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Romancing the “Illegal” Immigrant
Neeta Bhasin
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DOI:10.17265/2159-5836/2018.10.004
Austin Peay State University, Clarksville, Tennessee, USA
Romance is the most lucrative genre of fiction in America. According to the Romance Writers of America, romance fiction is a billion-dollar industry with an estimated annual total sales value of $1.8 billion in 2013. Other genres do not come anywhere close to the sales of romantic fiction. This astonishing figure may well point to the undeniable fact that even in difficult times the formula of love, sex, and happily ever after still appeals to romance book buyers, most of whom are women. However, over a period of time there have also been changes to the conventions of the romance genre, as its writers (again, mostly women) get more attuned not only to the changing gender roles and the realities of women’s lives, but also to the pressing socio-economic and cultural issues of the time that often serve as backdrops to the love stories. This paper looks at a recent romance novel, Yours to Keep by Serena Bell whose protagonist, Ana Travares, is a woman of color and an undocumented immigrant from the Dominican Republic. Borrowing insights from Janice Radway’s Reading the Romance, this paper will undertake a cultural and literary analysis of Yours to Keep, focusing particularly on its narrative potential and its limitations, and the way its author, Serena Bell, attempts to reconcile the grim realities faced by undocumented immigrants in America with a more traditional romantic set-up.
romance, immigration, undocumented, popular culture
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