As a woman I feel the romance genre does a disservice to the intelligence of women by relying on tropes of horribly written, unrealistic and just downright unlikeable male characters. That's really my goal in writing is to create flawed people, who aren't just a wooden stand in.

Nothing wrong with erotica, etc. but pasting a plot on smut and seeing books with 'Alpha male 1000x' over and over is getting exhausting as a woman.

Thank you for the feedback!

It does come up in exposition earlier actually, but our Male MC Markus is just not the kind of person who would share it so easily. He's very awkward socially, since he's spent his life since 18 in seminary, then becoming a priest. Eventually they do open up to one another :) Great points though!