Reformed Rakes

Sawyer interviews former People Magazine reporter Michael Small about the two(ish) weeks he spent with romance cover model Fabio Lanzoni in 1993.
Michael is also the host of the podcast I Couldn’t Throw it Out. Listen to his episode, My Fun, Strange Adventures with Fabio, featuring Sarah Wendell of Smart Bitches, Trashy Podcast.
Read Michael’s 1993 People Magazine cover story on Fabio: Love for Sale

Michael’s Musical: The History of Light
Sawyer’s previous Reformed Rakes Fabio episodes: Fabio: Part One and Fabio: Part Two
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Beth’s Substack
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Set in 1865 during the Second French Empire, Moonrise by Roberta Gayle tells the story of Pascale de Ravenault, the daughter of an acclaimed artist. Pascale is an artist in her own right, though she has abandoned painting in favor of aiding her father in the business side of art. At a salon, she meets British sea captain Jack Devlin. Pascale and Jack butt heads as she fights her attraction to him, forming in spite of his cageyness about his actions that led to the danger and he worries about the gap in their stations and lifestyles. Though Moonrise starts with the promise of political intrigue and possibly sea-faring art thieves, the result is a relatively quiet and sweet book, filled with conversation and meditations on art, gendered roles and personality clashes.
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Visit our website for transcripts and show notes: reformedrakes.com
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Beth’s Substack
Chels’ Substack
Emma’s Substack
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Warrior’s Woman by Johanna Lindsey is a futuristic romance set in the year 2139 and follows Tedra de Arr, a highly skilled Security Agent who is too bodacious to lose her virginity to the puny men on her home planet of Kystran. When a failed presidential candidate launches a coup, Tedra, along with her annoying sex pest personal computer, Martha and sensual sentient robot, Corth, flee to outer space. To Tedra’s surprise, she ends up on Sha-Ka’ar, a planet chock full of big beefy blond warriors. Published in 1990, reviews, at the time, were mixed, calling it a successful romance, but a woefully underdeveloped science fiction novel. Cynthia Eisenmenger for Florida Today writes, “Although it is a bold exploration, Lindsey often appears lost in space with this new genre.”
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Visit our website for transcripts and show notes: reformedrakes.com
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Bluesky: @reformedrakes
Beth’s Substack
Chels’ Substack
Emma’s Substack
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Published in 1991, the The Gilda Stories by Jewelle Gomez starts in 1850 where we open on an unnamed enslaved girl as she kills a bounty hunter trying to capture her. We meet the first Gilda, who takes the girl in and raises her along with her partner Bird. Both Gilda and Bird are vampires with certain rules they’ve constructed to live by, including to not kill humans and aim for some sort of exchange when drawing blood from them. Gilda wearies of the world’s cyclical violence and chooses to take the true death, but not before turning the girl into a vampire. The girl, now grown up, takes on the name Gilda. What follows is a series of vignettes from Gilda’s life as she travels and lives across the United States, with the last chapter set in 2050. Gomez said of Gilda in the foreword of the 2016 edition: “Each new decade brings up reminders that the culture has not yet healed the wounds left from slavery and bigotry. Gilda must learn to leave those she loves behind without bending under the further weight of loneliness. Throughout her journey she tries to hold on to her humanity and help others to find theirs.”
Support us on our Patreon!
Visit our website for transcripts and show notes: reformedrakes.com
Follow us on social media:
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Bluesky: @reformedrakes
Beth’s Substack
Chels’ Substack
Emma’s Substack
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What makes something a romance novel? Most readers probably have an intuition of where their definitional lines are, and what are the make or break points, pushing something out of “romance” and into a neighboring genre. Critics and professional organizations of authors and publishers might provide a definition, for analysis or award purposes, to create parameters around what is the in and out group. Today’s episode is less about answering the question “what is a romance novel” and more a historiography of that question. When do we start asking it? How have the answers changed in the long arc of romance history? Who gets to decide what the final, be-all, end-all definition is? Are we ever open to change?
Support us on our Patreon!
Visit our website for transcripts and show notes: reformedrakes.com
Follow us on social media:
Twitter: @reformedrakes
Instagram: @reformedrakes
Bluesky: @reformedrakes
Beth’s Substack
Chels’ Substack
Emma’s Substack
Thank you for listening!