Bitchin' Blog Posts
: Heroine
April 26, 2011 | Tuesday | 7 Comments
Time for some more RITA® Reader Challenge reviews, which readers have taken to like romance readers reading romance novels. (Obvious statements is obvious!) Today, we have a review for the RITA® nominated novella “Mistletoe Magic” by Sandra Hyatt in Under the Millionaire’s Mistletoe, plus the other novella in the book, “The Wrong Brother” by Maureen Child, both reviewed by Lindlee. The cover copy: Pucker up for two irresistible millionaires who are about to meet their matches…under the mistletoe! “The Wrong Brother” by Maureen Child Well, she’d asked to be kissed. Who was Sam Hale to deny a beauty such a…
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April 12, 2011 | Tuesday | 44 Comments
Beverly Cleary has always been one of my favorite authors. I think I read every book she wrote, and while I liked the Ramona books just fine (I was, after all, an older sister who had acres of sympathy for Beezus), I loved Cleary’s teen books. Fifteen was one of my favorites, but my absolute mushy love is reserved for The Luckiest Girl. From a romance perspective, this book is a perfect construction of romance tropes and expectations. There’s the plucky, pretty, enthusiastic and sensitive heroine, Shelley, who is invited on what seems like a whim to live with her…
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April 02, 2011 | Saturday | 106 Comments
Are you breathlessly anticipating the next book in Julia Spencer-Fleming’s series? Curious to see how Clare and Russ survive her deployment? Well, over the past few months, Julia and I have been working on an interview (really, this email has been going back and forth for AWHILE) and she’s got5 8 ARCs to give away this weekend. She’ll ship them out anywhere so you’ll get a copy zippy fast. Just leave a comment below to enter - and add to the Julia Spencer-Fleming Series Drinking Game (or, if you’re not so inclined, just leave a comment and tell us what…
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February 21, 2011 | Monday | 79 Comments
Hi, sorry, sorry. This semester is kicking my ass, and all my classes are things I actually give a rat’s ass about (I’m taking law in the Ancient World, and it’s the best ever), so there’s a lot less procrastination on my plate this semester than last semester. This is also the first book I’m reviewing from my brand new Kindle, which I adore more than is reasonable. I got it for school (really) and also so people can’t judge me for the covers of what I read. Yay for eink! This book is so deliciously fucked up, you guys. …
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January 10, 2011 | Monday | 85 Comments
Kay and a few others have alerted me to this Carla Kelly cover, and it’s prompted me to ask for your opinion: Not a bad looking cover - except that the hero has a hook for his left hand. He lost his hand in an accident at war and while it doesn’t bother the heroine in the least, it’s a part of the story in a big way. That there, as Kay pointed out, is his left hand. It’s not even a plot twist - it’s in the third paragraph of chapter one! Bright stared at his rapidly cooling cup…
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January 06, 2011 | Thursday | 44 Comments
My much awaited copy of One Con Glory arrived on the same day that I was supposed to be preparing for my daughter’s seventh birthday party. Let me give you some context here. This is my only child. She is a girl so beautiful that I can’t believe she’s real, a kid who can take on five boys at recess during a spirited game of Star Wars and whup them all into submission while wearing pink sparkly tennis shoes that light up. So, when the book arrived in the mail, I did what any good mommy would do and set…
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December 14, 2010 | Tuesday | 22 Comments
I tweeted about this book after I finished the ARC, and I still think about this book, AND remember the title - which is totally odd for me. Blake did a number of really interesting things that made this book different from a lot of contemporary romance: The heroine, Tessa, has Crohn’s disease, which means she has periods where she’s very weak, nauseated, and ill, and she’s on a very strict diet to try to control the intestinal inflammation. Crohn’s disease is not a sexy disease, but it does profoundly affect the people who have it, often severely. If there’s…
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November 24, 2010 | Wednesday | 44 Comments
I’m over at The House of Kirkus today talking about Friends-to-Lovers plots, and the various pitfalls that could happen to the hero and heroine on their way from friends to friends-with-benefits all the way to friends-with-happily-ever-after. There’s the type in which one person is secretly in love with the other, while the other remains ignorant of all that ardor. I call this One Pines and One is Clueless. Then there’s the type where one or both Wake Up (often at about the same moment) and See Something More in the other person that wasn’t so obvious before. Both plots can…
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November 23, 2010 | Tuesday | 62 Comments
Good Shit vs. Shit to Avoid time! I had an interesting email (many of them are, thank you, thank you) about books featuring the heroine who is surprised by a relationship - and by someone’s interest in her: I’m looking for a book where the heroine is genuinely not interested (romantically) in the hero. I know, I know, it’s supposed to be a romance novel, but lately I’ve lately been reading books and watching dramas (asian tv) where the heroine with zero pride will throw herself at the guy. She usually goes through great humbling lengths and all of her…
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October 28, 2010 | Thursday | 20 Comments
It’s time for more Holiday Gift Ideas for all that shopping that, judging from the mall decorations, needs to be done right hopping now! First: a note. Somehow, I must have given the impression that I dislike Christmas in my last Gift Guide entry - which, OOPS. So not the case! To all those who emailed me about Christmas gifts, let me restate: I don’t actually dislike Christmas at all. I don’t celebrate it but I do like much of it, particularly the SMELL. If I walk by a Christmas tree display I will stick my nose in the branches…
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October 19, 2010 | Tuesday | 22 Comments
Dear Smart Bitch Sarah: I’ll go on and ‘fess up. I’m unlikely to be a lead character in a romance novel. I’m the friend who helps one of the main characters talk it out and see sense. But I need to check myself here. After all, I could be wrong. Because of fractal theory (aka, it never rains but it pours), Several of my friends have been involved in some manipulative relationships, including one friend actually does the manipulating. She said being irrational is a good thing, because she can “act upset and get her boyfriend to pay attention to…
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October 09, 2010 | Saturday | 126 Comments
Question for you: which do you think are the most memorable scenes from a romance novel wherein the hero or heroine (or both!) reveal how they feel about one another? Which scenes do you adore wherein the hero or heroine confesses how they feel - or asks openly for the other person to be with them? I remember being breathless when I first read the final scene between Jason and Victoria in Judith McNaught’s Once and Always, where he thinks she’s dead and doesn’t quite believe she’s in the room with him. Seeing his misery and what it reveals about…
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October 07, 2010 | Thursday | 142 Comments
I recently discovered three advice email messages in the spam folder - which I feel really shitty about and I apologize. This letter came in mid-August, and while it’s been almost 2 months since it was sent, I wanted to answer it and discuss here because the romance/porn accusation is unfortunately perennial. That said, I don’t know if this person is still in this relationship and I don’t have an update. Dear Smart Bitch Sarah: I have a general question for anyone who also loves romance that may be willing to help me untangle a sticky situation in my current…
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September 24, 2010 | Friday | 4 Comments
Oh, the challenges of setting a schedule for yourself and then facing technological fuckwittery! But now that the poll software and I are getting along, LET THERE BE VOTING. Below, the finalists I selected (wait, you wanted a poll of over 200 entries? No? DIDN’T THINK SO.) for your voting pleasure in the Contemporary Series Name Generator contest. Voting will close Sunday, so click and enjoy. The entries are below the poll. Entry 1 For discriminating readers who love football and despise no-talent starlets, see Heidi Montag repeatedly demolished by bloodthirsty offensive linesmen in…The Football Hills Entry 2 Hero escapes…
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September 15, 2010 | Wednesday | 13 Comments
From Romantic Alice, who lost a wonderful book featuring very sound medical advice: I read this about 10 years ago, but it was probably older than that as I got it in a give away bin. It got donated on accident and I can’t find out what it is. It takes place in “the West.” I don’t remember the exactly location or the hero/ heroines name. Our hero and heroine find themselves having to share ownership of a building- I think because the original owner sold it to both of them, but I don’t quite remember. He opens a sporting…
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