Conrad V. Sucatre, with the assistance of his daughter, Athena, started working on a book filled with nostalgia surrounding wonderful romance that entails the passion of ‘Old School’ romances. Conrad begins his search into the many facets of how the wonder of romance book began. Through his words he takes quotes from other books that have been penned and he sketches how the romance of yesteryear is most often different from our romance today. His introduction first turns to Margaret Mitchell’s all time classic, Gone With the Wind, and how people will not think of that as a romance, but rather turn to the movie version, never really reading the book. He goes on to show how many romance novels are nothing like the ones of today with different hero’s and heroines, and how often the emotions of the characters cannot always be portrayed as well in some of the stories. Throughout the book, Conrad mostly speaks of different authors and the way their stories were fashioned to be not only filled with romance, but some down to earth stories where the passion was often overshadowed and couples did not immediately jump into the bedroom. With his study of romance including the paperbacks, some even from Harlequin, many romance books today have certain designs and rules that must be followed as guidelines for publication. In his search, he even found many high paid romance authors in the 30’s, that no one has ever even heard of today. In the long run, it all boils down to the publishing industry and how he gets perturbed by the way the current publishers handle things.

Old School Romance is a documentary on the History of Romance. The documentation enlists many authors that are no longer remembered and more or less swept under a rug never to be heard of again. With the assistance of his daughter, Athena, who also pens under the name of Cathy Heath, the two have searched diligently throughout history on the Romance genre. They also produce Romance with an Attitude, a magazine they have produced over the Internet for the past six years. Conrad V. Sucatre has proctored much work into this documentation that really makes the reader think. There was much information on the history of romance and writers, that I too, had never heard, that was very interesting. It had some memories with its own touch of romance that made the reader feel a part of history in the making.

Reviewed by: Linda L