See Chapter 5, "The feminine suburb 1: Women readers and romance fiction" which discusses magazine romance fiction and Chapter 6, "The feminine suburb 2: Sophie Cole, Alice Askew, Louise Gerard, Mary Hamilton." Hapgood chose these four authors because "they published romantic fiction frequently over a longer period of time, their popularity was confirmed by sales, and they differ in important ways from each other so that their novels suggest a variety of different possibilities for reader response" (142). Most of the novels discussed seem to be "romantic fiction" of the kind which closes with an ambiguous ending and/or the definitive parting of lovers. Cole favours London settings, the novels under discussion by Gerard have African settings and Hamilton has Indian ones.
See Chapter 5, "The feminine suburb 1: Women readers and romance fiction" which discusses magazine romance fiction and Chapter 6, "The feminine suburb 2: Sophie Cole, Alice Askew, Louise Gerard, Mary Hamilton." Hapgood chose these four authors because "they published romantic fiction frequently over a longer period of time, their popularity was confirmed by sales, and they differ in important ways from each other so that their novels suggest a variety of different possibilities for reader response" (142). Most of the novels discussed seem to be "romantic fiction" of the kind which closes with an ambiguous ending and/or the definitive parting of lovers. Cole favours London settings, the novels under discussion by Gerard have African settings and Hamilton has Indian ones.