Books Without Romance
Top 5 Wednesday is a group challenge created by Lainey and run by Sam that includes a new book-related topic every week. Check out the goodreads group for topics and to interact with the community.
This week's Top Five Wednesday is all about books that don't include a huge romantic subplot. This isn't to say that there is no mention of romance or relationships in the book, just that it really doesn't factor into the plotline or the story as a whole. It was honestly a little sad and a little surprising to find that there are so few of these kinds of stories on my shelves. Even some of the middlegrade books that I have include a romantic subplot. In any case, here are my Top 5 books without romance.
5. Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel
This week's Top Five Wednesday is all about books that don't include a huge romantic subplot. This isn't to say that there is no mention of romance or relationships in the book, just that it really doesn't factor into the plotline or the story as a whole. It was honestly a little sad and a little surprising to find that there are so few of these kinds of stories on my shelves. Even some of the middlegrade books that I have include a romantic subplot. In any case, here are my Top 5 books without romance.
Station Eleven follows several different points of view leading up to and following the outbreak of a flu that decimates 99% of the population, examining human nature and what it takes to survive both a barren wasteland, as well as our ordinary lives.
So this is where the "doesn't factor into the plotline" rule really comes into play. There are people in Station Eleven who are in relationships. There are people in Station Eleven who are married, divorced, recently broken up with, and the marriage between Arthur and Miranda is a point of interest throughout the novel. However, this book isn't about the romantic elements at all. In fact, they almost always come up as a means of connecting characters together, rather than a means of creating tension or providing more embellishment to the plot. While the characters are in certain ways intertwined, the main discourse of the novel is their survival, which is so much more interesting.
Also, two of the main characters in the post-flu storyline, Kirsten and August, could have really easily be thrust into some kind of romantic subplot, but instead, they're just good friends who look out for each other, and I'm really here for that.
So this is where the "doesn't factor into the plotline" rule really comes into play. There are people in Station Eleven who are in relationships. There are people in Station Eleven who are married, divorced, recently broken up with, and the marriage between Arthur and Miranda is a point of interest throughout the novel. However, this book isn't about the romantic elements at all. In fact, they almost always come up as a means of connecting characters together, rather than a means of creating tension or providing more embellishment to the plot. While the characters are in certain ways intertwined, the main discourse of the novel is their survival, which is so much more interesting.
Also, two of the main characters in the post-flu storyline, Kirsten and August, could have really easily be thrust into some kind of romantic subplot, but instead, they're just good friends who look out for each other, and I'm really here for that.
By all accounts, this book should not work, but it does. This story follows a botanist named Mark Watney as he is left stranded alone on Mars, trying to find a way to survive until the next mission to mars is able to retrieve him. He's completely alone, with limited supplies and a long wait ahead of him, and so must rely on his skills and scientific knowledge (which he kindly explains in layman's terms for those of us who only barely passed 11th grade chemistry) to get him through.
Like Station Eleven, survival really takes precedence in this story, and so even if wise-cracking son-of-a-bitch Mark weren't completely by himself, I don't think that romance would have factored into this story much. Unless, of course, you count his tumultuous love affair with the potatoes.
3. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle
The relationship between Holmes and Irene Adler is not a romance and I will literally fight you on this fact. I wrote a paper on Adler's role in A Scandal in Bohemia and the fact that she is always mediated through a man. The only time that we actually see her in her story is when she is inviting Holmes in, and every other mention of her, even the letter she writes, is interpreted by either the King of Bohemia, or Holmes. Just because he respects her does not make it a romance, and to ignore the fact that Watson flat out states "to think of this as a romantic relationship would be to misunderstand Sherlock Holmes entirely" is just... ridiculous. No amount of BBC Sherlock will ever convince me otherwise.
So now that that's settled. There are characters in these stories who have romantic relationships, but they're basically always either the key to the subterfuge, or entirely false. In any case, Watson's wife doesn't figure into this particular collection, and the romances between side characters is subtle, given that they follow a really similar pattern.
Like Station Eleven, survival really takes precedence in this story, and so even if wise-cracking son-of-a-bitch Mark weren't completely by himself, I don't think that romance would have factored into this story much. Unless, of course, you count his tumultuous love affair with the potatoes.
3. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan DoyleThe relationship between Holmes and Irene Adler is not a romance and I will literally fight you on this fact. I wrote a paper on Adler's role in A Scandal in Bohemia and the fact that she is always mediated through a man. The only time that we actually see her in her story is when she is inviting Holmes in, and every other mention of her, even the letter she writes, is interpreted by either the King of Bohemia, or Holmes. Just because he respects her does not make it a romance, and to ignore the fact that Watson flat out states "to think of this as a romantic relationship would be to misunderstand Sherlock Holmes entirely" is just... ridiculous. No amount of BBC Sherlock will ever convince me otherwise.
So now that that's settled. There are characters in these stories who have romantic relationships, but they're basically always either the key to the subterfuge, or entirely false. In any case, Watson's wife doesn't figure into this particular collection, and the romances between side characters is subtle, given that they follow a really similar pattern.
This little novella is 80 or so pages of pure intrigue. In a future where everyone is connected to the server via in A.I. that records everything they see and hear, Katya makes her living by seeking out antiques from before the world went digital. On her way back from a prospective artifact, Katya is kidnapped and, for the first time, taken off the grid.
Trying to pack a romantic subplot into this short a story would have been exhausting, frankly. Instead, the novella focuses on the interactions between Katya and her captor, whether or not they can learn to trust each other, and why exactly she's been taken at all. It's got a bit of a weird ending that a lot of people didn't like, but I really enjoyed it, and would highly recommend.
I love this book. I love almost everything about this book. The Bees follows the story of Flora 717 throughout her life in an orchard hive, born to be a sanitation worker but, through her strength and her nurturing demeanour, builds her way up through the ranks, perhaps changing the hive forever. The story follows a traditional epic quest format, and includes Flora 717 interacting with many different interesting creatures, but, you know, because she's a bee, there isn't any romance.
In fact, one hilarious aspect of this novel is that the males in the hive are insufferable brats who are fawned over and preened at, but ultimately prove to basically be useless whenever misadventure or trouble strikes.
In any case, if you're looking for a story without romance, I 100% recommend The Bees.
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