(I’m sure nobody really cares about this stuff, but it’s bouncing around in my brain and I like to put it into words somewhere.)

• I’m usually a pretty upbeat guy and I love a good happy story. Yet looking back at the last dozen books I’ve read, it’s what other readers call “angst-y” books that I enjoyed the most. I’m not quite sure what to make of this. I guess it’s more interesting for me to read of characters overcoming obstacles to get what they want?
• Speaking of angst, there is a surprising trend in many books where at least one of the main characters is damaged (for want of a better word) in some way. Thinking of past books, we have war injuries, car accident injuries, suffering from aphasia, suffering from acute ADHD, inconvenient lycanthropy (!), and the ever-popular emotionally-scarred-from-previous-relationships. There’s probably some interesting sociological and psychological observations to be drawn from this (power balances in relationships, masculine and feminine roles, caregiver/patient roles, etc.). I’m an engineer not a sociologist or psychologist, though. I have a sneaking suspicion it has something to do with the fact that the target demographic for these books is straight women, and the character of the relationships are being squeezed to fit what is considered current heterosexual norms.
• I am amused that every blurb for every M/M romance can be summarized with “X is a guy who <problem>. Y is a guy who <role tangential to problem>. Can X and Y <resolve problem>?”
• I have come to the conclusion that the only thing worse that M/M romance covers is M/M romance titles. Wow, there’s some tortured puns in some of those.

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