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Originally Posted by Jane A
Probably. The lines blur for me when defining those genres!
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As someone who reads romance, paranormal romance, and character-driven urban fantasy, I wouldn't call the Mercy Thompson series paranormal romance, although I might agree that her spin-off series featuring Anna & Charles is.
In a romance novel, the romance is the focus. There may be subplots, but they assist in the goal of the couple's coming together.
The Mercy Thompson series is character-driven, and the main character is a female. So is the author. So Mercy's relationships are included as part of her life and growth. I don't think this series is action driven, although some of the books in it do have a lot of action. It's focus is Mercy, not the magic.
I would agree that - at least for a while - it seemed like every urban fantasy series written by a woman had some kind of love triangle in it. And this started out that way.
But I see this series as Mercy's journey on learning who she is as she interacts with the "natural" and the "supernatural" people around her. In this case, Mercy's journey includes her deciding to get married. And one or two of the books focuses on that part of her journey more closely (the honeymoon book, for example).
I'm probably not saying this well. I think Briggs does a good job of including the romantic aspects of Mercy's life without making them the focus. There's a science fiction author I like (Linnea Sinclair) who has both male and female followers. Those who read her for the SF sometimes say her books have too much romance (especially the later ones, which were specifically marketed as science-fiction romance). Romance readers who read for the relationships sometimes feel there's not enough focus on the couple. I always felt her books were half-romance and half space-opera.
And I don't think the Mercy Thompson books are even "half-romance" most of the time. Briggs' Anna & Charles (Alpha & Omega series) is different. It was born from someone asking her to write a romance novella for an anthology. So her focus in that series was always as much on Anna & Charles (if not more) as on the supernatural storyline, especially in the novella and first 2 books.