Smart Bitches Trashy Books | All of the romance, none of the bullshit.

Great tits cope well with warming.

To which I say: Tits, schmits--won’t somebody think of the boobies?

(Many thanks to my friend HaikuKatie--my favorite source of anything tit-related--for sending me the link.)

There are few people more informed than the people who read this site (hi, folks) so I want to ask you who are better informed than I am about Myanmar/Burma and that region in the world. Currently, news reports list at least 22,000 people as casualties of Cyclone Nargis. According to Reuters reports, international relief and aid is somewhat compromised because those requesting a visa to enter the country for relief purposes are not being granted entrance by the military junta in Burma. One report from the Times Online estimates that the government totals released from Burma could be very low, and a more accurate casualty count could reach double the presently published number:

The latest official death toll was 22,500, according to Burmese state media. But even after three days there has been no comprehensive survey. Assuming that there are many casualties to be revealed, and that a significant proportion of the 41,000 listed as “missing” are dead, the final toll will be much higher.

“We’re looking at 50,000 dead and millions of homeless,” Andrew Kirkwood, country director of the British charity Save The Children told The Times. “I’d characterise it as unprecedented in the history of Burma and on an order of magnitude with the effect of the tsunami on individual countries. There might well be more dead than the tsunami caused in Sri Lanka.”

So, what to do, where to go, how to help? Any suggestions?

According to the Wikipedia article, very few organizations have operations already located within Burma, and those that do are accepting donations to help relief efforts. But I’m curious if anyone reading has suggestions or knowledge that might give me and other readers an indication which organizations can offer the most direct aid.

Below the fold are links to the organizations highlighted within the Wiki article that offer online donations earmarked for the Burma relief effort and who indicate that they are already within the country, if you are interested for more information.

I’d been thinking about interracial romance over the weekend, while I was trying to draft a section for The Book (OMG The Whole Genre?!) {that’s a working title, obviously} that examined minorities in RomanceLandia. What a verdant, green - or white, perhaps - pasture of peaceful writing that was. Not a landmine in sight for my clodding feet to trip on. No, no. *head desk* So when a friend of mine forwarded me a news article that Mildred Loving, the Black woman whose marriage to a white man overturned laws against interracial marriage died today at the age of 68, I had to think how different the world is in 2008 vs. 1958. Before I move on - our condolences to her family. I always thought it was unspeakably awesome that the name of the court case that declared laws restricting marriage on basis of race unconstitutional was called “Loving v. Virginia.”

Since I count among my neighbors several interracial couples and families, I have been spoiled with an experience that indicates interracial marriage as something that’s somewhat common. As the friend who forwarded me the article said to me over email, I’m nuts if I think that’s the rule across the US. It’s certainly not the case in romance - interracial couples in romance novels are still somewhat rare, though there are more of them of late. One writer of bestselling awesomeness told me recently that many romance writers, including herself, would love to write a romance that crosses racial lines - but those books are difficult to get into publication from established print romance publishers. In the e-format, there’s a more vigorous supply, but then, the “e” in romance is the one area that does tend to push the boundaries of the genre a little bit harder, giving the “nudge nudge” a more diverse meaning. Samhain has an entire section of interracial titles, featuring white heroes and Black heroines, and vice versa—and hero/hero, as well, so clearly someone or many someones are shopping for interracial romance specifically. 

From Thursday Bram comes this absolutely gobsmacking-badass article about how everything you need to know about strong copywriting comes from ... wait for it… romance novels. It’s not about the sex; it’s about the pain, and overcoming it.

From SonomaLass comes this tale of stacked love: are you a Welsh single in Swansea? Then head to the library’s single’s evening to meet literary like-minded people, and judge them by what they’re browsing. I have to say, I wouldn’t wear a badge to announce I’m single and browsing for books and booty, but then, I’m squidgy about branding myself like that.

And finally: Erotica authors, take note: Ahoy! Thar be plot inspiration, mateys! Dan Filler from the Faculty Lounge blog emailed me about his review of a new nonfiction book by Charla Muller called 365 Nights of Intimacy, a memoir of her experience giving her husband 365 consecutive nights of sex for his 40th birthday.

Via Sandra Schwab via email, and the Professors Brilliant at Teach Me Tonight, everybody book your trips to Chicago to go curtsy gracefully to University of Chicago student Elizabeth Litchfield, who won the 2008 T. Kimball Brooker Prize for Undergraduate Book Collecting.

Her entry, A Library of Love: Challenging the social order one couple (or threesome?) at a time, won her not only a monetary prize, but also a special display of eight romances, once of which is Schwab’s The Lily Brand. In the comments on her blog, Litchfield writes,

I really enjoyed The Lily Brand and thought it stood out from the crowd in a lot of respects. I also like that people really hassle me about the cover, but when I get them to read the book they invariably are impressed and enjoy themselves as well. That little surprise and undermining of expectations is one of my favorite parts of pushing romances on unsuspecting doubters.

Well played, Ms. Litchfield, well played. Congratulations!