seryn

You know what we need? Within genre ratings.

A really excellent romance book is not ever going to be literature quality work. Most of them use small words and small concepts. Some of them only have a loose grasp of grammar (part of my belief that publishers aren't doing their jobs, since they're in charge of editing.) Most of them rely upon tropes and the expectations of the reader. They don't create ideas or worlds or push the envelope of our society. But even within those low expectations, there are good and bad romances.

I have the same issue with action movies. A great action movie isn't likely to ever get more than 3 or maybe 4 stars, because it's still got banal plotting and mediocre characterization that they hope will be covered by lots of car chases and explosions. But if you know I think action movies are not in the same caliber as dramas, when I give a 5 star to an action movie, you can judge that I thought it was definitely worth watching.

We shouldn't compare things cross-genre when the quality of the work in those genres is disparate.