It certainly seems to be true in the Heterosexual or Straight Contemporary Romances. If you can get outside of the traditionally published market - it's not as bad. Or outside of Romance Writers Association dictates.
In this novel, the female protagonist - Esme (that's the name she's chosen for herself) is hunting her father - she doesn't have one currently in her life. He got her Mom pregnant and left. So major league father issues.
I've read ones here and there that aren't - but usually they are either independently published, or queer in some way or historicals. Historical Romances for some reason are less like this, or less glaringly so, and don't feel the need to infantilize the female lead or heroine. Or have her searching for Daddy, in most cases they are either trying to get away from that or don't want a guy ruling their lives, but it being a historical - they have little choice in the matter. T
I've also noticed that most of the reviewers on Good Reads and Amazon on romances tend to do this in their reviews: "The Hero is...and the heroine is..." or "the H and the h". Chauvinism and sexism is so deeply ingrained in our culture that don't pick up on it. It got to the point that I gave up on reviews.
Also, with all the Mommy issues and Daddy issues in fiction - I'm thinking there's a lot of folks out there that should have been neutered at birth - because they were definitely not cut out to be parents.
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In this novel, the female protagonist - Esme (that's the name she's chosen for herself) is hunting her father - she doesn't have one currently in her life. He got her Mom pregnant and left. So major league father issues.
I've read ones here and there that aren't - but usually they are either independently published, or queer in some way or historicals. Historical Romances for some reason are less like this, or less glaringly so, and don't feel the need to infantilize the female lead or heroine. Or have her searching for Daddy, in most cases they are either trying to get away from that or don't want a guy ruling their lives, but it being a historical - they have little choice in the matter. T
I've also noticed that most of the reviewers on Good Reads and Amazon on romances tend to do this in their reviews: "The Hero is...and the heroine is..." or "the H and the h". Chauvinism and sexism is so deeply ingrained in our culture that don't pick up on it. It got to the point that I gave up on reviews.
Also, with all the Mommy issues and Daddy issues in fiction - I'm thinking there's a lot of folks out there that should have been neutered at birth - because they were definitely not cut out to be parents.