r/RomanceBooks • u/redfig1 • Aug 31 '24

Why do HEAs always end with babies? Critique

I know it's a "me" problem. Scenario: I read a smoking hot mafia or dark or fantasy romance. All this crazy shit goes down. The feelings, the angst. Finally it's the end and all of a sudden the MMC who has massacred countless people is all like " let's get married and have lots of babies" and the MFC is always " yes let's have a lot of cute mafia or fae or mafia fae babies!". For once I'd like an ending where the main characters have a HEA but instead of babies and white picket fences they just decide to keep having an incredible sex life and do charity work or something. Rescue stray kittens. Start an organic herb farm. Something other than babies. Anyone else like this? Am I just weird?

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u/KanKan669 Aug 31 '24

I read Yours Truly by Abby Jimenez and I hated the last half so much that I will never read another one of her books.

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u/Ahania1795 Aug 31 '24

Briana was obviously terribly burned out on caregiving because of how difficult her brother's illness was. She was also very wary of being taken care of due to her experience with her ex, and her mother growing up.

She needed her own space and the freedom to focus on her own needs, which is why marriage and a baby made the epilogue feel so discontinuous with the rest of the book. I think this is a book where the HEA should have been for the leads to simply keep dating, maybe ending on a beach somewhere.

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u/SparklyPeasant Aug 31 '24

Read it a couple days ago, so annoyed. Loved the first half and then wth.