AAR Poll Winners and the Test of Time
Commenters in the forums posed an interesting question: How do AAR Annual Poll results hold up over time?
I went back to explore the winners and honorable mentions for Favorite Romance for the first five years, figuring those gave enough distance to see which books remain popular today. I used subjective measures (do I feel like these books still get buzz?) and the objective data in the AAR 2013 Top 100 poll (do winners each year continue to beat other books released that year, or have other books surpassed them?). Please note that each poll reflects books published the previous year (ie the 1997 poll is for books published in 1996).
1997 Poll (1996 books) 
Favorite Romance of the Year: Shattered Rainbows by Mary Jo Putney; Honorable Mentions: Anyone but You by Jennifer Crusie, Rapture in Death by J.D. Robb (aka Nora Roberts), Kiss an Angel by Susan Elizabeth Phillips.
Mary Jo Putney is an author whose appeal has long eluded me – I really don’t like her prose – but Shattered Rainbows remains a popular recommendation. Rapture in Death probably made the list because of its wide distribution and readership; it doesn’t particularly stand out to me among the many Eve Dallas books. I love Anyone but You, which gets overshadowed by more prominent Crusie works. Kiss an Angel is a book I personally find very dated, with a hero who is emotionally abusive. However, it clocked in at #40 on last year’s Top 100 poll, and no other book from this year placed.
1998 Poll (1997 books)
Favorite Romance of the Year: Nobody’s Baby But Mine by Susan Elizabeth Phillips; Honorable Mention: As You Desire by Connie Brockway.
Both of these books turned up on the 2013 annual poll, with Nobody’s Baby at 18 and As You Desire at 51. While personally, I’d reverse these placements, it looks as if readers did a good job picking books with staying power and placing them in a consistent order. This is also the year of Brockway’s All Through the Night and Laura Kinsale’s My Sweet Folly, both of which won or received honorable mentions in other categories but did not place for Favorite Romance.
1999 Poll (1998 books)
Favorite Romance of the Year: Sea Swept by Nora Roberts, Honorable Mentions: Dream a Little Dream by Susan Elizabeth Phillips and Mine to Take by Dara Joy
Dara Joy – now that’s a name I don’t hear in recommendations anymore! Dream a Little Dream has had the best longevity of these options, placing 79 on the 2013 Top 100. However, it was beaten by several very popular books from 1998, including Stephanie Laurens’s Devil’s Bride (32 in the 2013 Top 100), MJP’s The Rake (54), Loretta Chase’s The Last Hellion (57), and Brockway’s My Dearest Enemy (74). A different Roberts books, Rising Tides, came in at 93. This is by far the year with the greatest disparity between AAR Annual Poll and long-term popularity in the Top 100. Was there something in the water when we voted in ‘99?
2000 Poll (1999 Books)
Favorite Romance of the Year: The Lady’s Tutor by Robin Schone; Honorable Mentions: Lady Be Good by Susan Elizabeth Phillips, The Proposition by Judith Ivory
A win by an author who doesn’t come up much and a book that’s fallen out of discussion. Interesting that Schone was an early erotic writer (although that category did not exist independently) and I can’t see erotica taking the top spot these days despite the fact that we think of ourselves as living in an age more friendly to that subgenre. None of these books continue in the Top 100, although I perceive both Lady Be Good and The Proposition as widely read and recommended. All three have lost in the long run to Julie Garwood’s 1999 release Ransom, which is currently at 75 in our Top 100. My personal favorite from that year is Suzanne Brockmann’s Heart Throb.
2001 Poll (2000 Books)
Favorite Romance of the Year: Winter Garden by Adele Ashworth; Honorable Mention – Welcome to Temptation by Jennifer Crusie.
Neither of these books won in the long run against the juggernaut that took Favorite Funny: Julia Quinn’s The Viscount Who Loved Me, which came in at 9 in our most recent Top 100. In fact, in the 2013 Top 100, both winners lost to Quinn’s other 2000 release, The Duke and I, which ranked 16: Welcome to Temptation was 20 and Winter Garden didn’t place.
Linda Howard’s Mr. Perfect, currently at 41, came out that year without making the Favorite Romance category, and so did Mary Balogh’s More than a Mistress (53). The only one of all of these I haven’t read is the actual winner, Winter Garden. Of the remainder, I’m hard pressed to choose between Welcome to Temptation and More than a Mistress, both of which made my personal Top 10.
What do you all think about the first five years of AAR poll results? Despite a few misses, I think on the whole we did a good job identifying good books. Do you agree? What do you think was the biggest upset? Were any of your favorites robbed in these first few years, or do you truly loathe some books which made it in? Am I missing any great 1996-2000 releases?
Caroline AAR
I thought it was interesting how many of Susan Elizabeth Phillips books make the lists regardless of the year. Her writing certainly has staying power.
Generally speaking, I think AAR annual winners stand rather well the test of time, if I compare them with other prizes and recognitions, in which lists I find many names and titles quite forgotten nowadays. I think that lists made by readers tend to be more sincere about recognizing what novels really work and which of them, although critically acclaimed, are not keepers in the end.
I don’t think you’re missing any great 1996-2000 releases. I’ve taken a look to my data base and I find these interesting books from those years, some of them appear in Top 100 lists but did not win in the annual polls.
Montana sky, one of Nora Roberts’ books that I find more interesting, is from 1996. As The outsider, written by Penelope Williamson. It was in 1998 Top 100 and is mentioned in the Western mini-polls.
Judith Ivory published Sleeping Beauty in 1998, a novel that was in the Top 100 in 1998, 2000 and 2004.
I think that a “”best romance”” win or a best “”in some other category”” win for any book is only as good as the competition its up against. If its a relatively weak year, then a book that would not normally rise to the top spot will do so and in the long run, that book will not fair well against winners from stronger years in our hearts and minds. It’s the same with all awards competitions — the Oscars, Tonys, etc. (Not so much the Emmys because they seem to nominate the same shows over and over again. ;-)
Another thing that might cause a book to rise to the top but not stay there is whether it’s “”the flavor of the month,”” the best of a new trend in romances that doesn’t last. Will we still find vampire romances — just as an example — compelling 10 or 20 years from now such that it remains in a top 100 poll? I guess if there’s something timeless in the story beyond the “”fad,”” it has a better shot at it. I would guess that story telling which jumps onto a new trend, one that burns out quickly, is less likely to remain well loved. It’s just seems logical.
I cut the 2013 list down to what I personally own – 67! Paperbacks! No wonder my house is overrun.
Oh, derp! Loretta Chase is Lord Perfect!
I feel the same way about Mr. Perfect – but it’s from 2006, so it didn’t fit in the time frame of this post.
Color me confused. I was referring to Linda Howard’s Mr. Perfect that you mention as part of the 2001 poll above.
Since you asked, Caroline, I thought I would go back and look at the 2013 Top 100 list I submitted to AAR and see which 1996 to 2000 published books made it to my personal Top 100. Full disclosure, Lord of Scoundrels did not make the cut, and there are a few extremely quirky books on my list, so we can probably all agree I am not the arbiter of good taste when it comes to Romance literature. I like what I like, period. (Including, Kiss an Angel which I really loved as an audiobook with Anna Fields doing the narration.)
1. Nobody’s Baby But Mine, Susan Elizabeth Phillips, 1997 (ranked 6 on my list)
2. Simple Jess, Pamela Morsi, 1996 (7)
3. By Arrangement, Madeline Hunter, 2000 (16)
4. A Lady’s Companion, Carla Kelly, 1996 (25)
5. The Lady’s Tutor, Robin Schone, 1999 (27)
6. Cherish, Catherine Anderson, 1998 (31)
7. Kiss an Angel, Susan Elizabeth Phillips, 1996 (34)
8. Anyone But You, Jennifer Crusie, 1996 (53)
9. Baby Love, Catherine Anderson, 1999 (59)
10. Always to Remember, Lorraine Heath, 1996 (68)
11. Miss Milton Speaks Her Mind, Carla Kelly, 1998 (72)
12. The Weaver Takes a Wife, Sheri Cobb South, 1999 (74)
13. Dream A Little Dream, Susan Elizabeth Phillips, 1998 (81)
14. Texas Destiny, Lorraine Heath, 1997 (83)
15. Simply Irresistible, Rachel Gibson, 1998 (98)
I will add that I had a strange experience with Ashworth’s, A Winter Garden. I loved the book the first time I read it, and on a subsequent reread. However, I listened to it as an audiobook and I couldn’t get past listening to the first chapter. It seemed silly and trite. It wasn’t the fault of the narrator. I think some books just don’t stand up as well to narration. Once again, I will own that this is a matter of personal taste.
Since my own The Weaver Takes a Wife is on this list, I certainly think you qualify as an arbiter of good taste! ;-D And since it not only made (and remains on) your list, and is out in a new edition which includes audio, I like to think it has stood the test of time. Thanks for the shout-out!
I love the presences of two Carla Kellys on this list. I vote for her every poll and want very much for her to crack the Top 100 one day.
I don’t have time to go through all five years of those polls, but at a glance, I remember loving Sunrise Song by Kathleen Eagle (Most Hanky Read) which was on the 97 poll. All Through the Night from the next year is still one of my favorite guilty pleasures. It’s not the kind of book I want to dissect and explain why I like it so much. I just do. A few books during those years that didn’t work for me at all that still routinely make the AAR Top 100: Mr. Perfect, Nobody’s Baby But Mine. I’ve tried a few Garwood books over the years and I’ve never been able to finish a single one. I simply don’t like her characterizations. Sometimes it takes just the right book before an author will slowly begin appealing to me, though. Maybe I haven’t tried the right one.
I actually quite liked Winter Garden. I have read all five favorites and I do remember The Lady’s Tutor being very popular. And I have reread More Than a Mistress and As You Desire several times. Lovely books.
Well, I’m not a believer in “”test of time”” theories since popularity and the value we place on cultural artifacts rises and falls with social and cultural values.
Having said that, of the books listed, I have a strange love for _Kiss an Angel_, though I agree with you that the hero is emotionally abusive for a good part of the novel, and it’s a novel that fetishizes the virginal heroine, paints abortion as a wicked act, elevates marriage to “”sacred vows,”” and demonizes the heroine’s sexually promiscuous mother and castigates her as a “”slut.”” The hero utterly abases himself to win the heroine back and ultimately falls in line with all of her sexually conservative politics. Up until the end of the book (and aside from his mistreatment of Daisy), Alex was a very interesting character: an intellectual, an atheist and a free spirit. Most of that is crushed by the novel’s resolution as he’s brought to heel. It has all of the characteristics of a book I would rapidly throw in the trashbin, but I still weirdly like it a lot. It’s an emotional tearjerker, even when I’m tearing up over ideas I find crazy and would never condone in my own personal life.
Have to agree too about Putney, as I dislike her writing style. I also dislike Garwood’s writing intensely and am not a fan of Stephanie Laurens either.
Of all others listed here, Brockway’s As You Desire, Robert’s Rising Tides, Phillips’s Lady Be Good, Ashworth’s Winter Garden, and Balogh’s More Than a Mistress are still among my favorites and I reread all of them from time to time.
I too like Kiss an Angel even though it has a bunch of stuff I wouldn’t normally enjoy. (The whole communing with the animals thing isn’t for me and yet….)
Ha! Yes, animal telepathy is usually one of those elements in fiction that raises an eyebrow or two. Somehow it worked for me in Kiss an Angel. I think if AAR still had the “”guilty pleasure”” category, this book would fit nicely for me there.