George Paizis presents a detailed study of the business practices and global market success of HarlequinEnterprises, the world’s largest producer of category romance fiction. On the one hand, Harlequin fiction is probably the most globally accepted genre of literature in existence in our world today. It is a product of globalization in the strictest sense, as virtually all of its products are produced in the West and spread to countless countries around the world where consumers have developed a taste for the product. On the other hand, as Paizis shows, Harlequin’s sales are in decline and its business practises are forced to adapt both to the rise of electronic publishing and the Internet, and to the gradual spread of non-Western popular culture, such as Japanese manga comics. (xvi-xvii)
According to the introduction to the volume