15. What We’re Reading: November 28, 2011

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Sarah Wendell: Hi ho there, and welcome to another podcast. I’m Sarah Wendell from Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, and with me is Jane Litte from Dear Author. This is the Dear Bitches, Smart Authors podcast where we talk about romance novels. This episode’s a little bit different. We start out talking about romance novels, and we spend a lot of time talking about what we’re reading, what we want to read, what we wish we were reading, and what we want to read next, but we also talk about microphones and football and a host of other things, but we hope you enjoy it.

The music today is, as usual, provided by Sassy Outwater. This is from an artist named Jade Simmons, and this is “Sonata for Piano,” twenty-six, I believe. I will have all the information about Ms. Simmons on the website when we post the podcast, but for the meantime, enjoy the music and enjoy the podcast.

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Sarah: Yes, let’s talk about cursing in romances, especially because I can’t say cock when we read bad erotica.

Jane Litte: The, there has been an increase in foul language, mostly by the heroes. I mean, I don’t think that you can read a contemporary or paranormal where there isn’t cursing.

Sarah: It’s true, and I’m not – obviously – I’m not that fazed by cursing, but I’m always, I’m, I’m, I’m okay with it. Certainly, in urban fantasy, I expect them to curse. It’s like the leather pants and the belt equal cursing. And in paranormals, I am not fazed by cursing. In contemporaries, I’m always a little surprised. I very rarely find the cursing in the Harlequins that I read, but I’m also sticking mostly to Superromance, which is a little light on the cursing, unless, of course, you’re talking to, talking about an Australian author, as we discovered. And with romantic suspense I almost figure that there’s going to be cursing as well. The best, the best thing about historicals is when they get creative cursing.

Jane: And, and I think I’ve noticed that more and more, especially from more of the modern authors, and by modern I – ‘cause I don’t want to use younger authors, but the authors who are, you know, started to write or publish in the, like, last five years – I see a lot more cursing in the historicals. It doesn’t bother me, but there’s been definitely a change.

Sarah: Why do you think that is?

Jane: I, I, it might be publishers loosening up the reins a little. Maybe as a society we’ve become more vulgar.

Sarah: [Laughs]

Jane: I, I don’t know. I, I have a potty mouth. I try to actually, I’ve, I’ve been trying to, you know, cut back on my profanities. I don’t know if you recall; there was that embarrassing moment at the Tools of Change conference, which I said the F-word. [Laughs]

Sarah: Yes! It was great.

Jane: Because I couldn’t think of any other word to express the frustration that readers were having with the formatting of e-books, but I, I always look back at that as, and cringe a little bit because I probably should not have used a profanity, and disappointed in myself that I couldn’t think of a better word in the heat of the moment, but –

Sarah: But you know, it’s funny, I think that the restrictions and frustrations of e-books are entitle, entitle cursing. Like, it’s, it’s absolutely appropriate that your frustrations with e-books would yield a few F-bombs; that makes perfect sense to me. And also at a conference full of tech people who curse like sailors, I don’t think anyone even noticed.

Jane: [Laughs] Well, I think that the people there were a little shocked that I had used the curse word, so –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Jane: I, I am trying to reduce my profanities, but I do think definitely that there’s a change, that there’s, that there are more, more cursing from characters, but primarily from men and not from women.

Sarah: Yes, definitely the men are cursing more. I started reading a book this week. I’ve, I’ve been on a real contemporary kick; like, I really want to read a lot of contemporary. So I started reading Addison Fox’s Baby It’s Cold Outside, which is set in Alaska, which is a place I happen to love, and I’m sort of on the fence about it. I’m, I’m, I really want to like it, but the, the main, the heroine, so far, she is just too perfect. You know, she’s got money, she’s smart, she’s socially adept, and the, the premise of the book is that she has gone to this small town in Alaska because her best friend has been there for a little while, and her best friend inherited, I think it’s half of a house from a guy who she didn’t know was her biological father, and when she gets to this town of Indigo, Alaska, her half-sister is very resentful of her, of this woman’s presence, the woman – I think her name is Grier, and the half-sister is Kate. Kate is very resentful of Grier’s presence and refuses to allow the will to move forward. She’s contesting the will, and the legal part of it is kind of fascinating, because the firm that’s representing the estate, the, one of the attorneys is the hero, and he is really attracted to Grier’s best friend, who’s the heroine, and the best friend has money. She’s a freelance, a freelance writer, but she comes from a very wealthy Westchester family, and she gets a lot of pressure about why she’s not married yet, and she lives in Manhattan. She has a very sort of opulent awareness of her lifestyle. She herself doesn’t necessarily have super, super, super nice things, but she can identify the finest glass sculpture, and she can identify a thousand-dollar bottle of wine very quickly, so she is sort of fluent in rich people stuff? She’s really perfect, so I’m having a hard time really getting into it, although I keep, I keep going and I keep going and I keep going. The thing that’s interesting is that there’s a sort of instant friendship between three women: there’s Grier and the heroine, Sloan, and a woman who lives up in Indigo named Avery, and Avery pronounces, at one point says that the hero is fuckalicious –

Jane: [Laughs]

Sarah: – and I had to go back and read it twice, because I was like, there’s no way she said fuckalicious, and I thought maybe it was funkalicious. I could not wrap my brain around the fact that the heroine was saying this – or the, a future heroine; I’m presuming she gets her own book someday, ‘cause, like, any good small-town contemporary, this is totally a series, I’m betting. It’s an Alaskan Nights novel; yes, it’s definitely a series at some point. So she says fuck-, fuckalicious! And then she says it again, and I was like, whoa! That is the first time in a while I heard a heroine drop the F-bomb, even to describe the relative hotness of another guy.

Jane: Yeah, the, the only author that I can recall off the top of my head who regularly uses profanities that come out of her heroines’ mouths would be the Shelly Laurenston books?

Sarah: Yes! Her heroines have excellent potty mouths.

Jane: But I don’t recall it in other, in other books. I think it’s just viewed as unladylike.

Sarah: I think you’re right. I think you’re, I think you’re right that it’s unladylike. I do want to read, have you read Heartstrings and Diamond Rings by Jane Graves?

Jane: No, but I really do trust Jane with the wise recommendations for contemporaries; she has really excellent taste, and there’s –

Sarah: She has good taste in general.

Jane: [Laughs] She does have good taste! And she just, I, I respect her so much because she is, has such varied tastes and she reads, you know, real broadly, but her contemporary recommendations have always worked for me, so I have bought that book, and it’s in my queue, but I haven’t been reading it. I’ve been reading a lot of other books, though.

Sarah: What have you been reading? That was my question for this podcast, actually.

Jane: I know. [Laughs]

Sarah: Whatcha reading?

Jane: Well, I read the, I wanted to read more werewolf books. I really love shapeshifter books, particularly –

Sarah: Me too.

Jane: – particularly werewolf books, and I particularly love books that have a lot of pack dynamics. I have not been finding them.

Sarah: Oh dear.

Jane: But Jill Myles recommended that I read a three-book series by Kelley Armstrong that’s YA, and she described the hero as Clay, Jr., and Clay is a reference to the male werewolf and forester in Bitten and Stolen, which is her adult series, and my favorite –

Sarah: I love Clay. I love Clay!

Jane: Yeah, my favorite line of Clay’s is that he says, I am the local psychopath.

Sarah: Yes! I love him! I love that he’s, like, totally, he has no problems with the fact that he’ll rip your head off and eat your liver, ‘cause that’s his job.

Jane: That’s right! And I love how protective he is, not just, not really of Elena, but of Jeremy, his pack alpha, and I remember there’s a scene in Stolen where Paige, a witch, wants to bring in Jeremy and these other three paranormal beings, and Clay’s like, you want me to bring in my pack alpha and subject him to a dangerous environment where he’s the only fighter? Uh-uh. [Laughs] So he takes his, he takes his role as the pack enforcer and –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Jane: – and protector of the pack alpha very seriously. So in any event, these three books by Kelley Armstrong were very good, and I bought them all; I didn’t ask for review copies. They, they were totally entertaining, and, and she’s right that they, the male in the book, Clay, Jr., is a little psychopathic werewolf as a teenager.

[Laughter]

Sarah: Yes, but I think that a lot of, there are a lot of teenage boys who are psychopathic.

Jane: [Laughs] These books, they’re the Darkest Powers, they’re The Summoning, The Reckoning, and I think The Gathering? But I’m glad that I didn’t have to wait, because they all end in a big cliffhanger?

Sarah: Ohhh! Oh goodness. I saw somebody on Twitter griping about that.

Jane: And if I had to have waited for them, I would have been upset. [Laughs]

Sarah: Yeah, I, I hate cliffhangers. I hate them a lot. I don’t understand why anyone thinks this is a good idea. It just, it just pisses readers off.

Jane: Well, it must not piss ‘em off enough, because they keep buying the books with the cliffhangers. So I don’t know if readers are buying books in spite of the cliffhanger or if the cliffhanger actually works to drum up a lot of interest and support, because there’s obviously a lot of books that end in cliffhangers that, you know, make no noise at all, and so it might just be the author’s skill in telling the story and that readers are willing to put up with the cliffhanger in order to read another book by that author.

Sarah: Mm-hmm. Or it’s sort of a cheap and dirty way to guarantee two sales.

Jane: [Laughs] That too. So that, I’ve been reading that. I also read an Avon Impulse title called K. C., by K. C. Klein called Dark Future, and it’s a futuristic. It’s not a book I ordinarily would have picked out, but –

Sarah: Yeah, I would not have expected you to read that.

Jane: I, I did. I, you know, I, I’m always leery of the initial authors – you know, K. C. or K. T. or –

Sarah: [Laughs] Is it because you don’t know what gender they are, or is it because it’s just, you know, the, the ambiguity is somewhat alarming?

Jane: No, I always assume that if they’re using kind of a gender-neutral name, that they don’t, aren’t writing romance.

Sarah: That’s interesting! But I can totally see why you’d feel that way. What else have you wanted to read, or what are you interested in reading right now?

Jane: I’d like to read more werewolf books. I’ve tried. Like, I tried the Molly Harper books, and it, you know, I, I objectively look at the Molly Harper book – also set in Alaska – and I kind of had the same reservations that you have about the Addison Fox series, which I’ve heard very good things about. I’ve heard very good things about the Addison Fox book.

Sarah: I’m, I’m going to keep at it. I mean, I’m, I’m sort of, eh, you’re so perfect, I’m really having a hard time being interested in you, but I’m going to keep at it. Do you mean the, the Molly Harper Naked Werewolf series?

Jane: Correct.

Sarah: Yes, the Naked Werewolf, ‘cause I, ‘cause I read And One Last Thing… for the RWA Rita reviews, and her voice is awesome.

Jane: You would think that I would like that, her voice.

Sarah: Yes! It, I’m surprised that you don’t, ‘cause you usually go for unique voices.

Jane: For some reason, it’s just not working for me. I, I put the book down, and I have not gone back to it, and generally, that means that it’s just going to languish, so I guess that’s another $7.99 that I’m out, but – so let’s see, what else have I been reading? So I read the Dark Future. That, that book has flaws, but it, it, it’s interesting. It’s kind of like John Connor-ish in terms of time travel, post-apocalyptic future –

Sarah: Oh, cool.

Jane: – you know, so it’s different, and I think it’s the per-, it’s the perfect kind of title that come, that should be coming out of these digital firsts, and –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Jane: – by that I mean experimental, different.

Sarah: Totally unique?

Jane: Yeah, it is unique. I, I mean, there are problems with it. The, the heroine is a little too pretty princess for me? [Laughs]

Sarah: Yeah, yeah, I understand that.

Jane: And the sexual encounters that they have in the early part of the book were kind of, you know, I wasn’t prepared for it. [Laughs]

Sarah: Yup!

Jane: And –

Sarah: Surprise! Here’s nookie!

Jane: And then the heroine starts off kind of like, I’m a feminist! And then later on the whole thing is, but you swore to protect me!

Sarah: Naaah!

Jane:  Then you left me! And I kind of got tired of that. But putting those issues aside, I like the story, and I’d definitely read another one.

Sarah: What about, would you be interested in reading YA, the werewolf YA that I reviewed this week?

Jane: Well, you know, I do have that Jennifer Lynn Barnes book that I keep meaning to read, which I, you know, you loved.

Sarah: Oh, I, I re-, I have a serious weak spot for YA, particularly YA with confused but strong female protagonists, and the Jennifer Lynn Barnes book and the Kait Nolan book that I reviewed this past week, both of them have heroines that are really scared and really conflicted and trying very, very hard to be strong and make the best decisions for themselves, which is something that I love reading about, I love experiencing, that set of emotions in young women, which sounds really vicious when I say that out loud, but I don’t mean it to be. [Laughs] I don’t know; I would, ooh, I would hesitate to recommend it to you because I know that, I think first person gets on your nerves, and there are some parts of the Nolan book that are so pedantic, where she sort of hits you over the head with what this means, Do You Understand the Meaning of the Mythology That Is At Work Here? Let Me Tell You Again. And I know that that would bug the crap out of you, but I thought it was really very well done, particularly because it was a retelling of “Little Red Riding Hood.” I have had a really hard time too finding, finding werewolf books that I want to read. What do you look for in a werewolf book?

Jane: Well, I want, you know, animalistic characteristics, because, you know, they’re werewolves, right?

Sarah: Right. Oh yeah. My theory has always been that werewolf fiction is all about exploring rage and anger and aggression and, and the, the type of behavior that we as humans tends to label as “animal.” It’s about exploring the fact that we all have those emotions.

Jane: Yeah! I think that’s a great description of it. I want more books by Bit-, like Bitten and Stolen, and even Kelley Armstrong – [laughs] – you know, had –

Sarah: Oh yeah.

Jane: – really left that behind, but the pack dynamic had always interested me ever since I read Bitten, and that’s what I want to see more of. You know, the protection of their territory, the interpersonal relationships within the pack –

Sarah: Oh, I love that!

Jane: You know, Elena – this is kind of a spoiler for the Kelley Armstrong series, but Elena is the one who ultimately becomes the alpha of the pack, and it’s because, not that she’s physically stronger. She is physically strong, but she isn’t the strongest wolf, but neither was Jeremy –

Sarah: No.

Jane: – the, the current alpha, but they are smart and level-headed, and Clay, the enforcer, acknowledges that he doesn’t have the skill set to be the alpha, and he doesn’t want to be the alpha.

Sarah: No.

Jane: And while he could physically dominate, he is hot-headed and would often make, you know, poor decision-making. And he has no –

Sarah: And he doesn’t have strategic skills.

Jane: Right, and he has no problem deferring to Elena, and I just really love the development of that pack’s story, and I would love to see that within other romances. So often, though, you find really crazy things in alph-, werewolf books like, I, I can’t even remember the werewolf book that I read that had multiple alphas.

Sarah: What?!

Jane: Yes. Everybody in the pack was alphas or betas. We –

Sarah: How does that work?

Jane: [Laughs] But that’s, you know, why even write a werewolf book if you’re not going to observe, you know, actual wolf dynamics?

Sarah: Yeah, that doesn’t make any sense.

Jane: You know, another great pack book are the Patricia Briggs, particularly the Charles and Anna stories?

Sarah: I was just thinking about those, about how I go back and reread them, and I can’t stop rereading them. They are so sticky. I love those books. [Laughs] I love them a lot.

Jane: Well the, her next one, I think, is coming out in March or April, so I’m anxiously awaiting my ARC. I hope it comes soon!

Sarah: Oh my gosh, that will be so very much sought after. I –

Jane: But, so I haven’t really found those types of books, and that’s what I’m looking for. So what have you read?

Sarah: In the werewolf world, not a lot, unfortunately. I have not read a lot of werewolf books that are, that are, that explore those dynamics that, that you mentioned. I also get really irritated when the werewolf alpha becomes also the general alpha, and the female’s just supposed to be sitting there and letting him take care of everything. You know, when, when she’s human and weaker and less strong physically and supernaturally than the hero, she be-, it’s, it’s often I find the heroine becoming so diminished altogether, until, of course, she’s changed, and then she’s superpowered.

I have been not so much on a paranormal kick as, as on a contemporary and historical kick? I keep bouncing back and forth? One book that I really, really want to read that is next on my list – I’m actually traveling tomorrow on a train, so I have, like, three hours of reading time – is The Lady’s Secret by Joanna Chambers. Somebody emailed me about this as a, as a HaBO, as a Help a Bitch Out, and they, they had read the sample, and they wanted to go back and finish it, but they couldn’t find it on their Kindle, and they couldn’t find it on Amazon, and it was driving them nuts, and then while I was formatting the post, the person emailed me and said, I remember where it was! I read it online! It’s, it’s this person’s book, and I read it, and it was amazing! It’s so good! You have to go and read this. And so I tweeted about it, and all of these people came out of the woodwork saying, I read that book; it’s amazing! It’s a cross-dressing historical, and the heroine is posing as the hero’s valet, as his, as his very personal servant, and apparently there’s one scene where she shaves him, and she’s still disguised as a boy, so I totally want to read that.

But otherwise, I’m still working on this Addison Fox book, and I really want to, I really want to get into it. I hope that the, the flaws of the heroines become more apparent. The book itself is sort of, works on a gimmick that the grandmothers of the town have an annual bachelor contest where they try to get women to compete to marry off their grandsons, who of course are not very willing, but it’s a huge tourist draw, so they participate. At one point, they’re supposed to, like, lug water down Main Street – and this is the females – they’re supposed to, like, lug water down Main Street and do all these other superpowered chores to prove that they can live in Alaska. It sounds really awful, and I’m hoping that it’s funny.

Jane: Oh, but that doesn’t even make sense, ‘cause doesn’t, isn’t the male-to-female ratio in Alaska like, you know, two-thirds to one-third? But this –

Sarah: More men than women?

Jane: Yeah!

Sarah: That’s what I thought.

[music]

Jane: I did read some historicals. I reread Lord, The Madness of Lord Ian Mackenzie. I just love that book.

Sarah: Aw!

Jane: And I love rereading it. At some point I’m not going to be able to reread it anymore, ‘cause I’ll have no, I’ll just know every step of the book, and then it won’t give me any kind of joy. I kind of –

Sarah: Yep.

Jane: – feel like that about some Julie Garwood books that I’ve read into the ground. But I still love that book. I wish you would read it.

Sarah: Okay, I’ll put it on my list. I’m adding it right now.

Jane: [Laughs]

Sarah: Adding it right now: Madness of Lord Ian Mackenzie. That’s Jennifer Ashley, right?

Jane: I, I really think you would love this book. I know you like angsty men.

Sarah: I do like angsty men, but I have to read them in small doses. I can’t read angst after angst after angst or I get miserable. On my, yeah, it’s on my list. Fear not.

Jane: And the heroine is great. She’s a wealthy widow who loved her husband, and she’s pretty heavily pursued by Lord Ian, and she’s titillated by him, because he does things that no person has ever done to her before, and she’s, you know, she, she very kind of goes out and, and acknowledges that this is a different kind of life that, than she had led before, and she’s kind of excited about it?

Sarah: Mm-hmm?

Jane: And I just think it’s just a great book.

Sarah: Ohhh.

Jane: And I’m not the only one that’s –

Sarah: No, you’re definitely not. There are people who love that book!

Jane: I read Grace Burrowes for the first time.

Sarah: Oh gosh! What did you think?

Jane: Well – [laughs] – Burrowes has a really lovely voice.

Sarah: Really.

Jane: And I, and I think that if her books were set in small-town contemporary, they would be some of my very favorite.

Sarah: [Laughs] What makes you say that her books would be better if they were small-town contemporaries? They would work for you better.

Jane: Because the – and I am no historical, you know, scholar, but even I can recognize that these books, the only thing really historical about these books is that they’re titled or labeled historical romances.

Sarah: [Laughs] Oh no! Oh no.

Jane: And you know, at one point, she has the son of an earl helping him, the hero get dressed.

Sarah: What?!

Jane: Yeah, and another point has a landed gentry shaving him and helping him in his bath?

Sarah: No, that’s not going to happen.

Jane: And, and the heroine and the hero just, you know, swan around the countryside half dressed and making love in her backyard! I mean, it’s just amazing!

Sarah: Ohhh. Is this something that readers have commented on, the historical inaccuracy of her books?

Jane: Yes, apparently so. Apparently, her, her connection or her know- – I don’t know! Like, I don’t know what kind of historical researcher she is, but it’s not showing up in her book, and I mean, that’s why I think that the book would read great as a small-town contemporary. Like, you would only have to change the fact that the hero’s father is a duke to that the hero’s father is a wealthy businessman with nine kids, you know? [Laughs]

Sarah: And that’s all you’d have to change?

Jane: Seriously. And, but her, you know, I really read that book with a lot of regret, because her voice is really amazing, and I love the way that she wrote the interaction between the characters and the –

Sarah: Which one did you read? The Virtuoso?

Jane: Correct. So I don’t know. I mean, I don’t know that I can read another book of hers, because I’m, like, it, every time, like, I don’t even know if one scene in that book is historically accurate.

Sarah: Wow. So you sort of read it, and you go, okay, come on now.

Jane: Yeah! Yeah! Like, the guy is, like, running around and whipping off his shirt constantly. You know, one time they’re dangling their naked feet in a pond, and then he whips off his shirt and, and dries her feet with it. And, and they just met! In fact, like, two pages before, she was chiding him for using her Christian name without her permission.

Sarah: What?!

Jane: Yes!

Sarah: That’s, that’s kind of crazy. Like, she would be ruined socially if somebody saw that.

Jane: Yeah, or, or, this is my, this is probably my favorite: so she’s a baroness. Her, she married into this family; her husband’s title, her dead husband’s title is one of the oldest titles in England. Only the monarchy is, like, has a longer history than her husband’s title, so you know, that’s very well respected.

Sarah: Yes.

Jane: Well, she grows flowers and other kind of herbs and sells them at the market out of her wagon!

Sarah: What?!

Jane: Yes.

Sarah: No, that doesn’t make any sense.

Jane: I know.

Sarah: So the whole time you’re reading it going, wait, I know that’s not right.

Jane: Right!

Sarah: Because, you know, I, I have often joked that I’m not a stickler for historical details, and it doesn’t bother me at all if there’s a major historical inaccuracy, as long as the characters speak to each other? But I think that that would even make me raise an eyebrow, especially the part where he takes his shirt off and dries her feet in the middle of a field, and she’s not worried for her own reputation.

Jane: There’s, there’s no concern. Like, at one point, in the middle of the day, they’re lying out on a blanket behind her house within walking distance of his home, which is being refurbished and thus has any number of local artisans or laborers, and they start disrobing and engaging in coitus.

Sarah: What?!

Jane: Yes!

Sarah: Oh no. That’s crazy!

Jane: I know.

Sarah: So, yeah, that did not work for you.

Jane: And I regret that, because her, I’m telling you, her voice is very fine.

[music]

Jane: Have you read Meg Benjamin yet?

Sarah: I think I read the whole series. The, the Konigsburg series?

Jane: Oh yes. Okay.

Sarah: I love those books! There was one where I lost my mind because it was so gross, because –

Jane: The fish?

Sarah: The, yes, yes!

Jane: The tuna.

Sarah: She ate a tuna fish sandwich, and he kisses her, and he tastes the tuna in the kiss, and I was like, oh God, I’m going to hurl! Oh, that really grossed me out. Oh!

Jane: See, that doesn’t affect me at all. I –

Sarah: That, ooh God, my skin was crawling! And I just, I don’t want to know that the hero is tasting what the heroine ate when they kiss. I mean, ugh! But, you know, I get kind of skeeved when people, like, make out first thing in the morning and there’s no mention of them brushing their teeth. [Laughs] I, I find that kind of gross. Aside from that one scene, I really liked the Konigsburg books a lot. You just finished reading them all, didn’t you?

Jane: I did, ‘cause I – how did I – oh, ‘cause I saw that the Brand New Me was going to be released in print in November, and I thought, oh, I’ve always wanted to read these books, so I’m going to try this one, and I liked the first one so much that I went back and I bought all of the other books. I, the Brand New Me and Venus in Blue Jeans were my favorites.

Sarah: Ditto. I loved –

Jane: I didn’t –

Sarah: – Venus in Blue Jeans. I loved it. I loved that she was curvy.

Jane: Yeah! Well, did, you’ll have to read the All They Need by Sarah Mayberry, because that woman is a six-foot Amazon-, Amazonian woman as well.

Sarah: Awesome!

[music]

Sarah: So Jane, what’s up with Caris Roane?

Jane: I, did I tell you that I read that her next one was, that her next book was about a hero who smelled like coffee and a –

Sarah: No!

Jane: – heroine who smelled like doughnuts?

[Laughter]

Jane: Now, I knew that in the last book, that the hero, the heroine smelled the hero –

Sarah: America runs on Dunkin!

Jane: – and that she smelled like croissants, but it, in the, kind of changes in the next book, that she smells like, like fried dough or something? And I, and I said to my husband –

Sarah: Ohhh.

Jane: – I said, well, you know, if you smelled like fried dough, I’d be all over you too!

[Laughter]

Sarah: Well, you know, America runs on Dunkin!

Jane: Seriously! I mean –

Sarah: Oh my God!

Jane: – who wouldn’t want to be next to, you know –

Sarah: A husband who smells like doughnuts? If my, if I smelled like doughnuts, my husband would never leave the house.

Jane: [Laughs]

Sarah: He would go, he wouldn’t even go to work. It would be like if he grew breasts.

Jane: But if they tasted like doughnuts, oh my God!

Sarah: Oh my Lord! [Laughs]

[music]

Sarah: Well, I have some trivia for you.

Jane: Oh no.

Sarah: It’s football trivia! In the NFL, as gauged by a Nielsen poll among active NFL players, guess who the top five most disliked are?

Jane: Oh, I saw that article. The number one is Michael Vick.

Sarah: Yeah, but that’s a –

Jane: Who, by the way, made a gay slur calling Eli Manning a fag the other day.

Sarah: Nooo!

Jane: Yes.

Sarah: No! Oh, he’s so fucking gross! Seriously, I told you about my carnival, right? You saw me tweeting about it?

Jane: Yes.

Sarah: Carnival, carnival for charity, where you line up and you get to kick these assholes right in the nuts. I want Michael Vick and Ben Roethlisberger. Now, I’m five-foot-four, and I still want to kick Ben, and he’s 6’5”, 6’6”? I still want to kick him in the nuts. Even if I have to stand on a chair. So number three was Ben, of course.

Jane: [Laughs] Who was number two?

Sarah: See if you can guess!

Jane: Let’s see –

Sarah: Take a shot at it.

Jane: I’m going to guess Ray Lewis?

Sarah: Surprisingly, no! He’s not even in the top five!

Jane: Ndamukong Suh?

Sarah: Nope!

Jane: Oh, uh, uh, Jay Cutler?

Sarah: No, he’s number five.

Jane: Okay. [Laughs] Let’s see, who is hated? Well, Tom Brady?

Sarah: No, he’s not in there either. I think people feel bad for him, because lately he sucks. So, yeah, Jay Cutler is number five.

Jane: Okay, so we have –

Sarah: Number four and number two.

Jane: Vick is number one.

Sarah: Vick is number one. Ben Roethlisberger is number three –

Jane: And Roethlisberger was three.

Sarah: – and he was disliked at 49%.

Jane: Philip Rivers?

Sarah: Nope. Nope. I’ll give you a hint.

Jane: Okay.

Sarah: He’s a Jet, but he wasn’t always a Jet. He was also a Steeler, and also I believe he played for the Giants too.

Jane: Plaxico Burress?

Sarah: Yes, he’s number two! Can you believe that?

Jane: That kind of surprises me.

Sarah: He shot himself in the foot or leg or something, but, you know –

Jane: Yeah.

Sarah: – that’s it! I mean, he didn’t hurt anybody else. It’s not like it’s Ray Lewis and people died.

Jane: Well, and, you know, any person that shot, shoots himself in his own foot is too pathetic to be –

Sarah: [Laughs] I know!

Jane: – disliked.

Sarah: I know; you’re lucky you didn’t hit an artery and die, you fucking dumbass!

Jane: [Laughs] He is a dumbass!

Sarah: And number –

Jane: I mean, I would put him right up there in the top five dumbasses!

Sarah: Yes! Stupid asses, no question, but hated? I, I have no idea why he’s hated so much. But yes, he’s number two! I find that very strange.

Jane: All right, I’m going to guess number four is Chad Ochocinco.

Sarah: Alas, no, it is not!

Jane: All right, I’m going to make one more guess!

Sarah: Okay.

Jane: [Laughs] And let’s –

Sarah: This is weird; it makes no sense to me, so don’t be surprised if you don’t guess it.

Jane: Okay. Tim Tebow.

Sarah: No! Albert Haynesworth of the Patriots.

Jane: Oh, he just got released.

Sarah: I know! But how does that – who cares? Very strange.

Jane: But you know, you knew that that was a bad thing when they signed both him and Ochocinco. It just is like –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Jane: – two dysfunctional loudmouths –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Jane: – who are probably on the tail end of their careers. Way to go!

Sarah: Yeah, that’s exactly what the Patriots need.

Jane: But I’m happy; I don’t like the Patriots, so I’m glad to see them lose.

Sarah: I don’t like the Patriots either, but the Steelers/Patriots have been a nice, happy rivalry for a long time, almost as bad as the Steelers/Ravens. So Chad Ochocinco is number seven, and Vince Young was number eight.

Jane: Really! Vince Young!

Sarah: Yes. And Carson Palmer is number nine. And number ten is Sir Romo. Tony Romo.

Jane: I’m not surprised about Carson Palmer, ‘cause you know, he quit on his team and demanded to be traded and, you know, now he’s playing for the Oakland Raiders.

Sarah: Yep.

Jane: And hilariously got beat by the terrible Tim Tebow.

Sarah: I know! [Laughs] Isn’t it satisfying? Like, I’m so, it’s so horrible, but that game, the, the Saints/Colts game, where it was, like, 62 to 3? I found that to be so enjoyable!

Jane: I swear, they need to give the MVP to Peyton Manning, ‘cause clearly he is the most important –

[Laughter]

Sarah: Clearly, without him –

Jane: – most valuable football player in the league!

Sarah: [Laughs] I know! Without him on the field, nothing happens! Who was, I think it was Mike Golic who was like, he doesn’t play defense! Come on, what the hell happened there?

Oh, and number eleven is Jeremy Shockey.

Jane: You know, he’s another one that I kind of just feel like, eh, your time has passed.

Sarah: Yeah, you’re old!

Jane: You’re too pitiful to be disliked.

Sarah: You’re old! You’re leaving! Why are we going to waste the energy on you? Ben, Ben I will dislike for a long, long time.

Jane: Well, you know what, I’m no fan of Aaron Rodgers. I just think he’s a dickwad.

Sarah: Oh, I love when you call him out on Twitter! Oh my God, it’s the greatest thing.

Jane: But, you know, so I totally understand; obviously, he hasn’t reportedly raped anybody, but – or allegedly raped anybody – and I, you know, who knows? But he just seems such, like, a superior, smug asshole. But maybe that’s what makes him a great quarterback.

Sarah: Yeah! And, and I, I wonder if, to be a quarterback, you do have to, a certain degree, believe that your shit does not stink.

Jane: I’m sure, but, you know, other quarterbacks don’t give off that odor. [Laughs]

Sarah: Oh, I don’t know, I think Ben does. I think Ben thinks he is the shit.

Jane: Yeah.

Sarah: A big, tall, raping piece of shit. [Laughs]

Jane: And I, I guess, you know, for all of Brett Favre’s faults, and he had a lot of ‘em, he played the game because he loved it, and he was, I never got the sense that he thought he was better than everybody else.

Sarah: Yes, I know exactly what you mean. You never got the sense that he thought he was better than everyone.

Jane: Yeah! I did.

Sarah: You know who I love? I love Hines Ward, even though he’s reaching the end of his career and he is not nearly as good as he used to be? When he is on the field, he has the biggest smile on his face, like, I can’t believe they pay me to do this job! This is the greatest thing that’s ever happened to me! He’s so happy to play football! I love watching him, even if he drops the frigging ball. He’s like, all right, that’s all right, I got it, I got it next time. He’s happy!

Jane: I love Donald Driver for the Packers.

Sarah: Yep, I can understand why.

Jane: Love him.

[music]

Jane: This Yeti microphone is huge.

Sarah: [Laughs]

Jane: It’s like – [laughs]

Sarah: Is that a big old peen on your desk?

Jane: Yes! It’s like –

[Laughter]

Jane: It’s enormous! I can’t even imagine! You know, there’s some, there’s a Brenda Joyce book in which the heroine’s penis is described as a club? [Laughs]

Sarah: No!

Jane: Yeah! And, and then, then there’s ones where the heroine, like, can’t get her fingers around the girth, and I’m like –

Sarah: What?!

Jane: – that, that monster’s not –

Sarah: I’m not putting that anywhere near me!

Jane: – coming anywhere near me.

Sarah: That’s not coming anywhere near my parts. No way!

Jane: And that’s kind of how I feel about this Yeti microphone.

[Laughter]

Jane: My fingers cannot get around it!

Sarah: Oh no.

Jane: Okay, maybe the women – okay, maybe the women who can’t get their fingers around it are the, the ones with the really tiny, tiny hands, ‘cause you notice there’s – [laughs] – the, there’s all these books that describe the women’s hands as tiny hands?

Sarah: Yes! They all have tiny hands; they’re all very delicate.

Jane: Right, so tiny hands and big dicks, and that’s the only explanation I can have about why they would allow this big dick thing in their body – [laughs] – when they can’t even put their fingers around it! I mean, can you even imagine?

Sarah: I, I have no interest in – yeah, that’s bizarre.

Jane: All right, but, you know, take it, take that part out. [Laughs]

Sarah: I, I will. Believe me, I won’t let anyone know that you’ve got a giant peen on your desk.

[Laughter]

[music]

Sarah: Thank you again for listening to the Dear Bitches, Smart Authors podcast. I hope you enjoyed our conversation. If you have any comments or questions, you can email us at [email protected]. That’s S for Sarah, B for Bitches, J for Jane, podcast at gmail dot com.

Again, thank you to Sassy Outwater for the music and also to Jade Simmons for doing such a nice job playing the music.

We hope this podcast has given you some ideas of books to read or books you might want to check out, and as always, we wish you the very best of reading.

[beautiful music]