This HaBO request is from Susan, who is looking for this YA novel:
Not sure I’ve all the details correct, but here goes: This was probably classified as YA and isn’t, strictly speaking, a romance. The teenage heroine’s mother is seriously (probably terminally) ill, so the heroine is on her own a lot. She meets a young man who turns out to be a vampire. His younger brother is also a vampire, but while the hero is sweet and brave, the younger brother – who still looks like an angelic child – is every bit the monster who finds his victims when they try to help what they think is a lost child. The hero is victorious in his efforts to destroy the evil sibling, but in the end he allows himself to be destroyed by sunlight.
I’m pretty sure this is a fairly well-known book, but I can’t remember the title or author. Thanks for any information that can be provided.
Let’s HaBO!
I literally just read this! The Silver Kiss by Annette Curtis Klause.
Co-opting your HABO for a minute to complain about something: in the book’s introduction the author mentions reading a teenage vampire book set in 60s London and how that inspired her writing. The book is called The Shiny Narrow Grin by Jane Gaskell and it is out of print and not available for less than $400 online. So now I must devote the rest of my life to finding a copy I can afford.
Looks like there’s one that’s $300 on abebooks, but your point is taken. Hard to justify spending that much on a book that you don’t already know is something you’ll cherish forever.
Regarding The Shiny Narrow Grin, there are a few copies in some US universities. You might be able to ask your local public library to request it via ILL. See: https://www.worldcat.org/title/shiny-narrow-grin/oclc/9962663?referer=br&ht=edition for libraries holding it.
@EJ, might interlibrary loan be an option? WorldCat shows 17 libraries worldwide that have the book.
Annette Curtis Klause is also the author of a really good YA werewolf romance, BLOOD AND CHOCOLATE. (Caveat: don’t watch the movie unless you’re interested in a masterclass on how to botch an adaptation.)
Loved this one as a teenager long before Twilight hit the shelves!
@Kareni
Perhaps? I don’t know how to make it happen unless it’s in my library’s system, which it isn’t.
I’m sure there’s a copy languishing on a shelf of old pulp novels in a used bookstore in Yorkshire but I don’t have the time or the money to go looking. I thought about contacting some used bookstores in London (a la 84 Charing Cross Road if you know you know), but my desperation might tip them off and they’d rather sell it for $300.
@hng23
I read Blood and Chocolate so many times as a teen. I’m convinced it was the first romance to use the “werewolves as sleazy bikers” trope.
@EJ I wouldn’t be surprised, since it came out in 1997. Still one of my faves.
@EJ, you could ask one of your librarians if interlibrary loan is an option. Looking at WorldCat.org, I see that several libraries in the UK have the book.
And I suspect I’ll be perusing the book shelves at the next thrift store I visit….
If I’m remembering correctly, I much preferred The Silver Kiss to Blood and Chocolate. it’s been at least 20 years though so I don’t know how either would stand up to a reread.
@footiepjs
I enjoyed re-reading The Silver Kiss. Certain details haven’t aged well such as landline phones and shopping at the punk store at the mall lol, so it feels a little like a 90s period piece.
The most prominent themes are death and grief and isolation, which are timeless. The romance is pretty low-key and there’s no sex. It’s fairly obvious that the main characters are driven together by loneliness and neither of them take advantage of that.
There are some horror elements to the story, so if you’re squeamish it might not work for you, but overall it’s just very atmospheric and lovely.
I haven’t picked up Blood and Chocolate in decades but I remember it having that whole “wolf pack hierarchy as an excuse for toxic masculinity” which I have come to hate.
@footiepjs I remember preferring Blood and Chocolate to The Silver Kiss – but but then again, I grew up to STILL fall on the side of “shifters YES PLEASE, vampires meh” side of the fence. So it could have merely been an early indicator of my PNR loyalties.
This does bring back memories of the late 90’s /early 00’s YA precursors to the big paranormal deluge in adult romance in the mid to late 00’s. The request made me think it might have been one of Amelia Atwater-Rhodes’ books at first, but I think the brothers in question there were twins.
@Courtney M
My preferences are the reverse, lol. I was super into Caroline B. Cooney and Lois Duncan.
@footpjs
Have you read the Both Sides of Time series by Cooney? I was obsessed.
Thank you to all who responded. I knew the Smart Bitches would not fail me, even if my own memory did.
As for finding OOP and very expensive books, I live in Washington, DC. A few years ago I wanted to read Fitzempress Law by Diana Norman, and the only copies I could find online were priced at the level of the Gaskell book mentioned above. I got a friend who worked for Congress to check the book out of the Library of Congress for me (I could have read it at the Library but couldn’t have checked it out). Liked the book, but not $400 worth. I counted it as a benefit of living in DC that I had access to the Library so got to read the book without spending a fortune. By the way, if you are ever in DC be sure to go into the Jefferson (main) building and the Reading Room; they are gorgeous and well worth a visit. My husband and I used to go to concerts there; the LoC has some amazing instruments in its collection – it’s not just books!
@Susan/DC: I used to work right by the Madison Bldg and went to a lot of meetings/functions there, but I don’t recall ever going to the Jefferson Bldg. I just looked at some photos and it’s amazing. It also never even occurred to me that people could actually check books out to read!
@EJ:
It looks like The Shiny Narrow Grin is available online at wattpad.
https://www.wattpad.com/668252-the-shiny-narrow-grin
I haven’t read it, so I don’t know if it is complete and I also don’t know how/why it is there. But try this before you spend any money.
And please let me know if you are able to access it.
Susan, you’ve reminded me to go find the first in Diana Norman’s Makepeace Hedley trilogy to complete my set – I loaned the first one out years ago, and never got it back!
The second book (TAKING LIBERTIES) isn’t really a romance but a historical novel about American captives in Britain during the Revolutionary War, but it still contains one of my all-time favourite romance storylines featuring an older woman. Her aristocratic husband has died of syphilis (so much for sexy rakes), her grown son is a jerk, and she’s trying to regain some autonomy over her life. The ending is terrific.
Here’s an interesting discussion of Jane Gaskell and her work: https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/lost-beneath-the-waves-of-time-jane-gaskell-in-and-the-60s/
@ Susan: As far as I know, anyone can read a book at the library, but only US Representatives/Senators and their staffs can check books out. Scholars can request a carrel in the library and keep the books they need for their research there for a limited time, but I don’t know what that time limit is.
@ Tom: Taking Liberties had such a perfect title, as it was about personal and political liberty, how they are defined and who determines the limits of liberty for all. Makepeace and the Countess are limited due to their sex, and there are POC who are limited due to their race (and the irony of a war fought for independence but not theirs is quite clear to them). I thought Norman did a wonderful job of putting us in Britain in the middle of the American Revolution, when no one knew which side would win and if those leading the Revolution would be hailed as Founding Fathers or hanged for treason. Agree that the ending was extremely romantic. Book 3, The Sparks Fly Upward, takes place during the French Revolution. I didn’t find it quite as satisfying as the prior book but it was complex and thought-provoking and, despite some close calls, had a HEA for the central couple.
Thank you everyone for the resources and advice! The Shiny Narrow Grin sounds pretty bonkers even for readers like us, so if I manage to access/read the whole thing I’ll send a review to SBTB or make a comment somewhere about what I thought.
@EJ I found 84 Charing Cross Road for free on the Roku channel. I’ve never seen it- thanks for the hot tip!
OMG, I’ve been trying for years to remember who wrote this book! It haunted me throughout college and my 20s, it was such a favorite of mine. But, I had borrowed a copy from the tiny library in my home town, thus did not have a copy of my own. Y’all just made my day!
If you join the free trial for Scribd, they have a download able version of The Shiny Narrow Grin xx