Bitchin' Blog Posts
May 11, 2012 | Friday at 4:19 am | 7 Comments
From Petra comes this very silly and marvelously costumed commercial from New Zealand. As Petra says, "This is the ad for DB breweries in New Zealand. Although it shamelessly encourages the stereotypical dumb male - it never fails to crack my shit up. "
Link!
Those are some of the most glorious 80s haircuts and fashions I've beheld in recent weeks - not that I see a lot of 80s fashion, though I did see a pair of stonewashed pleated jean shorts on someone in Times Square and I did a double-take. Next it's peg jeans and scrunchy socks, right?
I hope your weekend is filled with all your favorite beverages and potent potables, and, if you're into that kind of thing, majestic mullets, too!
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May 10, 2012 | Thursday at 3:35 am | 7 Comments
This review was written by Phyllis Laatsch. This novella was nominated in the "Best Romance Novella" category. 
The summary: When law secretary Nell Rose is snowbound with a handsome stranger, keeping her New Year's Resolution becomes nearly impossible. Why swear off men when a romantic weekend with a reclusive writer seems to be the ideal way to ring in the new year?
And here is Phyllis' review:
A legal secretary gets stuck in a ditch in a snowstorm on New Year's Eve, just as she's making resolutions to avoid men, go back to school, etc. She trudges up to an isolated house and is let in by a famous author, who can't figure out if she's the stalker who's been sending him crazy letters.
The sparks between the hero and heroine were amazing. They really got each other, though they didn't want the same things out of life in the beginning. They acted on the attraction awfully quickly, especially since the heroine had just sworn off men. And yet,…
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May 10, 2012 | Thursday at 1:26 am | 45 Comments
I receive many requests for review daily. This is probably not a surprise. It increases with each review we do, particularly if I review a self published romance. I've begun to notice a pattern with the requests, and so I put together this list of tips to address them.
Here are a few hints on submitting for review here:
1. I don't accept every book pitched to me, nor do I guarantee a review.
1.5. We review romance fiction, with the occasional, and I mean occasional, diversion into novels with a strong romantic element, or nonfiction that might appeal to romance readers. I am partial to most sub-genres of romance with the exception of romantic suspense. Carrie S is all about fantasy and science fiction romance, and we both make the occasional foray into nonfiction. RedHeadedGirl reads the old skool classics, both awesome and crazysauce. But the majority of what we review here is romance. Not thrillers, spy comedies, books about investing, or nonfiction biographies of slain world leaders.
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May 09, 2012 | Wednesday at 12:40 pm | 41 Comments
I have a lot to say about this novella, so let's get the plot summary part done - which is not easy as a lot happens in a short space. Serena Barton was fired from her position as a governess because she was raped by the duke of Clermont, but because she didn't fight back or shout when it happened, she holds herself partially responsible. Serena is determined to be heard and seen now that she's pregnant, and decides for her own sake and the sake of the child she's now carrying, she will sit outside the duke's home and humiliate him - and cause more discord with the duke's very wealthy wife, alienating the duke from the spouse and fortune he very much needs. The longer she sits outside the duke's home in all sorts of lovely London weather, the more people will wonder, and talk, and speculate. She will cause the duke trouble by refusing to hide - especially when she begins to show.
Hugo Marshall is an employee of the duke of Clermont, known as "the Wolf of Clermont."…
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May 09, 2012 | Wednesday at 1:58 am | 61 Comments
I notice that when I read romances, I really enjoy scenes from the hero's point of view. I love the change in perspective, but more importantly, I love scenes where, because I know the character from the prose, I almost know already what he's thinking.
But then, I realized, we've known for a long time what men are thinking in romanceland. Take, for example, these marvelous examples of portraiture which are all courtesy of the amazing old skool collection of JamiSings, who scanned and sent all these images to me.
I think we've been subtly taught by these cover images what the romance hero is thinking, particularly about fashion. These heroes are here to guide us through important heroic wardrobe decisions.
Wardrobe is very important. Whether you're in the dazzling Tudor court or the sparkling Regency or the semi-carbonated Jacobean era, what you wear is crucial. See? This poor man looks miserable.
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May 08, 2012 | Tuesday at 11:19 am | 21 Comments
Be Ye Warned, HarperCollins has put an epic ton of books on sale today, including a pile of Barbara Delinsky's backlist, and some lovely books by Brenda Joyce. I'm sorry in advance.
But first, links!
I don't know how I ended up reading about women in the pornography industry, but this link came from Darien the day after I'd read for hours online about how women work in the porn industry - and not in front of the camera.
First, I read this article about women who work behind the scenes (no pun intended) including one woman who is the makeup artist for all the naked people, and another, Anna Span, who directs films:
In my teens, I was very anti-porn. I thought women were being exploited. But when I went to college to study fine art, something clicked.
Men were able to use their sexuality. Why not help women take advantage of theirs?
Now I’ve shot over 200 explicit scenes, and my films are among the most popular with UK women.
I use…
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May 08, 2012 | Tuesday at 1:23 am | 15 Comments
Some people want scientific explanations for everything in fiction. I'm not one of them. Frankly, I prefer it if we never know why the zombies walk the earth, or how the Force works, but if the author feels he or she simply must try to explain the science of what's happening, I'll usually accept it and move on. You can get away with a lot of bad science and as long as the characters are compelling, I don't care. But people, this was just too much.
The premise of The Last Night, insofar as I understood it in one reading, is that a chain of devastating earthquakes worldwide destroyed all the cities. The earthquakes, and volcanic activities, still rumble every few days. All this seismic activity churned up the soil and unleashed previously buried microbes that infected people, turning them into "ashers". Ashers have skin (and possibly internal organs - I wasn't clear on this) that has turned to stone (or a stone-like substance). They have the mindless persistence of standard zombies but they can feel fear…
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Event | 4 Comments
Event Date: May 09, 2012
Event Time: 7:30 pm - 9:00 pm
I'm reading alongside local humor writers and novelists at Watchung Booksellers (54 Fairfield Street, Montclair NJ) as we discuss motherhood in suburbia. This is a big huge moonwalk style leap outside of what I normally talk or write about, so…
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May 07, 2012 | Monday at 2:06 am | 15 Comments
This is the first in a series of four books, and I think this is a good example of decent western romances (which I promised after the Scoundrel’s Captive debacle), and an author making the effort (and succeeding!) at not writing the same book over and over and over again (Dan Brown: take notes) (I do rag on Dan Brown a lot, don’t I?) (HE DESERVES IT).
So this series is about the Jarrett siblings- Texans all (why is it always Texas?) and great lays- except for the oldest brother. Because he is the parental figure that raised the rest of ‘em and as we all know, parents do not have great sex.
….
Anyway, I read the first one back in my misspent youth, Silver Surrender, and always had this niggling feeling that there were clearly MORE, so when I started this venture, I found the rest of them. And they are my very favoritist type of bubblegum reads. Crazy, but not too crazy, likable characters, high adventure, hot sex, FANTASTIC CLOTHES.
(I’m…
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May 06, 2012 | Sunday at 4:14 am | 2 Comments
Hello there, bestseller list!
Bared to You: A Crossfire Novel by Sylvia Day | Amazon | BN | Sony | Kobo | ARE
The Governess Affair (The Brothers Sinister) by Courtney Milan | Amazon | BN | Sony | Kobo | ARE
Flawless by Lara Chapman | Amazon | BN | Sony | Kobo | ARE
Regency Pirates: Pirate Next Door by Jennifer Ashley | Amazon | BN | Sony | Kobo | ARE
Master of Crows by Grace Draven, Lora Gasway, Mel Sanders and Louisa Gallie | Amazon | BN | Sony | Kobo |
The Long Shot by Ellen Hartman | Amazon | BN | Sony | Kobo | HQN | ARE
Beguiling the Beauty by Sherry Thomas | Amazon | BN | Sony | Kobo |
A Week to be Wicked by Tessa Dare | Amazon | BN | Sony | Kobo | ARE
Sabriel with Bonus Materials by Garth Nix | Amazon | BN | Sony | Kobo | ARE
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May 05, 2012 | Saturday at 3:36 pm | 3 Comments
This request comes from Kim, who is looking for a shipbuilder romance:
I've got a HaBO for you. I've recently been reading Sarah Vowell's Hawaii book, and it reminded me of a book I read about ten years ago. The book was, if I recall, not particularly recent when I came across it (most likely in one of the bags of books that my mother traded back and forth with her friends and then passed on to me), but it was also not particularly old school, so it might have been published anytime in the 90s. I've tried googling around, but, alas, no luck. So here's what I remember:
--It takes place primarily on the east coast (possibly Baltimore, but definitely in a city with a port), during the 19th century. --The hero's name is Lachlan or some variant thereof; people call him Lock. He is, or was, a shipbuilder. I have vague recollections of some sort of tormented relationship with the past (shocking in a romance novel, no?). --I can't remember the heroine's name, but she came from Hawaii (possibly somewhere else…
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Event | 0 Comments
Event Date: May 30, 2012
Event Time: 9:00 pm ET - 10:30 pm ET
The Sizzling Book Club Chat for Ellen Hartman's The Long Shot will be May 30 at 9:00 pm ET. The author will join us at 10:00 pm ET for Q&A. I hope you'll join us! The 50% rebate will be available from May…
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May 05, 2012 | Saturday at 6:31 am | 7 Comments
Dee wrote in looking for two books from her sister's stash of Harlequins:
I was inspired by the success of others at finding their first-read, life-changing romances, to ask about mine. These were gleaned from rummaging through my oldest sister's boxes after she had moved away to go to university.
They were definitely 80s Harlequin or perhaps could be Silhouette, either way they were old. Young and impressionable as I was, even then I remember feeling a little scornful of both heroines, who seemed like they needed the hero's love or lovin to become "the person they were meant to be."
anyways. The first one is the typical story of the jock and the nerd. The hero is a sports star at the college they both attend and the heroine is a literature or history major. I remember resenting the fact that she was made out to be a nerdy lit major because even then I knew that all lit majors weren't nerds. I can't remember how they end up meeting or even having a relationship, but they do. Then something happens…
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May 05, 2012 | Saturday at 12:18 am | 17 Comments
Emily wrote in with a request for her friend, S. (Not me! I swear! I've never bought a book at Heathrow, even if my reading history is one big HaBO):
I'm hoping this awesome site and its readers might Help a Bitch Out. There's a book I'm dying to read, as described to me by my friend S. She's been looking for it for a reread lo these many years, and this is her description:
"I bought it in Heathrow Airport in 1988. It had a white cover with pink and silver lettering. An English upper-class daughter of a mine executive dabbles in socialist causes, and falls in love with a rough-but-charming miner. The hero has bigger dreams than mining, but went down the mines to save his family and is now part of a big countrywide coal strike."
"The heroine's father (the mine executive) was standard-issue Evil: oppressive, misogynist, etc.
The book was set in the teens or '20s of the twentieth century, around the time of the national coal strike in England. There was some suffragette background stuff.…
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Event | 2 Comments
Event Date: June 09, 2012
Event Time: 10:00 am - 2:00 pm
I'm speaking at the Virginia Romance Writers chapter meeting on 9 June 2012. The meeting begins at 10am, and I'll be speaking before lunch. They meet at the Twin Hickory Library, and I will be looking for twin hickory trees,…
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