Just a question....

[Bramblethorn]

So the takeaway is, in order to be a romantic male lead, you need fabulous wealth or an expertise at deadly violence. Now to just sit back and wait for the Duke of SEAL, who combines both!

Duke of SEAL, SEAL, SEAL...

Taking the long view of it, dukes (and some billionaires) are just people whose ancestors were good at deadly violence.

 

[Bamagan]

Duke of SEAL, SEAL, SEAL...

Taking the long view of it, dukes (and some billionaires) are just people whose ancestors were good at deadly violence.

True, although probably true of everyone if you go back far enough.
Especially considering our paleolithic ancestors only partially triumphed over the bears, whose remnants are out there lurking in the woods and tundras, just waiting for their chance at revenge...

 

[gunhilltrain]

So the takeaway is, in order to be a romantic male lead, you need fabulous wealth or an expertise at deadly violence. Now to just sit back and wait for the Duke of SEAL, who combines both!

That's not true - the ladies love us because we are so witty and intelligent. By the way, it's not that prices are going up so much as that the currency is being devalued. Never mind; save that for the Politics board.

Also Anna Nicole Smith doesn't count. No expertise in deadly force, but he did have wealth.

Anna and hubby

 

[Yarglenurp]

As a straight man, if I could get Bezos' ex-wife's level of wealth by fucking Bezos for a few years... I'd absolutely do it. Any time I felt shame, I would just take a bath in a giant pool of 100-dollar bills to clean my soul.

 

[slave_]

It used to go all the way to South Ferry. You see what I mean? I feel like Dr. Stangelove biting his own hand. Not that I'd be saluting the Fuehrer, but I'd be saying things like "In 1950, it was cut back to Chatham Square, then in 1955 . . ."

I didn't know that went all the way down there. Sheesh.
I have the same affliction of thinking of one thing, that leads to another and then another. And lol on the Dr. Strangelove example.

 

[Bramblethorn]

I think the premise of the argument is a bit off... there are actual billionaires, but no vampires, fairy lords, or alien seducers.

Billionaires? Yes, they exist.

Young, sexy billionaires who are decent enough human beings to qualify as Mr/Mrs Right in a romance novel? Probably better off holding out for a fairy lord.

 

[gunhilltrain]

It's my thread so I say hijack away

Well, you're practically daring me! April, 1973, with a few photos going back to the 1950's in Manhattan.

 

[gunhilltrain]

As a straight man, if I could get Bezos' ex-wife's level of wealth by fucking Bezos for a few years... I'd absolutely do it. Any time I felt shame, I would just take a bath in a giant pool of 100-dollar bills to clean my soul.

But what would Bezos get out of it? I know it's hypothetical, but what would you bring to the table?

 

[gunhilltrain]

I didn't know that went all the way down there. Sheesh.
I have the same affliction of thinking of one thing, that leads to another and then another. And lol on the Dr. Strangelove example.

Yeah, that was what the Second Avenue subway was supposed to replace (since the 1920's). Only needs billions of dollars to finish it.

 

[Yarglenurp]

Billionaires? Yes, they exist.

Young, sexy billionaires who are decent enough human beings to qualify as Mr/Mrs Right in a romance novel? Probably better off holding out for a fairy lord.

You're not thinking like a billionaire. You don't need to be decent, young, or sexy. You just need to pay the girl enough so that she'll say you're decent, young, and sexy. For a little extra, she'll call you a fairy lord as well.

 

[litfan10]

There's more hope for those swooning for the arms of the ultra-rich. The odds have just gotten better @Priscilla_June story has become reality. Sir Paul McCartney just joined the billionaires' club making him billionaire number 2,782.
Who said "Baby, You're a Rich Man?" Paul did, that's who.

 

[litfan10]

Okay, I admit it - technically John Lennon was the primary vocalist on that particular track but billionaire McCartney was involved and sang backup.

 

[Bramblethorn]

You're not thinking like a billionaire. You don't need to be decent, young, or sexy. You just need to pay the girl enough so that she'll say you're decent, young, and sexy. For a little extra, she'll call you a fairy lord as well.

I wouldn't advise making that guy a romantic lead.

 

[litfan10]

I wouldn't advise making that guy a romantic lead.

But man, what a challenging writing prompt that would be.....

 

[AchtungNight]

I write my avatar character as a rich guy (successful club owner, got his seed money through lottery winnings and a bestselling sci-fi novel series, then grew it through various investments) because I'm already putting him in a power fantasy with all the beautiful women willing to sleep with him. Why not give him a bit of cash too?

To be honest, many of said women are on a level above him. He doesn't enjoy the level of wealth and fame they do, being celebrities. He's more on the level of Edward Lewis- low key, most of his money's in easily tapped investment accounts but liquid. And he only achieved billionaire status post pandemic. I was fine with millionaire before then.

Maybe it's like Bruce Wayne, aka Batman. He started out as a millionaire but these days he has to be a billionaire because cost of living has increased.

Even with all the money, he's still a decent guy.

 

[Bramblethorn]

But man, what a challenging writing prompt that would be.....

There are quite a few "Fake date turns into real romance" stories out there, including some where it's a paid arrangement. But a lead who can't be made attractive/sympathetic, that's the hard part.

 

[litfan10]

Fake/date or fake/engagement is another huge trope that I don't quite get - what's the appeal?

 

[Bramblethorn]

Fake/date or fake/engagement is another huge trope that I don't quite get - what's the appeal?

Romance requires two characters who are hot for one another and attractive (by whatever definition the author & reader think relevant - not necessarily physical). But if Chapter 1 is "they meet, they confess attraction for one another, they fuck and get engaged" that's not much of a story. There needs to be some reason why it takes a book's worth of time for that relationship to develop.

OTOH, if the author's playing with some kind of "opposites attract" storyline, there needs to be a reason why they're seeing enough of one another to get past the superficial stuff that might push them apart and discover the things they have in common.

Fake date/engagement can be an answer to those. It gives the characters an opportunity to spend a lot of time together, and to think about intimacy, but it's also an obstacle to them forming a real relationship - when both of them are supposed to be faking a relationship/attraction, it's hard for either to realise that the other one is genuinely attracted. So you can have two people both falling in love but thinking it's unrequited, and holding back on telling the other because This Is Not What We Agreed To, which provides plenty of material for the storyline.

Any scheme where somebody's trying to sustain a complicated lie adds potential for other shenanigans. Maybe somebody else finds out that it's a fake relationship and does something to break it up, just as they realise they actually want a real one.

Like anything that becomes a trope, it can also be good material for subversion; I read one recently where a young woman contrives a fake engagement without realising that she actually is engaged to him.

 

[gunhilltrain]

Fake/date or fake/engagement is another huge trope that I don't quite get - what's the appeal?

The way I have it, it isn't "fake." It's a college woman offering a classmate a blowjob in return for writing her term paper. She's already turning tricks on an ad hoc basis, but she needs the paper more than the money at that time. It turns out that they do have an affair - which lasts for four months, which sounds like a realistic time frame for such a thing.

The paper was a review of George Orwell's Homage to Catalonia. Seemed worth mentioning what it was about.

 

[Cali_Love]

I sometimes work with a contractor who doesn't need the money, but is bored in retirement. He worked for Elon Musk and was acquiring shares of Tesla at $2 (his wife used to complain, "You know every time you buy shares, you're just buying Musk a bottle of wine, don't you?"). It sounds like Musk is an absolute ass, and is frequently wrong but doesn't like to be told that when he is. Completely vexing his engineers, the seating in one of his cars was designed around his children's safety car seats and his wife egressing the vehicle, so at one time he was a loving family man. We all saw how that ended up.

More interesting than billionaires are the CEO and CFO of multi billion dollar corporations which I have met and known several. After (and even before) that milestone, a billionaire experiences zero pressure in life and future, while the leaders of their businesses experience nothing but. Wealthy for sure, but held accountable (usually). Most recently, a CEO of an 11 billion dollar publicly-traded corporation spoke to our organization about the importance of mental health and then proceeded to talk about his own daughter's struggles, the man pausing to weep at one point. While dealing with that, he was tasked to move the needle of the stock price 2x, it is now sitting at 3x. I'm going to sit on my shares until 4x (fingers crossed!!!). The point being that they can be real, human beings with feelings.

There's a lot of good potential story threads in the latter bucket, which I've mined before and will continue to do so as it is bottomless.

CL

 

[Yarglenurp]

I sometimes work with a contractor who doesn't need the money, but is bored in retirement. He worked for Elon Musk and was acquiring shares of Tesla at $2 (his wife used to complain, "You know every time you buy shares, you're just buying Musk a bottle of wine, don't you?"). It sounds like Musk is an absolute ass, and is frequently wrong but doesn't like to be told that when he is. Completely vexing his engineers, the seating in one of his cars was designed around his children's safety car seats and his wife egressing the vehicle, so at one time he was a loving family man. We all saw how that ended up.

More interesting than billionaires are the CEO and CFO of multi billion dollar corporations which I have met and known several. After (and even before) that milestone, a billionaire experiences zero pressure in life and future, while the leaders of their businesses experience nothing but. Wealthy for sure, but held accountable (usually). Most recently, a CEO of an 11 billion dollar publicly-traded corporation spoke to our organization about the importance of mental health and then proceeded to talk about his own daughter's struggles, the man pausing to weep at one point. While dealing with that, he was tasked to move the needle of the stock price 2x, it is now sitting at 3x. I'm going to sit on my shares until 4x (fingers crossed!!!). The point being that they can be real, human beings with feelings.

There's a lot of good potential story threads in the latter bucket, which I've mined before and will continue to do so as it is bottomless.

CL

Eh... I'm with you up until the "real human beings with feelings" stuff. I'm 100% on him faking his emotions to keep the staff motivated.

You don't get to where he is by having normal human emotions. You get there by being sociopathically focused on professional success. There is no other way.

 

[Trionyx]

Rich guy + poor woman is a common trope here on LE. Some plots are simply ludicrous. The rich guy also seems to be well skilled in self defense as he trashes the FMC's ex who is harassing her. Handy with firearms, too. Yawn.

I can recall only one or two rich FMC + poor MMC stories. Maybe I'll give it a try.

 

[Kelliezgirl]

Rich guy + poor woman is a common trope here on LE. Some plots are simply ludicrous. The rich guy also seems to be well skilled in self defense as he trashes the FMC's ex who is harassing her. Handy with firearms, too. Yawn.

I can recall only one or two rich FMC + poor MMC stories. Maybe I'll give it a try.

My Coven on Maple Street stories the FMC is far wealthier than the MMC and the only time violence is an issue she saves him...
It can be done.

 

[Trionyx]

My Coven on Maple Street stories the FMC is far wealthier than the MMC and the only time violence is an issue she saves him...
It can be done.

Will check it out. Tx.

 

[WrongFrog]

But man, what a challenging writing prompt that would be.....

I will if you will!!!