Enhancing Real-Life Relationships Through Romance Novels and Emotional Openness - Christina Baber

Ever wondered how your favorite steamy romance novels might actually be enhancing your real-life relationships? Renowned author and clinical psychologist Christina Baber joins us to uncover this intriguing connection. Christina shares her expertise on how these novels are more than guilty pleasures—they’re a treasure trove of insights into intimacy, offering a safe haven to explore fantasies and improve your communication with partners. Get ready to discover how romance narratives can serve as an unconventional yet effective form of adult sex education, challenging the often unrealistic portrayals found in mainstream media.

As we navigate the evolving landscape of romance literature, we delve into its significant role in promoting healthy masculinity and consent. Traditional publishers are now embracing diverse stories that break stereotypes and tackle crucial topics like agency and consent. Through the lens of romance, we explore narratives that celebrate emotional openness in male characters and portray healthy relationship dynamics. Christina helps us understand how these stories encourage readers to set boundaries and seek support in complex situations—promoting a culture of respect and mutual understanding.

Our conversation also uncovers how romance novels confront sexual shame culture and its detrimental effects on relationships. Misguided beliefs about gender and desire can lead to unhealthy dynamics, but with open communication and the right guidance, more consensual partnerships are possible. Whether you're new to the genre or a seasoned reader, we'll guide you through the world of romance novels, from sweet to explicit, as they entertain, educate, and inspire. So snuggle up and join us on this enlightening journey, where pleasure meets authenticity, and every page turn could be a step towards a more fulfilling intimate life.

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Chapters

• 0:06 Romance Novels for Better Intimacy
• 12:09 Promoting Healthy Masculinity and Consent
• 18:53 Exploring Romance Novels and Intimacy
• 26:13 Pleasure Principles for Intimate Reading

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:06

Welcome to Pleasure Principles. I'm your host, avik, and today we are diving into a world where fantasy meets reality. Romance novels, yes, but not just any romance novels. We are talking about the steamy, heartfelt stories that don't just spice up your imagination, but can also transform your sex life in real and tangible ways. So joining us today is Christina Baber, so welcome to the show, christina.

Speaker 2: 0:40

Hi, thank you for having me. I'm so excited to be here.

Speaker 1: 0:43

Nothing, nothing. Thank you so much, christina, for joining us today, but before we start our conversation, I'd quickly love to introduce you to all of our listeners. Dear listeners, christina is an author who combines her expertise in clinical psychology with the talent for crafting for crafting so unworthy character combines her expertise and a character-driven romance that's a little bit nerdy and a little bit dirty. So she's here to share how those stories are more than just guilty pleasures. So they are your secret weapon to better intimacy and stronger connections. So grab your wine or tea or whatever you're fancy, so let's get into it. Welcome to the show again, christina.

Speaker 2: 1:37

Thank you, I'm happy to be here. I love to talk about romance novels and the power that they can have in helping people explore more pleasure in their lives, so this is a great topic and I'm super excited to be here.

Speaker 1: 1:50

Lovely, lovely. So to start with, I mean can reading romance novels really improve sex life?

Speaker 2: 2:02

I mean, if you can share, Sure, yeah, I think so For a couple of reasons. One is helping well, maybe more than a couple of reasons. One is helping us explore our fantasies. Two is the modeling of techniques. There is real information in romance novels. Not all of it is real information, but I think you can pick out the real information in romance novels. Not all of it is real information, but I think you can pick out the real information.

Speaker 2: 2:28

And then for women, another reason for women we require a little bit of, we require more than just genital stimulation to get aroused oftentimes. And so a lot of that has to do with us connecting into our fantasies and our what turns us on and then get our mind and our brains thinking about that, and then that helps us to get a little bit more turned on and then we're more open to the idea of sex. So you know, romance novels are a great way for us to tap into our fantasies. As I said, we're often drawn to the, into our fantasies. As I said, we're often drawn to the same kinds of stories, the same kinds of heroes. There's things like the bad boy redeemed or the lover who is so overcome with passion that they kind of quote unquote can't control themselves. So these are common fantasies and often we as readers, we gravitate towards that fantasy in all the novels, in all the romances that we read, and so that helps us key into some of our fantasies.

Speaker 2: 3:33

So, for example, the fantasy of a lover being so obsessed with me that he just cannot control himself is not a safe in real life situation. In real life that fantasy can lead to assault, violence, stalking, like that is not as safe in real life fantasy. But it is a fantasy that's safe for me to read about. And then, once I know that that's a fantasy that I have and that I like, I can talk to my partner about ways that he can help me feel as if he's obsessed with me or he must have me, or create a safe space where he overpowers me in a fully consensual way. He overpowers me. That can feed into that base sexual fantasy that I have in a safe way.

Speaker 2: 4:19

So but if I didn't know? But from reading romance novels and thinking about what, what aspects of the romance novel turned me on, if I didn't know about that, I might not be able to articulate that to my partner to say, hey, you know, this is a fantasy that I have, this is something that you could do for we could bring into the bedroom, that you could do for me. That would just make sex so great for me. And you know most partners want to please their partner in bed and you know most partners want to please their partner in bed and vice versa.

Speaker 2: 4:45

You know, you might have your other partner, may have you want to hear about them. Say, hey, you know, read this novel and see what you, you know, read these novels together and what about this character turns you on and how can I be more like that heroine for you? Those kinds of conversations. Sometimes reading romance novels can help you articulate, can give you a place to start in articulating what you like. So, yeah, so they can definitely impact your sex life in a positive way, in a very real way.

Speaker 1: 5:18

Okay, great, and also like so you have called romance novels the sex education for adults. So what does that mean? I mean, why do you think that it's so, so important?

Speaker 2: 5:32

Well, I think, in the absence of quality sex education as we come of age, a lot of us are missing good information as we grow up and oftentimes are turning to things like porn, which porn has its purpose in the world, but educating people about the realities of sex and pleasure are not. That's not the point of porn. Porn performers will often say we are not sex educators, we are not teachers, we are performers. We are laying apart. But if that's all that you have, if that's all the information that you have about sex, then oftentimes you think that that's what sex is. And I often say like watching porn to get educated about sex is like watching Star Wars to become a pilot, like those things are not right. You know they're not the best resources of that information. So get looking at some other resources for adults, things that will help them explore.

Speaker 2: 6:35

There's tons of books out there by sex therapists, which is actually what I read. I read a lot of books by sex therapists and I try to incorporate their techniques and ideas into my steamy scenes, which is really the main reason that I write steamy. So there's a lot of information. Nonfiction books written by sex therapists. There's also romance novels are a huge, huge business. They're $1.4 billion in annual sales as of 2022. And that's more than, I think, all the other genres put together, or it's pretty competitive with all the other genres put together. So that's a huge amount of people that are reading romance, a huge opportunity to get some real information out into the world. And many of the people reading those romance novels are adults. Not everyone who reads a novel that's intended for 18 plus is 18 plus, but a lot of people are, and it's just a safer, maybe more approachable way to get some information out there.

Speaker 2: 7:33

Someone who's tentative about getting sex information as an adult? Because, as adults, we're supposed to already know right? Men are supposed to be born knowing how to please a woman. They're supposed to come into every sexual relationship with great prowess, and women are supposed to know how to feel good and how to enjoy it and how to orgasm and how to communicate with their partner. We're just supposed to be, we're just born to know that information, which is not true, you know. So as adults, we sometimes are reticent to say we don't know, and so sometimes finding information that's like reading a book on sex therapy that says you know how to have great sex on the cover could be intimidating for someone, you know, but reading a romance novel is a is a. If. I'm already reading this romance novel for entertainment and I'm also going to get some education about about what I like, how to please my partner.

Speaker 2: 8:23

Also information about consent, how to please my partner. Also information about consent, how to make consent sexy. I have conversations with people about. You know, consent doesn't have to be clinical, it doesn't have to be sign this contract or I would like to kiss you now. Okay, you may kiss me here, here, here and here. It doesn't have to be this clinical experience, and romance novels today really do utilize consent and make it sexy.

Speaker 2: 8:51

Also asking about safety, so making sure that the partner that you're with if you don't already know that partner's health background, sexy ways to ask your partner. You know, are you clear? Are there things I shouldn't do? Are there things we shouldn't, can't do, shouldn't do? And so all of that information is also included in romance novels to sort of model some of that behavior right down to like steamy scenes can give you the play by play about oral sex and penetrative sex and other kinds of sexual contact and closeness, depending on how steamy you want. Those romance novels are that you read. You can get you know some step-by-step information about how to do some of those sex acts in a more in more detail. That seems a little more fun and approachable than just reading it out of a out of a sex therapy book.

Speaker 1: 9:43

Exactly, exactly, I totally agree. And then, like your main lead's challenge, toxic masculinity. Why do you think that's so essential in today's romance genre?

Speaker 2: 9:59

Well, romance today has changed. I'll have to back up a little bit. So definitely there was a time that the Big guy rode in on a horse and scooped up the dandelion, distress and flowing hair and the Fabio covers that we all know, and that's when a lot of people who don't know about romance think about romance novels. That's what they think about. No shade to that trope. That is wonderful and fine if that's what you're into. But romance novels have really changed for a couple of reasons.

Speaker 2: 10:29

In the early 2000s, e-readers came on the market and so you could read a book and nobody knew what you were reading. Historically, if you were reading a paperback and it had that cover, you could only read it If you didn't want other people to know you were reading romance. You can only read it in the privacy of your room. Now, with e-readers, everybody can read anything and nobody knows what they're reading. You can read it on the bus, you can read it in the lunchroom at work and nobody has to know what you're reading. So that opened up the romance genre to a huge amount of new readers. In fact, e-readers, it's speculated, had the greatest impact on the romance genre, more than any other genre, more than any other genre.

Speaker 2: 11:15

And then in 2019, romance Writers of America, which was a huge professional organization for romance writers, arguably the largest, definitely the largest in the country, possibly the largest in the world I don't know that for sure, but a huge organization was really embroiled in scandal about racism and sexism. Most of the traditional publishers were implicated or at least tangentially related. One of the speculations is that people would take diverse stories to traditional publishers and they would say the only thing that people want to buy is white heterosexual stories and so cisgender people. So traditional publishers were not really open to those stories of diversity. So after that scandal, a lot of very successful writers who were traditionally published historically left and started to self-publish. Traditional publishers became more open to stories that included same-sex partners, all genders, a variety of sexual interests, and so you have much more diverse romance novel content now, and in piggybacking on that, a lot of authors have taken that opportunity not just me. Other authors have taken that opportunity to use them also to get information out. For some people, reading a romance novel may be their only exposure to the idea of agency that a married woman can be raped by her husband. Just because you're married doesn't mean you have to say yes, that might be a plot line in one of the books, a history or a wound of one of the books that are a history or a wound of one of the heroines, and so some people, this may be their only exposure to that kind of information or information about healthy, committed, loving relationships between same-sex partners. So that diversity has helped to open up people's minds a little bit. And on the other side, you know culture, I don't think will surprise anyone.

Speaker 2: 13:15

There's a lot of debate about toxic masculinity, and I tend to believe that this idea that men have to be a certain way, they have to be good at sex, they have to be providers, they have to be macho and tough and can't cry and can't feel and can't fail macho and tough and can't cry and can't feel and can't fail that, while that promotes an image that a lot of people feel is harmful to women, I think it's also harmful to men, and so one thing that I personally try to do is to create heroes who are deeply masculine, heterosexual. I'm heterosexual, so I write heterosexual stories. That's what I feel most comfortable writing, because I want to be respectful of experiences that I don't have firsthand, because I write first person POV. I write I'm in the character's head, but I want to be respectful of that diversity and not assume that I know how to do it.

Speaker 2: 14:07

So I write heroes that are masculine, heterosexual, but also very open to feelings, supportive of women, want their sexual partners to have a great time, are comfortable with agency, comfortable with consent, use consent very easily in a sexy way, and I think getting that message out that there are men out there who can be masculine and powerful and strong but don't have to be negative towards women and I think that I think it's an important message to get out there, so that we don't send the message Historically we may, in romance novels, have sent this message that here's this character, this hero that's super toxic in a lot of ways and then he becomes this great loving guy, which is that is as atropine as possible and that's a fantasy that some people have but it's not as common. It's not a common thing in real life. And so using romance novels to sort of paint a picture of healthier heroes, healthier men and how sort of model, how men can be still very masculine but also not in a toxic way, I think that's an important part of romance novels as well.

Speaker 1: 15:25

That's definitely the great one you explained and in a relationship, definitely, consent is something which is very, very important and which is should be at the top.

Speaker 1: 15:36

should be at the top, definitely absolutely yeah, but but also, uh, given the circumstances I'm taking these circumstances from the scenarios which is it is very important to take consent, whether you are in marriage or maybe doing any relationship, or maybe in living relationship, anything. But also there is a another part so this is just for discussion only so another part where we see that there are a lot of cases where there was a consent but somehow it was taken into consideration that it is abusive or maybe it's into different directions where it is denied, that consent was not taken. So in those scenarios, how one should get a help, or maybe one should take things ahead. What do you say?

Speaker 2: 16:42

So, if I'm understanding the question, it's the situation where consent was given previously but then the encounter became abusive and the person no longer wants to consent to that situation. Or are you talking about two different situations, where you had a relationship that was consensual but suddenly that not suddenly, but over time one of those partners becomes abusive?

Speaker 1: 17:05

It's a two different thing definitely, as you correctly mentioned, like one is definitely in a relationship, there was a consent and one is totally okay, but another is it was a relationship, or maybe into a marriage also, which is in a relationship, there was a consent and one is totally okay, but another is it was a relationship, or maybe into a marriage also, which is in a deep relation now, but intimacy happened in a consent way, but later it was because of some, uh like personal conflict or maybe abuse, it was taken into a different direction and it was mentioned that consent was not there and somehow it is taken in a different direction.

Speaker 2: 17:41

So in that, I think the important thing in that situation is boundaries, and I think what romance novels encourage, that's what we talk about agency, and we try to model partners, setting up clear boundaries, particularly in those situations that could become more questionable. About consent Situations where I consent to a partner and then that partner maybe takes things a little farther than I want them to. They do things that I don't want. I'm hoping that those people are in a relationship with someone where when they say no, that they you know, letting people, letting women know that they have the right to say no, even in a long-term relationship, and then I hope those women are in a long-term relationship with someone who respects their no. If they're not, then that's a different scenario. That's potentially a situation where a partner would need to reach out to a therapist, reach out for advice, reach out to professionals in their community. Potentially I don't want to say speak with law enforcement, but depending on how their relationship goes.

Speaker 2: 18:53

One of the things that I've studied, that I've researched for one of my characters, one of my books called your Turn, the heroine, is a sexual shame culture, survivor and a component of a sexual shame culture survivor. I'm sorry. The sexual shame culture world is that men are ordained to want sex and women are God ordained not to want sex. The woman's job is to have sex with the man. People coming out of sexual shame culture have talked in therapy about how the woman feels like it's her responsibility to please her husband, whether or not she wants sex or not. It is her wifely duty to do it.

Speaker 2: 19:33

So potentially that's a non-consensual situation in that relationship. She doesn't want to have sex, but she's doing it because she thinks she has to. That's potentially a non-consensual relationship that needs to be broken down, maybe in the bounds of therapy, because it's possible that he has been taught that this is his right, that this is what he can do, that this is what he's supposed to do, and so breaking down some of that education about what he, how to be a good and loving partner and helping her to practice expressing what she wants and doesn't want and talking about the components in their relationship that lead to that idea that sex is a chore or sex is a responsibility as opposed to a connecting time. The main focus is to if you're in a situation where your relationship is going in a direction that you're not happy with, it's important to reach out to a licensed professional and talk about what's going on and what you can do to change that.

Speaker 1: 20:49

Because you do have a right to say no, even if you're in a committed relationship with your partner. Exactly, yeah, I agree with this. I totally agree.

Speaker 2: 21:06

Exactly. Yeah, I agree with this, I totally agree. So, for those who have never read a romance novel, where's a good place to things? Romance? You can have all sorts of theme level, so there's absolutely sweet and clean, which is like a Hallmark movie, with even less kissing. You know. No sex on the page, not even really referenced in the relationship, maybe a kiss or two All the way to open door, you're in the room. They have sex a lot and give you the play-by-play and the details. So sort of.

Speaker 2: 21:40

I would. If you're new to romance, I would potentially, if you find that you like, say you like Hallmark movies. You think, oh, I like romance, maybe reading, maybe I'll read a romance novel. I would encourage you to check out some of the more popular authors and people like Lucy Score and Kennedy Ryan and also me and you know, check out the authors and then sort of decide do you like Steamy, do you not like Steamy? Because when you go on Amazon or on other places to buy books, usually there will be a tell that will let you know just how steamy that book is. So a lot of times they'll say they're clean, they'll say they're sweet, they're light on steam. So they might be middle ground all the way to super steamy, super spicy.

Speaker 2: 22:30

Like my books are steamy, they're explicit and I have put in my every one of my book notes that I have five plus explicit scenes. But the scenes are part of the journey. For example, my first book, your Two Lips, which is a great place to start it's. It's steamy, but it's not. It's my, it's probably the least steamy book that I'd written, and that is a story of a woman, a heroine, who has severe endometriosis, which a lot of us don't know. But endometriosis causes very painful sex in the women who have it and 6 million women in America have it disease and we don't really talk about it or know that much about it, because it has to do with sex, it has to do with our periods and nobody wants to talk about that, which I don't agree with at all.

Speaker 2: 23:17

But this character she has severe endometriosis ends up having to have a hysterectomy in order to be cured, which hysterectomy is often the only cure. There's treatments, but that's actually the only cure, I believe. So she has a hysterectomy and she can't have this part of her life becoming a mother, having a baby. So she's going to explore this pleasurable sex life because she's never really had pleasurable sex before and she meets a guy who kind of thinks he has this whole sex thing down. But it turns out that she's a little bit more complicated and they have to have conversation and what feels good, what doesn't feel good, what do you want out of this sexual relationship? And a lot of those things happen within the intimacy space of being naked in bed together in the act of.

Speaker 2: 24:11

Why I write those steamy, explicit scenes is because a lot of that character development and sexual growth, arc development happens in those conversations that happen in that during that time. So but then you know there's other books. There's books called Erotica, which is basically just sex. There's not a lot of story. It's a lot of description of sex which has a purpose, a lot of sex. Therapists encourage people to listen to erotica or to watch ethical porn, those kinds of things to help far spectrum between clean and then erotica and steamy and sexy are sort of in the middle there and that's what I write. So there's definitely a character, there's definitely a plot, a story, there's plenty of explicit sex, but it has a purpose within the character development and within the story.

Speaker 1: 25:10

Exactly Lovely. Great, that's really really great, and um, thank you so much. It was really a fun and enlightening conversation with you, christina, and um, yeah, and, and, dear listeners, like whether you are a long time fan of romance novels or just curious about how they can transform your love life, there's no denying their power to entertain, educate and inspire.

Speaker 2: 25:40

Absolutely, I agree with you.

Speaker 1: 25:43

Yeah, yeah. So if you're ready to spice up things up or more, or explore intimacy in a whole new way, then maybe it's time to pick up one of Christina's dreamy and heartfelt stories.

Speaker 2: 25:57

So both my books are written in dual POV, so one chapter is his perspective and one chapter is hers, and I encourage couples to pick up my book and read it together, maybe under the cover together.

Speaker 1: 26:13

Lovely, great so thank you so much to pick up my book and read it together, maybe under the cover. Yeah, lovely, lovely, great, great. So thank you so much, dear listeners, for tuning into Pleasure Principles, and do not forget to subscribe, leave us a review and share this episode with someone who needs to hear it. So until next time, keep it fun, keep it sexy and keep it real. Thank you so much.