How Nora Roberts Became the Undisputed Queen of Romance

Every genre of literature has its stars. Stephen King is the reigning monarch of modern horror. James Patterson and his assembly line of ghostwriters are heralded as leaders in suspense. You could fight a veritable Hunger Games with the current figureheads of young adult fiction. With romance, there are many beloved writers who have made the genre what it is, but they all know that they’re pretenders to the throne. The undeniable possessor of the crown is the one and only Nora Roberts.

Let’s look at the numbers: Over 271 books published (57 of which are part of the In Death series, written under the pseudonym JD Robb), 75 of which debuted in the number one spot of the New York Times bestseller list; reported sales of over 500 million titles, translated into at least 25 languages; an estimated net worth of around $400 million; and the first author to be inducted into the Romance Writers of America Hall of Fame (plus 12 RITA Awards from the same organization to keep her shelves full.) This year alone, she has four new releases on the calendar. She is prolific, popular, and revered on a level that can only be rivaled by the likes of Stephen King, and even he’s never come close to matching Roberts’ output.

Born Eleanor Marie Robertson, Roberts started writing during a blizzard in February 1979. While stuck at home, with two young boys running wild, she needed something to keep her busy and sane. So she turned to writing stories, scribbling down one of the ideas that had been bouncing around her head for a while. She fell in love with the process and decided to submit one of her growing pile of manuscripts to Harlequin. They repeatedly rejected her, and she eventually landed at a then-new publisher, Silhouette Books, which was focused on American romance writers. Her first novel Irish Thoroughbred was published in 1981, and between 1982 and 1984, she wrote a staggering 23 novels for the publisher and its various imprints.

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As the years passed, her readership grew and so did her ambition. She moved from category novels to hardbacks and began a crime series set in a futuristic New York called In Death, which soon became almost as popular as her romances. Her focus moved around subgenres, from family sagas and historicals to suspense and fantasy. Soon, she was one of the biggest-selling writers of all time.

Romance is a continually evolving genre, one that has mercifully made real progress in terms of diversity and reshaping the idea of what a happy-ever-after can look like. When Roberts began writing, romance was still in its early stages as a mainstream publishing idea and could be, to put it gently, rather rudimentary in its politics. The men were brutes, the women wilting flowers, and the sex uh, let’s say, dubious in terms of consent. There’s certainly a place for that in the genre, but Roberts’ style helped to create a new path.

The typical Nora Roberts heroine can best be described as capable. She’s independent, she’s got her own job and interests (and usually a fascinating occupation at that, such as wedding planner, yoga teacher, or search-and-rescue team member.) Nobody’s going to save her when she can get the job done herself. A man isn’t a necessity, but when love strikes, they’ll embrace it wholeheartedly. What they seek is a partnership, not a savior. The banter is sharp, the familial ties or bonds of friendship as crucial as that of the love story, and the backdrop to the action delightfully scenic. Oh, and the sex is phenomenal. Of course it is. The queen of romance would never skimp on such details. It’s fair to say that Nora’s heroines influenced a generation or two. Her heroes are no slouches either, from the enigmatic Irish billionaire Roarke of the In Death series to (my personal favorite) the sweet geeky teacher Carter from Vision in White. Roberts made romance thoroughly American at a time when publishers preferred Regency homes and cravats.

All of this can make it really daunting to delve into Roberts’ bibliography for the first time. After all, when there are this many books, where the hell do you start? Yet it’s Roberts’ range in which the answer lies. Whatever kind of romance reader you are, the chances are there’s something in her back catalog that will hook you. It’s romantic suspense, however, where you’ll find the author at her sharpest. As great as Roberts is at romance, she might be better at creating nerve-shredding tension. High-stakes books like Whiskey Beach and Night Work see their heroines forced to confront dark pasts, such as dead mothers, serial killer fathers, or stalker exes. Roberts pulls no punches, delving into territory just as violent and disturbing as her crime counterparts. In the In Death series, the heroine, Lieutenant Eve Dallas, has an intensely bleak backstory and must deal with gruesome murders and corruption that often feel hopelessly unfixable. Crucially, however, Roberts’s books are never pessimistic. Goodness can prevail, usually through the aid of a strong community and an understanding that nobody is unsalvageable.

Roberts’ work is often not marketed as romance. Her suspense novels have very generic covers, usually with a picturesque setting of a harbor or forest, devoid of embracing couples or half-naked heroes with fabulous hair blowing in the breeze. That doesn’t mean her work is embarrassed to be romance. Consider it, rather, a reconnaissance operation to get more readers into the genre. Roberts herself has never rejected romance, preferring to call out the industry’s disdain towards it and the still-ongoing maligning of its cultural and creative qualities. Even the biggest-selling romance writer of her time struggled to get respect from the likes of The New York Times, which reviewed one of her books in 2004 and sneered at it for being full of “heaving bosoms and consciousness-altering orgasms.” That’s a bad thing, apparently? As she told the Guardian in 2020, crime writing is seen as “somehow OK” but “romance is relationships, love stories, forming families, an emotional bond – and somehow that’s not worthy?”

That’s what’s at the heart of Roberts’ success but also the enduring appeal of romance as a whole. At its heart is an overriding concern for people, for their lives and emotions and the sparks of joy that bolster them through painful times. There is nothing more powerful than love, not just sexual and romantic but for your friends, family, and self. To celebrate that ethos, and to do it through a thoroughly feminine gaze intended for women to consume is always a worthy pursuit. For well over four decades, Nora Roberts has offered a consistent and entertaining stream of books that indulge and rejoice in the entanglements of people, with a hefty dose of love on top. It’s no wonder she’s stayed on top for so long. 500 million sales can’t be wrong…

Kayleigh Donaldson is a critic and pop culture writer for Pajiba.com. Her work can also be found on IGN, Slashfilm, Uproxx, Little White Lies, Vulture, Roger Ebert, and other publications. She lives in Dundee.