Flip the Page
A girl perpetually stuck in books, reviewing and recommending books to get you perpetually stuck in books.
This podcast will be highlighting fiction books across all genres from mainly Black authors. If you're struggling finding or deciding what books to read written by Black authors with Black characters and dope storylines, you've found the right place!
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Flip the Page
Ep 8 | A Love Song for Ricki Wilde: The Fated Mates Trope
Welcome back to episode 8 of Flip the Page. I’m your host Zo and today we’re going to be talking about a popular trope in romance: Fated Mates.
The book I’m going to be submitting in as evidence to frame my breakdown of this trope around is A Love Song for Ricki Wilde by Tia Williams.
Set against the backdrop of modern Harlem and Renaissance glamour, A Love Song for Ricki Wilde is a swoon-worthy love story of two passionate artists drawn to the magic, romance, and opportunity of New York, and whose lives are uniquely and irreversibly linked.
[Intro Music] The Fated Mates trope. Look. Authors. Aspiring authors. If you're going to put this trope in your book, I need you to sell me on it. And 99% of the time, I'm not buying whatever it is you're selling. Honestly, I feel like you're scamming me out of what could have been a well-developed romance. Yeah, I said it. Y'all are out here scamming! It's like going to the corner store and buying a family sized bag of chips and opening it up to see it's only about a third of the bag actually filled with chips. Let me start this shit from the top. Hey y'all. Welcome back to episode seven of Flip the Page. I'm your host, Zo. And today we're going to be talking about a popular trope in romance Fated Mates. The book I'm going to be submitting in as evidence to frame my breakdown of this trope around is A Love Song for Ricki Wilde by Tia Williams. Content Warning for racism. Before I get deeper into my opinions on the Fated Mates trope, I'm going to run through the plot for A Love Song for Ricki Wilde to get y’all that haven’t read the book up to speed. If you have read it, you can use the timestamps to jump ahead in this episode to when I start discussing the trope in relation to the book. Spoiler warning This book is a contemporary romance novel set in modern day New York, but backdropped by events that occurred in Harlem during the Harlem Renaissance in the 1920s. Ricki Wilde, a 28 year old Black woman, is the female protagonist of the story. She comes from money, as her family owns a national funeral home chain. Her and her three older sisters were raised to take over different parts of the family business. Ricki being the black sheep, always rebelled in attempt to stray away from this path that was set for her. Currently, she works as a receptionist at one of her family's funeral homes. At the beginning of this novel, however, she tells her family that she's moving to New York to open up her own flower shop, Without financial assistance, she's been receiving from her parents. Lucky for her, before she moves, she meets Ms. Della Bennett while finishing up her last day as a receptionist. When Ricki talks with Ms. Della and tells her about her situation, Ms. Della offers Ricki an apartment in the brownstone that she owns in Harlem to live in, and to open her flower shop. The male protagonist of the story is 28 year old Ezra “Breeze” Walker, the fourth or the fifth, who we’re introduced to early in the story, as we're flung back into the past. Ezra and his family were sharecroppers back in his hometown of South Carolina. Five years prior, Ezra had fought in World War One before returning home. Shortly after returning home, His entire family was murdered by the KKK when they set a Black church on fire. Following these events, Ezra, who had been big on music and exceptionally talented at it since he was a child, gave it up for four years. Eventually, though, he ended up moving to Harlem in 1923, where he got into the music scene and blew up big time. Back in the present, Ricki moves into the new apartment. She quickly becomes an adopted granddaughter from Ms. Della and she makes a close friend in Tuesday Rowe, who is an eccentric ex child actress. When Ricki officially opens her flower shop, business is booming in the early days but quickly starts to decline. Stuck on what to do to bring back business, Ricki goes for a walk at a community garden. At the garden, she runs into a man who she feels she knows, even though she doesn't. Before she can say a word, however, he dips. Ricki's thoughts after this encounter are consumed by who she calls the Garden Gentleman, when she really needs to be focusing more on resuscitating that flower shop that's pretty much flatlining at this point, but let me stay focused. Early on into her move, Ricki began seeing this man named Ali, who's an artist. Ricki had gone with Ali to an art party where some of his work was being displayed. At the party, a nude portrait of Ricki that Ali painted is bought by an anonymous buyer for a lot of money. Not weird at all. Ricki presses the lady, purchasing the portrait in place of the anonymous buyer, and she eventually receives a phone number from her. After breaking up with Ali, Ricki and Tuesday use the number she got at the art party to track down the address of the anonymous buyer. They camp out at his house until he appears and to no one's shock, the anonymous buyer is Garden Gentleman. When they confront him, he demands slash begs Ricki to leave and stop trying to contact him. Ricki does end up running into him again at the community garden, where it's revealed that this man is Ezra. They strike up a conversation, but Ezra remains firm in his stance that they stay away from each other. This, however, doesn't work out as they continue running into each other in a long stream of coincidences. When Ezra has a conversation with his life coach, you learn that there's a specific reason why he's staying away from Ricki. The reason being that back in the 1920s, one of his ex-girlfriends had placed a curse on him before committing suicide in front of him. The curse making him immortal and leaving him to be haunted by images of the love of his life until he found he. When he does end up finding the love of his life, she would die on the same day his ex-girlfriend did. February 29th. Ultimately, Ezra and Ricki give in to their attraction for each other and compulsion to be together, and Ezra reveals the curse to Ricki. Initially, she doesn't believe him because who would? But after she learns about the history behind the curse, she does. The two seek out different ways to break the curse, but when they learn that it can only be broken by sacrificing a life for Ricki's, they give up. Now, we find out that Ezra's ex, who had placed that curse on him all them years ago, was Ms. Della's mama. This revelation being one of the things that led Ricki to eventually believe Ezra. When Ms. Della, whose health had quickly deteriorated due to cancer, learns about the curse and what is needed to break the curse. She gives her life to save Ricki. And there you have it, A Love Song for Ricki Wilde. Now I'm going to be moving into my breakdown of the Fated Mates trope. Part One. The Cop Out. This story is advertised as an epic romance. But let me tell it. Ricki and Ezra's love story was neither epic nor romantic to me. And yes, I blame the Fated Mates trope for the shortcomings of the romance in this story. For anyone who doesn't know, the Fated Mates trope is a trope typically found in romance and fantasy genres, where two characters are destined to be together due to magical, cosmic, or supernatural reasons. Simply put, soul mates. In the case of A Love Song for Ricki Wilde, Ricki and Ezra are Fated Mates. Their relationship is marred with the many pitfalls of the Fated Mates trope that make me loathe its insertion in books. My main gripe with the Fated Mates trope is authors tend to skimp out on the development of the relationship between a couple because of the trope. You'll see authors harp on this feeling of connection between a pair, emphasizing this pull and draw they have towards the other person. In the book, when Ricki first runs into Ezra in the garden, she describes feeling helplessly drawn to him, the pull going far beyond her “attraction to terrible men.” When they run into each other the second time at a wedding, Ezra describes when he first saw her,“Everything went still. Still and calm.” This is all fine and cute, but if you're not going to put in the work to show me the development of the relationship, what else can I feel but that you're using the Fated Mates trope as a crutch. Thinking that it allows you to forgo actually writing the development of a couple's relationship? Don't just tell me. Show me. Unfortunately, this story, failed to show me any real depth and connection between the two Outside of this apparent draw, they have for each other. Ricki constantly raves internally that Ezra puts up with her ramblings about random facts, and is the first one who's ever asked her about her reasons for opening a flower shop and guessed those reasons correctly. Now Ricki. Sweetie. Have you ever considered that rather than Ezra's “putting up” with your ramblings being indicative of some special connection, perhaps the people in your life up to this point have just all been dickheads? A point I can prove rather easily given she has no friends prior to moving to New York, purposefully seeks out relationships with emotionally stunted men strictly for sex, and her family is insufferable. When it comes to him guessing the reasons for opening up her flower shop, Ricki quite literally insinuated her reasons for opening the flower shop to Ezra five seconds before his guess. Ezra tells his life coach, who is also an immortal, about his feelings for Ricki. He admits that seeing her is the reason he wakes up in the morning and that he's fallen for her. Bad. Let the record show... Ezra and Ricki have had two conversations at this point. I repeat. Let the record show. Ezra and Ricki have had TWO conversations at this point. Come close, come close. Listen and listen well. I need you, the author, to convince me, the reader, that this alleged draw between two characters, these feelings and the compulsion to be around each other, runs deeper than them being destined to be together. Prove to me, through their interactions and conversations, that even though their love was predestined, it's something that exceeds the confines of the label that is Fated Mates. Show me that it can stand alone! If I were to strip away that flimsy ass title that is the Fated Mates trope. That is, if I were to remove all insinuations of them being fated from the book based off their conversations and interactions, would I believe this all encompassing, deep, once-in-a-lifetime love exists between these two characters? At this point, the book has proved the answer to this question to be no. So to have Ezra confess his feelings and admit Ricki is essentially his reason to continue living at this point in the story is a bit wild to me. Based on their prior conversations, to me, it's literally just fate that has led him to love not anything related to their actual relationship. It just cheapens love to me. I wouldn't even have beef if y'all just didn't advertise these books as some epic love story, because now that's what I'm expecting. And y'all are not meeting these expectations a lot of the time when the Fated Mates trope is thrown into the story. Part Two. Now, Where Have I Seen This Before... My next gripe with the Fated Mates trope. It’s just too damn predictable. Y'all just reduce, reuse and recycle the same tired plot points and arcs. Sure, authors tweak the elements a bit, maybe switch up the lore or the stakes, but at its root it's the same rinse and repeat ass script. Are the girls not tired? In the case of A Love Song for Ricki Wilde, to put it simply, you have Ezra and Ricki, a couple fated to be together but also fated to never truly be together due to a curse placed on Ezra. Sound familiar? The curse stating that when Ezra does meet his one true love, Ricki, she will die on the same day his ex-girlfriend who cursed him, died. I'm sure when this was revealed in the latter half of the novel, it was meant to evoke a guttural, heart wrenching reaction for me as I watched the two try and fail to break the curse before accepting their fate. But let me tell you. You ain't get no type of reaction from me other than a deep, heavy sigh, because babe, I know, you know, that I know you're not killing Ricki off by the end of this book. How then can you expect me to buy into the angst when I know these supposed high stakes are not actually high staking? Look, at this point. If you're going to give me Fated Mates, I need someone in the pair to die by the time I flip to the last page of the book. It is 2024. I need more authors to make something shake and subvert my expectations. At least then I won’t assume from jump that some loophole or a Hail Mary in overtime will occur That solves the problem. If you don't want to kill off a character, which, let's be real, isn't happening because we're dealing with the romance genre. I need you to push the damn pen. I need you to develop the [redacted] out of their relationship. I need deep conversations. I need banter. I need yearning. I need longing. I need deep physical and emotional connection and support spilled out onto those pages. And I don't want it to be half assed. Don't give me 2 or 3 conversations barely scratching the surface of actual depth and expect me to smile at the pages when I see a love confession coming out of someone's mouth. Or to be clutching my chest in agony when one half is facing “certain” death. You won't get neither of these reactions around these parts if you don't put in the work to lay the groundwork in their relationship. To wrap my thoughts up, At the end of the day, this story just played it too safe when it came to the romance. It's so formulaic and predictable. It strips what should have been a well-developed, high stake story and romance into something that was, quite frankly, boring and simple. A major conflict in the story is the secret Ezra is hiding. And the story spent so much time building it up. And when I learned his secret, is that his existence and appearance in Ricki's life is literally a death flag for her. I felt... Nothing. Well, that's not true because I did feel disappointment and underwhelm. I knew Ricki wasn't going to croak, and the development of their relationship and feelings for each other was so abysmal, so I hadn't bought into the authenticity of their love for each other. So now all these angsty scenes between these two lovers, destined to never be together, fell flat for me. I didn't care. Perhaps if one of them croaked, or to be less dramatic. If more time had been spent developing their relationship, my heart might have twitched with some pity and sadness. But alas, I sat there, bored and unsatisfied. And thus the story ended with Ricki being saved by Ms. Della and Ricki and Ezra living happily ever after. While I'm sat here debating if those hours spent reading the book might have been better, used towards literally anything else. Flip or Skip I wonder which- Skip. This book is getting a one out of five for me, which is tragic because I was excited to read it. I really wanted to like her. I really did. I really wanted to like her. I promise y'all. Oh, I'm not beating the hater allegations, but I'm not a hater. I'm not. I really wanted to like her! Perhaps if Ezra and Ricki being Fated Mates wasn't used as a crutch for their relationship, and more time had been spent developing their relationship, my rating for this book would have been higher, but oh well. I really did enjoy the depictions of Harlem during the Harlem Renaissance that were in the book, and I was anticipating how things would go with Ricki in her flower shop. However, we did not stay in Harlem long, unfortunately, and with how things were settled with Ricki's flower shop, it seemed like that plot point was just thrown in there to get her to Harlem. I have author's other book, Seven Days in June on my To Be Read list. But after this... I fear it's getting knocked down a few positions on that never ending list because I can't y'all. That's. That's the end of this episode of Flip the Page. If you enjoyed this episode, please like or drop a comment. In next week's episode, we're going to be getting into another queer romance slash literary fiction book that I'm really looking forward to. So hopefully, it doesn't let me down. Until next time. Buh byeeee.
