The world stopped Thursday night for some, when Grey’s Anatomy killed off Patrick Dempsey’s character Derek Shepherd, aka McDreamy. So far more than 67,000 people have signed the petition on change.org to bring Dr. Derek “McDreamy” Shepherd back to the show—something that would require a surgical feat of the highest order but also quite doable in Hollywood if soap operas are to be believed.
As the woman who started the petition lamented, “We would have been better off hating Derek thinking he was cheating on Meredith than for you to just kill him off. I would rather hate him thinking he is an adulterer than have him dead!”
Ouch!
I suspect as the news spread many a reader clutched her latest novel closer, comforted by the knowledge that at least in the world of romance books, this could not happen to them.
Or could it?
The long-standing, unspoken understanding between romance authors and readers has always been a happy ending—in a world too often bereft of them. Heroes won’t die. And love will find its way. All one need do is read to the end.
Which begs the question: is it ever okay for the lovers in a romance novel to pull a Romeo and Juliet?
You tell me.
And while we’re talking disappointments, what is the worse thing one of your favorite authors has ever done to one of your favorite characters—that shocked you but you were able to forgive?
—Jeanne Devlin
