Love Between the Covers Premiere in LA Film Festival This Weekend, and a Regency Crush

Love Between the Covers, the documentary about the romance industry and the women within it, is having a premiere in LA this weekend, so heads up, west coast Bitches!

Love Between the Covers is showing at the Regal Cinema LA LIVE 10 in downtown LA:
June 14th at 6:15 pm &
June 16th at 5:25 pm.

Tickets are on sale now at the LA Film Festival website and they are $15.00.

Anyone who comes to a screening will be eligible to win a Love Between the Covers tote bag filled with books and other goodies. Plus, local RWA chapters are having a celebration for romance writers after both screenings.  All local romance bloggers and writers are welcome.

I can’t go, because I’m on the other side of the country, but I am in the documentary. If you attend, and I hope you do, I would love to know what you think!

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Here’s an interesting perspective on text on the internet: according to recent research, the internet “talks like a woman:”

…instead of a level playing field, the web proved to be a petri dish for linguistic theories about gender. When linguists analyzed IM conversations in 2006, they found that women’s messages were more expressive than men’s. A 2009 analysis of Italian text messages found similarly that women, as compared to men, had crafted “a highly expressive style….”

Despite the boys’-club atmosphere that often seems to permeate the internet, so much of what seems fun today about online writing is, in fact, thanks to women.

I am fascinated by linguistic theory as it applies to digital communications, and how people use alternate methods to convey tone in text.

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Are you on Instagram? So are we – have a look!

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This email is from Claire, and it’s long, but it is SO GREAT. If you’re a Regency fan, read on.

First, a picture!

Claire: I have a perilous yet invigorating past time, which has recently produced a wonderful piece of hilarity that I would like to share with the Bitchery. To pass the time and procrastinate, I carefully turn the pages of tomes of old periodicals. I know this sounds like amazing fun, but I would caution anyone planning on taking up this past time, as too much excitement and carrying too many books may result in back problems. Which may result in a hiatus of tome exploration.

While perusing Harpers Weekly from 1861, I came across a wonderful cartoon and short narrative about the perils of party attendance during the Season. I thought you all would get a kick out of it as well as my fellow members of the Bitchery. I have edited the first paragraph out of the excerpt, but have it in my possession if anyone is interested. The article is by the cartoonist Richard Doyle from Harper’s Weekly New York, Saturday, April 13, 1961 edition (Vol. V.–No. 224).

“Bird’s-eye view of Society: At Home. Small and Early” By Richard Doyle

It is a Protest against a habit the givers of parties are given to of inviting into their houses more people than the houses will hold. And it may be remarked, that if it be necessary to the happiness of the hostess and the success of “At Homes” that the guests should be crushed almost to death; it would be an improvement if such pressing invitations were issued in winter only, and not, as now, chiefly in the hottest months of the year.

It is common at these receptions for the crowd to reach such dimensions that, the rooms becoming quite full, the company is squeezed gradually up the stairs till it disappears out of sight in the direction of the bedrooms, and toward the roof of the house; while in another direction it overflows out of the windows on to the balconies into outer darkness. More guests arrive every minute, and endeavor to make their way into the presence of the hostess; some struggle manfully, but never reach the rooms, and subside at last on the stairs; others succumb sooner, and live the rest of the night on the landing, a quiet, but an oppressive existence among colored lamps and flower pots.

The whole staircase at last becomes chocked up with “society,” closely packed, leaning against the balusters on one side and the wall on the other, resigned to their fate; while in the centre or middle passage, the horrors of which increase each moment, two streams of company are seen, one purposing it is going up, and the other under the impression that it is coming down; but this is a delusion, for neither had moved more than three quarters of an inch in the last half-hour, and it becomes a melancholy subject for speculation whether, at this rate, the middle of next week or the latter portion is the soonest their respective destinations are likely to be reached.

In such circumstances a philosopher may, although a stout lady be standing upon each of his patent-leather feet, in agony, yet fixed– the edge of a gibus hat stuck in his eye, or an elegant gold pin of enormous size decorating a lovely head, but at the same time stabbing him in the ear–he may. I suggest, still, if he has any pluck, find amusement and instruction. He may find pleasure in the delightful good-humor of some, in the long-enduring uncomplaining patience of others; and again, he may see one of the gentler sex, while grief is struggling in her face, gallantly preserving her company smile, and trying hard to look as if she really thought it pleasure she was undergoing; and he may see, and hear too, some of the sex that is not gentle seeking relief to their pent-up feelings by muttering words of condemnatory nature. He may discover who is good-tempered, and who is not, as he contemplates that mob of well-dressed persons, whose trains, heads of hair, wreaths and bouquets, flounces and feelings, are more or less disheveled.

But observe the refreshment-room. From about midnight all the various currents set in in that direction–those in the drawing-room, the staircases, and the hall; all these, which are full, are to be emptied into the refreshment-room, which is already full. That is the intention; the consequences of the attempt to carry it out it is not easy to imagine or to describe.

Suppose yourself slowly drifting toward the ices, you being, perhaps, short of stature but of a persevering nature–pledged, perhaps, to the Object of you Affections to get a strawberry cream, she being on the point of fainting–you yourself in an exhausted state, your progress stopped in front, and the horizon shut out from view by a big fat man. The consciousness that the parting of your back hair is being ruffled, that a dragoon’s mustache of supernatural length is tickling your eye on one side, and that the man of all others in the world you most dislike has his elbow wedged into your side on the other, almost drives you to despair; and when, with a surprising effort, you are able to turn to escape these, it is only to find all your features violently imbedded in the prodigious wreath attached to a lady’s head, and not hers. To be near the rose is considered an advantage, but when the roses are artificial that makes a difference. For my part, I think what I describe realizes the picture of an honest man struggling with adversity, formerly esteemed one of the noblest of sights.

After all, I suppose that, while there are Objects of the Affections, men will be found willing to go through dangers and difficulties to see them and to serve them; and who can doubt that in the fabulous period when the knight killed a dragon, or fought his way through the enchanted forest, an additional pleasure was imparted by those facts to the interview afterward with the princess, who was waiting the result on the tower-top?

Suppose, then, that you have survived the super-room, your next endeavor is to get into the apartment devoted to outer coats, ect.; and upon reaching which you fondly hope that your garment will be delivered up upon the production by you of a small ticket, having a number inscribed upon it. Vain delusion, and weak-minded man! The barricade of tables formed for the preservation of order and the outer garments, and behind which neatly-attired maidens had officiated in the early part of the night, has been stormed by “society” and complete anarchy prevails. Ladies’ cloaks, beautiful burnooses, shawls, bags containing furs, strange hoods, are trampled under foot, with coats, Inverness wrappers, and hats, all mingled together, and flung about in the wildest disorder. “Numbers” are no use; the maids are fled, or out of their wits with perplexity; it is a wild hunt of ladies and gentlemen for their “things.” Some find them, some don’t; some take what comes, some go without taking any thing; some have even been known to imagine they had a chance of recovering their property by calling next day.

And to think that there were some people who “moved heaven and earth” to get invited to this party, while of those who were there the greater part seemed to think only of how they could get away soonest, and in safety.

The change into the fresh air is pleasant after an atmosphere of faded flowers, wax-lights, and scent. There is a whole army of servants about the door, the familiar shouting of the linkman greets the ear, a long stream of carriages–their lamps shining into the far distance–meets the eye, while above are the stars glittering in the cool, bright sky.