What Mr Mills and Mr Boon did was to start a publishing company. The Mills and Boons publishing house started out by publishing everything from burlesaue to romance. They later cashed in on the fact that women were looking for more romances and specifically, Mills and Boons romances. And so came about the first romance fiction that came to be known by the publishing house and not the authors.

After a century MBs still rule the roost as far as romance goes. The Danielle Steeles and Judith Michaels have eaten into the romance fiction market but their victims have been the Harley Quinns and Georgette Heyers. ``In my hostel, girls come at all odd hours, bang on my door, asking for MBs,'' says Thinlay Choden, a EconomicsHonours student at Miranda House. ``We generally rotate the books and when we buy, we do so from second-hand shops.'' Sunil's pavement book stall in Kamla Market is the staple MB store for those on North Campus. He sells all his books at a flat rate of Rs 50, but the MBs carry a special 10 per cent discount.

Says Crossword manager Jacob Johnson, ``We have a lot of teenagers and middle-aged women who buy these books.''

The storyline has always been similar: Man meets woman, they fall in love at some point, they then squabble and finally they unite. Yet these syrupy love romances have been termed as a ``global phenomenon''.

``They have constantly appealed to people because the readership is renewed periodically,'' explains Dr Radhika Chopra, a sociology teacher in the Delhi School of Economics who has done extensive work on popular fiction.

So, in the 1990s authors of sensuous MBs like Nora Roberts and writers of ``sweet romances'' like Bettie Neils are equally popular. In fact, the mould of ``toneddown'' MBs was broken in the 70s by Anne Mather. She was the first author to actually express overt sexuality in her books, turning the genre of romance fiction on its head.

What hasn't changed is the fact that the heroines continue to be white women. There is a little more variety as far as the men are concerned, what with Latin counts, Indian Maharajas and Arab Sheikhs being a part of the books.

Some MBs series focus on the man. ``Most men don't admit it, but there is a secret readership that some of them are a part of,'' Chopra says. ``A lot of MB authors are drawn from the readers. There has been an increase in the number of male authors, indicating an increase in readers also.''

MBs have their share of critics. ``The stories are so similar, only the names and the locales change,'' says Divya Chopra, a second-year student at Lady Shri Ram College.

Die-hard MB readers defend their choice by saying that these ``easy read'' books are just like a ``hot water bottle, making one feel warm andcomfy''.