Book Boyfriend Crushes

September 14, 2018, Guest Blog, Fall Into Love ~

Novels with the author’s perfectly crushable book boyfriends.

Book Boyfriend Crushes

by Jana Richards

I tend to fall in love with every hero in every romance novel I read. Some of them stick in my head long after I’ve read the book. Let me tell you about three of my most memorable crushes.

I read Carnal Innocence by Nora Roberts back in the 90s, but Tucker Longstreet still tugs on my heartstrings. I disliked him intensely at first. He was a lazy, good-old-boy without a drop of ambition. His relationships were as shallow as he was; Tucker was all charm and flash with no substance.

Or so I thought. Tucker turns out to be the glue holding his family, and his family’s business, together. His relationship with Caroline Waverly becomes the opposite of shallow. And when he’s unable to provide an alibi for a murder because he was home alone reading poetry, I was a goner. I mean, really, reading poetry? Be still my heart.

Wulfric Bedwyn is one of my favorite Mary Balogh heroes. In her Slightly series, he is the Duke of Bewcastle, the dour head of the Bedwyn family. He took his dying father’s instructions to heart:

“Never become emotionally involved with any other person.
Never seek to know or share the emotions of another person.
Remain aloof.”

So it was a joy to see him break out of his self-imposed prison when he meets widow Christine Derrick in Slightly Dangerous. He learns he can be the Duke of Bewcastle and Wulfric Bedwyn – both duke and man.

The opening line of Deirdre and Don Juan by Jo Beverley is one of my favorites: “The news of his wife’s death caught the Earl of Everdon in his mistress’s bed.” From that first line, we may be inclined to believe Mark Juan Carlos Renfrew is a philandering husband, but we soon learn the truth. Ten years previously, his much-adored wife ran off with an Italian diplomat six months after their wedding. Eschewing divorce, he lives up to his Don Juan nickname. But when he unexpectedly falls in love with Plain-Jane Deirdre Stowe, he discovers that love and marriage mean more to him than he ever believed. And he knows he must become the man she deserves.

I’m detecting a trend here. My favorite crushes are the heroes who are more than what they first appear to be. Or they grow and change into men of honor and integrity. Share your favorite heroes!

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Comment at the bottom of this post. Who are your favorite book-boyfriend crushes? Winner will be randomly chosen from comments received by midnight MT on September 18.

About Jana

Jana Richards writes romantic suspense, contemporary romance, and historicals set during WW2. She loves to create characters with a sense of humor, but also a serious side. She loves to discover what makes them tick. Jana lives in Western Canada with her husband and a dog named Lou.

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