I've been totally out of it since yesterday. I don't really know what's going on, but my brain just feels sluggish. The Hubby was trying to talk to me while we were making dinner tonight and I think I just looked at him for a couple of minutes. Special.
I've been trying to decide how I'm feeling about the Eloisa James book I finished last night. The cross-dressing plot worked pretty well without being too homophobic. The big climactic fight between the hero and heroine, however, didn't make a lot of sense to me. I don't feel like I understood at all why the hero got so upset with the heroine. I may need to look at it again and work out some thoughts.
Neither of the two Eloisa James books I've read in the past couple of days has affected me as much as When Beauty Tamed the Beast did. They were both good reads and I'm glad I read them. I enjoyed them. (Well, I think. I'm still puzzling over the last one.) But When Beauty Tamed the Beast was incredible. I mean, I get teary thinking about that book, it was so good.
I found a couple of places where romances are being critically analyzed and my inner nerd's heartstrings have been tugged. Tugged, I say! Now I'm having all kinds of fantasies of doing critical work in romances, writing papers and going to conferences and stuff. I'm such a dork. But it's very cool to know that people are looking at romances seriously, and critically.
I'm trying to read Beyond Heaving Bosoms again, a loving and critical look at romances from the women who founded Smart Bitches Trashy Books (and I swear, Sarah Wendell is my sister from another mister or something, she's so awesome).
I'm watching a bunch of shows on the Travel channel about super-expensive stuff. I have decided that if I was ever ridiculously rich, I want a villa in the south of France. I love the Provencal vibe. This one villa we saw on this show could be rented for like $12,000 a week, and I swear it is my total dream home. Everything about it is completely perfect. The dream. I love the style of the house. I love the colors, I love the architecture, I love it all.
Yeah, this is ridiculous. I'm just babbling now.
I don't know what's up with my brain. It is not functioning. Not functioning at all.
Yeah, I'm giving this up today. Hope everyone had a lovely weekend. Maybe my brain will be working tomorrow.
Showing posts with label romance. Show all posts
Showing posts with label romance. Show all posts
Sunday, February 12, 2012
Saturday, February 11, 2012
Much Rambling
It's been a lovely chill day. I've slept a lot, read some stuff, done a little bit of laundry. The Hubby's out with buddies, and I am watching a movie that the Hubby would never want to watch, and I found problematic the first time I saw it.
The movie, folks, is He's Just Not That Into You.
For one thing, I hate Bradley Cooper's character in this movie with a seething, roiling passion. He is such a complete jerkwad. Ugh. He makes me want to puke.
Then there's the relationship between Ginnifer Godwin and Justin Long. The first time I saw this movie I was so happy that there was a relationship between a man and a woman that was based in friendship, not romance. But when I watched their relationship develop, I admit I had some crazy secret romantic streak and I was hoping that they would get together. And I was horrified when she came on to him and he rejected her -- because, obviously he did really care about her. But then he comes back for her and tells that he does love her, and then I was totally disgusted, because of course, they had to make it romantic. They had to have some kind of fairy tale ending, even though the whole point of the movie is to show that romantic expectations are screwed up and unrealistic and can completely damage your relationships.
So, I'm watching it again, to see how it feels this time around.
I'm still completely hating Bradley Cooper's character. I'm hurting for Jennifer Connelly's character. I'm hurting for Jennifer Aniston's character. I'm really debating turning the channel.
My latest book, another one by Eloisa James, is a cross-dressing story, which sometimes bothers me. To make the romance work, the hero has to be attracted to the heroine dressed as a male, which leads to a bunch of questioning of one's sexuality, only to be profoundly relieved when the heroine is revealed to be a woman. It just seems to come across a bit homophobic, which is, of course, to be expected of a character living the 1780s, but it still bothers me a little bit. So I've been having some trouble getting into this one.
I'm a teeny bit jealous of The Hubby going out with friends, since with all of my back stuff I can't really do much, but I'm trying not to be one of Those Wives.
Have I mentioned how much I love Drew Barrymore? I love Drew Barrymore. I adore her. She's totally adorable. She's smart. She's funny. She's completely amazing and I love her with every fiber of my body.
Yeah, my brain is not organized right now. I apologize.
Okay, back to watching this movie, or reading my book, or hating Bradley Cooper.
The movie, folks, is He's Just Not That Into You.
For one thing, I hate Bradley Cooper's character in this movie with a seething, roiling passion. He is such a complete jerkwad. Ugh. He makes me want to puke.
Then there's the relationship between Ginnifer Godwin and Justin Long. The first time I saw this movie I was so happy that there was a relationship between a man and a woman that was based in friendship, not romance. But when I watched their relationship develop, I admit I had some crazy secret romantic streak and I was hoping that they would get together. And I was horrified when she came on to him and he rejected her -- because, obviously he did really care about her. But then he comes back for her and tells that he does love her, and then I was totally disgusted, because of course, they had to make it romantic. They had to have some kind of fairy tale ending, even though the whole point of the movie is to show that romantic expectations are screwed up and unrealistic and can completely damage your relationships.
So, I'm watching it again, to see how it feels this time around.
I'm still completely hating Bradley Cooper's character. I'm hurting for Jennifer Connelly's character. I'm hurting for Jennifer Aniston's character. I'm really debating turning the channel.
My latest book, another one by Eloisa James, is a cross-dressing story, which sometimes bothers me. To make the romance work, the hero has to be attracted to the heroine dressed as a male, which leads to a bunch of questioning of one's sexuality, only to be profoundly relieved when the heroine is revealed to be a woman. It just seems to come across a bit homophobic, which is, of course, to be expected of a character living the 1780s, but it still bothers me a little bit. So I've been having some trouble getting into this one.
I'm a teeny bit jealous of The Hubby going out with friends, since with all of my back stuff I can't really do much, but I'm trying not to be one of Those Wives.
Have I mentioned how much I love Drew Barrymore? I love Drew Barrymore. I adore her. She's totally adorable. She's smart. She's funny. She's completely amazing and I love her with every fiber of my body.
Yeah, my brain is not organized right now. I apologize.
Okay, back to watching this movie, or reading my book, or hating Bradley Cooper.
Monday, February 6, 2012
The Back Update and a Bit On Comfort Reading
So, my big neurosurgeon appointment was this morning. What a mess that was. For starters I got a little lost finding the place, which is not shocking and why I gave myself a ridiculous amount of time to get there this morning. Then I got there and there was ten pages of paperwork to fill out. Meanwhile, I got nervous, and more nervous, and more nervous, and more nervous, until I was shaking so hard I could hardly write and I was dripping with sweat. (Add to all of this, the pain from not taking any pills this weekend, and oh yeah, it was special.)
I went by myself because The Hubby was like, "Hey, I'm not going to have to be there, am I?" And I said, "Oh no, they're not going to do anything to me that day." So while I was having a mini-heart attack in the waiting room, and blowing up my husband's phone with texts about my sweat level and the fact I was pretty sure I was about to vomit, The Hubby said, "Hey I could be there in 35 minutes if you need me/think it'll be that long before you get in." And I said, "No, it's fine." Because I am an idiot.
By the time they took me back into the examination room, I was crying. Kind of a lot. The doctor walked in (who was not the neurosurgeon, but the PA, which I have learned means Physician's Assistant), and he was just kind of stunned by the fact that I was having a freakin' nervous breakdown. He was really nice though, he told me that he didn't bite and he had no needles, and I laughed a bit at that (because needles don't scare me, my dad and I celebrated my seventeenth birthdat by me giving blood, true story). So, I started to calm down a bit. We talked about my pain and how it hurts and where it hurts and all that jazz. Then he pulled up my MRI and walked me through the images, showing me how severely screwed up the major herniation is (and good lord, is it screwed up). He told me that physical therapy wouldn't really help me, and, in fact, could increase my pain. And then he walked me through my options for how to proceed. I can: 1) do nothing, 2) take painkillers and some steroid, 3) have epidural shots to control pain and inflammation, 4) have surgery.
So, he typed up his notes for a bit and I looked at the MRI image and thought about it. I started sweating and shaking again. And then I thought, basically, everything but surgery is pain management. Which is kind of like putting a Band-Aid on a broken bone. I don't want to be hooked on pain pills. I don't want to have depend on pain medication for the rest of my freaking life. I want to fix the freaking problem. So, that means surgery. And I told him that I wanted surgery.
And proceeded to hyperventilate. So, I now have an appointment on the 29th to discuss surgery with the neurosurgeon. Apparently I may be a candidate for minimally invasive surgery, which would be excellent, and would apparently just require shaving off the bulging parts. I will be up and walking by the next day and my recovery period will be: walk, rest, walk, rest, walk, rest. There's a 15% chance that my discs could herniate again. There's a chance that the surgery might not get rid of my pain. I'll never be able to lift more than 20 pounds again. But you know what, I'm okay with all of that. I've been dealing with this stupid back pain since 2005. It's time to get it fixed. (And hell, maybe if someone had taken me seriously back then, it would've never gotten this bad. Friggin' asshats.)
So. That's my plan.
In my "my head is spinning too fast to be able to think clearly" daze after the appointment, because, HOLY CRAP I'M HAVING BACK SURGERY, I bought a couple of books by an author I've recently discovered, Eloisa James. She writes historical romances, and a couple of them are revisions of fairy tales, which I love. The first one I read by her was When Beauty Tamed the Beast, which was a retelling of... Anybody? Anybody? Bueller? (Yeah, that was lame.) Anyway, you get it. But it was completely lovely. The beauty was Linnet, a stunningly beautiful young woman who has been completely ruined by a bad prawn, a frumpy dress, a flirtation with a prince, and her dead mother's reputation as a tramp. As her father and aunt are trying to fix the situation, because Linnet's really not pregnant, they find a duke, a bit obsessed with royalty, whose estranged only son is apparently... incapable... of having a family, due to an injured leg, not to mention a fiendish temper. His name is Piers and he's the beast. He's also an amazingly brilliant doctor, and fashioned a bit on the character of House. (Except he's not an addict, yet. There's a temptation to numb his pain with laudanum, but he hasn't succumbed yet.)
So, the duke, supposedly desperate to see any heir in the family, agrees to set Linnet up with his son, and takes her to the castle in Wales where Piers has set up a hospital. And sparks fly. As do tempers. It's wonderful to read Linnet and Piers going back and forth on each other, because Linnet's no dummy and can give all his venom right back to him. There's one glaring possible historical inaccuracy, but I don't even care, because it's a truly wonderful plot point that gets them alone together. The sex scenes are fabulous. The damages they both carry from their parents is fabulous.
But lemme tell ya, that's not why I love this book. Why do I love this book? Because some crazy bad scarlet fever breaks out, and Piers kicks everyone out of the house so he can tend his patients. He says some terrible things to Linnet to get her to, not just leave the castle, but to leave him. We know he loves her, he knows he loves her, he knows that she loves him, but he doesn't think he should have her -- because his father was an addict, and Piers is really, desperately afraid of becoming his father, and with his injury, the temptation is always there. So, he kicks her out, and she leaves.
Piers saves all of his patients, and is seriously regretting sending Linnet off, so he's thinking of going to London to bring her back and make all better. But he's been having these dreams about Linnet that have been nagging at him. And then suddenly, he realizes that there is a damn good chance that Linnet may have been infected with scarlet fever before he kicked her out, and then he goes searching for her. He finds her in a coma, dehydrated, covered with the sores and rash of the fever and very, very close to dead in a chicken coop. That whole description of what he does to save her, how hard it is for him to see her that way, how hard it is for him to do the things he needs to do to save her, because of his leg, is freakin' heartbreaking. I think I've read the book three times now, and I still sob like a freaking baby all throughout that part. It is so gorgeous, and sad, and just shows how desperately he loves this woman. It's wonderful, wonderful stuff.
Anyway, the point of this is that that's the book, when I was scared to death last night of my appointment, and I hurt, and I couldn't sleep, I turned to that book, specifically to that scene in that book, because watching him fight so damn hard to save her, when he can barely carry a bucket of water up the stairs by himself, is such a wonderful, beautiful thing. It's comfort.
And I love that so much about stories, that they can give you that. That they can make you cry, but you're so happy that you don't even notice that you're crying. That they can give you safe space for you to go when you need to, that you can get a bit of peace for a moment, so that you can finally get a couple of hours of sleep.
I went by myself because The Hubby was like, "Hey, I'm not going to have to be there, am I?" And I said, "Oh no, they're not going to do anything to me that day." So while I was having a mini-heart attack in the waiting room, and blowing up my husband's phone with texts about my sweat level and the fact I was pretty sure I was about to vomit, The Hubby said, "Hey I could be there in 35 minutes if you need me/think it'll be that long before you get in." And I said, "No, it's fine." Because I am an idiot.
By the time they took me back into the examination room, I was crying. Kind of a lot. The doctor walked in (who was not the neurosurgeon, but the PA, which I have learned means Physician's Assistant), and he was just kind of stunned by the fact that I was having a freakin' nervous breakdown. He was really nice though, he told me that he didn't bite and he had no needles, and I laughed a bit at that (because needles don't scare me, my dad and I celebrated my seventeenth birthdat by me giving blood, true story). So, I started to calm down a bit. We talked about my pain and how it hurts and where it hurts and all that jazz. Then he pulled up my MRI and walked me through the images, showing me how severely screwed up the major herniation is (and good lord, is it screwed up). He told me that physical therapy wouldn't really help me, and, in fact, could increase my pain. And then he walked me through my options for how to proceed. I can: 1) do nothing, 2) take painkillers and some steroid, 3) have epidural shots to control pain and inflammation, 4) have surgery.
So, he typed up his notes for a bit and I looked at the MRI image and thought about it. I started sweating and shaking again. And then I thought, basically, everything but surgery is pain management. Which is kind of like putting a Band-Aid on a broken bone. I don't want to be hooked on pain pills. I don't want to have depend on pain medication for the rest of my freaking life. I want to fix the freaking problem. So, that means surgery. And I told him that I wanted surgery.
And proceeded to hyperventilate. So, I now have an appointment on the 29th to discuss surgery with the neurosurgeon. Apparently I may be a candidate for minimally invasive surgery, which would be excellent, and would apparently just require shaving off the bulging parts. I will be up and walking by the next day and my recovery period will be: walk, rest, walk, rest, walk, rest. There's a 15% chance that my discs could herniate again. There's a chance that the surgery might not get rid of my pain. I'll never be able to lift more than 20 pounds again. But you know what, I'm okay with all of that. I've been dealing with this stupid back pain since 2005. It's time to get it fixed. (And hell, maybe if someone had taken me seriously back then, it would've never gotten this bad. Friggin' asshats.)
So. That's my plan.
In my "my head is spinning too fast to be able to think clearly" daze after the appointment, because, HOLY CRAP I'M HAVING BACK SURGERY, I bought a couple of books by an author I've recently discovered, Eloisa James. She writes historical romances, and a couple of them are revisions of fairy tales, which I love. The first one I read by her was When Beauty Tamed the Beast, which was a retelling of... Anybody? Anybody? Bueller? (Yeah, that was lame.) Anyway, you get it. But it was completely lovely. The beauty was Linnet, a stunningly beautiful young woman who has been completely ruined by a bad prawn, a frumpy dress, a flirtation with a prince, and her dead mother's reputation as a tramp. As her father and aunt are trying to fix the situation, because Linnet's really not pregnant, they find a duke, a bit obsessed with royalty, whose estranged only son is apparently... incapable... of having a family, due to an injured leg, not to mention a fiendish temper. His name is Piers and he's the beast. He's also an amazingly brilliant doctor, and fashioned a bit on the character of House. (Except he's not an addict, yet. There's a temptation to numb his pain with laudanum, but he hasn't succumbed yet.)
So, the duke, supposedly desperate to see any heir in the family, agrees to set Linnet up with his son, and takes her to the castle in Wales where Piers has set up a hospital. And sparks fly. As do tempers. It's wonderful to read Linnet and Piers going back and forth on each other, because Linnet's no dummy and can give all his venom right back to him. There's one glaring possible historical inaccuracy, but I don't even care, because it's a truly wonderful plot point that gets them alone together. The sex scenes are fabulous. The damages they both carry from their parents is fabulous.
But lemme tell ya, that's not why I love this book. Why do I love this book? Because some crazy bad scarlet fever breaks out, and Piers kicks everyone out of the house so he can tend his patients. He says some terrible things to Linnet to get her to, not just leave the castle, but to leave him. We know he loves her, he knows he loves her, he knows that she loves him, but he doesn't think he should have her -- because his father was an addict, and Piers is really, desperately afraid of becoming his father, and with his injury, the temptation is always there. So, he kicks her out, and she leaves.
Piers saves all of his patients, and is seriously regretting sending Linnet off, so he's thinking of going to London to bring her back and make all better. But he's been having these dreams about Linnet that have been nagging at him. And then suddenly, he realizes that there is a damn good chance that Linnet may have been infected with scarlet fever before he kicked her out, and then he goes searching for her. He finds her in a coma, dehydrated, covered with the sores and rash of the fever and very, very close to dead in a chicken coop. That whole description of what he does to save her, how hard it is for him to see her that way, how hard it is for him to do the things he needs to do to save her, because of his leg, is freakin' heartbreaking. I think I've read the book three times now, and I still sob like a freaking baby all throughout that part. It is so gorgeous, and sad, and just shows how desperately he loves this woman. It's wonderful, wonderful stuff.
Anyway, the point of this is that that's the book, when I was scared to death last night of my appointment, and I hurt, and I couldn't sleep, I turned to that book, specifically to that scene in that book, because watching him fight so damn hard to save her, when he can barely carry a bucket of water up the stairs by himself, is such a wonderful, beautiful thing. It's comfort.
And I love that so much about stories, that they can give you that. That they can make you cry, but you're so happy that you don't even notice that you're crying. That they can give you safe space for you to go when you need to, that you can get a bit of peace for a moment, so that you can finally get a couple of hours of sleep.
Saturday, February 4, 2012
Nothing Serious
I'm a little worn out by all the whining I've done about my past the last couple of days, so I'm steering clear of those kinds of discussions for awhile. I will just say that although my past has been problematic, although I may come off as a man-hater and a victim, I am most certainly not. At least, not anymore. I couldn't even tell you when it all changed, or how it all changed. I know that sometime after I stopped taking anti-depressant medications and stopping seeing therapists, I started reading, almost exclusively, romance novels. I branched out from Jennifer Crusie and found other authors and subgenres that I enjoyed. And I think that I was affected by those stories the same way Jennifer Crusie was when she first started reading romances -- that here were these positive stories of women working hard to find happiness. And even though I can't pinpoint exactly when it happened, suddenly reading became my therapy; stories became my medication.
And suddenly I was happy, but it was a sustained completely goofy happiness. I have been known to bunny-hop across the apartment just for giggles. The Hubby and I went to get our taxes done last night. He "fake stole" a peppermint and I wrote on him, and the chick doing our taxes stopped suggesting that we get some "dependents" so we could get a bigger refund. :)
Right now I'm reading Frederica, by Georgette Heyer, and it is so adorable. It's a Regency romance, and I have always maintained a disdainful distance from historical romances because usually they involve things so improbable as to border on ridiculous, or what the SmartBitches call the "Old Skool Romance" hero, who is generally an asshole who must be redeemed. Since we all know I how much I hate men, I am not a fan of that kind of hero. (Dripping sarcasm, by the way -- although I don't like the rapey asshole heroes, they annoy me for some reason.) Anyway, I've found a few historical romances that have been absolutely incredible. I've heard so many references to Heyer lately, that I decided to bite the bullet and try her out. Oh my god. SO cute. Take one something by Jane Austen and throw in the most hilarious and ridiculous set of accidents, and that's Frederica. The heroine is smart and funny and sharp. She thinks she's too old to be a suitable marriage partner for anyone, but wants to push her younger sister (a stunning beauty, but not a whole lot going on upstairs) into society. And the hero is this supremely bored, too rich for his own good, sardonic, sharp guy who is convinced to help, and to watch him fall under the spell of the family, to not be bored, but to try to do the right thing for everybody, and to watch him slowly realize he's in love with Frederica.. *sigh* It's just too, too wonderful. I am totally in love. And they do the things that Jenny Crusie and Lani Diane Rich determined were necessary to establish a good romance -- they work together (there's a completely hysterical scene where they just kind of improv with each other, which reminds me of It Happened One Night), they have great dialogue, and you can tell that they really care about each other, and it's so fabulous. So much squee.
Anyway, romance is fabulous. Haha.
Also, I'm going painkiller free this weekend, because the big meeting with the neurosurgeon is on Monday, and we want to have the decision based on all the facts. So, I may become extremely bitchy by tomorrow. That may be why The Hubby went out and got me peanut butter and chocolate ice cream of his own free will. Haha. That's a smart man. I'm very lucky.
Okay, I'm going to go back to my extremely happy-inducing book and to the UFC event we decided to buy.
Here is the transcript of a Three Goddess chat on romantic comedy, where they discuss everything they learned from their review of romantic comedy films on Popcorn Dialogues: http://lucymarch.com/?p=6066. It's awesome. You will learn much.
And suddenly I was happy, but it was a sustained completely goofy happiness. I have been known to bunny-hop across the apartment just for giggles. The Hubby and I went to get our taxes done last night. He "fake stole" a peppermint and I wrote on him, and the chick doing our taxes stopped suggesting that we get some "dependents" so we could get a bigger refund. :)
Right now I'm reading Frederica, by Georgette Heyer, and it is so adorable. It's a Regency romance, and I have always maintained a disdainful distance from historical romances because usually they involve things so improbable as to border on ridiculous, or what the SmartBitches call the "Old Skool Romance" hero, who is generally an asshole who must be redeemed. Since we all know I how much I hate men, I am not a fan of that kind of hero. (Dripping sarcasm, by the way -- although I don't like the rapey asshole heroes, they annoy me for some reason.) Anyway, I've found a few historical romances that have been absolutely incredible. I've heard so many references to Heyer lately, that I decided to bite the bullet and try her out. Oh my god. SO cute. Take one something by Jane Austen and throw in the most hilarious and ridiculous set of accidents, and that's Frederica. The heroine is smart and funny and sharp. She thinks she's too old to be a suitable marriage partner for anyone, but wants to push her younger sister (a stunning beauty, but not a whole lot going on upstairs) into society. And the hero is this supremely bored, too rich for his own good, sardonic, sharp guy who is convinced to help, and to watch him fall under the spell of the family, to not be bored, but to try to do the right thing for everybody, and to watch him slowly realize he's in love with Frederica.. *sigh* It's just too, too wonderful. I am totally in love. And they do the things that Jenny Crusie and Lani Diane Rich determined were necessary to establish a good romance -- they work together (there's a completely hysterical scene where they just kind of improv with each other, which reminds me of It Happened One Night), they have great dialogue, and you can tell that they really care about each other, and it's so fabulous. So much squee.
Anyway, romance is fabulous. Haha.
Also, I'm going painkiller free this weekend, because the big meeting with the neurosurgeon is on Monday, and we want to have the decision based on all the facts. So, I may become extremely bitchy by tomorrow. That may be why The Hubby went out and got me peanut butter and chocolate ice cream of his own free will. Haha. That's a smart man. I'm very lucky.
Okay, I'm going to go back to my extremely happy-inducing book and to the UFC event we decided to buy.
Here is the transcript of a Three Goddess chat on romantic comedy, where they discuss everything they learned from their review of romantic comedy films on Popcorn Dialogues: http://lucymarch.com/?p=6066. It's awesome. You will learn much.
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
A Literate Rant
I have admitted I was a pretty big snob about literature. I either read literary fiction, some kind of nonfiction (usually histories or historical biographies), or YA, where I would indulge my passion for fantasy and love stories. I mocked my mom and grandma for reading romances. Romances were dumb, I sniffed, pointing my little elitist nose up in the air.
And then something changed.
I left my first college because I was suicidal and I realized that if I stayed there, one of my attempts would probably wind up being successful. So I moved home for awhile. When I'm deep in Depression Mode, I tend to stay up all night and sleep all day. One night, I had nothing to read and I was bored, so I went down to our basement where a lot of my mom's books were kept. I dug around for awhile, looking for something that wasn't a "romance." I found Fast Women by Jennifer Crusie, with an innocuous cover with a white teacup and a red lipstick stain. It didn't look like a romance, so I read the back cover and the book sounded pretty interesting. So, I took it upstairs to read.
I devoured it. It was smart, funny, and interesting. I kept going back down to my mom's books in the basement, finding more titles by Jenny Crusie -- all of them without the cheesy bodice-ripper-looking covers that made me cringe. But every one of the stories were smart and funny, I frequently would laugh out loud reading, and they were sexy without being embarassing or corny. There were no throbbing rods, no heaving bosoms. I was hooked, so I started hunting bookstores for more of her books. At some point I realized that her books were considered romances, but I argued that they weren't "real" romances, they were romances for smart women.
One night my depression kind of exploded and I tried to kill myself. My dad took me to the hospital and I was admitted in the psych ward for the night. When I got out, my parents took me to my mom's apartment to stay, and I promptly showered and curled up with one of my favorite Crusie's, Welcome to Temptation. I started to laugh reading some of the funny dialogue, and it was so amazingly comforting to be able to go to this lovely world Crusie had created.
So eventually, I started losing my snobbery. I started reading other romances. Mostly they were paranormals and I went through a phase where I read every romantic suspense Mariah Stewart had written. I have finally dove into the historical pool and I have found some seriously awesome stuff. I started to lose my embarassment of being seen in the romance aisle of the bookstore, I have started to stop stressing if a great book has some completely ridiculous cover.
This process has been hastened by my realization that "literary fiction" is not always better written, or smarter, than romances.
Michael Ondaatje used to be one of my favorite authors. I still love The English Patient and Anil's Ghost, they are excellent stories, written in a fantastic, interesting style. However, I'm kind of over worshipping Ondaatje as a writer. A couple of years ago, I saw that he had a new book out -- Divisadero. It was about these two sisters who lived on a farm or a ranch. One of the sisters had a limp, the other sister had a sexual relationship with the young man who worked for them -- until one night, the father busts in and finds the lovers and all hell breaks loose.
That's the first section of the book. It was great stuff.
The second section started with the young man from the farm/ranch, older now, and he's doing something sketchy involving a poker game. I never really understood if he was cheating cheating or if he was counting cards or what, but he won a game and then he and his group all had to scatter for awhile. Then the sister with the limp runs into him. Then somebody wants him to play poker for them, and he refuses, and they drug him and beat the shit out of him, and the sister with the limp is trying to nurse him back to health. Then the third section starts. It starts off with the story of the other sister, who's living in France, in some guy's house, who she is studying and writing about. This sister is also sleeping with some Gypsy guy. And then the story veers off into the Gypsy guy's past, and then it may go into the story of the guy the sister is writing about. And then it ends.
And I threw the book at the wall.
I mean, seriously, what the hell?! How you end a book and not finish the freaking story? What happened to the ranch-hand guy? Did the sister with the limp ever tell her other sister about seeing the guy again? Did the sister finish her book? What. The. Hell?
Now, not all romances are perfect. Far from it. But I have never read a romance that just ditched the major characters halfway through the book. But, yet, romances get zero respect, and anything considered "literary fiction" is immediately deemed to be better than anything genre fiction -- and romances are considered the bottom of the barrel of genre fiction.
It's such a goddamned crock of shit.
There are a lot of theories about why this has happened to romance: Because romances are made by and for women, they are "less than." Because romances focus on emotions, relationships, and sex that is positive and not degrading to anyone. Because romances focus on the happiness -- the happily ever after of the couple -- when, basically, happiness is not cool, not valued.
I think it is because of these things that romances should be valued and appreciated. In a world that devalues women and in a society that sees women as varying degrees of whore, it's important to see women in healthy relationships, where female sexuality is healthy, important, and natural. It's empowering to hear women's voices. I love that.
For more on how important romances are, check out Beyond Heaving Bosoms : The Smart Bitches Guide to Romance Novels (Sarah Wendell and Candy Tan) and Everything I Know About Love I Learned from Romance Novels (Sarah Wendell), and the Smart Bitches, Trashy Books website: http://www.smartbitchestrashybooks.com/.
And then something changed.
I left my first college because I was suicidal and I realized that if I stayed there, one of my attempts would probably wind up being successful. So I moved home for awhile. When I'm deep in Depression Mode, I tend to stay up all night and sleep all day. One night, I had nothing to read and I was bored, so I went down to our basement where a lot of my mom's books were kept. I dug around for awhile, looking for something that wasn't a "romance." I found Fast Women by Jennifer Crusie, with an innocuous cover with a white teacup and a red lipstick stain. It didn't look like a romance, so I read the back cover and the book sounded pretty interesting. So, I took it upstairs to read.
I devoured it. It was smart, funny, and interesting. I kept going back down to my mom's books in the basement, finding more titles by Jenny Crusie -- all of them without the cheesy bodice-ripper-looking covers that made me cringe. But every one of the stories were smart and funny, I frequently would laugh out loud reading, and they were sexy without being embarassing or corny. There were no throbbing rods, no heaving bosoms. I was hooked, so I started hunting bookstores for more of her books. At some point I realized that her books were considered romances, but I argued that they weren't "real" romances, they were romances for smart women.
One night my depression kind of exploded and I tried to kill myself. My dad took me to the hospital and I was admitted in the psych ward for the night. When I got out, my parents took me to my mom's apartment to stay, and I promptly showered and curled up with one of my favorite Crusie's, Welcome to Temptation. I started to laugh reading some of the funny dialogue, and it was so amazingly comforting to be able to go to this lovely world Crusie had created.
So eventually, I started losing my snobbery. I started reading other romances. Mostly they were paranormals and I went through a phase where I read every romantic suspense Mariah Stewart had written. I have finally dove into the historical pool and I have found some seriously awesome stuff. I started to lose my embarassment of being seen in the romance aisle of the bookstore, I have started to stop stressing if a great book has some completely ridiculous cover.
This process has been hastened by my realization that "literary fiction" is not always better written, or smarter, than romances.
Michael Ondaatje used to be one of my favorite authors. I still love The English Patient and Anil's Ghost, they are excellent stories, written in a fantastic, interesting style. However, I'm kind of over worshipping Ondaatje as a writer. A couple of years ago, I saw that he had a new book out -- Divisadero. It was about these two sisters who lived on a farm or a ranch. One of the sisters had a limp, the other sister had a sexual relationship with the young man who worked for them -- until one night, the father busts in and finds the lovers and all hell breaks loose.
That's the first section of the book. It was great stuff.
The second section started with the young man from the farm/ranch, older now, and he's doing something sketchy involving a poker game. I never really understood if he was cheating cheating or if he was counting cards or what, but he won a game and then he and his group all had to scatter for awhile. Then the sister with the limp runs into him. Then somebody wants him to play poker for them, and he refuses, and they drug him and beat the shit out of him, and the sister with the limp is trying to nurse him back to health. Then the third section starts. It starts off with the story of the other sister, who's living in France, in some guy's house, who she is studying and writing about. This sister is also sleeping with some Gypsy guy. And then the story veers off into the Gypsy guy's past, and then it may go into the story of the guy the sister is writing about. And then it ends.
And I threw the book at the wall.
I mean, seriously, what the hell?! How you end a book and not finish the freaking story? What happened to the ranch-hand guy? Did the sister with the limp ever tell her other sister about seeing the guy again? Did the sister finish her book? What. The. Hell?
Now, not all romances are perfect. Far from it. But I have never read a romance that just ditched the major characters halfway through the book. But, yet, romances get zero respect, and anything considered "literary fiction" is immediately deemed to be better than anything genre fiction -- and romances are considered the bottom of the barrel of genre fiction.
It's such a goddamned crock of shit.
There are a lot of theories about why this has happened to romance: Because romances are made by and for women, they are "less than." Because romances focus on emotions, relationships, and sex that is positive and not degrading to anyone. Because romances focus on the happiness -- the happily ever after of the couple -- when, basically, happiness is not cool, not valued.
I think it is because of these things that romances should be valued and appreciated. In a world that devalues women and in a society that sees women as varying degrees of whore, it's important to see women in healthy relationships, where female sexuality is healthy, important, and natural. It's empowering to hear women's voices. I love that.
For more on how important romances are, check out Beyond Heaving Bosoms : The Smart Bitches Guide to Romance Novels (Sarah Wendell and Candy Tan) and Everything I Know About Love I Learned from Romance Novels (Sarah Wendell), and the Smart Bitches, Trashy Books website: http://www.smartbitchestrashybooks.com/.
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