Of prime importance in real estate, location is also a key element in the appeal of romances. Popular geographic settings and historical periods sell, unpopular ones do not--not always with a logical explanation, as the author discovered when she conducted a survey on this topic last year. (Why, for example, are the French Revolution and the American Civil War considered unappealing settings?) This brief article evaluates the answer to this question and how the passage of time effects the outcome.