Outlander
Diana Gabaldon · 1991
The most beloved romance novel of the 20th century according to genre readers, and deservedly so. Jamie and Claire's relationship has a physical and emotional depth that most literary fiction doesn't attempt. A time-travel premise somehow becomes a meditation on what it means to belong to someone across lifetimes.
The case against
Eight hundred fifty pages, and the plot runs on sexual peril: rape threatened, attempted, or committed at intervals regular enough to chart. Jamie also beats Claire with a strap for disobeying him, an episode the book frames as roguish discipline, and 1991 forgave that more easily than you will. The time travel itself draws maybe ten minutes of anyone's curiosity.
Romance · the Pro canon
The case for it and the rest of the canon open with Pro.
if this one calls to you, so will these →
