Magic or madness? - Kandy Shepherd

Do you believe in love at first sight? I do. 

The night I first met my husband I knew straight away he was “The One”. Luckily, he felt the same about me. I can still remember what he was wearing, his smile, how my heart started pounding erratically, how I couldn’t sleep that night for the excitement and anticipation of seeing him next evening for our first date. Just days later we talked about spending our lives together. Ten months later we were married—and we would have done it sooner if we’d been able to arrange it. Twenty-three years later we’re still together. Yes, I believe in love at first sight. It worked for me!

Allie and Noah fell in love at first sight--the start of a love that endured in The Notebook.

And I believe in it on the pages of romance novels and in romantic movies, too. In fact, one of the joys for a romance reader is that the hero and heroine meet, fall in love (maybe make love) and commit (to some degree or another) all within the pages of the story. Sigh! Don’t you just love that happy-ever-after ending? It’s what keeps me reading (and writing!) romance novels.

Cupid's Span at Rincon Park in San Francisco, just near Tom's fictional
apartment in Love is  a Four-Legged Word

You can tell already that I’m not among the critics who query the speed at which our romance heroes and heroines fall in love. Or the cynics who say you can’t base happiness on instant attraction. Heck, this man-woman falling head-over-heels thing has been going on for a long time!


The Ancient Greeks called it theia mania—madness of the gods. Then there’s the Cupid’s Bow scenario—love coming with the swiftness of an arrow to the heart. The medieval European tradition of courtly love purported the source of the love dart to be a woman’s eyes. At college, studying drama, I played Rosalind in Shakespeare’s As You Like It. I was obviously very influenced by the quote: “Who ever lov’d that lov’d not at first sight?”


  

It's all about the eyes when we're falling in love

 Scientists put what the French call coup de foudre down to hormones and chemicals and even use MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) to study the physical changes in the brain that take place when lovers are in close proximity. (Can you imagine what a turn-off that would be, kissing your man while doctors take an MRI?) But I’m not arguing with this, don’t we often put down that source of instant attraction as “chemistry”?

They're budgies, not lovebirds, but the feeling is the same!

 Of course we know that initial heart-stopping attraction won’t last without what psychologist Dr Gordon Livingstone, in his book How to Love, calls the ten "essential virtues"— kindness, optimism, courage, loyalty, tolerance, flexibility, beauty, humor, honesty and intelligence.

Our romance heroines aren’t silly, they’re looking for those “virtues”, too. And it’s up to us authors to make sure we give our characters a hefty helping of those qualities—along with the lust-inspiring ones, too. That way we can happily believe that their love will endure.
 
  

 In my The Castaway Bride, lone sailor Matt and runaway bride Cristy are shipwrecked on a tropical island for just four days—and it’s more than long enough for them to fall first in lust and then in love. 

In Love is a Four-Legged Word, Maddy and Tom have 21 days to ensure the millionaire mutt Brutus gets to keep his inheritance. And it’s more than long enough for Maddy and Tom to fall in love. I love this review from a new reader on Goodreads: “To have a dog, money and find love in 21 days makes for a good book.”

On page 85 of Love is a Four-Legged Word, Maddy and Tom have just kissed for the first time but Maddy is cynical about the concept of forever love. “Maddy couldn’t look at him; she couldn’t trust herself not to reach up and kiss him again. She looked down to the sidewalk, noting where a youthful hand had chalked a red heart with ‘K & J forever’ entwined within it.”



That chalked red heart is a little tribute in my book to my own real-life romance with my husband, whose initial is, of course, J.

What about you? Do you believe in love at first sight? Or think it’s something that only exists in romance novels and movies? Do you have your own real-life love story to share?

Please leave a comment for a chance to win a signed trade paperback copy of Home Is Where the Bark Is. Please include your email address if you want to be in the draw.

I’m also giving away a free e-book of The Castaway Bride to anyone who comments here over the next five days via a coupon for Smashwords where you can download the book in a format to suit any e-reader or PC. Be sure to leave your email address if you would like the free download.

Author Kandy Shepherd
http://www.kandyshepherd.com

(Photo of Cupid's Span courtesy of freefotos.com )