The literati police will condemn me to a life of non-association with real readers and writers.
My crime? Taking the time to be fully absorbed, with the excitement of a fat kid seeing cake as I read: a mills and boon word for word.
I have never read a mills and boon until this past week when I was stuck in a beautiful cabin, with time on my hands tasty coffee and a growling dog on my laptop. My options were very limited.
Like sweet valley dreams, a collection of chic lit for teens, I found my choice of Mills and Boon pretty much predictable but nice to read. It felt like watching a soap opera and all the characters were fully explained: flaws and all and all I needed to do is choose to support one. Obvious choice is the victim who really is the villain. See? I was into the Storm, the title of my first mills and boon book.
So why is that all literature fundi's frown upon such a page turner? Not everyone wants to be challenged or needs to argue a point, change the world, philosophies or to question the character and their motives. Why cant reading be simple and straight forward, soppy, cheesy but nice?
The only reason I would not repeat a chic lit, if I can help it, is because it has this tendency of even affecting my diet. I know full well that carbo loading on fries and a cheese sandwich is not the Doctors advice for me, but it felt good, at the time. Now to work the calories and all that food-sin out of my system is the challenge.
