Reading material

I read romance novels. I will read other things sometimes, but the majority of my pleasure reading is romance novels. None of the authors on my must-read list have anything new out (but one should be out in a day or two, I think), so I've been re-reading my older books. Sometimes when I read these books, I really wonder about the authors and what they consider to be "romantic". I was reading a couple of books by Claudia Dain (historical romance), and I had to put it down, because it was about to make me ill. The concept of these particular 2 books is that the woman is somehow damaged, and needs a man to fix her. She will never be complete otherwise. I'm sorry, excuse me while I *puke*.

Years ago, I read a lot of books by Cassie Edwards, until one day the underlying message of her books hit me, and then I was disgusted, and have never read any of her books since. C. Edwards writes the "Indian" love stories. Her heroines are always white, and the hero is always half Native American and the other half is white. Any male character in her books that are 100% Native American are always cruel and cold. It's as if the white heritage is what makes the hero capable of love, and worthy of being loved in return. When that finally hit me, I was repulsed by her books.

Now, I read a lot of paranormal romance. Vampires, werewolves, that kind of thing. I will occasionally pick up a "normal" romance, but not often. I do read other things, though. I read some fantasy (actually, some might argue that reading romance is the same as reading fantasy), some suspense/mystery, and occasionally, I will drift into just fiction. I also read cookbooks. I do get bored with the formula nature of the romances, but I find that a lot of mystery books suffer from that problem, too.

My favorite authors are Christine Feehan, Katie MacAlister, Sherrilyn Kenyon/Kinley MacGregor, Laurel K Hamilton and Carol O'Connell. Some of the new authors that I've started reading are Lynne Viehl, Mary Janice Davidson, Kim Harrison, and J.R. Ward. I really prefer the series type author, I think. I like being briefly introduced to a character in one book, and then getting their story later. I also like the ongoing relationship with a character.

So, who are you reading?