Smart Bitches, Trashy Books

Hello, Gorgeous! by MaryJanice Davidson

Tall, snarky, not-too-bright blonde chick dies, is resurrected with superpowers that include unusual strength and speed and is dragged into the battle of Good vs. Evil, kicking and screaming and making pop culture references all the way. Sound familiar? Yeah, the Undead franchise has been so good to Davidson that she’s now saving other people the trouble and is blatantly ripping herself off, down to the black best friend and taciturn, hot, dark-haired hero. She could’ve called this book Undead and Microchipped. Feh.

Feminism is a dirty word

Thanks to Monica, I found Brenda Coulter’s blog, which I’ll probably be checking out regularly from now on. (Note to self: Must update sidebar links.) This entry about double-standards in judging fiction in particular made me chuckle, and I agreed with much of what was said. This bit, though, made me sigh a little: “I’ve said before that I don’t consider myself a feminist, and I don’t twist myself in knots trying to be politically correct. But when someone displays prejudice of this magnitude in a public forum, even a non-militant type like me tends to take offense on behalf of her gender.”

Since when were all feminists militant? That’s like saying all Christians are homophobic Bible-thumpers. I’m a feminist, and although I’m outspoken, I don’t think I’m militant in my views. My feminist stance is very simple: I think a woman should be free to do whatever turns her crank, whether she wants to be a CEO or an engineer or a porn star or a stay-at-home mom, or whether she wants to subscribe fully to religious fundamentalist doctrines of female submission (I know a fundie Christian whose wife doesn’t work outside the house and… read more »

I don’t care if you’re an asshole, as long as you write a good story.

Today’s (uhhh, actually, yesterday’s) Romancing the Blog entry was about author blogs influencing book-buying decisions. With me, it really boils down to this: If I refrained from reading books written by assholes or people whose opinions differ in any way from mine, I’d run out of books pretty damn quick; I think my list of authors would probably be pared down to, like, Eric Schlosser and Jennifer Crusie. Aside from that, I also find it fascinating to read books by people whose views are radically different from mine. A couple of years ago I tried reading Mein Kampf, for example, but I had to quit at page 150 because it was seriously sending me to sleep. I never knew anti-semitic vitriol could be so boring.

Blogs have introduced a lot of authors to me; recently I saw a PBW book written under the Lynn Viehl pseudonym (If Angels Burn) and I picked it up because I recognized the name through her blog. I certainly don’t agree with some of her opinions, but the premise of the book sounded interesting, and hey, if I gave Hitler a chance, I had to extend the same courtesy to PBW, no? (Note:… read more »