…And Love Conquers All

The idea that love magically conquers all is quickly becoming my second least favorite ending. Deus ex machina does, of course, take the prize, but despite the fact that there is a genre expectation in romance that love can conquer all, I wonder if it is not a little “god machine” itself.

It’s magic. Whether love conquers all in a literal fantasy or in a book shelved under contemporary romance, it’s a wave of the hand followed by, “and they lived happily ever after.”

You could argue that this is exactly the sort of magic that romance readers expect, and that they willingly suspend disbelief for the cherished fairy tale. And you’d probably be right. Maybe I should just turn off my brain and go with it…

But I’ve realized recently that I’m a pragmatic romantic. I just made that term up. It’s not a thing, as far as I know. Maybe it should be. 🙂

I love a solid love story. I love feeling like two people have fallen in love. And I love to feel like that love is based in some real, measurable truth.

That’s why I think love is a verb. It’s something you have to work for… work at… and by that I mean forever, not just until happily ever after.

That’s the pragmatist in me.

The romantic in me says love doesn’t have to do the conquering. People… two people working together towards a common goal… can conquer a great deal. So don’t just toss aside problems like they don’t matter if you have love. They do matter. And love doesn’t conquer all, love is what happens as a result of the conquering.

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