Auto-Buy

Candy insisted I read Mr. Impossible by Loretta Chase, and was even kind enough to mail it to me – and remind me that I’d forgotten about it in my desk drawer (bad, Sarah. Bad). Chase, and Gaffney, are among Candy’s faves, and I’ve never read either until her hyperventilating intervention (Seriously, I could hear her screeching from the west coast when I emailed her that I’d not read either author).

And whaddya know, she was totally right. Gaffney’s To Love and To Cherish was really good – so good I still can’t figure out how to delineate what I liked about it. It was so different from any other romance I’d read – a beta hero! Who was hot! And cerebral! Considering I go for smarts over looks every time, yet never encounter a smart but average looking hero in a romance novel (romances are as much fantasy as Dove is moisturizing cream), this made me a happy camper.

And Mr. Impossible – y’all. I am not into historicals that go outside of England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland. I’m a solid “meh” on plots that take place in France, since it’s hard to suspend reality when reading about French royalty since I know what happened to a good many of them. But outside of that? Not my #1 choice when reading back cover copy and checking out the plotline. Mr. Impossible takes place in Egypt- I was prepared to not find it fascinating.

Holy crap on a crap-filled cracker, was I wrong. Again. Chase is gooood. So good I am totally into the idea of Egypt as a plot locale, and I am digging the book, even from page 30.

So now I have to add Chase and Gaffney to my auto-buy list, the list of authors whom I automatically buy on the basis that I know without a doubt that my $10 will be well spent and the book will be solidly excellent. Usually I don’t make that judgment based on one book, but having Candy’s recommendation backing it up makes it easier to modify the sacred auto-buy.

And when I realized the auto-buy list was going to endure some changes, it made me think more about my auto-buys of the past.

Don’t laugh too hard, because this is like admitting I had a perm, pegged jeans, leg warmers and a torn sweatshirt in grade school (I totally did, too), but my auto-buys used to include Judith McNaught, Catherine Coulter and Jude Deveraux. McNaught pretty much disappeared off the earth for awhile, Coulter got a younger stunt-double to pose on her cover photos and started writing crap-ass contemporary romantic suspense that wasn’t in the least suspenseful, and Deveraux, well, after An Angel for Emily I about cried. What happened?! She used to be so much better. Of course, now I go back and read her books and think, “Well, maybe they weren’t as good as I thought.”

I also used to auto-buy Julie Garwood and Julia Quinn, but never got back into Garwood. Quinn’s early Bridgertons remain among my favorite books but of late her plots have gotten more dark and sad than light and funny. I used to look to Quinn novels when I wanted to giggle and grin at the end, but To Sir Phillip, With Love was quite serious, and dealt with abuse and depression. Since the title sounded to me like a play on “From Justin, to Kelly,” I expected lighter fare. Other past auto-buys included Sandra Brown and even at one small time, Kathleen Woodiwiss.

Now my auto-buys are much more cautious. It takes more to earn that status with me, especially after Coulter and Deveraux started producing written-by-committee hardcover crapfrests. Do I add Emma Holly to that list, with a caveat to only buy her contemporaries? I wasn’t too crazy about her historicals. I feel reasonably certain that filling up the B(n)F queue with Gaffney and Chase would not end in disappointment – so now I have to evaluate my other auto-buys, and examine my borrowing queue for past transgressions into the ‘maybe this author will be consistently good even though her last books were terrible’ hopefulness. I tend to give authors waaaay to much room to disappoint me if they’ve written a book I liked, and then three or more that I didn’t enjoy. It’s like being a fan of a consistently-losing baseball team, which I am (Go Pirates!).

So – who is on your auto-buy list? Who got dumped off the auto-buy track when they changed the formula? Who do you wish would go back to their old ways, or go rehire that old editor that made their books so wonderful?

Categorized:

Random Musings

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  1. June says:

    I think I had all the same auto-buy authors in the past…what DID happen to Coulter?  Those contemporary/mystery type books are so badly done that I can’t believe I ever liked ANY of her books. 

    Garwood got dumped when the formula changed.  So did Quinn, Kay Hooper and Christina Dodd.

    Right now, the auto-buy list is: Loretta Chase, Jennifer Crusie, Patricia Gaffney, Mary Jo Putney, Judith Ivory, Laura Kinsale

    Second tier: Anne Stuart, Karen Robards, Susan Elizabeth Phillips, Jane Feather, Pamela Morsi

    On the fence (and teetering!): Linda Howard, Joan Wolf, Lisa Kleypas

    How about the authors whose formula hasn’t changed, but you just got bored with it? i.e. Krentz/Quick, Brockmann, Laurens

  2. Sarah says:

    Oh yeah, June, those whose formula didn’t change, but their writing didn’t change enough to make me keep buying!

    I forgot – Crusie is also on my auto-buy list. But she’s waffling because I didn’t like Temptation, or Faking it. However, I LOVED Bet Me.

  3. Darlene says:

    My auto-buys include Carla Kelly, Mary Balogh, Jennifer Crusie, Susan Elizabeth Phillips, Edith Layton,Loretta Chase, Connie Brockway, Judith Ivory, Laura Kinsale and Mary Jo Putney.  My “were-auto-buys-but-they’re-teetering” are Amanda Quick/Jayne Anne Krentz, Linda Howard, Anne Stuart and Nora Roberts.  Jude Devereaux fell off the “auto buy” list a few months back, and Patricia Gaffney’s no longer writing historicals. 

    Then there’s the “I’d-buy-them-used-in-paperback” contingent, which seems to be getting longer.

    Outside of Romance, but when considering romantic themed fiction, my auto-buys include: Connie Willis, J.D. Robb, Lois McMaster Bujold, Catherine Asaro, Sharon Shinn, Robin McKinley,Jacqueline Carey, Patricia McKillip and Diana Gabaldon.

  4. Candy says:

    Ahhh, auto-buy authors. Here are romance novel authors who consistently make me break any and all resolutions to be more temperate about my book-buying: Laura Kinsale, Loretta Chase, Jennifer Crusie, Ruth Wind/Barbara Samuel (romance novels only, not women’s fiction titles), Karen Ranney, Lisa Kleypas, Judith Ivory, Anne Stuart, Sharon Shinn, Shana Abe, Patricia Gaffney back when she was writing romances, Dara Joy should she get her mind back and stop self-publishing and selling overpriced novellas, Mary Spencer/Susan Spencer Paul (though I haven’t seen new books by her in ages and ages)

    Authors whom I used to adore but whose work eventually became crap: Judith McNaught

    Authors whose work I used to adore but I started to get progressively more cranky about certain aspects of their work: Connie Brockway, Mary Jo Putney, Teresa Medeiros, Jo Beverley, Shelly Thacker

  5. Sarah says:

    Oh, the descent into crap that was McNaught and Deveraux. It was a heartbreaking descent into sodden, wet slop, wasn’t it?

  6. Candy says:

    Oh wait, I just looked up Susan Spencer Paul on Amazon.com, and it looks like she has a new book coming out in August called Touch of Night. ROCK ON.

    Oh my, but the blurb? It’s one of those dreaded “hero’s letters to the reader.” GAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

  7. Candy says:

    Yes, my disillusionment with Judith McNaught has pained me. If only she’d write heroes who weren’t different iterations of the same guy with only minor variations (i.e. eye color). IF only she wrote heroines weren’t different iterations of the same woman with only minor variations (i.e. hair AND eye color). If only she didn’t make all her characters ache so much. Ache ache ache. Here, have some Ben-Gay, love.

  8. Jorie says:

    Autoreads.  (Uh, yeah, I will use the library for hardcovers.)  Crusie, Susan Elizabeth Phillips, Suzanne Brockmann’s single titles, Laura Kinsale, Lois McMaster Bujold, Iain M. Banks (er, moving out of romance territory), Karin Lowachee, and Alice Munro. 

    I still have to get my hands on Gaffney’s romances.

    Authors I eye with interest: Loretta Chase, Shannon McKenna, Anne Stuart (contemporaries), Virginia Kantra, Octavia Butler.

  9. Quaisior says:

    I don’t auto-buy in hardcover, so a lot of my authors are auto-pick-up-at-the- library, then buy the paperback a year later.

    My romance auto-buy list is very small:
    Julia Quinn, Pamela Morsi, Mary Jo Putney, J. D. Robb

    My romantic SF list is pretty huge though: Sharon Shinn, Catherine Asaro, Lois McMaster Bujold, Joan D. Vinge, Robin McKinley (except I’m having second thoughts now because I was so disappointed with Sunshine), Julie E. Czerneda, Anne Bishop, Jane S. Fancher, Karen Traviss, Tamora Pierce, and I’m probably forgetting a few

    Quinn almost went off my auto-buy list with To Sir Phillip, With Love, but I liked When He Was Wicked, even though that was darker too.  I’ve heard that It’s in His Kiss will return to the lighter, funnier side though.

  10. Amy E says:

    My autobuys are mostly paranormal authors—Sherrilyn Kenyon, Angela Knight, Susan Sizemore, Charlaine Harris, Melanie Jackson.  Madeline Hunter just made the list in historical, and Kate Rothwell too, and would have even if I didn’t know her.  And Kinley MacGregor, obviously.  On EC, I have totally fallen in love with Sahara Kelly’s fairies—they’re sexy and hilarious, a combination that gets me every time.  (Oh, I spend way too much money on EC.  Huge.)

    Know who’s fallen off my autobuy list in a huge way?  Christine Feehan.  I gave her too much leeway as it was.  Every Carpathian is like the last, only with a bigger I’m-an-asshole-and-you’d-better-like-it complex.  She FINALLY branched out into some psychic paramilitary stuff and some weres, but I have to say, her last Carpathian novel offended me so badly that I will never buy another book by her.  Nope.  No excuse for that shit.

    In the what was I thinking category… Charlotte Lamb.  I think the very first romance I ever read was from her.  The hero called the heroine “you beautiful little fool” and slapped her a few times.  I thought he was sooooo hot.  (Damn, I was stupid.)  I remember the hero caught the heroine’s hand when she tried to slap him back, took off her glove, and kissed her pulse.  Much as I wince at most things I remember from that book, the whole kissing-the-pulse fetish is with me to this day.  STILL think that’s hot.

  11. Sara says:

    Before I say anything about my autobuy list, I must point out that your reluctance to read romances set in France means you have missed two of the very best, ever written. Bliss and Dance (Judith Ivory wrote them when she was still Judy Cuevas) are in my top ten; Dance is in my top five. So please, reconsider. At least long enough to read these two.

    romance autobuys

    Jenny Crusie, Judith Ivory, Laura Kinsale, Susan Elizabeth Phillips, Susan Wiggs

    other autobuys: the list is pretty long, and really, if I am honest and write all the names down, I’ll probably have to admit that my daughter’s college tuition (or at least a big hunk of it) is sitting on my bookshelves.

  12. Candy says:

    “other autobuys: the list is pretty long (…)”

    Yup. I started to open that can of worms in my first comment for this entry, then decided not to go there because I didn’t want to make people scroll through an endless parade of names.

  13. Emma says:

    Autobuys: Laura Kinsale, Judith Ivory, Suzanne Brockmann, Susan Elizabeth Phillips, Rachel Gibson, and Susan Squires.

    The only author who used to be an autobuy but is not anymore is Madeline Hunter. She lost me with her move to Regencies. Her medievals were wonderful—atmospheric, unique, gorgeously written, and just…special. I only read her first Regency and had no reason to read any more, as it was nothing special at all. I really wish she’d write at least one medieval again every now and then!

  14. Sarah says:

    I think it is so funny how many autobuys we have in common- particularly Crusie, SEP, and Brockmann.

    And Sara, you are right, I should break past my France-o-phobia, and try those books – thanks for the recommendation!

    And Candy – letters from the hero?! The WORST back cover device ever invented. Doesn’t it automatically make you want to put the book back asap?

  15. Candy says:

    “And Candy – letters from the hero?! The WORST back cover device ever invented. Doesn’t it automatically make you want to put the book back asap?”

    It not only makes me want to put the book back, it makes me want to grab a marker pen and black the blurb out so other people won’t be inflicted with its horror. If this weren’t a Susan Spencer Paul book…. Well, to be fair, I’ve learned not to put ANY stock in romance novel cover blurbs. They are not accurate indicators of the contents. Romance authors just seem to get stuck with the double-whammy of “worst covers in the biz” and “worst blurbs in the biz.” I mean, some blurbs are so bad they’re just mortifying.

  16. Sara says:

    I’m reminded of this great quote:

    “Why judge mainstream fiction by its best examples and other types of fiction by their worst?”

    from an essay by Matthew Cheney at
    The LitBlog Co-op
    (in response—at least partially—to my snarking at them about intellectual elitism and snobbery)

  17. Sarah says:

    Great point, Sara – Why should romance be judged by the rape-filled bodice rippers? Why should we all have to bear the shame of Fabio?

    Why!?

  18. Lynn M says:

    Sarah, can I just say thank you because I always wonder if I’m the only one who didn’t *love* Crusie’s Welcome to Temptation. I feel much more normal now.

    But Crusie is an autobuy for me. As is Suzanne Brockmann. Loretta Chase, getting there quickly.

    Past autobuys for me included McNaught (and I still do love her earlier stuff) before I realized that I’d read it all before, Garwood who I stopped buying around the time of the Roses, and…okay, way more embarrasing than owning a neon shaker sweater…Johanna Lindsay.

    Do I win a prize for admitting that?

  19. Sarah says:

    Lynn – I know a couple of people who weren’t all that enamored of Temptation so fear not. I think it’s a large break from her usual style but I can’t put my finger on what the break was, other than that it bored the hell out of me.

    As for admitting to a Lindsay auto-buy, girl, you have my everlasting respect for admitting that. You go on with your bad self.

  20. Candy says:

    “Why should we all have to bear the shame of Fabio?”

    I don’t know. I think the secret lies in his man-titties, though.

    Who’s brave enough to go look?

  21. Maili says:

    Ooh, *hands on face* I think I know the answer to that question on the success of Crusie’s TEMPTATION!

    It was a proper adult romantic comedy that we hadn’t had for a while. Other romantic comedy novels, at the time, were along the line of very PC, Pollyanna-like, slapstick and/or has no swearing. I loved SEP’s books but I wanted something *different*. IMO, WTT delivered that. 

    Porn! Sexual jokes! Cynicism! Affairs galore! Snarkiness! Murder! Atypical Hero! Film quotes! Mad people! Fucked Six Ways to Sunday! Mad shags! On the pool table! Etc.! It’s Romance’s answer to Chick Lit, if you like.

    Also, think in terms of the Pink Ladies from GREASE: Crusie is a mixture of Marty and Rizzo and other authors, at the time, were a) Sandy, b) Jan, or c) Frenchy. 

    OK, I really DO need some coffee.

  22. Sara says:

    Maili—you’ve nailed it on the head (oooh, bad imagery) as far as WTT is concerned. Marty and Rizzo, ha! Jenny will get a kick out of that, I’m going to forward this to her.

  23. June says:

    Emma, I too LOVED Madeline Hunter’s medieval books.  And though I’m usually able to stick with an author through different settings, I just can’t get into her more recent offerings. However, I have found in general that after 20-odd years of reading romance, my taste has gotten very selective. 

    I feel that years ago I had a lot more tolerance for crap.  So yes.  I also confess to Johanna Lindsey being an autobuy.  But, in my defense, it was the EIGHTIES!  I didn’t know what I was doing!

  24. Gail says:

    Madeline Hunter was an auto-buy in Medieval. I bought her first 18th century (I haven’t really been able to figure out whether they’re actually Regency era or not), and didn’t like it, but have liked the more recent of them—THE ROMANTIC, THE SINNER, THE CHARMER—so she may be back on the list.

    Brockmann, Crusie, Kinsale are all on my list. I’ve added Liz Carlyle to it in the last year or so—A WOMAN SCORNED had me buying everything in the bookstore by her, and I’ve enjoyed all of them—tho some more than others. Mary Balogh is on my list too, as is Edith Layton, Anne Stuart, Susan Anderson, Robin D. Owens and Julia Quinn.

    Eileen Wilks, who writes mostly category but is branching out into werewolf books, has never disappointed, so she’s an autobuy. Evelyn Vaughn is going on my list with her recent Bombshells—

    I’m with you, Candy—I have way, way too many autobuy authors—even if some do slide off now and again—for the peace and tranquility of my pocketbook.

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