Popular romance novels, as defined by the Romance Writers of America, contain 'two basic elements': 'a central love story and an emotionally satisfying and optimistic ending'. In other words, these are happy stories of (eventually) requited love, though there may be some suffering and many obstacles to be overcome before the lovers reach their happy ending.

I have written For Love and Money: The Literary Art of the Harlequin Mills & Boon Romance and a number of articles about popular romance fiction. An index is available of many of the topics and romance novels I have analysed on the Teach Me Tonight academic romance blog.