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Romance novelists share their insights and personal experiences about the romance novel industry at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020. From left are Sally Kilpatrick, Sarah MacLean and Naima Simone.
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Books by romance novelist Sarah MacLean sit ready for purchase at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
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Romance novelist Naima Simone speaks at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
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Romance novelist Sally Kilpatrick poses for a photo with a fan at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
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Romance novelist Sally Kilpatrick speaks at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
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Romance novelist Sarah MacLean autographs a book at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
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Romance novelist Naima Simone autographs a book at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
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Hampton Sides, a nonfiction author who is editor-at-large for Outside Magazine and a frequent contributor to National Geographic, speaks at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
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Author Lauren Denton speaks at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
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Novelist Lauren Denton of Homewood, Alabama, at right, talks with an audience member at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
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Authors Kimberly Belle, at left, and Emily Carpenter speak at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
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Author Kimberly Belle of Atlanta speaks at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
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Hoover Public Library Director Amanda Borden introduces short story writer George Singleton at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
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Short story writer George Singleton speaks at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
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A woman loads up on books at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
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Authors Lauren Denton and Snowden Wright speak at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
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Author Snowden Wright speaks at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
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Author Emily Carpenter, a Birmingham area native who nove lives in Atlanta, speaks at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
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Guests peruse books for sale at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
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Southern Gothic author Emily Carpenter, a native of the Birmingham area who now lives in Atlanta, autographs a book at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
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Novelist Snowden Wright, at left, autographs a book at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
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Books by romance novelist Naima Simone sit ready for purchase at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
Organizers of the 2020 Southern Voices authors conference at the Hoover Public Library spiced things up a little this year with their first-ever panel of romance novelists.
Authors Sally Kilpatrick, Sarah MacLean and Naima Simone kept a mostly female audience laughing and engaged Saturday as they discussed the romance novel industry and what it has to offer.
Romance novels make up 65 percent of the paperback fiction market, said MacLean, who is both a romance novelist and romance columnist for The Washington Post. “It is a massive juggernaut of a market, and it is deeply misunderstood,” she said.
The romance novel industry often is disdained because love is so often used to sell everything from chewing gum to car insurance, MacLean said.
“It feels pedestrian in some way when in actual fact, it’s one of the most unique personal things that any of us can experience, and it’s really universal,” she said.
The early modern romance novels of the 1970s seemed a little bit “rapey” with women being forced into experiences with men, but romance novels really are a constant reflection of the way the world is treating women and other marginalized people, MacLean said.
As more women entered the workforce in the 1980s, there were working girl romances. In the 1990s, romance novels featured more women as breadwinners and in the 2000s, there was the rise of the paranormal romance stories, she said.
The overarching theme is that romance novels allow women to escape the worries of their lives and show that women can experience happiness, love, power, pleasure and triumph, MacLean said.
Simone, whose father is a minister, said her parents have never read any of her novels, but they are supportive of her.
“He loves the idea that his daughter is writing about love,” she said of her father. “He preaches it. I write it in a different way.”
Seriously, as a pastor, he understands that love is one of the greatest powers in the world, Simone said. “It heals. It brings redemption. It causes sacrifices. It brings understanding. It brings a joy that’s beyond our understanding.
“Everybody wants love. Everybody wants to be accepted. Everybody wants to feel as if we belong,” Simone said. “We all want somebody to love us and accept us, as imperfect as we are. People are hungry for it.”
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Books by romance novelist Sarah MacLean sit ready for purchase at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
Romance readers are incredibly voracious, MacLean said. The average romance reader reads 10 to 12 books a month, she said.
A man in the audience Saturday asked if romance novels always have to end on a happy note, and the answer from the panelists was a resounding yes. “The happily ever after is the payoff,” Simone said.
Simone likes to write about women who find romance with billionaires. Her father once asked her if she ever wrote about a blue-collar man, and she tried to explain to him that’s not as romantic. “He needs a really good job,” she said.
Kilpatrick, on the other hand, said she doesn’t write about billionaires or cowboys. The men in her books tend to be small-town guys — farmers, ministers or funeral directors, she said.
And heroines in romance novels today have come a long way from the blonde, blue-eyed nurse who falls for the doctor, Kilpatrick said. Heroines today might struggle with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, but the important thing is that women with struggles also can have that “happily ever after,” she said.
The best romance writers are the ones who get you thinking there is no way the couple can ever get together, but they wind up making it happen, Kilpatrick said.
OTHER FESTIVAL HIGHLIGHTS
Romance was just one element of the 2020 Southern Voices authors conference.
The day also featured suspense writer Kimberly Belle, Southern Gothic author Emily Carpenter, short story specialist George Singleton, Mississippi novelist Snowden Wright and Lauren Denton, a Homewood author who has made the bestseller lists of USA Today, Wall Street Journal and Amazon Charts.
But several in the audience afterward commented that they found Hampton Sides, the only nonfiction writer in Saturday’s lineup, to be among the most interesting speakers.
Sides spent most of his time talking about his latest book, “On Desperate Ground,” which tells the story of feats of heroism by U.S. Marines who fought in what is considered the greatest battle of the Korean War as they fought their way out of North Korea in retreat.
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Hampton Sides, a nonfiction author who is editor-at-large for Outside Magazine and a frequent contributor to National Geographic, speaks at the 2020 Southern Voices Festival authors conference at the Hoover Public Library in Hoover, Alabama, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020.
Jennifer Fite of Tuscumbia she had never really thought much about the Korean War, but she found the details shared by Sides about temperatures 35 degrees below zero, Chinese soldiers sent into battle without weapons, and the massive number of deaths that occurred in that winter retreat to be fascinating.
Olivia Davidson, who lives in the Kirkman Preserve subdivision off Caldwell Mill Road, said that book is not one she would have picked up at the library before, but after hearing Sides talk about it, she’d like to read it now.
Davidson said she likes the variety and the hospitality at the Southern Voices Festival. “It’s a wonderful way for Hoover to share their library with other people,” she said.
Laura Stephens and Marta Gore came all the way from Kansas City for the festival. A friend of theirs from Meadow Brook, Kay Calhoun, had been telling them about the festival for years and this year bought them tickets.
“Everything about it was so much fun,” Stephens said. “It’s just so entertaining — just hearing the authors talk and how they got to do what they’re doing.” They’re such storytellers, and I’m a sucker for a book show.”
On Friday night, mystery writer Laura Lippman gave the headline speech for this year’s festival. The five-day event also included a reception with artist Carlton Nell on Tuesday, Feb. 18, and two one-act plays called “Graceland” and “Asleep on the Wind” that each were performed on Wednesday and Thursday nights.
