This is wonderful article. I like this. Just order mine the other day!!! I was like you too Marline, but I broke down!!! I’m excited for pistol, yoke & busted!!! So excited!!!!http://onlinesolution.info/?ca…
Had no idea you’d even heard of the Vicar of Dibley in the US! My all time favourite episode is The Handsome Stranger with Richard Armitage. Brilliant!
January 24, 2012 | Tuesday at 9:00 am | 82 Comments
I received a pitch for this book from the author, and was intrigued by the mix of elements she highlighted in her email: the multi-cultural characters, the use of European soccer clubs as a setting, and the interesting conflict with the heroine posing as the fiancée of her gay best friend while being attracted to his nemesis. I not only bought it but sent a message to Jane at DearAuthor, since she and I both enjoy sports-focused romances.
Alas, this book is poorly edited, suffers from an outright fear of commas, is confused as to how the characters names are spelled, and is published with a lack of formatting that neglected to mark changes in scene or point of view, which made reading downright confusing.
Most bothersome to me, the plot relies on stereotypes to a degree I found offensive. The portrayal of the gay characters turned me off entirely.
January 23, 2012 | Monday at 5:18 pm | 53 Comments
A reader sent me a link to a Reddit thread which reveals that the image used in a popular meme online, Sheltering Suburban Mom, is the author photo of Carly Phillips, bestselling romance author.
Cue long discussion of how romance is porn.
This is a whole new kettle of WTF for an individual like Ms. Phillips, who probably never suspected that her image was being used to portray a meme character. Her identity has been listed at Know Your Meme for awhile, and their article traces the first known usage of Philips' author photo as 5 May 2011.
I don't know if I can successfully explain a meme, but usually it's an image representing a character with various captions attached. For example: judgmental bookseller ostrich, who is that horrible bookseller we've often met who judges our reading choices.
The problem for Phillips: some of the captions are funny, some are sort of meh, and some are painfully racist and homophobic, not to mention the overarching problem of having one's image used as a symbol for hypocritical self-importance.
January 23, 2012 | Monday at 2:51 am | 431 Comments
Lisa Kleypas' Rainshadow Road comes out in February, and her publisher has offered 10 finished copies to give away. Whoo! And not only do we have books to give away, but Lisa Kleypas was kind enough to answer several inane questions from me via email. Hooray - bonus interview!
Rainshadow Road has magical realism while Friday Harbor did not. Why add it to this novel? Did you plan to go this way all along with the series?
Well, when I first visited Friday Harbor with Greg and the kids a couple of years ago, I really felt a sense of "otherness" or magic in the air. It's a misty Brigadoon-type place--but you're probably too young for that reference, unless you're a show tune queen like me. San Juan Island is unique place--a mixture of steep hills and bluffs, forests, rolling farmland, sandy beaches, and all of it is protected by the Olympic mountain rainshadow. And I'd read and loved so much magic realism in the past, including "Like Water For Chocolate" by Laura Esquivel, and "Garden Spells" by Sarah Addison Allen, that I really saw…
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January 23, 2012 | Monday at 12:32 am | 8 Comments
This was recorded when I was coming down with the flu and pneumonia, and I'm slightly out of breath - and coughing. I edited out most of the coughing but if I missed one, I apologize.
This episode includes Sarah's nefarious plans for Romantic Times in 2012 in Chicago, reader mail from Sarah's inbox about buying books, picking self published books for review and how we do it, pitching books for review and how not to do it, and reacting and responding to reviews.
Jane also tries to recommend books to Sarah.
Here are the books we discuss in this episode:
And yes - more Peatbog!
The music this week was provided by Sassy Outwater, and the track is called "Nyup" and it's by the Peatbog Faeries from their 2007 album What Men Deserve to Lose. You can find them at their website, or at iTunes.
January 21, 2012 | Saturday at 6:39 am | 27 Comments
Lisa's email about the book she's seeking made me snort laugh.
I'm trying to find the first romance novel I ever read. I liked it
enough that I kept reading romances, but I think it was probably much
worse than I thought. I want to reread it...but I can't find it!
It's been bothering me for ages now. Please, can the bitchery help?
The heroine is an orphan/thief in historical London. She dreams of a
better life and spends her time practicing a refined accent and making
hats. She also has a brother.
The hero is rich, but he works - a lawyer maybe, or a doctor? His
best friend is a layabout who is waiting on his aunt to cough up her
inheritance.
January 21, 2012 | Saturday at 3:36 am | 7 Comments
Marisa has the same problem I do: she remembers a ton of details, but not the names of the characters or the title of the book:
I am looking for a book I got from the library forever ago and can't find.
Of course, I can't remember the title or the character names, but I can
remember some other details.
It's historical and in England, but I'm not sure when. It starts off with
the hero at the church after a failed marriage attempt. (The girl was in
love with someone else, so he let her out of the engagement, much to the
annoyance of her family.) He has been trying to secure a wife for a while
now. The heroine comes in and offers herself for marriage, citing some
reasonable argument for why he should accept even though he doesn't know her
(dowry?). He accepts, they get married and go off to live in his big house
(he has some kind of title). I remember she has this little dog that she
takes nearly everywhere.
January 21, 2012 | Saturday at 12:24 am | 23 Comments
Ilex emailed me a HaBO query in the form of an IM conversation she had with a friend about this book. It's hilarious.
I was wondering if HaBO could, well, HaBO. I'm your pretty standard, used-to-sneak-my-mom's-harlequins-during-highschool-algebra type. Unfortunately, my mom can't remember this particular gem, and I (and now my friend below) would kill to find this cracktastic romance now. (Okay, maybe we'd just kill bugs, but still...) It's taken me so long to get around to emailing you on this matter, however, that I've decided to just c/p our conversation for simplicity's sake. We had been discussing the re-issue of Nora Roberts' backlist when the topic came up...
<<me>> hey you might know
<<friend>> dude 1986!!!!
<<me>> there was this book i read of my mom's and i think it was one of the gold-framed covered - maybe the later silhouettes or something but it was about this executive ceo type and his assistant and he's the stereotypical cold bastard but they go to some kind of executive shindig and he gets drunk and she has to get…
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January 20, 2012 | Friday at 8:51 am | 42 Comments
Lynz sent me this link, and said, "I was channel-surfing the other day and paused when I saw a shot of an attractive man taking his shirt off - wow, that's a really awkward first sentence, I should start thinking more before I write. Anyway, my attention was thoroughly caught and I stopped to watch the video. Seconds later, what did I see but a Harlequin Suspense being used as a fan? I was thinking the video was really cute, until I hit the 2:20 mark, at which point I realized that it was the Best. Music video. Ever. Once I stopped laughing at the ending, I realized that other romance readers might get a kick out of it. Which made me think of you! "
Lynz is right - I thought this was adorable. And someone involved in the making of this video really likes romance novels.
Cool thing I learned: the video was produced with the help of MuchFACT, which is a Canadian fund that helps Canadian musicians produce music videos. Interesting fact: "Many of Canada's most influential…
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January 19, 2012 | Thursday at 3:54 pm | 11 Comments
This book was a big departure from what I usually read. I don't as a rule like Austen sequels, and I don't like sequel stories that take place within the same family. Sometimes the portrayal of the same people by two different authors, especially when one is Jane Freaking Austen, is so jarring and different I can't read either book for awhile, the classic and its sequel.
When the author enquired whether I'd be interested in this book, I was caught between my usual "No, thank you" reaction to Austen Sequels, and the opportunity to read about Mary Bennet, who was the sister after Jane and Elizabeth that I most liked and wanted to find happiness. I'm glad I read this book, as it was familiar and enjoyable, though it didn't leave me with the almost mental exhaustion and feeling of admiration as I had finishing Pride & Prejudice, which, the first time I read it, was so compelling and absorbing I was all wrung out when I was done.
January 19, 2012 | Thursday at 8:21 am | 58 Comments
I got this as a recommendation from…. Aw, hell, there isn’t a name attached to the rec, but Sarah sent in on because “it’s fun when your head explodes!”
So there’s a couple things you should know: first, like many people, I went through a dinosaur phase in my misspent youth, so there’s that. Not a big enough of phase to want to become a paleontologist, but still, very interesting and whatnot. There are pictures of dinosaur poo on my twitter feed from my Christmas visit to the Science Museum of Minnesota.
Second, Beauty and the Beast is my favorite Disney movie. Ever. I know there are people who think it’s an example of Stockholm Syndrome and that it encourages the idea that women can change men, which I think is a simplistic reading of the text and we could get into it, but the core lesson, I think, is that if you want to be treated like a person, you have to act like a person. And sometimes it’s someone…
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January 18, 2012 | Wednesday at 8:42 pm | 26 Comments
In one day, so many sites went black, and students everywhere lost their minds because they couldn't use Wikipedia.
Many senators and representatives, including Orrin Hatch and Nancy Pelosi, publicly withdrew their support of SOPA and PIPA, and I heard at one point, though I can't find a link to confirm it, that so many people were calling their senators and congressional representative that the phone circuits overloaded.
Co sponsors backed out and removed their sponsorship of the bill, and according to one tweet, 29 legislators announced opposition.
Authors, musicians, actors and producers worked together to coordinate an effort to make sure that despite pots of money from the corporations who stood to benefit, the individual constituents would voice their opinions. ETA: Sarah MacLean's open letter to Senators Schumer and Gillibrand is particularly awesome.
I hoovered some cough medicine and called my senators, and made it most of the way through a conversation without honking. OK! Success!
PIPA goes to the floor for vote next week, and I'll be keeping watch for what happens. If you blacked out your site, called your senator or congressional rep, or, even if…
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Join Sarah and uber-librarian Jennifer Lohmann at the Durham County Southwest Regional Library (3605 Shannon Rd.) to discuss romance and the many excellent books in the genre!
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This was recorded when I was coming down with the flu and pneumonia, and I'm slightly out of breath - and coughing. I edited out most of the coughing but if I missed one, I apologize.
I have found some sales on ebooks and paperbacks, as well as coupons that totally made me grin.
