By any standard, Shirley Hailstock is a romance-writing star.
Not only has she penned more than three dozen novels and novellas, she's won dozens of awards, written best sellers, and previously presided over the romance industry's leading professional organization, the Romance Writers of America.
So, naturally, she gets fan mail. And there's one letter from 1999 that she hasn't forgotten.
The letter was from a self-proclaimed fan, also a romance author. It was meant to be a compliment.
"I'm writing to let you know how much I enjoyed 'Whispers of Love.' It's my first African American romance," the writer wrote, as cited by reports published two decades later. "I guess I might sound bigoted, but I never knew that Black folks fall in love like White folks. I thought it was just all sex or jungle fever I think 'they' call it. Silly of me. Love is love no matter what color or religion or nationality, as sex is sex. I guess the media has a lot to do with it."
"It just floored me," Hailstock told CNN. "I didn't understand."
The letter went viral in 2019, making its rounds among the online romance community. Many were shocked, infuriated even. The letter was only 20 years old. Just three years before, Denzel Washington had been named People magazine's "Sexiest Man Alive." Prince had built his career in the decade prior on sexy, love-making music. And popular sitcoms like "Living Single," "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air" and "A Different World" had been showing Black people living their best lives, including romantically, for years.
"That is a little indicative of romance readership," said Jodie Slaughter, a modern romance author. "For a very long time, the bulk of the romance audience, being straight, cis(gender) White women, have found themselves completely uninterested in understanding the fact that other people who are not like them do in fact experience romance."
More than 20 years later, the romance genre -- one of the biggest moneymakers in publishing -- is seemingly more diverse than ever. Gay and lesbian romance novels have become best sellers, and covers featuring lovers of all races and shapes grace bookstore displays. Some characters struggle with mental illness (as in Slaughter's "Bet on It"); others are neurodivergent (as in Helen Hoang's "The Kiss Quotient."). And these are not fringe books -- these are some of the most popular novels in the genre today.
But, as some say, visibility can be a trap. And for authors of marginalized groups writing characters outside of the majority, questions linger. Is this visibility an authentic push toward a more inclusive industry, or is it simply a feeble response to societal trends?
"It appears that things are getting better, and that's the whole point," said Leah Koch, co-owner of The Ripped Bodice, a romance book store in Culver City, California. "It appears."