Sarah’s Gmail quote of the day was: “I am the literary equivalent of a Big Mac and fries.” – Stephen King.
That started us thinking: What does that say about romance authors? What’s their food item literary equivalent? Well, fear not, readers! Trust the Smart Bitches to come up with the perfect food counterpart for your favorite authors.
Nora Roberts: Ice-cream. You can always have ice-cream. Sometimes it’s a little bland or frosty, and sometimes it’s just what you needed when it’s hot as hell outside. Ice-cream is rarely, if ever, bad.
Cassie Edwards: Potted Meat Food product. It’s marketed as food, and it tries very, very hard to be food, but ultimately, it’s Food Product. Frighteningly ubiquitous, and therefore even more terrifying.
Laura Kinsale: Saffron. Rare and exclusive, but packs a huge wallop when used.
Laurell K. Hamilton: Cilantro. Some people LOVE her to the point of OMG obsession, and some people cannot stand her and think she tastes like soap.
Jennifer Crusie: Obvious choice: cherry pie.
Loretta Chase: Coconut milk. Looks like cow’s milk, but most decidedly is not cow’s milk, and adds incredible richness and flavor to any dish.
Julia Quinn: Trifle. Light, happy, not too maudlin, not too filling to be an after-dinner treat.
Catherine Coulter: Deep fried Twinkies. Once upon a time, it was a good junk food. Now? Not good at all, despite the potential.
Lisa Kleypas: A basic chocolate layer cake. Sometimes absolutely spectacular, sometimes pretty bland and chewy with frosting that’s too sweet, but dude, it’s still chocolate cake, so we’re having a piece.
Anne Stuart: Dark, dark chocolate with random habaneros hidden inside.
Sharon and Tom Curtis aka Laura London aka Robin James: An incredibly intricate, arcane cake that looks glazed and normal on the outside, then you cut a piece and holy crap there’s fondant and buttercream with fruit and about 18 layers of 1/2” thick rich cake in between, all sliced so thin it looked like someone used a razor.
Barbara Samuel: A really, really high-quality brownie. Deceptively simple ingredients, but incredibly dense and delicious.
Patricia Gaffney: A big bowl of hearty stew that’ll warm you to your toes and make you feel good. Unless it’s the older bodice ripper novels she wrote for Leisure, in which case, she’s cheese. Perhaps Swiss, for the plot holes. (We’re not necessarily knocking them, mind you. Candy owns almost all of them, and loves them all.)
Dara Joy: American Cheese. Cheesy, yet weirdly plastic, completely unearthly, not quite a food—yet a total guilty pleasure, should you choose to debase your palate so.
Connie Mason: Casu marzu. Cheese so bad, it can actually make you go BLIND.
Sharon Shinn: Sour cream blueberry muffins. People think she’s a quickbread, but really, they’re giant cupcakes without frosting that people justify to themselves as Not Cake because they eat them for breakfast and get them two tables over from the cupcakes. Some Bujold and Asaro novels qualify, too.
Judith McNaught: Grocery-store cupcakes. Sometimes, you just crave them, so you buy a box and eat, like, a dozen in a row. And you suddenly realize that you feel a bit boofy because they’re way too sweet and greasy, and not only that, they have the same basic taste, even though they claim to have different flavors and frostings. See also: Jude Deveraux and Johanna Lindsey.
Kathleen Woodiwiss: Chinese American food. Sometimes it hits the spot, but too often it panders to what people *think* Chinese food should be, so it’s way too salty, way too greasy, and WHY IN THE SHIT IS SOY SAUCE IN EVERYTHING? Just because it’s Chinese food doesn’t mean you slather soy sauce on all of it, you goddamn infidels.
Doughnut: JR Ward. Jhelli philled dhoughnutz, phull of ahngzt, pain and sadism—oops, sorry, zsadism, all skull-shaped with frosting fangs and tiny candy shitkicker boots, trying really hard to look hardcore and scary, but DUDE. It’s a DOUGHNUT. Sure, it’s tasty. It may be a Voodoo Doughtnut, even, and God knows Candy’s fond of those things—in fact, she loves them so much, she got married in the store. But c’mon. They’re DOUGHNUTS, PEOPLE. GET A GRIP.
Bertrice Small: Tex Mex. When done right, it can be yummy, but when mass-produced, contains way too much sour cream sauce and a lot of heat that’s weirdly flavorless.
Harlequin Presents: Cup O’ Noodles ramen. They’re highly standardized, they’re everywhere, they’re cheap, they aren’t especially filling, and nutritionally, they’re about the equivalent of a bag of rocks (actually, the bag of rocks might beat the ramen, because the dirt clinging to the rocks might provide a little B12), but they work if you need calories, and some of the variations can be pretty tasty.
Danielle Steel: Cheez doodles.
Susan Elizabeth Phillips: Tortilla chips. Delicious and addictive, but: Blue corn? White? Yellow? Low salt? Tequila salt? Extra salt? Pretty much about the same.
Diana Palmer: Biscuits. Made by virgins. Who are mistaken for whores by hard-faced Texan cowboys with women issues the size of, uh, Texas.
Stephanie Laurens’ Cynster series: Pocky. There’s Men’s Pocky, Almond Pocky, Strawberry Pocky, Green Tea Pocky, Coconut Pocky, Milk Pocky, Honey Pocky, Grape Pocky—Pocky Pocky Pocky. All variations of “sweet crap coating a pretzel stick.” And really, if “sweet crap coating a pretzel stick” doesn’t accurately describe all the humpings-on in a Laurens novel, we don’t know what does.
Edited to add:
Oops! Forgot to include this author in the entry:
Linda Howard: Foot-long hot dog with bullet-flavored relish and a lot of mustard. Can’t quite wrap your lips around that monster? TRY HARDER. RELAX. You’ll love it even as it hurts you. Really.
Emma Holly- For me, Emma Holly is like hot sauce. Some days, she’s “Da Bomb, Ground Zero”, and some days she’s just McIlhenny’s Tabasco sauce, but always hot and spicy.
Amanda Quick—Baked Chicken Casserole
This is the dish you get at a church fundraiser and think “I’ve had this before.†It’s great and you love it, but you realize your mother used to make the same thing for you when you were little.
Thank you! I was worried as I got to the bottom of the comments that no one had mentioned Jayne Ann Krentz, but that’s absolutely perfect.
(Forget my mother, my grandmother used to give me these. No matter how good a book is, realizing your grandmother once read the same sex scene you just did is kind of… disturbing.)
Jill Barnett: A thick-skinned tangerine
There’s a deliciously sweet bit of fruit tucked inside, but to get to it, you have to peel through an inch-thick tart rind first.
This reminds of something Steven Brust said on his live journal, and I quote:
“Books can be broken down into four classes: popcorn, steak, caviar, and celery.
Popcorn is pretty obvious. Anyone here enjoy The Destroyer novels by Sapir and Murphy as much as me? gobble gobble gobble Steak is the stuff you can bite into, chew, swallow, and gain sustenance from. Some of us use spices on our steak, or do interesting things with it by stir-frying it, adding ginger and various vegetables, and so on. In my case, paprika. But at the end of the day, it is steak. Niel writes particularly good steak—range fed, the spicing is different every time, always delectable, and some of it obviously comes from places where cattle are not indigenous, making you go, “Wow. How did they ever think of doing that?” as you go for the next bite.
Gene Wolfe and John M. “Mike” Ford write caviar. It is a lot of work to get to. You have to open the can, you have to make sure the refrigeration is exactly perfect. You have to have the right atmosphere, and you have to approach it with the proper reverence if you’re going to get anything out of the experience. But if you do, my god, is it worth it!
Celery is that stuff you have to chew and chew and chew and, by the time you’re done, you’ve gotten even less nutritional value from than the popcorn. I won’t name any names.
Some turn up their noses at popcorn. Well, that’s okay. Just don’t bring ‘em to a ball game. Most of us like steak, in one form or another. Some object to caviar because they have just never got into the glories of eating—into food that is worth the work. For them, the payoff just isn’t there.
The interesting thing, to me, is that there really are people out there who like the celery because it is so hard to chew, and the fact that there’s nothing of substance there doesn’t bother them.”
Heather Graham is that piece of overcooked octopus you’ve been chewing for hours and it’s still solid rubber.
I read The Island on a plane. Ogod. I had a better time staring at the seatback in front of me than reading the book. It seemed interminable. Though in its favor, I got lots of sleep.
Georgette Heyer is chocolate mousse. Smooth, suave, sophisticated, yet light and frothy. Always delicious and addictive.
A Haiku:
Looking for something
filling but not too heavy.
Romance! Order Up!
I didn’t click on the casu marza link before; I now have, and I wish I hadn’t. As Amy E said, food that eats you back is not a nice prospect.
On the other hand, I now have the ultimate piece of weird trivia to win all those trivia contests at college with. Thanks, Bitches! Just watch out for the little jumping maggots.
Ooh, SEP mentions. What? I’m like five whenever a Stars book comes out. I’ll admit it, damn it. And very proud of it. Ahem.
But shouldn’t Nora be a Lays potato chip? Aren’t they the ones you can’t eat just one of? Oh, wait. Maybe that’s Pringles. I think so, since it’s “Once you pop, you can’t stop.” I have a couple on my shelf now, and a lot in storage since I had to make room. Ha! In fact, shelved Roberts are next to my SEP. *gigglesnort*
Hey, no one ever said I had adequate brain power.
So what would MaryJanice Davidson be? A Jolly Rancher?
And you know it’s sad when you give your Cynster books to Goodwill because the tax write-off is better than rereading Take Your Pick Character A and B getting it on in a convenient daybed or chair. I’m just saying.
Damn I wish I didnt live about as far away from Voodoo doughnut as I can and still be in the continental US (Fl). I need to try Triple Chocolate penetration! Wait, that sounds very very bad… I think pop tarts would be accurate to describe Katie Macallister as well, some how it fits.
OH GOD OH MY GOD. Sweet jesus, the grubs in the cheese can JUMP AT YOUR EYES. They actually JUMP AT YOUR EYES AND EAT YOUR INTESTINES. SWEET FUCKING BABY JESUS.
I’m at the stage of planning my wedding in Michigan from Japan where I really really really want to go and get hitched at the donut hut.
I call dibs on fried ice cream – the whole concept seems unlikely, but I manage to pull it off deliciously.
Brilliant, although, I liked Kerry’s as well:
Eloisa James: one of those 7 mini course gourmet experimental extravaganzas, which may or may not compose a coherent whole and fill your belly.
I’m not sure Christine Feehan qualifies as tiramisu. I tend to think of her as candy sprinkles. Sure, eating them by themselves SEEMS like a great idea, and the first time or two you snack on them, you’re like “I AM GEEEENIUS” and then you realize they’re kinda waxy and kind of bland, just overpoweringly sweet.
Then you look down and realize what you thought were black and white sprinkles are now colored. Which means you’ve found true love. Or something.
Also, Kerry’s definition of Eloisa James had me giggle-snorting in agreement.
Absolutely brilliant, ladies! All of you, and dead on.
J. D. Robb—a martini: pungent, intoxicating and best savored one at a time. —loved this, Cyranetta.
“Then you look down and realize what you thought were black and white sprinkles are now colored. Which means you’ve found true love. Or something.”
Brilliant.
I was thinking Krentz was more like Hershey’s milk chocolate. Blended to within an inch of its life, it’s so smooth and comforting that everyone has at least one favorite brand that they like to keep in their house at all times. 😀
Hey, if Roberts can be ice cream . . . ;p
I’m sitting here actually LOL and snorting and my husband says, “You reading the Smart Bitches again?”
Need I say more?
Keeper post, definitely. *bookmarks*
Jen C – Sherrilyn Kenyon as mac n cheese is perfect! It tasted good, but you kind of feel bad about eating it. And yet when your toddler leaves you half a bowl, you’re secretly psyched to finish it.
Barbara Cartland: Boone’s Farm Strawberry Hill Wine. You loved it at sixteen, when it was the first wine you ever drank out of your parents’ sight. Then, nostalgic, you try it as an adult and OMG it tastes like Kool-Aid laced with grain alcohol.
OK, can there be an author who’s like Red Velvet Cake? (The bad kind that tastes like chemicals because it’s overloaded with the dye?)
Everyone around you is raving about how good it is and all you can think is ‘Are you people crazy! It’s AWFUL! It’s fake!’.
Oh and PS,
I feel no guilt in still loving Linda Howard’s older stuff. 😉
If some folks like buttsecks, I can like Linda Howard, thankyouverymuchandhaveaniceday! 🙂
Makes vow to self.
One day, somebody will describe me as panne cotta.
OK, can there be an author who’s like Red Velvet Cake? (The bad kind that tastes like chemicals because it’s overloaded with the dye?)
Everyone around you is raving about how good it is and all you can think is ‘Are you people crazy! It’s AWFUL! It’s fake!’.
LKH!!!!
I would come up with something but I must go raid my fridge RIGHT NOW.
I have Oreos, ice cream and donuts. DAMN IT
I just noticed my food and the authors on my shelf are the same. Isn’t that weird?
You smart bitches are awesome!
Georgette Heyer:
She is homemade noodles. All your life you get package noodles and you think those are fine. Then, one Christmas day, your great Aunt Estelle brings in her homemade noodles from her secret recipe. Now you realize that all package noodles are kinda fake and now you can’t ignore how fake they taste.
Just wanted to say I live within walking distance of Voodoo Doughnuts…yes, it’s like you imagine ONLY BETTER.
And For me Mary Balogh is like a Fat Elvis Cupcake from Saint Cupcakes…a shop run by minions of Satan who use their wicked bad evil to make frosting of sin.
OK, not entirely related, but what the heck happened to Dara Joy? I saw her name on this list and thought “oh, what is she up to?” and her website is awful and the cover art is so bad I couldn’t bring myself to read the excerpt. What happened?
Great comparisons, but I always thought that LKH would be more like anchovies. Some people love them, and some people hate them with a fiery passion.
And you can make jokes about that pungent fishy odor…
Dara Joy fell out with one publisher when she gave Ritual of Proof to Harper. Her publisher sued her for breach of k and I’m pretty sure there was a nervous breakdown somewhere in the story. She tried to self publish and that went south. You need to check out the story on Dear Author or just google Dara Joy and lawsuit.
This was fabulous.
And thank you for making me cherry pie. That was very kind (g).
Jenny
Oh my Lord, do people actually EAT that nasty cheese?! Why?! What possible reason could anyone have for ingesting maggot-ridden cheese? Especially considering that you have to wear protective goggles to protect yourself from leaping larvae.
…
I think I’m done with lunch now.
Im surprised none were compared to sushi. A symphony of tastes, classy, and acquired appreciation.