--- title: How Romance Novels Are Feminist description: Hear how writing romance novels is a feminist act, according to 'Beautiful Bastard' author Christina Lauren. canonical: https://time.com/4718350/romance-novels-are-feminist/ author: Christina Lauren article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-03-30T16:01:37.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T09:05:18.701Z og:title: Writing Romance Novels Is a Feminist Act og:description: 'Sex and free agency are empowering' og:url: https://time.com/4718350/romance-novels-are-feminist/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt9ba05c8338ca6dee/6988c08d4dd2154983efe539/romance-novels-are-feminist.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 5150 og:image:height: 2897 og:image:alt: Pen and pages of notebook forming heart-shape og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Writing Romance Novels Is a Feminist Act twitter:description: 'Sex and free agency are empowering' twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt9ba05c8338ca6dee/6988c08d4dd2154983efe539/romance-novels-are-feminist.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Writing Romance Novels Is a Feminist Act > Sponsored content. 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Worth Your Time is TIME's culture newsletter, published Tuesdays and Saturdays to 40,000 subscribers as of August 2026. #### Who writes TIME's culture recommendations? Culture editor Eliza Berman writes Worth Your Time, drawing on TIME's critics and culture desk. #### Is Worth Your Time free? Yes. It is a free newsletter available at time.com/newsletters. by [Christina Lauren](https://time.com/author/christina-lauren/) ## Christina Lauren Mar 30, 2017 4:01 PM UTC  Pen and pages of notebook forming heart-shape Pen and pages of notebook forming heart-shapeGetty Images by [Christina Lauren](https://time.com/author/christina-lauren/) ## Christina Lauren Mar 30, 2017 4:01 PM UTC Before we became full-time writers of romance, we had other careers. Lauren was doing neuroscience research at a pharmaceutical company. Christina was working with teenagers in a junior high counseling office. When we left our jobs to write, people were excited for us, but there was always the unspoken question: How can you call yourselves [feminists](http://motto.time.com/4618842/carrie-fisher-best-feminist-quotes/) and write romance novels? Mothers of our kids’ friends would ask us if our books were “trashy.” Book clubs would invite us to come and talk about our novels, and then ask if we had “unnatural obsessions“ with [sex](http://motto.time.com/4251266/end-stigma-women-sex/). People misunderstood why we left our jobs, with some hilariously assuming we had left to make pornographic films; in their heads, writing romance and making porn were that tightly connected. While we’ve had some great laughs about a few of these misconceptions, they do emphasize the perception that romance novels are about only one thing, and that there is something dirty or anti-feminist about what we do. The truth is that the stories we write create no conflict with our feminism. Sex and free agency are empowering. Deciding what you do with your own body, and with whom, is liberating. Falling in love with men does not make our heroines weak. Women’s strength comes in a million different forms, one of which is the ability to forge a connection with another person. We can find power in our sexuality, or by withholding it. We can be direct and pursue what we want, or enjoy the chase. The best romance writing portrays characters who are as varied and nuanced as real women and allows us to celebrate emotional connection. Our genre is at the forefront of inclusivity: books featuring [queer](https://www.amazon.com/Him-Sarina-Bowen-ebook/dp/B011LSLI9G?tag=mottocom-20) and [transgender](https://www.amazon.com/Hold-Me-Cyclone-Courtney-Milan/dp/1539674819/?tag=mottocom-20) couples, [racially and culturally](https://bitchmedia.org/post/three-authors-talk-about-their-favorite-romance-novels-featuring-people-of-color) [diverse](https://www.amazon.com/Bollywood-Bride-Sonali-Dev/dp/1617730157/ref=sr%5F1%5F1?ie=UTF8&qid=1490880479&sr=8-1&keywords=the+bollywood+bride) heroes and heroines, and characters with [disabilities](http://www.goodreads.com/list/show/72528.Sensory%5Fand%5FPhysically%5FDisabled%5FHeroines%5Fof%5FHistorical%5FRomance%5F) are gaining steam. In these books we can find ourselves, or see outside of our own experiences and find empathy. Our own power as women writers is just as significant as the power of our characters. In June 2012, Christina — who was living on a nine-month academic salary — was on the verge of losing her home. She asked her school’s principal whether there were any additional ways she could earn money over the summer. One week later, she found herself scrubbing lockers, polishing the gym floor and cleaning desks. She didn’t tell Lauren at the time, but that summer, Christina had made a deal with herself. If we didn’t sell a book by mid-September, she would have to retire from our writing partnership. But one week away from Christina’s deadline, we sold [_Beautiful Bastard_](https://www.amazon.com/Beautiful-Bastard-Christina-Lauren/dp/1476730091/?tag=mottocom-20). Writing romance changed Christina’s life in a profound way. It was never a question that when the books sold and we began to travel the world, our husbands would step up and cover more of the duties at home. That was their feminist contribution. Ours is using our creativity to do business as, for and about women — and writing the stories of our heroines, who have the strength to fall in love. _Christina Lauren_ _is the combined pen name of long-time writing partners Christina Hobbs and Lauren Billings, the bestselling authors of the_ [Beautiful Bastard](https://www.amazon.com/Beautiful-Bastard-Christina-Lauren/dp/1476730091/?tag=mottocom-20) _and_ [Wild Seasons](https://www.amazon.com/Sweet-Filthy-Boy-Wild-Seasons/dp/1476751803/?tag=mottocom-20) _series,_ [Sublime](https://www.amazon.com/Sublime-Christina-Lauren/dp/1481413686/?tag=mottocom-20) _and_ [The House](https://www.amazon.com/House-Christina-Lauren/dp/1481413724/?tag=mottocom-20)_._ [Dating You/HatingYou](https://www.amazon.com/Dating-You-Hating-Christina-Lauren-ebook/dp/B01M5IJK1Q/?tag=mottocom-20) _will be released in June. Find them on_ [_christinalaurenbooks.com_](http://christinalaurenbooks.com/)_,_ [_Facebook_](https://www.facebook.com/ChristinaLaurenBooks/) _and_[_Twitter_](https://twitter.com/ChristinaLauren)_._ ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4718350/romance-novels-are-feminist/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4718350/romance-novels-are-feminist/"},"headline":"Writing Romance Novels Is a Feminist Act","datePublished":"2017-03-30T16:01:37.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T09:05:18.701Z","description":"'Sex and free agency are empowering'","url":"https://time.com/4718350/romance-novels-are-feminist/","keywords":["motto","feminism"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt9ba05c8338ca6dee/6988c08d4dd2154983efe539/romance-novels-are-feminist.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Christina Lauren","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/christina-lauren/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt9ba05c8338ca6dee/6988c08d4dd2154983efe539/romance-novels-are-feminist.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Pen and pages of notebook forming heart-shape","caption":"Pen and pages of notebook forming heart-shape","creditText":"Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/motto/","name":"motto"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4718350/romance-novels-are-feminist/","name":"Writing Romance Novels Is a Feminist Act"}}]}] ```