Feature First love, then marriage. Then gay romance novels? June 18, 2004 If you have already found your true love, you can now go to Massachusetts, Canada, the Netherlands or Belgium. But for all the rest of us, there's Romentics. Romentics is a new line of contemporary romance novels just for gay men. Featuring handsome mechanics, dashing advertising executives, bitter ex-boyfriends, loyal fag hags, interfering parents, jealousy, drama and steamy bedroom scenes, each Romentics novel traces two gay men on their not-so-straight path to true love. Romentics is the brain- and love-child of a gay couple from Boston-both named Scott. Their work gives gay readers the first sustained access to the wildly popular but often overlooked market for romance novels, which accounts for more than half of all paperback fiction sold in the United States. Although there are gay books with romantic plots out there and historical love stories were popular decades ago, there has never been a readily identifiable line of gay romance novels comparable to – for example – Harlequin. This was the gap on the bookstore shelves Romentics authors Scott Pomfret and Scott Whittier aimed to fill. According to the Scotts, gay men are hungry to start reading about their own stories ending happily-ever-after. Interest in the Romentics line, which is available on the internet at Romentics.com, has come from all over the world, including places as far as Indonesia and Australia, and news coverage from South Africa. But what most surprised Scott&Scott (as the authors are known), was that the audience for Romentics is not exclusively gay men. A devoted contingent of straight women have been scooping up the books and writing to the Scotts to tell them how much they like Romentics. One African-American reading group in Atlanta has even chosen a Romentics novel as their first foray into gay literature. The launch of Romentics has also not gone unnoticed in the mainstream New York publishing world. In May, Warner Books (a subsidiary of Time Warner) acquired the rights to publish an edition of the first Romentics release. Hot Sauce will appear in stores everywhere (as well as Amazon) in June, 2005, during pride week. In the meantime, the rest of the Romentics line can be purchased from the Romentics Web site and at select gay bookstores, such as the Open Book in Sacremento (www.openbookltd.com). A Chapter From a Real-Life Love Story Romentics was inspired in part by Scott&Scott's own real-life relationship, which was a blue-print for the plot of a romance novel. The pair met with a fiery glance across a crowded dance floor. They quickly discovered they shared in common not only a name, but also a passion for writing. Weathering drama, jealousy, conflict, and overtime at bad day jobs, they nevertheless fell in love. They moved in together, consummated their relationship by launching the first-ever line of romance novels for gay men, and are now living happily ever after. "Actually," jokes Scott Pomfret, "we're still working on that last part!" Pomfret and Whittier come from a professional background that make them particularly well-suited to tap the gay romance market. Aside from being in a long-term committed relationship, each is a regular contributor to Playguy, Honcho, In Touch for Men, and Genre Magazine, and they have work in many anthologies, including Alyson Books' Just the Sex and the Friction series, which contains the year's best gay erotica. Romentics and Gay Marriage The launch of Romentics during the height of the battle for rights to gay marriage was not entirely coincidental. Scott&Scott believe gay writing has moved beyond the gay pulp of the 1950's, beyond post-Stonewall gay liberation literature of the 1970s, and beyond AIDS crisis books of the 1980s. "Gay marriage has shown us there's a real interest among gay men in committed relationships, true love, and romance – the very things Romentics novels are made of," Whittier said. The Scotts have drawn inspiration from the many wonderful stories about committed gay couples that have filled the pages of the mainstream and gay papers during coverage of the national same-sex marriage debate. Indeed, Pomfret acknowledges that Romentics has benefited from gay marriage. The first two Romentics novels were launched in Boston in November, 2003, just three weeks before Massachusetts' high court released the historic Goodridge decision recognizing the right to gay marriage. "We've been closely involved in the politics of the movement," Pomfret said, "and we hope to get to a point where we can donate a portion of each Romentics sale to legal groups fighting for gay marriage throughout the country." The Romentics Novels There are four novels now in the Romentics line ("and more in the works!" promises Pomfret). In Hot Sauce, a jealous and beautiful ex-boyfriend schemes to break up the match made in heaven between a gay celebrity chef and his hot club- and clothing- designer boyfriend. Razor Burn, as recently described in the Toronto Globe & Mail newspaper, is "the story of two gay men – one openly gay, one married to a woman – who have a brief encounter only to wind up at the same men's grooming-products company, working on the development of a new razor. Throw in some melodrama in the form of a case of amnesia and some explicit, though not gratuitous, sex scenes (there's a sizzling quickie by page 4), and the book mixes all the ingredients of a straight romance to whip up a happy ending." The latest Romentics releases are Nick of Time and Spare Parts. The Scotts describe "Nick" as a story about a gay stonemason who lives in the country and wants a family, who falls in love with an urban gay dancer who can't imagine anything but city life. Spare Parts, on the other hand, matches a hunky mechanic who is happy twisting wrenches and giving lube jobs, with Trent, a beautiful young photographer whose talent can't pay the bills. Although they have no trouble getting each other's motors running, things don't run smoothly when enemies and secrets from their past threaten to destroy everything. To date, the reviews of Romentics have been very positive. Richard Labonte, a regular contributor of book reviews to the Q syndicate and perennial editor of Best Gay Erotica, wrote that Romentics are "old-fashioned romances about sweet love, some sex, and scattered moments of uncertainty – the Scotts are a lean, clean writing machine, their plots are imaginatively implausible but impeccably logical, and they pull off simpleminded, goodhearted entertainment without exploding into queeny camp." (Richard Labonte, Books to Watch Out For (May, 2004)). Romentics are now available online in e-book and paperback editions. Although Pomfret and Whittier won't disclose sales figures, they expect to have broken even on their Romentics venture by mid-summer. "We aren't yet a threat to Harlequin or Danielle Steele, but we're doing pretty well," Whittier said. "Our best week so far was just before Valentine's Day; I guess people figure that if they can't find a Valentine, at least they know they'll find true love between the covers of a Romentics novel." 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