As the gif review has become more and more common, I've seen some readers who think it is completely excellent, and some who hate all the giffing. I can understand both perspectives.
But I got to thinking that this was actually quite a boon to the romance community, all this animated visualization.
NOW we know what some scenes in romance novels and some common cliches LOOK like. Or, if we don't, we can add some excellent visuals to make the cliches that much more powerful! Carrie, Elyse, RedHeadedGirl, Amanda and I, we're here to help.
For example: you know in the Christine Feehan novels when the Carpathians dance some intricate pattern of steps to cast a spell or remove a spell or stymie some bad dude? They dance a lot.
What does that look like?
Now we know:
Or maybe:
No, no, the Carpathian spell-casting feet shuffle is TOTALLY this:
But you know, it's NOT just the Carpathian dance that we can illustrate visually. There's MORE. The possibilities are endless!
In a romantic suspense, the bad guys are after the hero and heroine, danger lurks around every page turn… but there is SO TOTALLY TIME for sex in the stairwell!
Or, as we call it: DANGER BONER.
Then there's one of my least favorite lines that I've read way, way too often: he'd been too long without a woman.
Ick.
I mean, not only is it really gross, because apparently any warm and available hole will do, but really, if he needs to get off so badly, grab a sock and some lotion and go find the bathroom, dude. Leave “a woman” out of it and take care of your own business.
But no, many a romance hero has been too long without a woman.
Now, I can picture this:
Got some smoldering gazes? We got that covered:
And when there's an evil glint in someone's eyes, or he has a “dark gaze,” you can picture this:
She takes one look and knows it won't fit. There's no way!
The heroine wears sexy undergarments as her “one concession to femininity:”
Dance as old as time?
The hero and heroine will have a FAKE RELATIONSHIP and possibly also MEANINGLESS SEX… which always never works out the way they want because
Baby filled epilogue? You know someone's in the background of that small town filled with perfectly happy people saying the following:
Aren't gifs something to be thankful for? I think so. What other romance cliches can you illustrate now?
I’m sorry, but for a moment I thought you had illustrated ‘dance as old as time’ with a bootleg Vladimir Putin dance at some tropical Sochi resort…. then I realized it wasn’t Poop-tin, as we call him in my household. It was better when I thought it was Vlad doing the dance as old as time.
But I do like Gifs. In small doses.
I’m ok w/ the judicious use of gifs, but more than one (maybe two) is heading into ranty territory. It’s the equivalent of all caps—I feel as if I’m being bludgeoned and tune out.
As long as there’s editing, it works. Be it GIFs, hashtags, tagging, whatever. There’s this one 50 shades trilogy review that has about 11 gifs per book. It works because they are short, to the point and tied to the writing. You can skip them if you have a slow connection, and everything is still understood.
Gifs can completely bump up a review from helpful and enjoyable to outright hilarious – when used judiciously. A few here and there to enhance the main points/particularly funny moments of a review is great; when the review is basically a collection of captioned gifs, it turns me off. They aren’t a substitute for actually having witty things to say.
I love gif reviews when they’re done well. OR when they make me laugh. Otherwise it strikes me as trying too hard. And yet… sometimes you see a great gif and you just have to use it.
Like, you know, this one.
Christine E, they actually revived it last fall on CW. Aisha Tyler is the host, with Colin, Wayne and Ryan all there as the 3 regulars.
I know I’m probably the odd man out, but I don’t like gif reviews.