Smart Bitches, Trashy Books

This book sounds INSANE. I must know what happens next!!!!

Great review!

Oh wow - when I first looked I thought it said A+ rating. 

I kept waiting for Cassie’s Dream Sequence/ nightmare to end and Lord Uncle McRapey to wake up as a pet monkey or something.

yick.

I read this book when it came out way back when - it was the boat issue that rang in my head and then the rape scenes.  You made it further than I did - this book got tossed.

Great review!

LOL what’s sad is, I saw the A+ rating and thought “she’s being cute, maybe?  like it’s the best of the worst??”

I’m too askeered to assume around here.

I will never understand the appeal of these books.  And I read a Coulter recently and loved it… which shocked me, from my memory of her early stuff.

It’s a crap shoot, I spose.

Haha, this was the first romance I ever read! Luckily, it didn’t scar me too badly.

Tina - I hope we see some more reviews from you! I’m glad I’ve stayed far from this work, it sounds plum horrible.

As a very wise review on Amazon said, you never know when you open a Coulter book whether you’re getting a sweet pusscat or a ravenous tiger!

she is seemingly incapable of following up on these questions, even in her own head, before she is—OH LOOK!  SHINY!

Hee hee hee.  *snicker* 

If I admit that I really liked this one when I first read it will I have to turn in my Smart Bitch status?  In my defense I was about 15.  What can I say, at that age having an orgasm induced by someone else really did seem magical.  And he bought her purty clothes.

Oh wow, I had the same reaction to Coulter’s historicals. I read her contemporary books first and really liked them. Then I went and read some of her older stuff. There was a great cacophony of wall-book interaction. And then book-UBS interaction. I was horrified (this was when I was an impressionable teen) that anyone would ever believe that women treated that way would fall in love with the men who did it. There was so much skirt-over-head action, you start wondering how any of them see to get around. Now I don’t buy any of her books without seeing reviews first.

A heroine named Cassie, a hero named Edward…doesn’t that sound like a familiar name…

if you want more torture, there’s also a sequal. LOL.  It’s like a novella though with two different stories. It’s a sequal about Anthony and Cassie’s children getting hitched together with Edward’s kids. I think it’s a little better than Devil’s Embrace. It’s called Devil’s Daughter.
If i were you, i’d skip to the end of the book because it’s just THAT hilarious.

Bwahahaha - I’ve read part of this book. I still have it in case of the apocolypse and I run out of other things to read. The moment I put it down was after the 2nd rape. I felt dirty after reading and Cassie was TSTL! I wanted to smack her!

Then, of course, there was the whole cream thing. Ewww, this was the first Coulter novel I’d read and didn’t know this was s.o.p.

Damn, there goes the plot for my next book.

I really was expecting the reviewer’s husband to post there at the end explaining that Tina’s head had just exploded all over their living room.

Funny review, cracked me up.

I’d like to read a review by Tina of a book she did like!  Great fun!

Thanks for the hilarious barf-review. ;)

What I find disturbing is not that it was published in the 1980’s (okay, I’m disturbed, but not dwelling), but that it’s been RE-published. 

Why-oh-why?  Who is reading this and thinking, “Thank God, this was re-released!  I’d must read another Coulter posthaste?”  Or even another romance?

I was talking to some other writers on Saturday, and Coulter’s name came up as someone who hires other writers to write additional stories under her name.  (We weren’t being snarky, just talking about consistency in writing.)  I’m not sure how to apply this little thought to this re-issue situation…. but I keep trying. ;)

But back to having a point…. My main peeve here is in having an editor, marketing department, and big-ass publisher thinking that this book is the answer to the un-voiced reading public’s quest for a fine reading experience.

Barf.

-Diane

I find myself strangely compelled to begin looking for this book in my local UBS.

I’m one of those people who needs to experience the horror for myself.

And here my first thought was “I wonder what textbooks and essays she plag—I mean *borrowed* from?”

Wouldn’t it be funny if she used this?

Tina, this review was absolutely hilarious! (AND informative) I hope we get to read more guest reviews from you.

Disregard the last comment—my nap-addled brain somehow conflated Catherine Coulter and Cassie Edwards (which would explain why I was thinking “Huh, I thought Edwards only did Noble Savage Amerindian stuff.”)

Ah! Saved! I was *this close* to buying this when hanging around the grocery store this morning before helping at my kids’ school. I ended up with a Nora re-release instead. Close call!

LOL, D
you have to finish reading this.  I remember reading this book sometime in college b/t 1998-2001.  The rape scenes are not over (if I recall correctly).  I wont spoil any more of it for you since I can tell *snicker* that you are enjoying this book.  Let us know when you get to the end.

But how do you really feel?

I have the strange feeling that I read this or something similar many, many years ago.

OMG Maritza…I read this in college too and I remember feeling sorry for the heroine. Coulter also has another historical where the heroine get put through the wringer to the extent that a happy ending would have required valium and years of thereapy. I wish I could remeber the name of that book… Sorry for the rambling but, Tina, I do recommend finishing the book… not because it gets better but it is abit like a trainwreck.

There’s another Coulter romance that starts a whole family series ... Sherbrooke Bride I think?  Much rapage of the heroine and this on top of sexual abuse as a kid.

Okay, this is an insanely entertaining review. 

I will probably not read this book, but I sure have gotten a great deal of pleasure out of it.

Oh, I can so relate to the “just gotta get this off my chest” syndrome!  I’ve sat down and banged out reviews for horse-apple books, too, just to vent. 

Feels good, no?

Great review, Tina!  I thoroughly enjoyed it although I’ll be avoiding this book like the plague.

I agree that this was a fabulously entertaining review—it ALMOST makes it worth having dreck like this re-issued, to have a Smart Bitch like Tina do such a number on it.

And if you do finish it, Tina, please add a P.S.

Ugh.  Some books really shouldn’t be resurrected.  What horrible characters and stupid plot.  I saw this at my grocery store but passed on it in favor of Kabul Beauty School.  Soooo glad I did.

However, your review rocks!  Hope to see many more from you, Tina.  Very entertaining.

That was great, Tina. The exclamations points underscore the hum and crackle of your outrage. And if I say your review is “shiny,” I mean in the cool, Joss Whedon-Firefly way. Thank you!

I just reread a bunch of Coulter’s viking books that I had enjoyed (in the naughty HEE HEE OMG SEX way teenagers oftne do) and came to the conclusion after four heroines are deflowered in the “I was totally gonna make sure you had a good time BUT I CANNOT RESIST” (and then he falls asleep) while she says, “Ow, wait, what?”  that Coulter herself had some issues she needed to work through.

darlynne - yay firefly!! :-)

Hilarious review - almost has me wanting to read the awfulness for myself but sadly my local library doesn’t have a copy. It does have one of the sequels but they couldn’t guarantee me horrible rapist heroes and TSTL heroines so I probably won’t bother.

My first teenage tee-hee-there’s-sex-in-that-thar-book was Angélique, borrowed from my sister’s friend’s mother and covered in brown paper by the mother lest anyone see what she was reading! There was a general theme of love and great sex and then it was ruined by our heroine getting raped by some bastard but getting off on it simply because of the “repetition of the gestures of love for which her body was so marvellously fashioned”. Blecccch. A sentence that has stayed with me for 15 years. And then the next day she goes to Confession because she cheated on her husband with the rapist and she enjoyed it. So wrong. So very very wrong.

This is why I don’t read romances written before 1992.

Loved your review!
Catherine Coulter is one of those authors I used to read and thought I liked - until much later when I went back and tried reading some of them again and recoiled in horror thinking “Eeek - I LIKED that?”
And more than one of her “heroes(?)” has had to use lubricant to enter the heroines hallowed halls.
Mind you some of her books I still remember fondly, but one to avoid at all costs is Fire Song *shudder*

LMAO!

Tina must do more reviews.  I will be more than happy to send her more old school Coulter historical romances. :D

Ugh.  Just finished reading this.  I was off sick from work, and may need an extra day to recover just because of this book! Count me among those that loved Coulter when she was younger.  Now that I’m going back and re-reading them, I wonder what I was thinking!

You know, since Sarah posted my review today, I’ve been compulsively checking the remarks to see what you all would have to say in response.  I wasn’t feeling well most of the day but still went to work because of the whole, “if I don’t go today and get what needs to be done, done, then I’ll have to do it tomorrow and I won’t get what I have to do tomorrow done, etc etc” thing.  Seeing what everyone has said has just made my day a helluva lot better!

I really was expecting the reviewer’s husband to post there at the end explaining that Tina’s head had just exploded all over their living room.

You should have seen what I edited out of the version that Sarah posted.  When I first emailed her, I included some of the remarks he made in response to the plot synopsis.  Unfortunately, when I let him read what I’d sent her, he was embarrassed, so I took it out.

you have to finish reading this.

To be honest, the biggest reason why I haven’t picked it back up again is because I’m 90% certain I know exactly what is going to happen from this point.  To all of you that have managed to finish this book (and I admire your threshold for pain), tell me if I’m right…

I left off with Cassie having just agreed to marry Anthony because she’s pregnant and can now never return to Edward.  The former mistress is using her diabolical villain-sex power to manipulate the half-brother, telling him that it isn’t right that he lose his place as the Earl’s heir, which will happen if Anthony marries Cassie and has a legitimate baby with her.  Now, this is my prediction:
Half-brother charms Cassie and lures her away somehow.  He then sells her to the Arabic pirate/slaver.  She, thinking she will never see Anthony again, realizes just how much she loves him.  Somehow, she avoids rape until Anthony rescues her, they marry, and all is right in their icky little world.  In the meantime, the half-brother is redeemed somehow (probably by helping with the rescue) and the former mistress meets some nasty demise.  How close am I?

And if I say your review is “shiny,” I mean in the cool, Joss Whedon-Firefly way. Thank you!

I agree with Harlequin, darlynne—yay Firefly! 

Again, thanks, everyone, for all of your kind remarks.

then41?  I’m still 41, thank you.

~Tina

I vaguely remember reading that book as a teenager, but it’s been a long while and I don’t remember the end (fortunately). I used to love Coulter—back in the days when the heroines always fell in love with the guy right after a date rape, and that made it all okay. Luke and Laura syndrome, anyone? Yuck. I stopped reading her in college when it finally occurred to me that 1. date rape was NOT a seduction technique, and 2. the villain was always the father figure / older brother who raised her / uncle / whatever. The fact that the “villain” was sometimes also the “hero” (as in this case) just made it that much worse.

Great review, btw.

I read this book! At one point, I had all of Coulter’s historicals neatly (worshipfully, even- this was before I read Julia Quinn and reevaluated my reading standards) arranged on my bookshelf, and I remember haaaating this book like I had never hated a book before. And I’m not even that picky.

Devil’s Daughter was just as bad.

Oh- also, Sherbrooke Bride didn’t have any childhood sexual abuse, nor, I believe, was there rapage (of the herione, anyway. Who had enormous fun bags that are commented on in every. book. in. the. Sherbrooke. series. Even when she’s a grandmother, her lovely lady lumps are both pulling small planets out of their orbits and somehow still perky and luscious. (It’s to make up for the fact that she’s not pretty.)

Night Fire had some really heinous sexual abuse in it, though. And there was another that I can’t remember that was pretty appalling.

Also- reading at CC’s website, do you know she says that Cassie and Lord Rapey Rapist are her very favorite characters EVER? Yikes.

And, Yay! Firefly.

This is the same Catherine Coulter who wrote ROSEHAVEN, about which I remember only about two things:

1. The only likeable character was the hero’s pet marten.

2. At one point they milked a billygoat.

comes64 —- Somebody read ahead, counting.

Oh Tina, you naive darling. There is so much more horror contained in the ending of the book than you’ve even begun to imagine. I’m talking major trauma. Your ending is sunshine and lollipops compared to how the book actually goes.

Seriously, I’ve read this book twice (once when I was about 15 and then again when I was around 20) and I will never fail to be horrified at some of the things that happen towards the end of the story.

Pleeeeeez, SOMEONE tell me how it ends!?!?!  I can’t possibly bring myself to read it, but I’ve heard too much now to stop without the true, horrific finale.

Tina, you are an excellent reviewer!

I love Coulter too, but have never read this one.  Because of you, I must now read it!  (Mind you, just to see if it really is all that bad.)  I’m sure it is, but I still gotta read it!

I agree with SonomaLass!

Oh Tina, you naive darling. There is so much more horror contained in the ending of the book than you’ve even begun to imagine. I’m talking major trauma. Your ending is sunshine and lollipops compared to how the book actually goes.

I omitted the part where Anthony has to fight the Dread Pirate Arabi to the death while Cassie whines and shudders in an utterly useless fashion.

Seriously, you wouldn’t want to be responsible for my hysterical blindness, brought on when I attempt to actually plow through to the end of this wallbanger, now would you?  How does it end?

eye19—see, even the spam foiler is trying to warn you of the consequences.

Ok, I’ll say it: In addition to being raped by the psycho stalker hero, the heroine is also gang raped later in the book. I have no idea how it ends though, since I stopped reading after that. If it gets worse, I really don’t think I want to know.

They de-clinched the cover!

Never buy de-clinched it makes the cheese go rancid. If your gonna read 80’s Romance must have clinch cover.

Really entertaining review.

Is there an online Hall-of-Shame for TSTL characters?

I remember reading that book in high school and thinking that it was really dumb. I didn’t pick up a CC book again until I saw her mysteries in the supermarket. Those are all right.

Of her FBI stories, the only ones I find completely satisfying are THE MAZE and THE TARGET.  The others tend to fall apart at the end, plotwise.

What Sara N. said. My fingertips itch just remembering: at the end, I was so stunned, I could only sit too slack-jawed and brain-broken to claw my eyes out. It wasn’t that long ago, either.

As to why I submitted myself to the torture. You know how something is so horribly traumatic, you can’t look away? I remember thinking, “This can’t be happening…” Unfortunately, it did.

Continuing from anon, (close your eyes anon!) ... it does get worse from there.

Excellent review, though, Tina! The laughter has soothed my scars ;)

near85 ... nearly 85 incidents of horror? ;)

Seriously, what was up with romances in the 80s?  I mean so many of them were so messed up and this was over a decade into the women’s movement!  Someone should do a psychological study.

I think this book OBVIOUSLY needs a different ending.  Let’s have a competition.  Here’s mine:

Cassie finds a copy of Mary Wollstonecraft’s VINDICATION OF THE RIGHTS OF WOMEN and gets her consciousness raised instead of her skirts, for a change.  She tells Nasty Rapist Uncle that she will NEVER marry him no matter how often he rapes her.

In revenge, to deprive her of her favorite element, he takes her to South Dakota and imprisons her in a small cabin.  She is able to attract a family of black-footed ferrets who enter through a hole in the floorboards and make friends with her.  Eventually she acquires a whole army of ferrets, which she trains for battle.  When Nasty Rapist Uncle returns to see if she’s ready to yield, her faithful band of ferrets attack him and his men and gnaw off all their dangly bits.  She steals his Arab stallion and flees, to the sound of men screaming and ferrets munching.

Eventually she reaches Nantucket, disguises herself as a man, and takes a job on a whaling ship under the name of “Ishmael.”

HEA all round—villains foiled, ferrets fed, heroine not only free but finds herself in a much better book!

plant15—what they do with the bodies after the ferrets are done with them

I also loved Coulter’s historicals in the 1980’s, but gave them up when I got tired of the heroes spanking the heroines.

I enjoyed her FBI books for a while, until I got the one where the hero accidentally rescues a child from kidnappers.  He immediately decides that she must have a bad mother - how else would the child get kidnapped.  He doesn’t report the kidnapping and keeps child - because they have bonded.  Even after the mother shows up, the child regards him as her primary protector.

I found the whole thing way too creepy.

Wow, I was happily reading along, waiting for Edward to come save Cassie from Lord Creepy Uncle when Tina wrote, “If he were the villain, I could live with this, but this guy is the hero??” Holy shitmonkeys!!!! Lord Creepy Uncle is the hero? What kind of crap is that?

That’s it. You have discovered the book that still gives me nightmares. I wanted to hack the uncle’s manly parts with a rusty saw and douse what remained with vinegar afterwards.

This book enraged me so much I wanted to take it outside and set it on fire afterwards. Sadly, I couldn’t, as it was a library book.

Luckily, our library got rid of it a few months later (because it had been read so often it was falling apart- now that really makes me afraid!), and I slipped a warning into the book for anyone who thought it might be a good read.

I still want to scrub my brain out with copious quantities of bleach and a wire bristled brush to stop the pain of remembering how shitty the book was.

Early 80s romances apparently are ALL like that, or at least the ones I have read.  Judith McNaught’s WHITNEY, MY LOVE has a 18-year-old TSTL ‘heroine’ and a 35-year-old arrogent, abusive asshole ‘hero’.  He doesn’t bother courting her, just buys her from her father for 50,000 pounds.  After they have been married for a bit, he gets angry at her for some reason ( thinks she’s been flirting maybe) so he drags her out of a ballroom, flings her down on the nearest level surface, and rapes her.  Naturally, she ‘understands’.  This is considered by some to be a classic romance!  Other people think the title should be changed to WITLESS, MY LOVE.  Either way, it, too, has recently been reprinted.  I found it at the public library, in paperback. Oh, and McNaught was so proud of it that she named her own children Whitney and Clayton, after the characters.  I hope they didn’t require years of therapy.

I love your ending, Talpianna!  Much better, from what I have discerned from here and from reading the reviews on amazon.com, than the actual ending of this book.

Speaking of the reviews on amazon, just in case anyone is interested, I can only assume that Coulter aged Cassie a year for the reprint, given the number of people there that refer to her as being 17.  And one reviewer stated that when she finished the book, she was so overcome with it’s “dark beauty”, she had to immediately re-read it.  Then she berated everyone that objected to the book for not taking it in context of the time it was set.  (Apparently, the abduction and rape of young heiresses by half-Italian, pseudo-uncle Earls was commonplace during the Napoleanic era.  Who knew?)

pay77—I’d pay at least $.77 (or even $7.70) to replace this book’s ending with yours. :)

//(Apparently, the abduction and rape of young heiresses by half-Italian, pseudo-uncle Earls was commonplace during the Napoleanic era.  Who knew?)//

Too funny.

Come on, is there anyone who hasn’t wiped the ending from their brains?

I agree, tell the ending! I keep checking in, waiting to find out how this thing ends, somebody tell us!!!!

Great review. The book sounds *horrifying*.

Now I know where all of those idiot fanficcers who write stories where heroine is raped (either by hero or by someone else) and it is a great transformative experience get their inspiration.

(Hah! Botword: men58. B/c women enjoy being raped by 58-year-old men. Or 58 men. Or any horrifying combination of those letters and numbers.)

okay, after some of you mentioned the reviews on amazon, I went and checked them out. OMG, awful!I think I shall go take a bath now because just reading the review made me feel really dirty.

here’s the link:
http://www.amazon.com/review/product/0451223314/ref=cm_cr_pr_link_2?_encoding=UTF8&filterBy=addOneStar&pageNumber=2

Look for the 4th review down by DogEat"God”

Here’s one that caught my eye:

It seems you either love this book or hate it. I guess it depends on what you see as in depth real passionate love and to what lengths one is willing to go to achieve this love. Anthony was willing to do almost anything - yes he did perhaps go beyond the rights of man with her first taking of Cassie’s virginity. However - I guess I can forgive that one lapse for what comes after - and Anthony is just the epitomy of the strong, sensual passionate man that I would have loved to have met in my life. He is just so gentle and loving to Cassie - you can feel instantly the love he feels for her. I think this is because he truly does understand her - he loves her fiesty nature, her love of adventure and she meets his passion with one of her own. Yes, Cassie thinks she loves her soldier Edward - who right from the first just seemed to tame and too staid a man for one like Cassie. She would have been bored to death with him!! Anthony and Cassie’s whirlwind love affair will totally pull at your heart - at times your heart will break -

At times, your eyes will blead and your throat will retch…

“Blead” is not a misspelling.  It’s a typo caused by the bleeding eyes and retching.  At least that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

I can’t remember if I read this particular novel, but in my teens I remember a lot of romance novels where scenes of the young heroine (always a virgin!!) being forced by the older “hero” (who’s always well experienced) were standard fare. The silly female starts off by saying “no, no, no” and ends with “yes, yes, yes” and then she falls in “true love” with the bastard. Isn’t this called Stockholm Syndrome or something?? I usually ploughed through to the grubby end and then felt extremely dirty and angry afterwards.

Thank goodness tastes have changed (at least I hope they have!).

And honestly, she was bought off with a boat??!! Geeze…

Great review, Tina!  I really got a kick out of reading it.

As for the book itself, I’d like to kick it all the way to China.  Then go ahead and shoot both leads:  him for being a sicko rapist and her for being TSTL to the power of 10!  Neither must be allowed to pollute the gene pool and contaminate future generations.

I will stay far, far, far away from any CC books in the future.

I know I read this but the details are obscured by the 1000s of other historicals I read in the ‘80s.  Still, I have, more recently, tried to read Coulter’s historical novels and come away feeling just eh.  I lose interest in the characters.  Maybe I’ll check one of her contemporaries out of the library to see if I enjoy them better.

Ok, I’ll say it: In addition to being raped by the psycho stalker hero, the heroine is also gang raped later in the book.

Dude, I so didn’t remember that part.  I remembered her sailing and the see through shift and. . . er.  Gang raped? 

Perversely, I am tempted to go find a copy and try to re-read this. Only if I can find it for under a buck though.

The Eighties revival ends here!

“Ok, I’ll say it: In addition to being raped by the psycho stalker hero, the heroine is also gang raped later in the book.”

I know, I was disgusted when I read that.  Not only did Cassie “come” (Ha, unintentional pun) to love her rapist, but why not throw in an actual gang rape to show that Edward’s rape was out of love, so I guess not rape…?? Seriously messed up.  & unless I’m confusing my trashy 80’s romances, I’m pretty sure Cassie ends up sleeping with Anthony too & they both realize they’re just not meant to be!  So Edward by default! Woo..

After reading this review, I went to my “stash” of books in boxes and found it.  I’d never read it, but had it and saved it.  So, of course, I had to read it now!

Yes!  He rapes her!  And ties her hands to the bed while doing so!  And she is sobbing (tears running down her face) the whole time! 

And he tells her it “had to be done”. 

What a hero!  Not!!!!!!

talpianna, I think I love you. Will you have my ferret babies?

talpianna, I had to muffle my laughter at your ending.  LOVE it.

Just because it’s a trainwreck idea that won’t leave my brain - Is Cassie still pregnant when she gets gang-raped?

And yanno, I had fond memories of a Catherine Coulter book. I’m thinking that those are false memories of someone else’s work, now.

Well, all this talk lured me into doing something that the book could not.  I picked it up again during lunch.  I’m now up to page 260 or so and yes, she was pregnant when she was brutally gang-raped.  She was savaged so badly during the rape (and beaten and kicked before and smacked around during) that she lost the baby. 

I think Annie was right.  I think the scene was put in to show that what Anthony has been doing repeatedly (up to and including the initial rape that took her virginity) was not really rape because he didn’t beat the crap out of her and/or literally rip her up.  Well, if you don’t include the “light” whipping on the boat that upset him so horribly to administer and the slap in the face later when she was “hysterical” about being pregnant and having to marry him, that is.  Because she didn’t sustain any lasting damage from either of those things, they aren’t really physical assaults and since the sex wasn’t so horrific that it induced psychological and physical trauma that required medication like the gang rape did, it’s not really rape.

still72—I’m still convinced that he should be fed to sharks.  I just think that there are 5 other people that need to attend the luncheon.

Doesn’t it make you wonder when CC says these two are her all-time favorite characters?  Hell, with everything she does to poor little Cassie (who may be dumb, but doesn’t deserve all of this), you’d think CC hated her with a burning hot passion and wanted her to suffer until she wished for death.

appeared14—given the plot, do we really want to go there?

Yvonne wrote:  talpianna, I think I love you. Will you have my ferret babies?

It’s a tempting offer, but in my human form I already have grandferrets—the offspring of my adoptee, Clover the Cutest Ferret.

And in my online avatar, I am a Mole, so not likely to birth ferrets.  Which would probably eat me when they grow up, anyway.

ways99—Let me count the ways to destroy this book…

Whose Law is it that any book with a swastika on the cover is bound to be bad?  I think we need a rule that any book with a character or author whose name is any variation of Cassie or Edward(s) is bound to be awful and should be destroyed without reading.  Of course, this is going to cost us the Iliad and a few Greek tragedies; but think of the upside…

doubt32 —I doubt if that many people will agree with me.

And people wonder why, in these modern times, there are still women who can’t seem to understand what abuse is?  Or rape? 

I often wondered if the many, many young girls who were told to shut up, or told they were liars, or told they were whores in my own era (I graduated HS in the 80s) by their own mothers were victims of the subcultural subliminal.

I just gotta say I feel icky just reading the review. I can’t imagine actually reading the book. Ick. Rape and gang rape and a miscarriage. That is not what I call romance.

Thank you for letting us all know what lurks behind the shiny cover.

As horrifying as these stories are, I did read them in the 80’s, and because while my first venture into sex was willing, it wasn’t all that great, it was easier to go with the romance idea of forced sex back then. (Of course we all bought the Laura/Luke relationship, too, on General Hospital. Apparently the 80’s were a big time for believing that women often fall in love with their rapists. What the ****?)

What upsets me the most is that these authors are re-releasing this stuff. They didn’t make enough money off of the first release of this morally bankrupt garbage? Did they say to themselves, “Hey, I need to make x-amount of money this year, but cannot write another new word. I know let’s re-release “dated novel I” which was barely tolerable when it was first published, but I’ll re-work it slightly and make it all better….” NOT!

I vaguely recall this book from its first incarnation. I also used to read Barbara Cartland, but I’m not going to pick up any of her books again either. The time and place for this is past. No matter what these books originally provided for me back in my late teens, I have moved on. I just wish the authors and the publishers would, too.

Sounds like almost every Rosemary Rogers book I’ve ever read. She had a propensity for gang rape too.

“I was totally gonna make sure you had a good time BUT I CANNOT RESIST” (and then he falls asleep) while she says, “Ow, wait, what?”

This just sounds so personally familiar to me… but was she asleep at the time, too? 

This book… wow.  Horrors galore.  Can’t wait for the PS post!

Even when she’s a grandmother, her lovely lady lumps are both pulling small planets out of their orbits and somehow still perky and luscious.

Laughing. My. ASS. Off!!!

Okay, just finished reading the comment thread (posted that one midway through) and now feel physically ill.  Raped and beat her until she miscarried, had to get sewn up on the inside, etc… dear lord, someone pass a bucket.  This is hideous.

And the reviewers DEFENDING it make me even sicker.  Especially the one who said some variation of, “The bad rape scene was the one with 4 guys, but the Earl, he just ‘forced’ her and that wasn’t so bad.”  THE HELL YOU SAY.

I am revolted, disgusted… words fail me.  I’d thought about picking this up for the trainwreck value, but no frickin way.  I cried with joy when I held my friend’s 9 hour old son today, a perfect, warm, cuddly bundle.  Reading this review is seriously harshing my sweet-baby-buzz.

So I probably shouldn’t mention this is my all-time favorite romance ever?

Reading this review is seriously harshing my sweet-baby-buzz.

Honestly, I didn’t realize it got this bad because I hadn’t read that far when I wrote the initial guest review.

Sorry, y’all.

I just re-read this

And the reviewers DEFENDING it make me even sicker.  Especially the one who said some variation of, “The bad rape scene was the one with 4 guys, but the Earl, he just ‘forced’ her and that wasn’t so bad.” THE HELL YOU SAY.

and I was trying to figure out who in this thread that was.  And then I thought, I wonder if she took my second paragraph…

I think Annie was right.  I think the scene was put in to show that what Anthony has been doing repeatedly (up to and including the initial rape that took her virginity) was not really rape because he didn’t beat the crap out of her and/or literally rip her up.

as “defense” of what was in this book.  No, that was me being sarcastic, like with the review.  In re-reading that, however, I can see where someone could misconstrue it, not hearing the tone that I hear in my head as I type.

If you weren’t referring to this, then I apologize for being paranoid, but I just wanted to make it clear that I in no way condone what anyone did in this book (including re-publishing it).  The characters, with only the exception of Edward and Cassie’s brother thus far, are almost uniformly horrible.  The men, in particular, are either condesending-dismissive-rapist-assholes, viciously-violent-rapist-assholes, or just completely ineffectual.  As I said at the end of the comment I’m referring to in this one, I still think the “hero” and the other 4 should all die horribly.

I just finished reading it.  I kept thinking somehow this hero was going to redeem himself.  But even near the end, I wanted to slap him. 

And Edward (the one she was supposed to marry, then was kidnapped by the hero a day before the wedding) seemed so much more honorable and “hero” material. 

Oh yes, I forgot.  Edward wasn’t good in bed. 

Yes, that’s right.  In addition to being gang raped.  She slept with both the Creep Uncle Hero and Edward! 

Okay, yes, I’ve slept with more than one man.  But we are talking historical romance here.  Those heroines (according to me) are only supposed to be with one man!

Definitely not one of my favorites.  Still, I did read the whole thing (beginning yesterday and just finishing up this evening).  So it did hold my interest and I didn’t fling it aside.

I enjoyed Coulter’s Legacy series and I still pick up her Sherbrooke books.

Devil’s Embrace marks the ONLY time I have ever started a series and not picked up the next book(s). I kept reading DE because I assumed there had to be some sort of redemption before it ended. Boy, was I wrong. I couldn’t stomach the idea of any more of the story so I never picked up the second one.

In retrospect, there are a lot of seriously screwed up sexual encounters in Coulter’s work.

I can actually say that I read the original and it sounds pretty close to the revised edition.  Trust me, you wouldn’t want to read the sequel either (Devil’s Daughter).  It has a little revenge from the son of an ex-mistress who was sold into white slavery (I think) or something by kidnapping the daughter of Anthony and Cassie.

After reading some of those Amazon reviews, I’m feeling a little despair for the human race.

“It’s okay that he raped her b/c he really loved her, and he just wanted to show her.”

“He was really respectful! He didn’t force her to marry him—he wanted to wait until she was ready!” (But not, apparently, enough to NOT rape her.)

“When she slept with her fiance it was almost as disgusting as the gang-rape.”

The first one is the worst, though. It’s okay that he raped her b/c he loved her? The HELL? And more than once person actually says this?

Well, ladies, if (God forbid) you’re ever raped, just remember—he was probably just really in love with you, so it’s okay. (Oh, and if you happen to have an orgasm from it, which does happen, unfortunately, I guess that means it wasn’t rape, since you “enjoyed it.”) Ah, the wisdom of Amazon.

I read this book when I was about 14 and it burned a hole in my brain. I’d forgotten the title and author, and was this close to asking for the Help a Bitch Out reminder. I couldn’t think of a good reason other than it was driving me crazy. You guys are so good, I didn’t even have to ask.

I read a Coulter book from the 80s a few years ago… I think I still have it somewhere, though I’ve steadfastly blocked the title out of my memory. Traumatic experiences and all that. I just remember that the whole book (past, maybe, the first 30 pages) made me want to hurl all over the place. Only my lack of matches (and lack of a mode of transportation to buy matches/refusal to waste anymore money on the piece of filth) saved it from a fiery death.

Now that I think of it, I should’ve just tossed it in the fireplace.

Oh my god, I totally read this book in my teens. Back then I had no real standards for romance; I just wanted a hero and heroine to have some drama and learn they couldn’t live without each other, and I’d read any romance I could lay my hands on. But I distinctly remember being horrified by this book, even with my non-existent standards. I think it may have been this book, in fact, that clued me in that hey, there are good romances and there are downright dreadful romances.

The “hero” is the most despicable character I’ve ever come across in a romance. It’s not just the fact that he kidnaps her and rapes her repeatedly. It’s that he does all this because he was obsessed with her MOTHER and therefore in his twisted mind has to possess the daughter, which is his link to the mother, etc. It is so beyond creepy I can’t even tell you. He doesn’t rape Cassie because he loves her; he does it because he’s still freakily attached to her mom. That I was supposed to support and cheer on this ghastly hero, as well as believe that the heroine could actually fall in love with him, I found downright insulting.

I had completely forgotten the author and title of this book, as well as how it ended. Back then I pretty much read everything cover-to-cover no matter what, so either I wiped it from my memory or truly didn’t finish it. If you ever make it to the end, Tina, I’d love to hear just how bad it gets and your reaction - that was a great review!

And yeah, the first time he rapes her and takes her virginity, he’s tied her hands to the bedposts with scarves or whatever and she’s crying the whole time. That’s the thing I remember most clearly from this book, and that is not romantic. At all.

Just want to comment on the re-releasing of books, and the thought that this is the writer’s decision.

It’s usually not. Unless the rights have reverted back to the writer, this is a publisher decision.

Sometimes it may be a mutual decision, but very often, the writer has no control.

This book sounds like it could rival the all worst romance I ever read for sheer offensiveness and awful hero characters.

The one I read was called ‘At First Glance’ or something similar, which was meant to be very clever because the heroine was blind. Except the hero can’t stand the fact that she’s visually impaired, and, because it bugs HIM so much (she’s fine with it), he decides her condition is caused is primarily psychological, so imprisons her and forces the poor woman to undergo numerous painful seizures/psychotic episodes for a week until she remembers the trauma that made her lose her sight.
Oh yeah and he buys her from a brothel and rapes her too, but that’s fine because she was drugged at the time and supposedly enjoyed it.

But then of course, she settles down and becomes a compliant baby machine by the end of the book, whilst he never even has to apologise for brutalising her. Shame of it was, I really liked her as a character. Anyone else noticed the phenomenon of the heroine not only giving birth by the end of the book, but always having a male child?

bugger - ‘all TIME worst’ romance, I mean.

My words is clearly 92 - clearly I should edit more diligently after having 2 glasses of wine.

Everyone is judging this book simply as a work of fiction, and yes, as reading for pleasure, it sounds perfectly outrageous.

However, in terms of social history, this kind of thing is absolutely fascinating, and well worth studying.  Not only were there women in the 1980s who enjoyed reading this kind of tale:  there still are, even though I have the impression that the extremes have moved out of historical fiction and into the increasingly popular areas of fantasy fiction. 

The act of receiving information and processing it in one’s brain is vastly complex and above all, highly selective and interpretative. I have said to those who enjoy vampire fantasies, ‘how can you stand the idea of the bloodsucking?’, and have been told that these readers often do not think about it ‘literally’.  There is a mental redaction that makes it ‘not real’ as it would be if I were to read it.  In the same way, many women were, and are, able to perceive forced sex in a curiously edited fashion when it is a sexual fantasy.  It isn’t, to them, anything like the same as a real rape would be.

No doubt professional psychologists have terms for all these things, but I invite all of you, here, to think of some sexual fantasy that turns you on when you read or imagine it, but would be wholly unacceptable to you in real life.  I should be surprised if most people can’t think of even one.

I am not defending the book in question (I haven’t read it, and have no wish to do so):  I am merely trying to point out that we all mentally edit what we read all the time, and literal perceptions are rare.

Even almost more disturbing than the book itself, is some of the reviews.
At the risk of sounding literaryly (I know - not a real word) snobbish - reading some of those positive reviews is somewhat scary!  First off for their praise of this book and then for the grammar and spelling in many of them!
Yes - I read those 80’s books and at the time they might have worked, but that was then and this is now and how some of those reviewers can condone the kind of behaviour of those 80’s heroes by todays standards is rather frightening!!

I see what you’re saying, AgTigress, but I think the comparison to vampire romances is a little misleading:

I have said to those who enjoy vampire fantasies, ‘how can you stand the idea of the bloodsucking?’, and have been told that these readers often do not think about it ‘literally’.  There is a mental redaction that makes it ‘not real’ as it would be if I were to read it.

And the reason why I think it’s misleading? Vampires are literally not real. There might be people who like to pretend to be vampires, there might be people who suffer from porphyria, which is *like* vampirism in the whole garlic/sunlight thing, but vampires? Not real.

Rape is a very real thing, and while I don’t necessarily judge rape fantasies, I am profoundly disturbed by the way this book has been received on Amazon (for example). Even our reviewer, Tina, admits to enjoying the occasional captive/captor rape-fantasy novels. This book sounds like it goes beyond. By comparing the kinds of rapes, for example, it creates an appalling double standard that attempts to justify marital rape or something similar.

Personally, I think books that have women falling in love with their rapists are profoundly offensive, b/c they trivialize the reality of rape and the seriousness of its impact on its victims. Many of the early historicals included rape, some of which, I’m given to understand, was actually somewhat repented of? I just have a sense that, even for the time in which it was written, this book is beyond the pale, and, more importantly, the story is so blatantly uncritical of the hero’s actions that it more or less sets up his behavior as something to be admired.

If you really want to look at it as social history, I’d want to know why rape fantasies were supposedly so prevalent that practically all early romances featured them. I honestly think it was partly b/c rape was not yet treated with the seriousness it deserved. I saw somebody on Jezebel comment the other day that back in her day “there was no such thing as date rape. There were dates that got out of hand, but you learned from that.” What the hell kind of world is that? It sounds an awful lot like the one where this book would be a great romance story.

Snarkhunter, I understand you perfectly, and I, too, think that rape is entirely too real to be treated in any way that underplays or disguises its horror in the real world.  My point is simply that our minds constantly edit the fiction/reality balance, and we do not make the kinds of connections we make when reading a news item.  The fact that something can and does happen in real life does not alter our perception when reading it as fiction.

My vampire example (or I could have chosen others, such as the bestiality fantasies in shape-shifter stories) was therefore not ideal.  Let us take an example that is not ‘fantasy’ like the (to me) digusting vampires. 

Quite a number of women are turned on by the ‘sex-in-a-public-place’ fantasy.  This is perfectly possible:  it actually happens.  But I submit that a significant proportion of those women who are sexually excited by the thought of having full sexual intercourse in a public place and in view of other people, would actually have their libido turned off completely if their partner tried to put it into practice.  This is what I mean by the disconnect between the fantasy element and everyday life.

Even more simply:  how many readers who enjoy sexual orgy scenes involving several participants in fiction would actually wish to have group sex in real life?  I am pretty sure that there are more people who enjoy fantasising about it than there are those who actually do it.  I cannot cite any statistical proof, but I am fairly sure I am right.  I was a young adult in the 1960s, and I am not wholly an innocent.

Most of us are able to read accounts of gruesome murders that would make us physically ill if we encountered them in real life, and the fact that a story is fictional - even though it may be about things that really do happen - in itself interposes a blurring veil between the reader and the events described.  Our focus is partial, and under control.  And the whole thing is under control in a way that reality is not.

I could write at length about the changing attitudes to, and definitions of, rape, but this is not the place. I am one of those literal-minded people who loathes and detests stories that ‘re-write’ history:  any form of alternative history offends me.  Every time I complain, others say, ‘But this is FICTION:  everyone KNOWS it was different in real life’.  Quite so.  Rape is different in fiction and in real life.  I am not defending it, because I find the subject as distasteful as you do, but trying to explain.

I understood what you were saying—hell, I love a good threesome story, myself, but I can’t imagine I’d ever actually want to be in one. I’m just wondering if this book doesn’t somehow present a unique challenge to that reality/fiction divide—I feel like Coulter may have actually gone beyond the standard. I don’t know. I deliberately avoid novels with sexual assault in them, as much as I can, b/c I *can’t* separate those emotions, any more than you can disregard historical accuracy.

As for “rewriting history,” I always question issues of “historical fact,” b/c…whose history? History’s always more complicated than people imagine—there was a discussion on Dear Author a couple of weeks ago on a book query. The novel was set in post-WWI New York, and involved a gay couple. People were having a hard time swallowing the historical reality of that, b/c they really believed no one could be even semi-closeted in pre-1950s America. Which is inaccurate.

I’m not calling out your taste or your distaste for alternate histories, or questioning your credentials on that front. Just…furthering the conversation.

I think the comparison to vampire romances is a little misleading ... And the reason why I think it’s misleading? Vampires are literally not real. ... Rape is a very real thing, and while I don’t necessarily judge rape fantasies, I am profoundly disturbed by the way this book has been received on Amazon

I disagree, snarkhunter.  I’ll follow AgTigress and say that readers redact by their own standards, which may or may not include the relative realism of a plot point.  Some find it easier to read about a car crash than about a pet dying; some are laissez-faire about anything that happens *in fiction*; some are bothered by rape but turned on by incest.

I think books that have women falling in love with their rapists are profoundly offensive, b/c they trivialize the reality of rape and the seriousness of its impact on its victims. ... If you really want to look at it as social history, I’d want to know why rape fantasies were supposedly so prevalent that practically all early romances featured them. I honestly think it was partly b/c rape was not yet treated with the seriousness it deserved.

I read recently that rape fantasies are as popular now as they ever were.  My reaction wasn’t “O death and begonias, we’re not progressing as a society”.  It made me curious about the extent to which the rape fantasy is individual, not about social conditions—and what it means to different individuals.  I also wouldn’t assume that someone who likes rape fantasy has positive feelings toward rape itself.  I believe they’re quite different.  So I can imagine that someone might actually like that aspect of the book, while disliking the sexist standards of the day.

‘...readers redact by their own standards, which may or may not include the relative realism of a plot point.  Some find it easier to read about a car crash than about a pet dying;’

Exactly.  We all have tripwire places, where the fictional world can no longer function for us and reality insists upon intruding.  These tripwires vary on an individual and also a cultural basis.  People often say things like, ‘I was quite enjoying the book until the rape/incest/child abuse/animal abuse scene, but after that I couldn’t take it - that was too much for me’.  In fact, it was the point where the reality of something vicious broke through that shifting, nebulous curtain between fantasy and reality for that particular reader.  The fictional context then evaporates completely.

All I am asking is this:  when analysing a book that seems revolting to us, but is, or was, apparently acceptable to other readers, that we should always be conscious of this reality/fantasy disconnection, and be aware that a person who is (even shamefacedly) sexually thrilled by the idea of an abusive ‘hero’ is probably very unlikely to be casual about real rape.

as “defense” of what was in this book.  No, that was me being sarcastic, like with the review.  In re-reading that, however, I can see where someone could misconstrue it, not hearing the tone that I hear in my head as I type.

If you weren’t referring to this, then I apologize for being paranoid, but I just wanted to make it clear that I in no way condone what anyone did in this book (including re-publishing it).

Posted by Tina on 02/12 at 06:39 PM

Tina, don’t worry.  I think the comments referred to are the ones in the Amazon thread.

Roslyn:
“Rosemary Rogers.” Oh, just hearing that name makes me want to throw things against the wall. HATE.

My rules for keeping my blood pressure down include the following:
No 70’s or early 80’s romances.
No early Palmer, Coulter or Lowell.

I think I read this book when I was about 15, and it definitely stuck with me. Not the plot, of course, but the many sex scenes, in particular the gang rape towards the end.

If I remember correctly, the heroine is not only gang raped, but sodomized, and then her husband insists on sewing her up afterwards. Which sounds utterly repellent now that I’m typing it, but at the time, a lot of books were like that.

I understand, but I can’t really get behind, the outrage people express about these books. I don’t feel like I was harmed by them in any way, even though I read them at an impressionable age. I never for one instant thought any of it was real. I read a lot of fantasy at the time, too, and romance just seemed like a particular kind of (sex-filled) fantasy.

AgTigress, my problem with the reviews on Amazon has nothing to do with rape fantasies vs. rape in real life.  For me, it’s what seems to be the inability for many reviewers to accept that the hero has raped the heroine.  If the reviewers said “Yeah, he raped her, but it turned me on,” it would be much less offensive than “He didn’t rape her, because it was love and he didn’t hurt her.”

Yes, I understand what you are saying, but this is where we get to the vexed question of the changing definitions of ‘rape’.  We now have both popular and legal definitions of sexual violence that are markedly different from those that existed in the past (I said I wouldn’t go into this, and I certainly can’t begin to discuss it fully). 

I’m sure all of you know that the concept of ‘rape within marriage’ was legally invalid in the past, on the grounds that by marrying a man, a woman gave permanent consent to sex whenever and however desired by her husband.  However undesired by the victim, a husband could not, in law, RAPE his wife.  Consequently, the chief image of rape in the minds of many women 50 years ago was the scenario of a complete stranger sexually assaulting a woman.  That has changed, and rightly so, not only in law but in general public perceptions of morality:  just as many other concepts of both law and ethics have changed a lot in the last few decades.

The relevance of this is that it is quite conceivable that there are women who genuinely believe that if a man loves a woman, what he does to her when forcing her to have sex is not rape, but something else:  they may consider that rape is defined by the motivation of the male, rather than by the female’s lack of consent, which is now the element that is seen as crucial in the definition.

Again, I am most emphatically not advocating this way of viewing it, merely pointing out that we do not always define words and concepts in the same way (think of the many misunderstandings that arise because of the differences between American and British English).  The explanations or excuses given by some reviewers (I haven’t looked at the reviews) may be posited on a completely different initial definition of the crime.

If the reviewers said “Yeah, he raped her, but it turned me on,” it would be much less offensive than “He didn’t rape her, because it was love and he didn’t hurt her.”

I agree!  Maybe it’s a defensive reaction on their part, ie, they liked the book, they liked the sex, whatever, but they can’t bring themselves to acknowledge that what they liked was a rape fantasy, so they trot out the justifications.  At least, I hope that’s the case.  Otherwise, I hope they never sit on a jury adjudicating a date rape case.

Personally, I know the difference between fantasy and reality (#1 clue, fantasies don’t hurt) and it was never the core fantasy of this book that bothered me so much. 

The main problems I had with this rape fantasy was 1) he was a trusted friend of the family—a “kindly” uncle of sorts.  What he did was a major betrayal of trust to her and to her brother, who looked up to him.  Talk about shades of the Catholic Church scandals, as well as all of the Scout leaders, camp counselors, coaches, and teachers that we’ve seen in the news.  That’s not sexy—that’s just this side of child abuse!  2) He treats her like a child throughout the book—and he probably would do that because he’s known her since she was a child and he’s old enough to be her father.  He’s condescending, dismissive of her feelings, and a flat-out jerk.  None of that reads as “Alpha male hero” to me.  I read it and think, “I wish she’d kick the asshat in the balls!”  3) Coulter threw in a graphic, violent, vicious rape scene in a seeming attempt to show that what he was doing was okay and that it was not really rape.  It was yet another extraneous, albeit distinctly more disturbing, scene to show that he was the Good Guy.  If that’s not the case, it certainly the way that I interpreted it, so she missed the mark somewhere.  That’s right up there with the comments on Amazon saying it’s “not really rape”, if not more so, since the author was the one who made the implication.  That’s just so eggregiously WRONG.

Incidentally, I think it is easier to put the physical act of forced sex into the compartment marked, ‘fantasy - nothing to do with real life’ than some of the other abuse that has occurred in category romances in the past.

If you don’t know it, take a look at Elizabeth Lowell’s Too Hot to Handle (Silhouette, 1986).  In that, the horrible ‘hero’ practises a sustained and systematic campaign of vicious mental cruelty against the heroine, which she puts up with in the saintly spirit of the medieval Patient Griselda. It is quite extraordinary.

It is that kind of story, rather than the lurid and improbable excesses of the bodice-ripper, than I find really creepy.  And yes, if you go to Amazon, you will find that some reviewers regard Too Hot to Handle as ‘really romantic’.  It has been reprinted more than once, too.

Of course, the real difference between real rape and rape fantasy is that in the latter, YOU ARE IN TOTAL CONTROL OF WHAT IS HAPPENING.  This also applies to rape in fiction.  If it’s not YOUR fantasy, it’s “real” rape and NOT A GOOD THING.

This is why I have a problem with the “forcible” seduction in some of Linda Howard’s books.  Even though it occurs in the context of an established sexual relationship, it’s still too much of the typical alpha “I know what you need/want better than you do” attitude that makes me want to give the guy a good swift kick in his windswept desire.

try81—Tried ‘em, didn’t like ‘em.  On to the ‘82 romances…

Tina—it was my comment you were referring to (about comments defending the rape or calling it a rape fantasy, etc) and have no fear, I was reacting to the Amazon reviews, not yours.  I found yours to be right on the money.

What happened to Cassie in this book isn’t a rape fantasy.  It’s an actual *rape* complete with physical restraint and all the emotional pain and violation that goes with it.  Can’t do it, nope, doesn’t float my boat, but like y’all said, if the reviewers had written, “Yeah, it was rape, but it still turned me on,” it’d be much easier for me to swallow than all the “he loved her, she’d have been bored with Edward, etc” comments.

To do that, though, those reviewers would’ve had to admit that they did in fact get turned on by a rape scene.  I can see why many readers wouldn’t want to ‘fess up to that.  For lots of people, admitting such a thing would be personally horrifying—if I liked reading that, I must be a terrible person!—so trying to explain it away as something other than rape is the only way to defend their love of the book.  At least, that’s my theory.

I’ve written one story wherein the heroine has an encounter with the (incubus) hero where it’s very obvious that they’re enacting her fantasy—he’s got her pinned to the wall with superior strength, tears her shirt, etc, but I penned it in her POV and made it very, very clear that she’s totally into it.  She even says no, but at the same time, she’s thinking how long she’s waited for a lover who can overpower her and give her this fantasy and she’s very clearly loving it.  That kind of forced-sex scenario, I’m perfectly cool with, and IMO it’s one of the hottest sex scenes I’ve written.  Others might disagree and say he should’ve stopped because she said no.  I understand that I’ve crossed that reader’s personal line. 

I wouldn’t call even that scene a rape fantasy, though, because to me, the word “rape” connotates aggression, pain, and a bone-deep violation that isn’t in any way compatible with pleasure.  I understand other people don’t see it that way; that’s totally fine and I may be splitting semantical hairs.  But when I read about forced seduction, coercive sex, whatever you want to call it, I want to KNOW both parties are consenting before penetration.  That’s my line—before his throbbing purple-headed soldier of luuurve charges boldly beyond the hidden gates of her lush velvety grotto of paradise, she’s gotta be totally on-board with the humpage.  Even if the word “yes” never crosses her lips, it can be shown with actions and thoughts.

Amelia, it is common knowledge (except, apparently, among 80s romance writers and the readers who love them) that RAPE IS NOT ABOUT SEX; IT’S ABOUT POWER!  Most rapes are not committed because a man is overwhelmingly turned on (except perhaps, and I’m speculating here, those committed in the immediate vicinity of adult bookstores and theatres); it’s because he wants to control, hurt, and humiliate a women.  Often it has nothing to do with the woman herself; he’s driven by issues from the past and she’s just a target of opportunity. 

Something occurs to me: I wonder if call girls who are paid to enact rape fantasies ever get turned on by them, or if they find them about as erotic as cleaning a litterbox?

word78—Don’t you all just wish I could keep my posts that short?

Amelia, it is common knowledge (except, apparently, among 80s romance writers and the readers who love them) that RAPE IS NOT ABOUT SEX; IT’S ABOUT POWER!

Exactly!  As a rape victim and victim’s advocate once told me, calling rape “sex” is like beating the shit out of someone with a skillet and calling it “cooking.”

before his throbbing purple-headed soldier of luuurve charges boldly beyond the hidden gates of her lush velvety grotto of paradise, she’s gotta be totally on-board with the humpage.

Amelia, you got a way with words. I’m gonna have to get me some of your books.

For the record, Coulter’s Fire Song was the first romance I ever read (age 15, IIRC), and I remember being pretty turned on by it. I’m gonna have to pick it up again and see if it’s as horrible as I’m beginning to suspect it was. Although, from the discussion here it couldn’t possibly be more creepy than Devil’s Embrace.

Amelia, you still do not hear what I am saying.

What happened to Cassie in this book isn’t a rape fantasy.  It’s an actual *rape* complete with physical restraint and all the emotional pain and violation that goes with it.

You are reading that scenario with the unblinkered eyes of conscious reality, perceiving it as factual reportage;  a newpaper report rather than a work of fiction.  Certainly it is not a ‘rape fantasy’ to you, nor, as it happens, to me.  But I feel sure that there are people who could read that kind of repellent scene with the ‘fantasy curtain’ fully interposed between it and their rational perceptions, so to them it could, indeed, be a rape fantasy.  there isn’t a specific scene that is ‘a rape fantasy’ and others that are ‘real rape’: the classification depends on the brain of the reader, not the course of events described. 

The whole point about fantasies is that they are personal redactions of reality, and that we all have different levels and categories of things that can be turned into fantasy, and those that remain persistently real.  If that scene were edited by a reader’s mind to gloss over all the elements that, to us, slap it straight into the category labelled ‘real life’, then it can be, to that reader, an acceptable fantasy.  Frankly, it has to have been an acceptable fantasy to the writer:  I don’t see how she could have written it, else.

You mention further on in your comment the scene you wrote in which, in 1st-person POV, you made it clear that even though there was no overt consent, the female character was ‘enacting a fantasy’.  Don’t you see that the Coulter scenes could be read into by some in the same way, staying on the far side of the threshold that, for us, takes it into the realm of reality?  It is conceivable that someone could read your scene, and despite your deliberate indicators of ‘fantasy’, might read it as reality, and reject it.

You mention actual pain and restraint, but you don’t need me to tell you that there are people who, in real life, get off on real pain, real restraint and real humiliation.  The psychology of sex is a bottomless morass, not helped by the fact that most of what has been written about it over the centuries is misleading or plain wrong.

But in this instance, all any of us can say is that the scenes described cross OUR personal boundaries of what can be perceived as fantasy, and become uncompromisingly, and horrifyingly,  real.  The fact that people wrote (and probably still write) such scenes, and that people read them with pleasure, does not necessarily mean that those people are monsters, but only that their fantasy/reality threshold is located in a different place from ours. 

One historical reason may be that far less was actually known about rape by your average woman-in-the-street even 50 years ago than we know now.  For instance, Tal’s point, which is now generally accepted, that rape is not primarily about sex, but about violent domination, would have baffled most women who were adults in the 1950s.

Understanding more and hearing more about the actual crime, intensified by the fact that the reporting of crime is a great deal more graphic than it was 50 years ago, makes it much harder for most of us to swathe this particular crime in the woolly folds of fantasy.  We see it as it is, in real life.

AgTigress, I understand what you’re saying, and I haven’t been disagreeing with you on that.  As I said in my post, Coulter’s book crosses my particular comfort line, and I understand it doesn’t for others.  Also I mentioned that I might be splitting semantical hairs by refusing to use the word “rape” when describing the scene in my book because rape, as I understand it, is not compatible with pleasure and fantasy. Yes, I know I’m reading through my own perceptions and history—everyone does, and I tried to explain that I know that.  My “you bitches have gone too far!” line isn’t in the same place as someone else’s.  That’s fine with me.  I’m not trying to inflict my tastes on others.

I think my comment about some people not wanting to admit they were turned on by that scene is valid, and it’s not me judging someone.  Lots of people don’t want to be seen reading a book with three + naked people on the cover.  Others won’t admit to loving twincest stories.  Or slash, or m/m, f/f, Snape/Hermione, etc.  Or to make s simpler comparison, how many readers do you know who won’t admit to reading romance at all, even though you’ve seen them peeking out from under the bed?

People want others to think of them in a certain way.  Publicly admitting, “I lurved that scene, it made me hawt like hoodamn wow!” isn’t going to be compatible with that for some.  That’s all I’m saying there.

Yes, I’m reading through my own experiences and viewpoints—no way to get around that.  In reading your post and my post, I don’t see how I’m disagreeing with you.  While I may personally find Coulter’s book disgusting, I don’t dispute anyone else’s right to like it.  I don’t understand it and I don’t share their opinion, but that doesn’t mean I think they’re somehow bad people.

Anyway, sorry if my post offended you.  I was just intending to move the conversation along and wasn’t specifically replying to or disagreeing with your post.

Of course you didn’t offend me!  :)

I just thought you had not taken in what I was saying about different people’s boundaries between fantasy and reality. It is now clear that you understood that perfectly, so I should be apologising to you, and I do.

Absolutely right about many people not wishing to reveal the types of fiction that they sometimes enjoy.  I am too old to care much about what people think of my tastes in leisure reading, and I don’t think my personal image in my profession would be in the least bit damaged now whatever I favoured in that line.  Because I published a book on Classical erotica many years ago, and have lectured on aspects of the subject many times, some colleagues probably expect me to have raunchy personal tastes anyway. 

But when a person is still young, it can sometimes be important to fit a certain template, and if a taste for sentimental romance or for tales of unspeakable orgies don’t fit, people will conceal them, just to be on the safe side.

In general, most aspects of popular culture are more acceptable amongst well-educated persons than used to be the case.  When I was an undergraduate nearly 50 years ago, I used to keep fairly quiet about my passion for rock’n'roll:  classical music and jazz were acceptable interests for a student;  popular music, associated with hoi polloi, was not.  Now, people find it mildly amusing that a fat old female academic can hold forth for hours on the influence of Buddy Holly or the entire oeuvre of the Rolling Stones; such tastes are seen as what they are, personal tastes, not marks of a second-class mind.

This had been the most interesting conversation. I used to read historical romance when I was a kid in the late 70’s early 80’s. I would read anything and my mom always had them around.
The thing about the kind of novels Catherine Coulter and others were wrting at the time was they were for women who had married the nice guy and couldn’t begin to think about wanting hot sex with someone else.
I think that’s why the plots tended to go towards raping the herione. If she’d been interested it would have made her a slut and NOT worthy of being the herione. But if she was kidnapped and then forced, well it wasn’t her fault.
A lot of other authors did it better, and without turning the heriones into idiots.

Gang rape is not my definition of sexy or romantic.  I know it happens, and I agree about the concept suggested in historical fiction books - but I’d rather read some steamy sex scenes I can get into like in Gianna by Peggy Somers…....she has a free except at her website if you want to check it out:
http://www.peggysromancenovels.com

This book is a top favorite of mine. I’ve only read the original but have the rewritten version too. I like Catherine Coulter’s alpha males.

I forgot to say that the reviewer repeatedly referred to Anthony as Cassie’s uncle and called him a pedophile, which he isn’t since. Pedophile isn’t a word that should be thrown around just because you don’t like the hero.

I forgot to say that the reviewer repeatedly referred to Anthony as Cassie’s uncle and called him a pedophile, which he isn’t since.

Since I didn’t exactly call him the uncle or a pedophile, you must have also forgot to read this part:

“To sum up, he’s a crazy, obsessed, stalker who couldn’t get the mother so he’s transferred his crazy, obsessed stalker-y to the daughter.  He’s the pseudo-uncle, so he’s crazy, obsessed, stalker-y pseudo-incest guy!  He’s 34; she’s 18!  When he first decided that Cassie was his, he was 30 years old and she was 14!!  He’s crazy, obsessed, stalker-y, pseudo-incest-y, pedophile guy!!”

He’s the “pseudo-uncle” (kind of like an uncle or considered an “uncle”, but not) because she states, quite clearly, that she’d always considered him “like a kindly uncle”.  And if he was first interested in her physically when she was 14 and he was 30, he had some pedophile leanings, even if he didn’t act on them physically at the time.  So I stand by my words that, in my opinion, he is both a “pseudo-uncle” and a bit of a pedophile.  You are welcome to your own opinion, of course.

Tina, I didn’t forget to read anything. Don’t insult me because I’ve got a problem with you calling someone an pedophile when he isn’t.

You didn’t call him her uncle? What’s all this:

“Lord Creepy Uncle’s word for it).  And of course, she starts to relax her guard some—the day after he raped her—because he let her steer the boat!  And then he rapes her again that night and she can’t help but come all over him—because passion is a mighty force that cannot be denied between some people (per Lord Creepy Uncle). “

“The last straw for me was when she woke up the third morning, feeling guilty for betraying Edward by responding to Lord Creepy Uncle “

“For example, Lord Creepy Uncle is the one to tell her…”

” Good Ole Lord Creepy Uncle says that they will leave the slaving to “other, less scrupulous” men.”

” Lord Creepy Uncle got her virginity and…”

And you didn’t call him a pedophile right here?

“pseudo-incest guy”, “pseudo-incest-y, pedophile guy”

Well whether you liked it or hated it, it certainly has everyone’s attention.  For the era it was written in, it was an acceptable writing convention to use rape/force.  Many of the historicals in that time period featured it and many of them were written by authors still popular today.

In this day and age, readers aren’t interested in rape/force as a romantic element.  Perhaps it would have been best not to have brought this particular book back.  Unfortunately to revise it to be more acceptable to today’s readers, she would have had to practically rewrite the entire book and change the whole store.

Okay, first, you’re right.  In my answer above, I said that I didn’t exactly say that he was her uncle or a pedophile.  I mistyped, or rather, mis-pasted.  I meant to say, “I didn’t exactly call him her uncle”, but I previewed my post and had to re-paste it and forgot to take the word pedophile out of that sentence.  Because I sure DID call him one.  A 30-year-old man lusting after and plotting to “take” a 14-year-old girl—even if the author had him waiting a couple of years for her to learn Italian—is a pedophile.  It’s a “I’m Chris Hanson and this is To Catch A Predator” kind of thing and, sorry, NOT romantic.

Second, “Lord Creepy Uncle” was my little pet name for him, not what I thought his actual name and/or relation to Cassie was. 

I stand by my opinion, as is, without changing my mind in the least that he is the worst romantic hero I’ve ever read, that she’s too stupid to live, and the book is terrible.  I’m not trying to convince you, who loves the book, to agree with me.  To each her own. 

final96-Definitely my final 96 words or so on this particular subject.

I agree that a man of 30 really should not be thinking of a 14-year-old girl as a potential sex partner.  This is a Very Bad Thing from many points of view, and I agree that it is creepy. 

It is not, however, paedophilia, or anything close to it:  a 14-year-old is an adolescent, not a child, and paedophilia is the sexual exploitation and abuse of children, namely persons who have not yet reached the age of puberty. Actual sexual congress with individuals who are beneath the legal age of consent (which as you know, varies very widely in different countries) may be unwise, and is certainly illegal, but if the young person is sexually mature (not intellectually and emotionally mature, which are different issues, important in different ways), it is not paedophilia.  The ancient age of consent for females was twelve in a great many societies, because that is the average age of menarche.

Consider a 16-year-old boy lusting after a 14-year-old girl:  I don’t think many would call that paedophilia, though I suppose these days there are those whose carelessness with language might lead them into that misuse of words.  But if the 16-year-old boy wanted to have sex with a four-year-old girl (or boy), it most certainly is.  The 30/14 situation, and the 16/14 situation, are both against the laws of many countries, though not all:  wanting sex with a child is against nature and the moral law.

Okay, now that’s an argument I can buy.  Strict definition says that it’s not pedophilia.  Okay, he’s not, technically, a pedophile.

I still say Chris Hanson and To Catch A Predator would be very interested in talking to him. http://www.smartbitchestrashybooks.com/images/smileys/smile.gif

It’s official—I suck at smileys.  (I guess that should be a clue not to use them.)

In many states, if an adult has sex with a girl under the age of consent, it’s not rape (except maybe statutory) if there is less than 2 years between their ages.

Anyway, it’s apples and oranges.  Pedophilia is a psychosexual disorder, not a legal term.  The legal term is “child molester.”  If the victim is, say, fourteen, I think there is a different legal term,perhaps “contributing to the delinquency of a minor.”  In any case, the crime is a violation of state law, so there are 51 different legal definitions involved, many of them differing.  I don’t know if it’s still true; but in some Southern states, it used to be legal for a girl to marry without parental consent at twelve.

The Tigress supplied me with this link, giving the legal age of consent for countries around the world and for US states.  As you can see, it varies considerably:

http://www.avert.org/aofconsent.htm

local 39—Seems a bit high

I could have gotten a brand new, apparently never read copy of this book for 50 cents at the Public Library book sale earlier today. But I didn’t waste the money.  I just wrote “See the ‘Smart Bitches, Trashy Books’ website” inside the front cover and put it back.  They also had a truckload of Jude Devereaux titles, including COUNTERFEIT LADY, which is another contender for worst romance ever.  Although at least the ‘hero’ of that one isn’t a rapist, just a spineless, drunken jerk.

“I just wrote “See the ‘Smart Bitches, Trashy Books’ website” inside the front cover and put it back. “

I have to say, I think that’s really a repellent thing to do. I don’t like it any more than when I find books defaced to “warn” us they contain sex.

values47 - as in, don’t force your values down other people’s throats

I know I’m joining this discussion very late, but I just want to thank Tina for a hilarious review that’s always fun to reread.  In fact, I just starting reading an old copy of Catherine Coulter’s “Chandra” (it has been recently republished as “Warrior’s Song”- the original edition has a nice cover by Pino Daeni which lured me in). 

But…  oh dear lord… I had to stop reading on page 84.  The heroine was supposed to be this kick-ass warrior chick, but she was already acting TSTL.  Also, her best friend is raped by a violent obsessive stalker who, while the villain in this book, becomes the hero in the next one. 

AND the heroine has this weird, squicky quasi- incestuous relationship with her dad.  For example, Chandra’s father wants the hero Jerval to marry Chandra because J. looked just he did when he was younger.  Daddy thinks of his daughter’s dripping wet body and approves of Jerval trying to make out with her.  And then there’s Chandra’s comment when she and Jerval are wrestling that “only her father” has been on top of her like that.

Ew.

So, Tina, are you brave enough to read “Chandra”/“Warrior’s Song” for your next review?  Or are you too traumatized still from “Devil’s Embrace”?  :)

So, Tina, are you brave enough to read “Chandra”/“Warrior’s Song” for your next review?

You know, that book is on my bookshelf, but I have no memory of the plot you described.  I just have a vague memory of not finishing the book even though I can’t remember why. 

If you consider CC’s ouevre, it definitely appears that she had a few issues that she was working out.  I don’t know why I didn’t pick up on that back (way way back) when I was 16-24 or so and considered her a “must buy”

comes63— admittedly, I both lost count and quit reading the book, but I’m almost sure there aren’t 63 sex scenes, even in this rapetastic tripefest

I’ve never been able to finish a Catherine Coulter book, but then I’ve only tried to read two.  I never was able to understand why my other romance-reading friends were such big fans of hers, but then I couldn’t understand why they liked Judith McNaught either. 

I’d be quite interested in hearing what you think of “Chandra” now.  It’s always enlightening (at least it is for me) to find out why you didn’t finish something you tried to read when you were younger…

I read Coulter until I read the Heir, I hated that one so much. I’ve never ead another Coulter book ever. I can’t really get into all those raptist stories from the eigties, or those macho jerk ones from the seventies, I got rid of lots of those kinds although I did like Johanna Lindsay’s Fires of Winter.