50 Fun Facts About Romance Novels

Which Derbyshire estate owned by Jane Austen's Mr. Darcy does Elizabeth Bennet tour with her aunt and uncle?

Pemberley is where Elizabeth and the Gardiners meet Darcy unexpectedly, and his gracious welcome there begins to win her good opinion.

In Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre, at which mansion does the heroine work as governess to Mr. Rochester's ward, Adèle?

Thornfield Hall takes the heroine on after she advertises her services in a newspaper, and the reply comes from its housekeeper, Alice Fairfax, not its master.

Which Diana Gabaldon novel sends army nurse Claire Randall through a Scottish stone circle back to 1743?

Outlander is how the Highlanders of 1743 see the English newcomer: a Sassenach, an outsider ignorant of Gaelic culture.

Fifty Shades of Grey grew out of online fan fiction about the characters of which bestselling vampire romance series?

Twilight inspired a serial called Master of the Universe, posted in episodes on fan fiction websites before it was reworked into a trilogy.

Which novelist's debut The Notebook was inspired by the long marriage of his wife's grandparents?

Nicholas Sparks wrote the book in six months in 1994, and the couple who inspired it had been married for more than 60 years when he met them.

Which bestselling romance author also writes the futuristic In Death police series under the pen name J. D. Robb?

Nora Roberts took the initials J. D. from her sons, Jason and Dan, and built the series around detective Eve Dallas in a mid-21st-century New York.

Which long-haired Italian-born model became famous posing for the covers of hundreds of romance novels?

Fabio Lanzoni was discovered by a photographer while working out, and at his busiest he posed for 15 or 16 book-cover shoots a day.

Which English novelist, famous for pink chiffon gowns, wrote some 723 books and was Princess Diana's step-grandmother?

Barbara Cartland sent the young Diana Spencer early copies of her novels, yet she was not among the guests at the 1981 royal wedding.

Which Daphne du Maurier novel never reveals the first name of its narrator, the young second wife of Maxim de Winter?

Rebecca is the dead first wife whose memory haunts the house, while the narrator who replaces her stays nameless from first page to last.

Which author won the 1937 Pulitzer Prize for Gone with the Wind, the only novel she published in her lifetime?

Margaret Mitchell began the book in 1926 to pass the time while recovering from a slow-healing injury from a car crash.

Which British romance imprint, founded as a general publisher in 1908, was sold to a Canadian firm in 1971?

Mills & Boon was set up by two former Methuen employees as a general fiction house, yet the very first book it published was a romance.

Which English novelist established the Regency romance, having begun with The Black Moth, a tale for her sick brother?

Georgette Heyer collected reference works and kept detailed notes on every side of the period's life to keep her novels accurate.

Which bestselling novel follows Louisa Clark, hired to look after Will Traynor, a young man disabled in an accident?

Me Before You has Louisa racing to change Will's mind about an assisted death at Dignitas, and her story continues in After You and Still Me.

Which Colleen Hoover novel follows Boston florist Lily Bloom and her relationship with the neurosurgeon Ryle Kincaid?

It Ends with Us draws on the relationship between the author's own mother and father, and she called it the hardest book she had ever written.

Which American novelist, with over 800 million copies sold, has written all her novels on Olympia standard typewriters?

Danielle Steel bought her home typewriter while working on her first book, and she has described writing sessions of 20 to 30 hours at a stretch.

Which novel began as a newspaper column and borrows its plot from Jane Austen, right down to a Mr. Darcy?

Bridget Jones's Diary grew out of columns in The Independent, and its author said she stole the plot while the BBC's Austen serial was on air.

Which young adult novel has Hazel Grace Lancaster fall for Augustus Waters after they meet at a cancer support group?

The Fault in Our Stars takes its title from Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, from a speech the nobleman Cassius makes to Brutus.

Which Hawaii-based author began with Captive Bride, written on a whim, and created the Malory-Anderson family saga?

Johanna Lindsey ranged across medieval, Viking and frontier settings and even science fiction, and many of her novels topped the New York Times bestseller list.

Which publisher, founded in Winnipeg in 1949, grew into the largest publisher of romance fiction in the world?

Harlequin began as a paperback reprinting sideline to keep a Winnipeg printer's presses busy, and its first book was Nancy Bruff's The Manatee.

About which Wuthering Heights character does Catherine say that his soul and hers are the same?

Heathcliff overhears only part of that confession and flees, misreading her feelings; he returns three years later, mysteriously wealthy.

Which Jane Austen novel, the last she completed, reunites Anne Elliot with Captain Wentworth after a broken engagement?

Persuasion turns on advice Anne took at 19, when family and friends talked her out of marrying a young naval officer without rank or fortune.

Which Jane Austen heroine tries to match Harriet Smith with the vicar Mr. Elton, against Mr. Knightley's advice?

Emma Woodhouse even talks Harriet into refusing a proposal from Mr. Martin, a respectable young farmer Harriet actually likes.

Which saga set on Drogheda, an Australian sheep station, follows Meggie Cleary's love for the priest Father Ralph?

The Thorn Birds is the best-selling book in Australian history, and its author trained as a neurophysiologist before turning to fiction.

Which novel follows Henry DeTamble, a Chicago librarian whose genetic disorder keeps tearing him from the artist Clare?

The Time Traveler's Wife was the debut novel of Audrey Niffenegger, herself a visual artist who studied at the Art Institute of Chicago.

Which Midwestern state is the setting of The Bridges of Madison County, where a farm wife falls for a photographer?

Iowa was home ground for the author, a university teacher who photographed its covered bridges while on leave and then wrote the novel in eleven days.

Which Casey McQuiston novel pairs Alex Claremont-Diaz, son of the US president, with Britain's Prince Henry?

Red, White & Royal Blue starts with the two as enemies: a scuffle at a royal wedding sends them both crashing into the wedding cake.

Which Ali Hazelwood novel has Stanford PhD student Olive pretend to date the biology professor Adam Carlsen?

The Love Hypothesis began online as Star Wars fan fiction, and its hero was renamed Adam in print after the actor Adam Driver.

Which Helen Hoang debut follows Stella Lane, an autistic econometrician who hires an escort to explore intimacy?

The Kiss Quotient started out as a gender-swapped Pretty Woman, and researching it led its author to realise that she is autistic herself.

Which Emily Henry novel has blocked writers January Andrews and Augustus Everett swap genres for a summer?

Beach Read pits a romance novelist against her old college rival, an acclaimed literary fiction author, with each writing in the other's style.

Under which pen name did Charlotte Brontë first publish Jane Eyre, keeping her identity from Victorian readers?

Currer Bell kept Charlotte's own initials, and the sisters chose such ambiguous names because they did not want to declare themselves women.

Which Kathleen Woodiwiss debut, rejected by hardcover publishers as too long, is credited with spawning modern romance?

The Flame and the Flower ran to 600 pages, so its author sent it to paperback houses instead, and Avon, the first on her list, quickly bought it.

Which nickname did 1970s historical romances earn from covers showing scantily clad women grabbed by their heroes?

Bodice rippers were summed up by a 1980 Wall Street Journal article as publishing's answer to the Big Mac: juicy, cheap and predictable.

Which romance fiction award, presented until 2019, was named for the first president of the Romance Writers of America?

The RITA honoured Rita Clay Estrada and began life as the Golden Medallion; its short-lived successor was named after another founder, Vivian Stephens.

Which Robyn Carr book series, set in a remote Northern California town, became a Netflix drama about nurse Mel Monroe?

Virgin River made its author an executive producer on the screen version, a job she also holds on the adaptation of her Sullivan's Crossing novels.

Which Jane Austen novel opens by declaring it a universal truth that a single man of good fortune must want a wife?

Pride and Prejudice opens on an irony: in that society it was the single woman without a fortune who needed a wealthy husband to be secure.

Which Gone with the Wind character answers Scarlett's last plea by saying he does not care, and then walks upstairs?

Rhett Butler says the years of hurt and neglect have killed his love, in closing pages that the author wrote before the rest of the book.

Which Irish novelist, daughter of a former Taoiseach, wrote her debut PS, I Love You at the age of twenty-one?

Cecelia Ahern is the daughter of Bertie Ahern, and the novel earned her a Best Newcomer nomination at the British Book Awards.

Which fictional estate does a nameless narrator dream of revisiting in the opening line of a Daphne du Maurier novel?

Manderley struck the author's editor as being as much an atmosphere as a thing of stones and mortar, and the dream laments that she cannot return.

In Jenny Han's teen romance series, what does Lara Jean Covey keep in a teal hatbox given by her late mother?

Love letters were the author's own teenage habit: she wrote them to boys she had crushes on, and that inspired the book.

Which 1740 Samuel Richardson novel, narrated by a fifteen-year-old maidservant writing home, prefigured modern romance?

Pamela was the first popular novel built on a courtship told from the heroine's point of view, and it was a best-seller of its day.

Which E. M. Hull bestseller revived the desert romance and became a 1921 film with Rudolph Valentino in the title role?

The Sheik was its author's first effort, and to her surprise it ranked among America's ten best sellers in both 1921 and 1922.

Which author of the Wallflowers and Hathaways romances was named Miss Massachusetts 1985 and competed for Miss America?

Lisa Kleypas went from the pageant stage in Atlantic City back to her studies, graduating from Wellesley three months after selling her first novel.

Which romance byline is the combined pen name of co-writers Ms. Hobbs and Ms. Billings, who met writing fan fiction?

Christina Lauren joins the first names of Christina Hobbs and Lauren Billings, who met online in 2009 and became co-authors a year later.

Which romantasy bestseller sends Violet Sorrengail to Basgiath War College to train as a dragon rider?

Fourth Wing gave its heroine fragile joints because the author lives with Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, and it drew on her husband's military experience.

Sarah J. Maas planned her faerie romance series about Feyre as a retelling of Tam Lin and which other fairy tale?

Beauty and the Beast underlies the opening book, in which the nineteen-year-old heroine is brought to live in the faerie lands of Prythian.

Which English author's Rutshire Chronicles began with Riders and often feature the character Rupert Campbell-Black?

Jilly Cooper finished a first version of Riders by 1970, then left the manuscript on a London bus, and the novel did not appear until 1985.

Which Detroit-born author of Night Song is known for historical romances about 19th-century African American life?

Beverly Jenkins spent lunch hours with The Journal of Negro History, and publishers were at first unsure what to do with Black stories that were not about slavery.

Which Erich Segal bestseller about Harvard heir Oliver Barrett IV and music student Jenny began life as a screenplay?

Love Story was turned into a novel at Paramount's request to help market the film, and it became the top-selling work of fiction in the US for 1970.

Which Elizabeth Gaskell novel sets Miss Hale against John Thornton, a cotton manufacturer in industrial Milton?

North and South was a title pressed on its author by Charles Dickens, her magazine editor; she had wanted to name the novel after its heroine.

In E. M. Forster's A Room with a View, Lucy Honeychurch meets George Emerson at a pensione in which Italian city?

Florence supplies the title: the travellers were promised rooms overlooking the Arno, and the Emersons offer to swap theirs.