It’s Romance Awareness Month and we’re dishing all month long about everything romance related. And if there’s one name that is instantly recognizable in the romance world it’s got to be Fabio. Kerri Carpenter dishes about all things Fabio with us.
I Can’t Believe It’s Not Fabio!
By Kerri Carpenter
O Fabio, Fabio, wherefore art thou, Fabio?
As a romance writer, there are a lot of questions and comments I receive. Trust me, I totally get the curiosity.
Where do you get your ideas?
Do you write about yourself?
When are you going to write a real book?
How did you get into that?
Enter Fabio. That’s right. Fabio. The Italian/American model who graced the covers of countless romance novels in the 1980s and 1990s.
Is Fabio on your cover?
You write the kind of books with Fabio?
I suppose the answer to that is no. And yes. Sort of. Um, it’s complicated.
Besides a handful of mainstream romance authors, there is probably no other person on the planet more synonymous with romance novels than Fabio Lanzoni. I say, it’s time to bring Fabio off the covers and learn a little more about him. In honor of Romance Awareness Month, here are some facts about the undisputed king of the bodice ripper.
- Fabio is 58 years old. He was born in Milan, Italy, and he is six feet, three inches tall.
- Fabio became a U.S. citizen in 2016.
- Fabio appeared on 462 romance novel covers. This illustrious title was overtaken by Jason Aaron Baca in 2016.
- With Eugena Riley, Fabio wrote a series of historical romance novels: Pirate, Rogue, Comanche, Viking and Champion. He wrote three more books with Wendy Corsi Staub titled Dangerous, Wild, and Mysterious.
- In 1999, Fabio was riding in the first car of Apollo’s Chariot, a roller coaster at Busch Gardens Williamsburg. A goose hit him in the nose during a 64-meter drop. The goose died and Fabio’s nose was covered in blood.
- Fabio has been in dozens of national advertising campaigns, but the most popular was for I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter!.
- Before moving to the United States, he had to serve his required two years in the Italian Army.
- Fabio released an album in 1994 titled Fabio After Dark.
There you have it. Probably more than you ever thought you would know about the man with the flowing mane and bare chest.
I remember watching those I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter! commercials when I was a little girl. Never, ever did I think that decades later I would be talking about its spokesperson on a weekly (sometimes daily) basis.
While Fabio does not appear on the covers of the kinds of books that I write, I have to wonder what it would be like if he did. I tend to roll my eyes or let out a sigh when I’m asked about Fabio, but to be honest, I think it would actually be kinda cool.
Please pick up my book, Tempting Mr. Wrong, which sadly, does not have Fabio on the cover. However, it is on sale this week for only 99 cents.
-Kerri Carpenter, author of Tempting Mr. Wrong
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