books

I yam what I yam

Moriah

I try to be literary. Really, I do. That’s what Smart People do.

I read Racy Romance Reviews and Read For Pleasure and Teach Me Tonight and I think, “Gee, these women are Smart.” I am not that Smart. So I don’t comment much.

I read the in-depth reviews at Dear Author when they talk about worldbuilding and layering symbolism and use all sorts of literary techniques I learned but didn’t absorb for whatever reason. I read Mrs. Giggles reviews, wherein she’s snarkalicious but not (IMO) unkind—and I think, “Gee, these people are Smart.”

I read A Motley Vision and occasionally, Segullah. I read Theric and Tyler and Trevor. I think, “Gee, these people are Smart.” I am not that Smart. So I don’t comment much, except at AMV, where I probably drive the regular inhabitants insane with my less-than-suave sensitivities. Every time I post there I think, “That was a stupid thing to say.” But I let it lie because that’s who I am, even if I don’t like it sometimes.

And this is why I didn’t study English lit. I can’t analyze worth a damn and half the time, I don’t even know what the existing analyses are saying. I suppose there’s something to be said against a writer who doesn’t think about Great Works beyond “thumbs up” and “thumbs down,” but really, I’ve just come to the point where I have to admit that I like what I like and a good portion of it is crass and commercial.

Then again, sometimes the labels are deceiving. Perhaps I do like crass and commercial, but most times when I pick up a romance novel that intrigues me (mostly historicals), they’re rich and complex, layered and moving so that I’m still thinking about them long after. Sometimes they depend more heavily on characterization or on plot, leaning to one side or the other, but I really don’t care. When they strike a balance—well, that’s a lagniappe.

All I want is a good book to curl up with and a story that sticks with me a while.

But hey—I liked “I’m Too Sexy,” too.

A week!

Moriah

I cannot believe a week has gone by and I haven’t posted. Tax Deduction #1 just went into kindergarten and I find myself being forced by the school district to keep a schedule. (Blech.) Being a WAHM is its own precious kind of insanity and my chaos is getting beaten into submission. Thank heavens I still have Tax Deduction #2 to keep my days a little off balance. I just don’t know what I’m going to do when he goes to school, too, and we’re all perfectly regulated and scheduled by default.

FYI, I thought y’all might like to know what editing a book (for me) looks like:

20080904_editing4
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That stack of papers is one manuscript. Take about 100 pages off the top and that’s about how much of a dent I’ve made, which isn’t, admittedly, that much. Once I got through crying over all the bloodletting, though, I’ve started to have a lot of fun.

I’ll admit that when I’m under the gun like this (or otherwise preoccupied with Fun Stuff*), my blog reading goes way down (oh noes! missing drahmah!) and obviously, so does my posting. Hopefully I’ll be back on track in a couple of weeks and with any luck, I’ll get to start really cranking out the pages for book #2 in the Dunham series.

*  So in the last week, Fun Stuff has consisted of reading. A lot. I finished a couple of erotic historical romance author Pam Rosenthal’s books, which I enjoyed for their voice and odd cadences, but didn’t find terribly erotic. Both books were remarkable for how they took people from different classes and had them work to reconcile their thought processes and worldviews. To me, the sex wasn’t terribly descriptive anyway, so I don’t know why they’re billed as erotic. They’re fairly cerebral books. I liked The Slightest Provocation better than I liked The Bookseller’s Daughter. Almost a Gentleman was the one I couldn’t finish because I figured out the whodunnit a quarter of the way in and, again, the sex wasn’t enough to sustain the story if you already had it figured out.
I’m reading a (published) book by my crit partner. I’m reading a book by Rachel Ann Nunes (because really, how can I pound LDS lit into the ground if I don’t read it?), but I have to admit it’s just not holding my attention. I made an order to Deseret Book because I figured out that two of the books I bought in Nauvoo 2 weeks ago (yeah, I’ll post about that) are sequels (WHY don’t they put this on the cover?).

I was, uh, gifted with boxes and boxes of old LDS books, some of which are old-timey LDS romances and some others of which I think might be valuable, so I’m looking into that.

Hey Sam Weller’s. Call me!

Book Review: Married to a Rock Star

Moriah

Cover of MARRIED TO A ROCK STAR by Tami ParringtonMarried to a Rock Star
by Tami Parrington
published by Prairieview Publishing via Lulu

I read a great review of this book and went immediately forthwith to purchase it. I don’t know whether I’m more upset with the book or with the review, but let’s just say this would’ve been a wallbanger had it not been on my precious ebook reader. I shouldn’t have finished it, really, but I kept reading because I thought surely, somewhere along the way, the heroine would pull her head out of her ass.

Alas.

I wanted to like this book. Really. I thought I would like this book because of the real-life fantasy of it (as in, not elf- fairy- magick-type fantasy). It’s independently published and I want and need to support that community. Thus, I’ve been sitting on this review for several days, thinking about whether I wanted to post it or not.

Here’s the summary:

Out in the country, Karen and her two teenage children have a new neighbor-Isaiah Highland, who is anything but the farm type. Isaiah is a rock-star looking for peace, starving for privacy, and he’s found them both … and a whole lot more. Swept into a world of fame, fortune, and betrayal, Karen finds herself in a world far removed from her little farm.

Two separate worlds …

Worlds bound to collide …

When they do Isaiah and Karen will have to choose between their own versions of paradise … and each other.

Good points:

  1. It’s readable.
  2. Great concept.

Bad points:

  1. Consistent homonym, spelling, and grammar errors that should’ve been caught by a proofreader.
  2. Kansas City errors. If you want to get detailed with a city, please know what you’re talking about.
    1. There are no stockyards and haven’t been since 1974.
    2. Kemper Arena is not a stadium and is not referred to as such by locals.
    3. Bryant’s (the one on Brooklyn, which is the one referenced in the book) isn’t a restaurant; it’s a sleazy, nasty, dirty BBQ diner (which was a lot sleazier, nastier, dirtier when Mr. Arthur Bryant was alive and sitting in his straight-backed metal chair with his arms crossed over his chest, right next to the BBQ pit, overseeing the operations with an eagle eye) which does not take reservations and there is no cutting in line and most definitely not at midnight and I don’t care who the dignitary is (uh, with the exception of Jimmy Carter when he was president; I think Clinton chose Gates). Considering I worship at the altar of Arthur Bryant, this is an affront.
  3. A 40-year-old 1-year-widowed heroine who:
    1. becomes a rock star’s groupie in front of her 15-year-old son and 17-year-old daughter,
    2. drags said teenagers back and forth across the country to follow this guy around,
    3. tolerates his milieu’s dismissive treatment of her,
    4. tolerates him screaming at her in front of Princess Stephanie of Monaco for talking to reporters when she has no idea what the word “groupie” really means,
    5. takes the advice of aforementioned 17-year-old daughter who says, in effect, “If you don’t fuck him, the groupies will,” so she does,
    6. goes back to him after he’s abandoned her 90 miles from home with no cash and slaps her (in front of aforementioned teenagers and his entire milieu),
    7. tolerates the groupies anyway,
    8. seems to have no grasp on how her behavior can/will affect her already angst-ridden children (their father died barely a year ago, remember) and if she does, doesn’t seem to care, and
    9. doesn’t seem to love the guy in the first place, or at least if she does, I see no reason why she should and she never indicates by thought, word, or deed that this is anything but an exciting fling for her, no matter how degrading.
  4. No comeuppance for the, ah, “hero,” who begins the “I love you” business as a bargaining chip.

And you know, I could’ve gone with it and had snarkworthy fun with it had not children (impressionable teenagers, yet) been involved in her rapid and willing debasement. For that, I felt dirty after reading this book and I finished it wondering if the reviewer (whose recommendation I took) and I read the same book.

“Little Lion Face”

Moriah

Thmazing posted this poem by May Swenson (1919-1989), Mormon poet, in April. I don’t usually “get” poetry, but I sure as heck got this and it is … beautiful. I’m going to have to invest some time in her work.

Little lion face
I stopped to pick
among the mass of thick
succulent blooms, the twice

streaked flanges of your silk
sunwheel relaxed in wide
dilation, I brought inside,
placed in a vase. Milk

of your shaggy stem
sticky on my fingers, and
your barbs hooked to my hand,
sudden stings from them

were sweet. Now I’m bold
to touch your swollen neck,
put careful lips to slick
petals, snuff up gold

pollen in your navel cup.
Still fresh before night
I leave you, dawn’s appetite
to renew our glide and suck.

An hour ahead of sun
I come to find you. You’re
twisted shut as a burr,
neck drooped unconscious,

an inert, limp bundle,
a furled cocoon, your
sun-streaked aureole
eclipsed and dun.

Strange feral flower asleep
with flame-ruff wilted,
all magic halted,
a drink I pour, steep

in the glass for your
undulant stem to suck.
Oh, lift your young neck,
open and expand to your

lover, hot light.
Gold corona, widen to sky.
I hold you lion in my eye
sunup until night.

Spiritual erotica

Moriah

My book doesn’t have a genre. It’s too many things, but two things it is are spiritual and erotic. Okay, so in my mind, I think, “spiritual erotica.” I like it.

Anyhoo, I would like to direct your attention to today’s Thmazing’s Thmusings post by Eric Jepson on “The Erotic in LDS Lit, Part I: Why?” Very thoughtful piece. Tyler of Chasing the Long White Cloud appears on the verge of addressing the subject himself. Then there’s The Visitors’ Center, which is a blog “celebrating Mormon sexuality,” and I’m wondering …

Is this serendipity that a whole bunch of us are coming up with this just in the last couple of years or so or has it been simmering on the back of the stove for a while and is now gathering steam and getting ready to blow?

Blond heroes

Moriah

Upfront aside: On Amazon, Breaking Dawn is getting trashed for typos and grammatical errors and spelling errors, like … “blond” versus “blonde.” I didn’t bother to ask if the different usage was gender-specific. So for those who might misunderstand my usage of both “blond” and “blonde” in my book, let me disclaim that “blond” (no “e”) is to describe a male and “blonde” (with “e”) is to describe a female (you can apply that to “brunet” and “brunette” as well). Just your regular ordinary Latin declension.

That out of the way, I want to know how many people really don’t like blond heroes. I don’t remember where I ran across some “fact” with “data” that proclaimed that blond heroes don’t sell well.

I’m reading a book now with a blond villain and crimony, now that that I have that swirling around in my brain, I recall a good majority of the books I’ve read that have a slimy villain, they’re all blond. Not fair!

I love ’em. This is because of Wulfgar in The Wolf and the Dove. And other particular contributors to my life experience.

Two questions:

1. Do you have any particular dislike of blond heroes?

2. Is there evidence that blond heroes don’t sell as well as dark ones?

Thinging

Moriah

A meme of a calico cat relaxing. Text: “i gotz u a rly good book … but i eated it.”Late to the party, as usual. LibraryThing has been on my to-do list forever, and I finally got a decent start on it today. Mind, it’s far from complete.

I’m not going to be reviewing much of anything in the future unless someone asks (I doubt that’ll happen much) or unless I’m totally blown away. I don’t think I write very good reviews, for one thing and for another, after thinking about it, I only have three categories: liked, didn’t like, and didn’t want to finish.

I won’t review stuff I didn’t like. Now … stuff I didn’t want to finish may be a different animal altogether because then I start wondering why I didn’t want to finish it. Periodically, I’ll post what I’m reading that I like.

The price of nice

Moriah

I was over on Dear Author talking about Breaking Dawn by Stephenie Meyer, which I have not read. One commenter expressed disapproval of Meyer on the basis that she’s a Mormon mother and shouldn’t be writing stuff like that anyway. I will go so far as to guess this commenter was not Mormon because she spelled it “Morman.”

I could crack on Meyer for a couple of different things, but when the religion gets broken out as a generic weapon to say “You can’t write that because you’re a Mormon,” I’m on Meyer’s side. Period.

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What have you done for me lately?

Moriah

PUBLISHERS

I’d like to see new and different in romance. It took Ellora’s Cave and Loose Id and Samhain to break you out into genres you wouldn’t touch before (and no, they’re not all erotica).

I’d like to see you lead the way into e-publishing but again, you didn’t get in gear until the above-mentioned trailblazers kicked your butts. Apparently not even Baen was able to get to you like those three did.

INDEPENDENT BOOKSELLERS

The consignment system of inventory management is, I believe, in its late afternoon and Barnes & Noble CEO Riggio wants to push it into that good night. Agent Richard Curtis (and foresightful creator of e-Reads) points out that it’s not going away–on the dead-tree book brick’n’mortar playground, but, he says,

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My guilty pleasure

Moriah

My first full-on real-life romance novel was Shanna by Kathleen Woodiwiss. Naturally, it’s on my keeper shelf right next to The Wolf and the Dove. I have the ones with the original covers, though they are far from mint. The namby pamby covers on the ones with the links are meh. Unlike most of my contemporaries whose first (or close to it) romance experience was Woodiwiss, mine wasn’t with The Flame and the Flower or Ashes in the Wind, neither of which I cared for.

But she’s not my guilty pleasure.

It’s Carole Mortimer of Harlequin Presents circa 1979 through, oh, I guess around 1986.

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An embarrassment of half-assed riches

Moriah

See, the thing is, I keep getting these great ideas to blog about, but then I get distracted and they don’t gel and I have about 6 half-written posts in my drafts folder that kinda sorta mean something to me now, but not really. Prepare for leftovers, kiddies, because mommy’s tired and she doesn’t want to cook dinner.

Re: ANN HERENDEEN AND PHYLLIDA

This is what’s apparently called “good” gossip. I shall take the liberty of bragging.

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Getting the job done

Moriah

In my review of Phyllida, I made a reference to an average review it earned at Amazon with the caveat that the reviewer “stayed up all night to read the last two hundred pages, because I was engrossed with the characters’ stories.” To which my response was, that’s the mother lode.

I’ve thought a lot about this lately, what I pick up, what I put down. I’ll finish a book regardless; it’s just something I do. I can’t stand to leave a book unfinished, no matter how torturous. Also, I’m not one of those readers who has to be absolutely captivated by the first or third page. I’ll give an author a good 50 pages to live up to the blurb (which is what would have hooked me enough to buy it), sink that hook in my mouth, and reel me in. (Which is kind of a moot point anyway, since I’m going to finish it.)

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Genre, let me show u it

Moriah

I am bored with the below discussion (but don’t let me rain on your parade, so carry on). However, I do need to use it as the springboard for what’s on my ADHD mind today: What, precisely, defines a genre?

We’re very specific in romance. Got an email yesterday from my newest BFF (kidding! but the offer’s open!) who said, “I know you don’t write romance … ” Well, yeah, I do. It’s just got so much other STUFF in it that it can’t be classified, which is why I’m publishing it myself. In fact, it’s got THREE (count ’em, 1, 2, 3) full-length romances going on at the same time all woven together (which is why it’s going to top 700 pages and who-knows-how-many megabytes). And they have sex and there is no fade-to-black and they say the f-word and the c-word. They live a certain political philosophy (some more than others) that will probably be uncomfortable for other types of readers. The story takes place over the course of 5 years and oh, by the way, they’re all in their late 30s and early 40s and wow is that so not part of genre romance.

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Mormon-Vampire tale blows up intrawebs

Moriah

This post is for the non-Mormon readers of this blog who come from (most likely) the genre romance corner of the net.

Backstory: LDS fiction (aka Mormon fiction) is analogous to, say, what Steeple Hill puts out or any other run-of-the-mill Christian/evangelical inspirational romance. No swearing, no sex, very clean. No taking the Lord’s name in vain, no smoking, no drinking, no allusions to any of these things. For all intents and purposes, the term “LDS fiction” has come to be defined informally in the same milieu as inspirational romance category fiction.

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Book Review: Angel Falling Softly

Moriah

Angel Falling Softly
by Eugene Woodbury
published by Zarahemla Books

Perhaps I should admit upfront that I consider myself an undemanding reader. I’ll happily go wherever the author wants to take me as long as it’s logical, consistent, and interesting. Let me add that I don’t even particularly care whether a story is plot-driven or character-driven; give me something to chaw on intellectually and I’m good to go. Make me laugh and I’ll forgive almost anything.

This is one reason why, when I read Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight, I was highly annoyed [private link]. I like vampires. I’ve studied vampire myths since I fell in love with Vlad the Impaler somewhere in the early ’90s, so her inconsistent worldbuilding, her habit of telling rather than showing, and her mostly flat characterizations grated.

By contrast, Eugene Woodbury’s take is haunting. Poignant, even.

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