Romance Novel Hunks - Do you have one at home?

Yesterday, I wrote about love scenes in romance novels. As promised, here is a test to find out if your husband/life partner/boyfriend/imaginary hero is romance novel hunk material:

1. What’s his Big O scale? (For a RNH – romance novel hunk – it should be above 3)
2.  How long is his hair? (It has to be at least shoulder length)
3. How tall is he? (He needs to be at least 6’2”)
4. Does he have a lean body with six-pack abs? (Only yes or no is tolerated and both conditions have to apply)
5. Does he have chiseled face features? (Usually, his cheek bones are chiseled and the nose is straight)
6. Does he have a tortured past? (This is pretty much self-explanatory)
7. How high is his IQ? (For a RNH the IQ has to be at least 140 points)
8. How many times did he safe your life? (This can be freely interpreted – number should be between 2 and 4, though)

This list is totally incomplete. But feel free to add some features if you like.
Remember, the ‘O’ is representing the number of O’s in one single act, not several serial acts. 

Just a little side note: I remember another Linda Howard story which was a really nice read. In ‘Death Angel’, a Mobster pimps out his girlfriend to his favorite hitman. This is at the beginning of the story, by the way, (which breaks my 50%;75% rule) and they don’t know each other really well. So the hitman then satisfies the Mobster bride in a four hours act (with a countless number of Big O’s) before he is finally satisfied (if you know what I mean). What a nice hitman!

But back to your test results.
If your lover fulfills at least 6 out of the 8 conditions then – Congratulations – you have yourself a romance novel hunk!  

For the rest of us ordinary beings: Who needs a RNH!

Romance hunks with long hair … If you’re a hair-o-phobic like me you don’t want a hunky highland warrior hanging over you with his long hunky hair in your face. You want to see his hunky body but instead you’d see hair, hair, and overall hair tickling your face. It would mingle with your own wavy hair (in my dream I always have this beautiful long and wavy hair) and after a few seconds all you got is a big mess of hair. The highlight comes, when you finally want to kiss him (this is still a dream by the way - or nightmare - however you wanna interpret this) and instead have a bunch of hair in your mouth (you wouldn’t even know if it’s yours or his). Do I need to be more visual?
There are only a few guys who look good with long hair…seriously.

Romance hunks with commitment issues … That is how it turns out when you find a guy with a tortured past as described so many times in those romance novels. In a romantic story, a tortured hero sounds very – well romantic –because for  the female readership it’s nice to believe that they could rescue him or that they were the aggressor of his transformation. The hero usually has to overcome obstacles which force him to grow and realize that the world isn’t such a dark place at all and eventually he confesses his love to the heroine. This usually happens in a moment of great epiphany when the heroine is almost dying and he wasn’t there at the right time to save her. (in modern days we would call this probably a narcissistic regret – when the truth is that it’s only his male ego that is hurt ;-)).
The time span in some novels from meeting to falling in love is only a few days. After a week they’re both ready to settle down and marry. Isn’t that wonderful?

Some things just sound better on paper or in our imagination than in real life.