August 31, 2008

Mills and Boon Romances

A blue eyed, peaches and milk complexioned girl. A bronzed, muscular, multi-millionaire man. Romance. A beautiful, vixen-eyed, cold-hearted girl vying for the man's affections. This forms the plot of every mills and boon book ever written. No marks for guessing the ending of these stories. As predictable as the tip of your nose. So why are MNBs famous all over the world? Why do people read them so much? Why do I spend hours in musty second hand stalls, poring over these books, and why do I end up buying them, one for every day, to last throughout the week? For book lovers like me, reading is a way of letting out stress, and the tensions of everyday life; truth be told, I dont care if the plots are the same, or whether all the heroes and heroines of these books resemble each other to a great extent. I love reading them, period.

I am an absolute romantic at heart, and a sucker for love stories. I shed buckets of tears when I read Love Story and The Bridges of Madison County, and yes, ahem, I shed tears when reading MNBs too, though a few friends might laugh at that admission, heh. After all, what is life without fantasies? Fantasizing about our very own, personalized Prince Charming? There is a certain innocence in every MNB, which captures our heart. The girl, hopelessly innocent, falls for the hero since the start but acts like she hates him; the man, inevitably older than the girl by a few years, is a casanova, with a bevy of women on his arm, acts like he cares tuppence for the girl, and yet at the end we find all of a sudden he is madly in love with her, and was not sure whether she loved him back. Cmon, we find that a little hard to believe! And hey, dont forget the punchline, "So, darling, when did you know?!!!" Then both exchange stories about how they fell in love, and ta-da! The book ends with a kiss.

Sometimes I wonder why I read them so much; I try to psycho-analyse myself, and I wonder whether it is because I want the same to happen to me, a love story, a man who sweeps me off my feet, and then the happy ending. I created a community in orkut for MNB lovers, just for kicks; I never, ever, imagined that today the community would boast of 500 members :D Well, honestly, I feel, what Harry Potter is to kids, MNBs are to the Bridget Joneses of this world. Silhoutte Books also churn out romances, but I think they concentrate more on the physical aspect of, things; every other line has a sexual ennuendo attached to it. Nevertheless, I'm not complaining. Every girl needs some romance in her life, some spice.

All the best, dearies, if you still havent read good old mills and boon here, then please! Head for the nearest book store, buy one, curl up in bed and start reading. Ohh, yeah, dont spoil the fun by reading an ebook, you are gonna spoil the spirit of romance! Go ahead, and do share your reviews with me!