Dark even though the story around her performance made no sense at all, and beyond that there were only a handful of films she saw fit to grace. Nevertheless, sixteen films in fourteen years and five among the most romantic of all American time is a remarkable achievement. She has been a rare bright spot in this debauched month of romance movie-watching and she should always be remembered as the perfect anecdote to sitting through a Barbara Streisand movie.

“Speaking of the devil, your daughter looks remarkably like...”

Mills & Boon categories are conveniently separated by colour. The more sexually explicit material has a sexually explicit picture on a cover adorned with red, the international colour of explicit sexual material. Modern Romance is symbolised by blue, because blue is classy, emotionally sterile and modern. Our newfound favourite subgenre is Romance Romance, also known by a series of less powerful monikers including Tender Romance and Special Moments. These books have an innocent picture of two adults innocently cavorting with an adorable child on a orange cover, because nothing speaks of romance without explicit sexual content like the colour orange.

The Dad Next Door tells the story of a thirty-something single dad, abandoned by his wife when their twin girls were one-year-olds. Marianne, a traditional name for an evil woman, disappeared and has not been heard from since. Life for the single dad, Gavin Gray, hasn't brightened either. From two kids he is down to one, Tory, an insolent, uncommunicative tyke without opinions or forthrightness. Her sister, Samantha, was the outgoing, strong-willed one, so outgoing in fact, she ran into a street one day and was hit by a motorcycle. Gavin is tired and disconsolate, but still rather handsome, with broad shoulders and John F. Kennedy's gait. Shortly after Samantha's death he ups sticks and moves to small town New Hampshire into the house his wife grew up in, a decision the author, CJ Carmichael, manages to make sound more curious than creepy. To add to the glamour of the location the book is set on Squam Lake, the very golden pond Henry Fonda and Katherine Hepburn filmed On Golden Pond on. The American Film Institute's twenty-second best romantic film is surely the most glamorous movie ever made about geriatric loving, irresponsible parenting and fear of dying.

Meanwhile, back in the novel, we meet the cute and loveable Alison Bennett, a single business owner with only happiness in her manner. She takes an immediate interest in the strapping hunk of grief moving in next door and can't help but note the adorability of his daughter. However, we soon learn Alison comes with her own forlorn hopelessness. She receives an order of wedding invitations she forgot to cancel, having cancelled everything else romance-related with her ex-fiance, Tyler Jenkins. Now just a sad, lonely woman with nothing to do in the evenings except be alone, her telephone rings and who's on the other end? Her father, wishing her a happy birthday.

My word, book. How did you get published? What is more, we're only three chapters in. Bring on the terminal illness and dog who has seen better days. It makes for an inauspicious beginning when to up the ante the author decides to kill a child, and to add insult to death the accident, as Gavin wants it to be known, seems a superfluous tragedy to base the narrative around. There is plenty going on with this family without the need to make the cause so obvious and peripheral. We will learn more of the incident and its effect on the characters in due course, as Alison gently tugs on the string holding Gavin's existence together. Clearly he and Tory have not moved on from losing Sam, as a father and a twin sister are supposed to. While Alison has moved on from her broken engagement from Tyler, her divorced and lonesome parents do not believe she has made the right decision. In the small town tongues wag and Alison needs a new man in her life to quell speculation as much as Tory needs a mother figure and Gavin needs a supportive, loving woman. But good golly, that's surely too much to ask. If only there was some way to neatly fit these carefully constructed pieces into one puzzle.

While Bewildered Heart continually criticises the problematic nature of Modern, Sensual Romance, Blaze! and Modern Heat, for their inherent lack of depth to story and characters, even the most cynical critic cannot fault The Dad Next Door, which dishes out the neuroses and tragedies as if the author has something to prove to the reader. This overwhelming heartache will make the coupling of Gavin and Alison, because that is happening, all the more satisfying, as this union will solve every problem for every character and every character has a serious problem that only love will solve. Hurrah for the healing power of love!

Credit therefore to CJ Carmichael. Well done, her, so far. Nevertheless, with all this additional sorrow piled upon a simple tale of love the writing becomes a delicate balancing act of haunted emotion and story progression. Alison is an old school-friend of Marianne, and the revelation of her being Gavin's former flame must have an effect on the burgeoning relationship, meaning Carmichael will have to introduce Marianne and even Tyler now they've been pointedly referenced, their force over our leads abundantly apparent.

Never before in my Mills & Boon reading has a story begun with so many broken lives, with so many characters living in lonely despair, regretting life choices and reluctant to be hurt once more, in a world where everyone gets hurt and nothing good comes easily. This isn't to say The Dad Next Door is a successful book, of course, the prose style has forced contrivances and heavy-handed emotional footnotes, leaving no room for subtlety, and yet it is these faults that feel more in-keeping with the Harlequin modus operandi. There is plenty of opportunity for subtext, yet a stern refusal to leave certain things unsaid. When a character stops short of saying how they really feel, the narrator helpfully jumps in, to press home the unspoken bond between Gavin and Alison. This is a shame, but perhaps an inevitable one.

There remains a missed opportunity in back-dating the tragedy. After all, who wants to read a book in which all the interesting, dramatic things have already happened? The Dad Next Door ends up revolving around the renovation of a house, a handy metaphor, but a didactic and clichéd one. We, the gentle readers, continue on regardless awaiting the arrival of Marianne with all her baggage. There is an obstacle in the way of romance here greater than Gavin and Alison's thought processes and hang-ups. Marianne represents the author's first obvious concern when introducing a child into their Mills & Boon world. What happened to the missing parent? And of course, what about the child? How does the kid figure into the plans of the adults? Presently, Tory is a minor nuisance, with an issue Alison immediately fixes through the clever skill of offering companionship. Therefore the daughter becomes what children are in real life, a sign that their single father is sensitive and charming.

"Does this have anything to do with the fact that I'm gonna get sunburn on my rear end?"

Before an aspiring author attempts their addition to the swell of romance writing published every month by Mills & Boon they are smartly advised to choose the sub-genre they wish to be considered for. Without further ado, therefore, a little research is necessary. As Bewildered Heart has already helpfully alluded to there are numerous different styles for your generic love story, including, but not limited to, Nocturne, Medical, Blaze!, Intrigue and Historical. Other less well-known categories are named Mira, Cherish, Desire and Riva. What are these? you demand, impatiently. Unfortunately, our necessary research wasn't especially thorough, but never mind because Cherish sounds like the antithesis of Desire and frankly the other two aren't even words, so forget them.

Because of a particular aversions toward vampires, demons, well-being, sex and old people, we should press on with the least likely category to contain animalistic rutting between otherworldly beasts. With Nocturne and Cherish out of the way then, we are left at the grateful feet of Modern and Romance. Yes, that's correct. There's a Romance sub-genre called Romance. Romance Romance, you might say. So, what does the Romance Romance genre ask for? Mills & Boon opens with, 'Do you love a happy ending?' It is never a good idea to immediately ask  a stupid question, but seeing as how they have we have little choice but join them. Don't all Mills & Boon books have happy endings? If the reader didn't love a happy ending would they even be here? How does that separate this style from all the other styles? Can we pretend they didn't ask that and move on? 'Do you love to get lost in a story that takes you on a roller-coaster of emotions?' Sure, why not. A roller-coaster of emotion sounds like a normal roller-coaster, except with more vomiting. But seeing as how most romance novels are emetic there doesn't appear to be anything here to differentiate this from the likes of Historical and Medical, besides history and medicine. After all, a stroll through indifference would be a terrible idea for a story.

'Do you want to walk in your heroine’s shoes?' They don't offer great arch support and chances are they wouldn't fit, but yes, we most certainly do. After all, she is our narrative representation, albeit with nicer shoes. 'Do you want pure Romance?' Of course, who doesn't want pure romance? No more of this diluted romance that doesn't even taste like romance. It's mostly anti-freeze. This question is a tricky one to answer, but the implication is that Romance Romance skips on the more sultry stuff. 'Each story delivers 100% pure romance - but happily leaves the explicit detail on the cutting room floor! Readers come to this series to experience the feel-good high of love blossoming!' So it's 100% pure, but not uncut?

'Do you want to explore a rainbow of emotional scenarios?' This is the same question as before only worded slightly differently, so the answer remains the same, only worded slightly differently. You're gosh darn right we do! And yet, why does it feel as if you're making vague and derisory statements that in no way explain what Romance Romance writers are expected to deliver? How about a long list of words? 'Vibrant, hilarious, heart-wrenching, exciting, uplifting, unexpected, intelligent, warm…' Yep, that didn't help either. In fact, as a description it seems ever more confused. Does Mills & Boon want a novel that fits all of these adjectives, or can the author choose one word and base their book around that, because Bewildered Heart has never featured a Harlequin that was any one of those things.

'We celebrate women: their lives, triumphs, families, hopes, dreams…and most importantly their journey to falling in love. These are heroines every woman can relate to, root for, a friend you can laugh with and cry with. There should be a sense that the story really could happen to you!' That's something. Readers of Romance Romance seek familiarity, their own personal, realistic fairytale with a likeable, relatable lead character. But what about that chap hiding behind her? 'Behind every strong woman…there’s a strong man. A guy you could meet on the sunniest of days, but who’ll be there for you on the rainiest.' That doesn't make sense. Let's assume what they're demanding is that we don't create a fair-weather love interest, instead a man who can be relied upon, for better and for worse, through sickness and in health, the sort of heroic lover that has appeared in every Mills & Boon since its inception.

'So - wherever in the world your book is set, whether it’s fun and flirty or deeply emotional, let your imagination fly. The possibilities in Romance are endless.' Please note that by endless we here at Mills & Boon are not implying that the possibilities in romance are endless. On the contrary they are limited to a standard structure, character archetypes and predictability any deviation from will result in instant manuscript rejection. We ask all potential authors to follow the strict guidelines that are not mentioned anywhere within the submission section of our website because we enjoy receiving up to 20,000 manuscripts a year that are unsuitable for publication.

Alternatively, there's Modern Romance, which translates as romance for the modern woman, still 100% romantic, but now with the occasional sex scene and talking on mobile phones! 'Modern Romance is the last word in sensual and emotional excitement,' they inform us. 'Readers are whisked away to exclusive jet-set locations to experience smouldering intensity and red-hot desire.' They are whisked away to exclusive jet-set locations in their imagination, for those excitable readers who took that literally. Modern Romance is the most popular category to write in and the most comfortable to be seen buying. Who doesn't yearn for a little romance in this day and age? Despite the contemporary illusion, the stories are exactly the same as they are in Romance Romance, only with the sexual element amped up to Low.

'Modern Romance explores emotional themes that are universal. These should be played out as part of highly-charged conflicts that are underpinned by blistering sexual anticipation and released as passionate lovemaking. However, Modern is not the home of purple prose, cliché or melodrama; we want to see writing that offers unique perspectives and bursts with originality.' Yeah, you salty dogs. Clichéd, melodramatic purple prose with stereotypical perspectives that occasional flashes with banality are published under the Blaze! banner.

So what have we learned from this, besides not to look to the Help pages for help? Well, it really comes down to sexual content. Much like life itself the books are categorised by the amount of explicit description they contain. Modern Romance features one, maybe two, encounters, but must use coy euphemisms and old-fashioned reactions to mark the books out as Modern. Blaze! can say what the reader wants to read, and must tailor their story around a couple who meet and almost immediately begin having sex, thus discrediting any semblance of intellectual connection. With Romance Romance the focus is rightly on the romance, and it would be expected that the couple do not fuse their bodies in a fit of passion until after the book has ended. A standard example will revolve around a slow-burning and tender courtship often involving a single parent with an adorable child. That's another thing we'll have to think about later on down the line, the involvement of adorable children, but for now we should all get on with reading some Romance Romance and the first example will be The Dad Next Door, and look there's an adorable child on the front cover holding a teddy bear!

“Laughing with him was way too easy... and that scared her more than any terrorist ever would”

Every so often when touring the seedy alleys of a local library Bewildered Heart discovers a book that we know we shouldn't read, but cannot seem to draw away from, the musty, weathered pages only adding to the illicit thrill. Despite Mills & Boon's predilection for archetypal characters in archetypal situations an oddity will escape the publishing daddies that aspires to shatter any allusions an experienced reader may have grown to expect. And thus, placed innocently in amongst a row of Harlequin Blaze titles there was The Domino Effect, by Julie Elizabeth Leto. Domino Black is a spy as only politically clueless, paranoid people can imagine them for popular entertainment. She wears tight-fitting outfits, has cool gadgets and kills terrorists and third-world dictators for a shadowy organisation named The Shadow, a top-secret government agency that officially doesn't exist. Oh, book. Your readers have already abandoned any hope of you being pleasurable and disease-free, but what the hell, we are feeling frisky. Go on...

Her tough-talking handler sends Domino undercover into the suave and sophisticated Club Cicero, owned by the sexy and mysterious Luke Brasco, a man the government believes is about to sell classified documents to terrorists, revealing the names and locations of spies around the world. She must murder the sonofabitch for the sake of democracy. But wait! For this is the United States and they have a sworn policy to only kill morally-heinous evil-doers. They can't just go around shooting people who might have anti-American agendas. And so it is up to Domino to infiltrate the nightclub and investigate Luke, and by investigate we mean find the truth, and find the truth by whatever means necessary, and by whatever means necessary we mean have sex with him.

Will this enigmatic and emotionally-cold woman slowly warm to a man she may have to kill, before their growing bond forces her to reject her life's work and renege on the operation, only for it to turn out the guy is not the traitor, but someone close to him who she will have to kill, thus revealing her true self and destroying the love between the man and she, until an extremely unlikely plot contrivance brings them back together where they forget everything that had happened up until that point, leaving the poor and foolish reader with those memories and hoping for a plot contrivance so they too can forget about everything as well? Although a predictable ending is part of a romance novel's appeal, for anyone who yearns for change a thrilling plot running parallel to the romance sounds as if it could be an intriguing ploy. We know Luke is innocent and he and Domino will end up together, and yet we remain in the dark about who the real villain is. Might it be one of the other characters in the story? we wonder aloud to concerned onlookers on the bus. After all, besides Luke there are only three possible suspects and two of those are quickly ruled out. Looks as if we shall be reading until the end this time to find out what we already knew before we had begun.

Not only does The Domino Effect have a mystery complicating the emotional journey of the characters, it also offers an entirely redundant and inane secondary romance. For the first time in our Mills & Boon reading there were other characters engaging in adulterous acts, their sordid actions having no bearing on the main story. Club waitress and sexy bombshell Sienna Monroe wants Mikey something Italian, the muscular club security chief. The only thing standing in her way? Mikey is married and his wife is pregnant with twins! Well, that certainly is a stumbling block. Furthermore, Mikey loves his wife and doesn't want Sienna. Soon enough, of course, Mikey has had too much to drink and Sienna has put his penis in her mouth and there's really only one result from that situation. By the time our story has wound to an end Sienna is missing, Mikey is begging his wife for forgiveness and the twin babies are facing a sad future which will one day end in their own broken marriages and a lonesome vodka Christmas. Why did Leto deem it necessary to add these brief interludes? Was it because she guessed the traitor plot was too engaging and she wanted to infuriate her readers with lengthy and pointless asides? Is there a message buried in there, suggesting no matter how happily married a man is he will still cheat and voluptuous twenty-year-old coquettes always get what they want while the rest of us wonder why they wanted it in the first place? No one on the bus knew either.

Further removing The Domino Effect from your typical Harlequin fodder is the lead character. When she reveals her name is Domino, Luke replies, 'Like the game?' She says yes, but the reader should assume they were confusedly referring to Dominoes. Miss Black has committed hundreds of murders without showing signs of remorse or thought. She is unwaveringly loyal to imperialistic greed and she finds herself sexually attractive. “She'd always loved the way she looked,” the narrator tells us, as Domino grows more empathetic by the word. In her introductory notes, Leto tells her excited readers that she is, 'exploring the good girl/bad girl dichotomy in (her) heroines,' and, 'Domino is perhaps (her) edgiest heroine to date.'

Fair enough, but let us examine her comments. Domino has no virtuous qualities. She is edgy, perhaps, if you are willing to misuse the word, and she does test the reader's own moral code. Usually the insipid, anaemic beauties of romance fiction deserve their loving lot because everyone deserves a shot at happiness and some folk are easier to please than others. Domino, however, is a step too far. Now, no one worth speaking to considers Mr. & Mrs. Smith a good film, but the one lesson the viewer can learn from that error in judgement, besides never share your film's title with a Hitchcock movie, is that assassin is an unsuitable profession for a romantic lead. Domino proves the point. Even if we take the novel's hilarious political rhetoric at face value there is still the fact she displays no emotional connection to anyone throughout the book. She alienates every female character because of her beauty and curt manner and she alienates the reader for more than those two reasons. While she and Luke enjoy a rigorous and healthy sex life there are few romantic feelings shared between them. Domino can light a bunch of candles and she can even fall asleep on his elbow but their entire relationship is built around a façade. Luke's only personality trait appears to be his zero-tolerance toward criminal behaviour, thus making Domino an unlikely partner.

Furthermore, if the United States requires a top-secret unofficial branch of international and domestic espionage then what are the chances this outfit is committing acts of pure altruistic heroism? Why is Domino being asked to undertake such a simple assignment which a regular and existing law enforcement agency could have easily looked after, she constantly asks herself and the author? We never find out, a glaring omission in a book of glaring omissions. Domino is an arrogant, bitchy, self-obsessed, unrepentant mass murderer. She doesn't have a change of heart when she desires to give her work up for the love of a man. Oh no, it's only a logistical nightmare to continue killing for the government while under-taking an honest relationship. She doesn't change anything but outward appearances. She doesn't even learn a lesson. She is not deserving of a novel and she is not worth reading about. It is not edgy to expect a reader to want to see how she turns out. It is obnoxious. The Domino effect is mostly rage.

“'This is crazy,' he said, his mouth pressed against her ass”

For the reader of Bewildered Heart, the name Trish Wylie recalls the title One Night with the Rebel Billionaire and the enjoyment of said novel and the further enjoyment of critiquing it, a review that can probably be found trawling through the archives. Or scrolling downwards. As with nearly all Harlequin authors Trish has her own website, her own series of romance fiction writing guides, her own weblog and her own Twitter account. On her blog, Writing & Other Assorted Forms of Insanity (a title of great offence to a writer, for numerous reasons) Wylie took time from her hectic schedule of writing in various forms to write a retort to an article that appeared online over at the Irish Independent, written by Patricia Casey and concerning the detrimental effects Mills & Boon has had on modern culture and Feminism. Oh no, she didn't! But oh yes, she did. In fact, she didn't, but Wylie couldn't resist needlessly defending her publisher and as a weblog who has read a handful of Mills & Boon books Bewildered Heart feels itself in a position of authority to wade into the debate. We read the books and therefore we get to make fun of how terrible they are.

Wylie's beef with Casey stems from the journalist's lack of first-hand experience with the material. Immediately you must be thinking there's an innocent journalist, an arrogant and knowledgeable author with years of romance under her notched belt, a classic misunderstanding and now a heated disagreement filled with tension, longing looks and unspoken desires. We're only two hundred pages of stubborn idiocy away from true love! You're foolish to be thinking that. Let's begin with the Casey article written for the Alternative Health section of her website. “The hero is tall and handsome with a thick mop of hair; the heroine has a sylph-like attractiveness, and is never overweight. She is often vulnerable and fragile. The hero may be a doctor, pilot or a billionaire while the heroine is a nurse, air hostess or poverty-stricken beauty. He saves lives through his psychological prowess and is always considerate and insightful. She, on the other hand, is gentle and supportive,” writes Casey, cryptically.

Isn't considerate and insightful the same as gentle and supportive? It is obvious that while Casey has never read a Mills & Boon her evidence comes from reading other articles about the same subject. She is merely recycling facts. And it is these recycled facts that Wylie takes issue with. Casey publishes statistics of the upsurge on electronic downloads proving that the digital era has facilitated the prosperity of the download and online markets. Amazon.com was really struggling before the internet was invented, dontchaknow? Never mind that though, because we covered this months ago. The idea that electronic downloads means young people can read erotic romance without having anyone see the book cover isn't Casey's thought, but Wylie shoots back sarcastically that Harlequin's success has, “Nothing at all to do with an increased need for escapism from real life due to the economic climate and the pressures people are facing on a daily basis. The same upsurge wasn't seen in the 1920's, was it?”

As Casey remarks, “In a complex and capricious world, a storyline that predictably culminates in a happy ending provides a degree of insulation against harsh reality and reassures the reader that good things can happen.” Trish Wylie can trash Patricia Casey all she likes about the lack of research in the offending article, but had Wylie actually read Casey's argument she would have found herself in agreement. After all, they are saying the same thing. This wouldn't be such a palaver had Wylie not rallied against Casey's ignorance for three thousand two hundred and twenty-nine words. “The handsome men and exotic locations capture the imagination and give a glimpse of what life could be like, although most women also accept their escapist value.” Casey ends her piece with such a shocking and hurtful statement it is no wonder Wylie was so upset. Her response to Casey pointing out how successful romance books are? Publishing figures showing how successful romance books are. That'll show her, Trish.

When Casey suggests sometimes books take place in exotic locations Wylie angrily points her to the Mills & Boon website where we are told the stories are, 'Set against a backdrop of luxury, wealth and international locations.' How dare she rephrase that poorly-written and grammatically incorrect tag-line! Then Wylie reveals the full force of her ire: “Was this after he saved her from an oncoming train by untying her from the railway tracks with 'psychological prowess'? In my seven years of writing romance, I can honestly say I've never had a hero kiss a heroine 'fulsomely on the lips'. Can't remember ever reading that description either. The heroine 'reluctantly submits' to her 'previously denied attraction to this tower of masculinity'? Hasn't been a whole heap of denying going on in my Modern Heat books. Or reluctant submission for that matter. And heaven forbid a woman should be happy the man she loves, loves her too! What woman could possibly want THAT?”

OK. You're misguided and your blog needed updating. We understand that, but you're nitpicking when you say you've never used the word “fulsomely”. As for the heroine's reluctant submission to a kiss from the hero? Bewildered Heart has only reviewed one of Trish Wylie's books, One Night with the Rebel Billionaire, and that is exactly what happens. The girl, Roane, isn't fond of the man, Adam, but then he surprises her with an enforced kiss, which she relents to after a brief struggle. So maddening was the scene part of the passage became a post's title. The anger never subsides, but there is one final disagreement worth mentioning and that, of course, is the fertile topic of Feminism. Casey makes a valid point, “Feminists have castigated these books for stereotyping women into particular roles. They claim that although there has been some evolution in the female characters over time, the constant portrayal of women as passive and submissive is unacceptable.” While these are Casey's words, she indirectly quotes from writers such as Julie Burchill, who wrote Mills & Boon books were 'rape fantasies', "Man chases woman, woman resists, and finally, woman submits in a blaze of passion."

Wylie, “Constant portrayal. Wouldn't that be another sweeping generalization? Considering this article is chock-a-block with the same uninformed, patronizing tone I've read before from the kind of feminists who haven't - and wouldn't be seen DEAD - reading a Mills & Boon, I'm finding it a tad hard to care what they think any more than they care what I think (unless it matches up with what they think, I should think). I always thought a huge part of the feminist movement was a woman's right to freedom of choice. As a modern, independent woman I'm no more going to have my reading preferences dictated to me by a card-carrying feminist, uninformed journalist or a literary snob, than I am anyone - be it female or male.” Maybe feminists could download Mills & Boon so no one would know what they're reading? But yes, to hell with feminists always forcing women what to do. Gawd, they're worse than men. From a feminist standpoint the idea of a passive and submissive heroine might be upsetting, but it is equally upsetting from a literary position. It's sexist, perhaps, but really it is lousy writing. Wylie is probably correct in doubting feminists care about Mills & Boon. No one should care about romantic fiction enough to write a lengthy riposte on their blog about it. The only person who cares the right amount seems to be Patricia Casey, who couldn't even be bothered to source her information.

“Man, but he loved her”

One Night with the Rebel Billionaire opens appropriately enough with gratuitous nakedness. But don't fret, nudity fans, because there's plenty more where that came from, all dealt with coyly and without description by Trish Wylie, a happy romance author, if you take her word for it. Her 2009 effort tells the story of Roane Elliott, a virginal twenty-seven-year-old whose Dad was the chauffeur for the Bryant clan, owners of the Bryant Corporation, one of those businesses that makes a fortune without offering any explanation of how. Since her father's passing Roane took a job flying clients and colleagues to and from the Martha's Vineyard Bryant home and the Manhattan offices of the company, trips taken daily because the Bryant dynasty hates the environment. Roane grew up with the Brothers Bryant, the younger Jake and the elder, the dark and mysterious and brooding Adam. Jake, the nice one, stayed and ran the family business, while Adam cut himself off from his disapproving father and has never come back.

One starry night Roane meets an enigmatic and gorgeous stranger on her company's private beach. She acts in shocked outrage, but revels in the sight of male flesh in all its dangled glory. You have one guess to guess who this man turns out to be. Did you guess Adam Bryant, the enigmatic billionaire owner of the Bryant Corporation finally returned to make peace with his ailing father? The Other Brother, or Adam, or The Guy would have all been acceptable answers. Now, what a pickle for dear Roane. On the one hand she's instantly infatuated with Adam and his sturdy forearms, rippled pectorals, thick eyelashes (the eyelashes get mentioned a few times every chapter), lazy smile and constantly changing eye colour. Yet on the other hand she's a woman of principle who doesn't jump into bed with any strange man, especially one who arrogantly dismisses her as 'Little Girl' and generally behaves arrogantly. Also, Roane loves Jake like a brother and loves the Old Man Bryant as anyone good-hearted loves a really old man. Not to mention she has had a lifetime of being aware of how terribly Adam treated both of them.

But these minor grievances are merely delaying tactics from the inevitable, and so Roane leaps, nay soars, into bed with Adam and finally experiences the orgasm she had until then only read about in bad romantic literature. Adam, it turns out, is an incredible lover and soon Roane is in love with him, despite knowing that soon he will have to leave Martha's Vineyard for that stuff that he was doing in places other than Martha's Vineyard before the story started. If that sounds vague it's because Adam is darkly secretive and Roane must use her delicate fragility to coax the truth from him. If that still sounds vague it's because the reader isn't delicate or womanly enough to coax the truth from the author. Happily, there is time for the giddied-up couple to indulge in some food shopping and outdoors sex before Roane is forced into remembering all those things about Adam she had been ignoring in order to find him a pleasant companion. However, these things are quickly resolved and had actually just been the result of a series of misunderstandings and plot contrivances. Phew! The only real trouble concerns Adam's relationship with his father, but that isn't important, says the book, skipping the matter entirely, because the father is old. Fuck old people.

There still remains one problem once Adam has finally been portrayed as a nice chap with only the best wishes for other people in his heart. Adam can't give Roane what she wants, and that thing is love. 'I want you,' he tells Roane. 'And I need you, God only knows how much,' but he cannot fully commit to love, because he doesn't know what love feels like. The implication being that God isn't telling. He touches a boiling kettle. 'Is this love?' he asks, with an endearing scowl. 'Oh, silly.' Roane replies, 'Why don't we look up Love in a dictionary, or on Wikipedia?' And they do and then Adam, despite all his intelligence, accepts that he's a ridiculous creation with no credibility as a human being. The End. As endings go it is pretty magical. The epilogue uses the future to emphasize how right the author was when she explained how these two were right for each other, despite the reader's reservations. In fact, Roane and Adam get married and have a baby and call out 'I love you' at inappropriate times in public locations. And thus the book closes at a brisk one hundred and eighty four pages. From a tricky meet cute the couple have made it, going from confidently naked to nakedly confident.

Continuing on from our discussions on the nature of hero and heroine construct, Adam Bryant is a fairly stereotypical Mills & Boon hunk of masculinity. He's cocksure, he's tanned and muscular, he has thick brown hair with specks of blond, his eyes change colour depending on mood, sometimes becoming hooded and lightening during times of levity. He's mysterious and abrupt, he is sexist and cruel and intelligent and a billionaire. And like the very worst kinds of men he doesn't fall in love with everyone he meets, instead falling slowly for the right woman and then mating for life. His only character flaw? Not being in love, an issue revolved by the end of the book, thanks to the hard work and dedication of Roane Elliott, your stereotypical Mills & Boon babe. She's a weak protagonist, but not weak in the virtuous way that all females are weak and therefore adorable.

Roane's journey involves forcing change on the personality of Adam. Her emotional obstacle would appear to be his misguided perception of her. She does not need to change, no, he only needs to see her for who she really is. This happens relatively quickly and then it is merely up to Roane to resolve Adam's problems which stem from an inherent issue of miscommunication over the Bryant Corporation's Assets and fraternal fighting liberally borrowed from Rumblefish. It is a wonder why novels such as One Night with the Rebel Billionaire are chosen as prime publishing fodder by Mills & Boon. Their clichés so clichéd and their stereotypes so stereotypical the stories become self-referential parodies of the genre. There is little here to distinguish Adam Bryant from all the previous and future Adam Bryants and even though he found the happiness he did not deserve the reader will always wish marriage to Roane Elliott on him as punishment for his pathetic behaviour to everyone who seemed to adore him for reasons they will fail to discern.

“What kind of woman was turned on by a naked stranger in the middle of the night?”

One of the dangers of reading romance fiction is the unrealistic expectations it puts on real life living. To treat the characters of One Night with the Rebel Billionaire as figures of escapist fantasy is fair enough, but the story becomes empty spectacle, fairytale scenarios masquerading as dramatically heightened soap operas. Mills & Boon picks at the facade with the introduction of emotional neuroses. This is a worthwhile endeavour, as flaws are endearing and the reader must find the characters loveable enough to follow. Their physical perfection is problematic in itself, but people don't want to read about ugly people anymore than they want to see them on the street. Nevertheless, a little humanising can go a long way. Forgetting our feelings on humans for a moment, these sexual predators and stunning virgins can only suffice on purely superficial terms. For deep-rooted bonding, the kinds of life-changing connections the books are supposedly indebted to uncovering, perfection just does not cut it. The Mills & Boon writer must create a hero the female readers will fall in lust with and then later, after pages of enigmatic eyelash-fluttering and brooding looks, allow that lust to become love, unconditional and forgiving, a soul-baring devotion.

So, how does an author, inexperienced in the ways of desirable men, create such a Lothario, a man full of passion, intensity, sexual prowess, knowledge and misogyny, without turning him into the jerk he sounds like? Well, fortunately Mills & Boon themselves are here to help and they realise that, “it’s not always easy to create an Alpha hero,” because, “We live in an age where equality is (quite rightly) the aim and male strength can be seen as oppressive.” You're gosh darn right, helpful little lady, and thank you for pointing out that equality is the aim, because it's easy to lose track of human progress. So how do we create an Alpha Hero without making him seem like an oppressive force and you know, rapey? As it happens, it is merely a matter of modernising unrealistically. Modern cultural male heroes are now peacemakers, environmentalists and family men. Apparently. Admittedly, a family man sounds like a stretch for romantic lead, but the first two are acceptable. Men must be strong, but their strength should be productive.

They should also be gorgeous, but should never be seen working on their beauty, such as modern types who moisturise and wash. They should be able to wake up in the morning and throw on a T-shirt and be as minty-fresh and equally irresistible as they would be dressed for seduction. According to Mills & Boon our Alpha Male must satisfy two narrative requirements. He must “take control” and he must “drive the story”. Now let's ignore the first of these for a moment, because it's vague enough to be rendered meaningless. The latter, however, is worth a mention. If we assume that our female lead is our protagonist, and the story's emotional centre, then she must drive the story. Her passiveness, while sexy, is not worthy of a heroine. The man takes control and drives the plot? That's sexist, Mills & Boon, and to think, seconds ago you were using brackets to prove how progressive you are.

Further tips include:

“Recognise that he is the ultimate nurturer and build his character around this trait. He acts for the welfare of others and he is the one who recognises the heroine’s true goodness and worth.

Build a list of his strengths and reveal them as his character develops in your story.

Show his passion for his work, his life and in the bedroom!

Know his flaws and have the heroine, and the storyline, challenge them – so that he has to contemplate changing himself and his behaviour. Though changing will always remain his choice!

Be clear about the heroine’s emotional and sexual needs. It is through her journey of fulfilment via the hero that the reader gains insight into his character.

Use writing technique to create a more complex rendering of his character, such as male point of view, and semi-climax when crisis occurs as a result of the hero’s flaws.

Be sure that by the last chapter our hero has experienced his own emotional journey and he’s ready to settle down to a happy ending.”

There you go, a neat list. Recognise, Build, Show, Know, Be Clear, Use Writing Technique and Be Sure. Seven points to follow and you have your male lead. Most importantly there's this, “An Alpha male should still be vulnerable – even if he’s too proud to admit it! We need to see that underneath the arrogance, charm or guarded heart, he’s capable of great emotional depth.” Agreed. Bewildered Heart also believes the most vital element to fleshing out a Hero is making him capable of emotion. Before you, dear reader, note with incredulity that these writing tips are useless, please bear in mind they're only the initial prompts. We take these non-committal and occasionally hilarious tips and use them to mould the man we already have in our hearts. Naturally, as this is a romance story we want a man with the ability to love, who sees the heroine for who she really is. After all, having him not fall in love with a false impression of her would be detrimental to our book. Hah! Only kidding, Mills & Boon, your helpful hints are idiotic.

Later on, as we properly prepare to create our Alpha Male we will build a list of his strengths, but for now let's mention the few traits clearly fundamental. Strength, Nurturing, Kindness, Perception, Passion, Talent, Bedroom Skills, Charm, Confidence, Hair. We'll add more as we go along. As we construct our itinerary of strengths, we will begin work on his flaws, remembering that misogyny and commitment-phobia aren't flaws, they're not even words. These issues will help humanise him for both the reader and the heroine, allowing us, the author, to colour him with a personality. Now, our hero only exists through the eyes of the heroine, and he is defined by what he represents to her. At first he usually represents an irritation, an arrogant, but devastatingly handsome, stranger who stands in her way, because he wants to build a hotel on the seal sanctuary she works to save. 'Damn the seals,' he says, his thick eyelashes fluttering in the gentle breeze. 'Ugh, what an obstinate jerk,' she thinks, 'If only I didn't badly yearn to birth him numerous children!' So the heroine comes first and the hero is created based on the fulfilment of her journey to over-come whatever character flaws she has. And thus they become the perfect fit, finally allowing us to use the word perfect without it feeling deeply inappropriate. For the sake of time it is best to gloss over the 'Use Writing Technique' tip, and yet it is the most fascinating on the list. Anyone who has read plenty of romance fiction will know that semi-climaxes just do not occur. These characters just aren't almost kinda people.