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

Ok: let’s read on past the headline, which someone spent copious hours on, I’m sure. It’s a clusterfuck of cliche up in here, up in here.
Reviews that aren’t really reviews but instead plot summaries of dubious grammatical construction: DRINK!

Did you know that any book, regardless of it’s social status and intellectual cache, can be reduced to fascination levels previously achieved only by lukewarm yogurt? So true: just summarize the plot points badly. For example:

Jesus’ half-baked buddy gets all asshurt when he’s forced to live in a motel and write his memoirs.

Three women living in the rural South explore the many layers of life women face living in the rural South.

I think my kid killed someone.

Some guy dies in a cave.

So yeah, doing the same to romances? First, not a review. I don’t think you’ve read the books in question past the back cover copy. Poor dear, was that all you could manage?

Second, still not funny.

Third, that’s the best you got? Come on, I got half a flask left here. 

Tangent Question: which is easier to mock, NASCAR or romance? I think it may be a close tie, but both parties are going to laugh all the way to the bank so you have fun with your flaccid humor.

NASCAR and romance have a lot in common, though: dismissed by outsiders as dreck for the unintelligent, yet made up of fascinatingly brilliant people with incredible intellect and creativity.

Reference to nausea as appropriate response to happiness: DRINK!

Yes. Because happiness is, like, so lame. Too easy a target - next!

Obligatory reference to romance readers as lonely, boring women: DRINK!

Equally important depiction of romance readers as women who have many, many cats: DRINK MORE!

Required snide mention of Nora Roberts: DRINK MORE!

This one is just pure chortling gold: Author Nora Roberts is known for her grocery store check-out aisle fame, her books typically picked up by single ladies and accompanied by nine tins of cat food.

WOW. I think Nora’s got some hot marketing potential here: “Nora Roberts: Bigger Than Tic Tacs.”

(I’m going to need some Tic Tacs after all this drinking.)

SWEET DELICIOUS IRONY: this article is from the Berkeley Beacon, the newspaper of the Emerson College, where they’re “Bringing innovation to Communication and the Arts.”

Yes. Because nothing says “innovation” like being uninformed, ignorant and lame! Ms. or Mr. Kavehkar, let me know when you’re ready to bring it, because then I’ll be ready to take you seriously.

Tune in next time for another round of, How many tired cliches of romance snippery can you fit in one lame article? with your host, “Whomever thinks they’ve got a clue about romance but knows jackall about it.

I have no brand loyalty towards a specific house or imprint. Increased transparency for editors online is a good thing for readers like me because I’m more likely to learn about their tastes, and see where they align with mine. I don’t necessarily remember if something is an Avon book, but I might care that Esi Sogah edited it because I know her taste from following her on Twitter and reading what she says on the Avon editor’s blog. I’m not impressed with Macmillan’s positions on ebooks, and know that if I am looking for a book published by a Macmillan author online in digital format, I likely will have a devil of a time finding it.

The exception to the publisher house brand loyalty oblivion are small presses who’ve consistently impressed or horrified me. Most of the time, if it’s a big publishing house or an imprint of one? I couldn’t tell one from another and don’t care to, either.

I don’t have any terrible brand loyalty to Amazon, though. I don’t care where I buy my books. I care about price and whether I can get them digitally in the format I want. I am discerning about the books and the authors and the prices I pay. And I don’t buy books all that often from Amazon. I buy groceries, children supplies and electronics, but books? Hardly ever. I use a Kindle, as I said earlier, but I bought it used and rarely do I put Amazon books on it, even though buying my books from other sources means I don’t have access to the additional features like syncing across devices. I’m more likely to buy from eHarlequin or AllRomanceeBooks.com than Amazon.

I don’t think either Amazon or Macmillan is thinking about the consumer in any of their tree-pissing positioning. I understand intellectually what they’re doing, but in the end, since I look for books and authors, not publishers and stores, their showdown only strengthens my deep and bubbly apathy towards publishers and vendors.

It doesn’t change much of my shopping habits, though it prods my empathy in a big way for the authors caught in the middle of this face-off. My loyalty is to them, and to the books that they write that I love. I don’t care where they come from, and I don’t care where I buy them, so long as I can have them. Neither Amazon nor Macmillan have stirred my loyalty as a reader such that I’m going to change anything.

What about you? Do you notice which publisher published what? Do you shop at more than one bookstore? What’s most important, the author and the book, or the publisher or the store - or none of the above? 

Then there was copious onanism about iWork, particularly Pages, and this is where I got really annoyed. How is there not more integration between iBooks and the iWork suite, especially as their featured demo was a term paper in progress with illustrations and source material?

What about onboard social networks, email functionality, or notation from inside iBooks? Wouldn’t that be a key feature to intregrate with the endless onward wanking about Pages? For example: writing a report… and easily with a single gesture including both the source material and the citation using iBooks and Pages?

I realize that reading isn’t the utmost important thing for everyone else, but come on now! Productivity in all forms includes printed material. The lack of interaction demonstrated in iBook makes me hope for other reading alternatives on the iPad (DEAR GOD THE NAME). Color me underwhelmed in a big, big way.

I am planning to order one, as I’m very curious about iBook, and about whether or not I’ll be able to use Stanza on it. Stanza on the iPhone is a hot sexy revelation.

With the iPad, my biggest concern is will my retinas hate me if I read on it. I love the Stanza features while reading, especially the email and Twitter integration, but the eyestrain I get from focusing on such a tiny screen is so painful it’s unreal.

Reading on the iPad may be awesome and comfy, despite the backlighting.

IF I’m able to use Stanza. iBook didn’t wow me out of the box, (Heh heh. Box.) and I hope I have options. However, as Jane pointed out in conversation on Twitter, alternative video or music or app stores are not on the iPhone. I hope this doesn’t mean I have to hack my iPad to use Stanza. And tape it together. Using wings.

Finally, one last thought about the iPad: someone, anyone, ask a woman before you name a device. Please.

You can watch the presentation online already:

The reader spends way too much time in Warrick’s head, and it doesn’t make for much heroism when he has loving thoughts like the following:

“Leonard Butkiss had a face only a mother could love. Wide eyes, large ears, and a slightly crooked nose. Warrick didn’t know anything about the guy, but Tangela deserved to be with someone strong and athletic and rich. Like him.”

Superficial much?

How do I reconcile that lovely bit of arrogance with the man who keeps thinking in bewilderment that Tangela was beautiful before she lost all the weight, and she was fine the way she was? And while I’m on the subject of Tangela’s weight loss, here’s her recounting of the change as she gets all ticked off that People magazine dared intimate that she had an eating addiction:

She was fit and fabulous whether she was a size eighteen or a size ten. Just because the editorial staff didn’t believe her didn’t mean it wasn’t true. She’d lost the weight without even trying. Having been to Guadalajara numerous times, she’d felt comfortable walking from her host family’s house to the institute where she taught English classes and studied Spanish.

Her host mother, Ima, was weight-conscious and took great pride in preparing tasty, low-calorie meals for the family. Three weeks after arriving in Mexico, Tangela had lost twelve pounds. Six months later, she was down to a size fourteen and by the end of the year, she was at the lowest weight she’d ever been.

This is a real pet peeve of mine in fictional universes. What the fuck planet do people live on where the weight “just falls off?” Unless we’re talking medical problems, twelve pounds in three weeks?! Come on now, and I mean it. It can be alarmingly easy to gain weight, but for that same person, trying to lose it can be so very very difficult. I don’t admire a heroine who blithely ruminates that the weight just disappeared while she wasn’t looking. I want to smack her with something containing a lot of mass. Like a recliner. What’s the problem, is being overweight some kind of moral failing that can’t be overcome with studious and deliberate weight loss? It has to magically happen, like she was never overweight to begin with? Goddammit, that blithe Magically Thin “Oops! I did it and have no idea how!” weight loss trope bugs the shit out of me.

Anyway, back to the book: MY GOD IS THERE A LOT OF RUMINATION going on. I’m amazed Tangela and Warrick didn’t walk into things while being wrapped in reverie. Every time there’s a bit of backstory needed, one of the protagonists starts reflecting:

Staring at Tangela, Warrick reflected on their seven-year relationship.

That’s a long relationship. He’ll be staring at her for awhile.

Then there’s the dialogue and the incredibly bizarre descriptions:

“After using the washroom, he wandered into the lounge and sat down. The inviting decor, padded leather booths and lively music created a relaxing atmosphere. Pressing his BlackBerry handheld to his ear, he listened to his messages. Making a mental note to return the calls later, Warrick slid the phone into his pocket and stared up at one of the flat-screen TVs.

He checked the score of the Mariners game, relieved to see his team was beating the Yankees. An American Airlines commercial came on and he thought of Tangela. He wondered if she was out with her friends. On the weekend, she liked to go with her coworkers to the Karaoke Hut for cocktails. Singing off-key and encouraging others to do the same was something he couldn’t get behind, but Tangela always seemed to enjoy herself.”

Currently I am sitting in my nondescript desk chair typing on my QWERTY keyboard into Microsoft Windows, and I’m hitting the capslock key to type, HEY! YOU!! WAKE UP!!!11!!!

What’s puzzling, on top of that passage above, is that later he has a different handheld. Warrick gets all ticked off because Tangela has his sport coat. She doesn’t understand why he’s chasing her down for it when he has several others:

“I’m sure you could live without it for a few more days.”

“You’re right, I could - if my iPhone handheld wasn’t in the breast pocket.”

iPhone handheld? BlackBerry handheld? Really? Who says that?

Finally, what drove me over the edge was the repeated habit of so much telling and not enough showing. Not NEARLY enough showing. And, in addition, the telling was so inconsistent I couldn’t trust the point of view of either protagonists. For example, Warrick looks at Tangela in a restaurant:

“Everyone inside the restaurant was dressed in their Sunday best, but Tangela had glammed it up as though she was going to a movie premiere. The yellow pantsuit matched her bright disposition and she was wearing her hair the way he liked, up off her shoulders, gathered in an elegant French roll with slim curls grazing her ears. The sexy flight attendant lived life beautifully and looked damn good doing it.”

The man thinks in cover copy!

Watching Tangela fiddle with her necklace, he realized he’d never really appreciated what she’d meant to him. She’d always been a prize, but now she had the three Bs-beauty, brains and brilliance.

So now that she’s lost weight, she’s even better? I thought he was dumbfounded and sad that she’d felt the need to change herself so much. That’s what he said in the first chapter when he reflected on it for awhile.

The major elements of the story drew me to this book immediately. A heroine who is so changed, having lost so much weight, that she appears on the cover of People’s annual weight loss issue, and thus brings her ex-boyfriend back into her life? Second chance stories? With makeover elements? I’m down with that.

But I can’t figure out how these people maintained a relationship for seven years because they just don’t talk to one another. They’re reflecting and wandering around in the midst of a reverie instead. They misunderstood each other repeatedly, and even seeing both sides of their backstories from their respective points of view didn’t endear me to either of them. Warrick never recovers even halfway into the book from being shallow, conceited, superficial and inconsistent in his ruminations on Tangela’s hotness. Tangela is either terribly selfish and cruel: she left Warrick because he didn’t have enough time for her… while he was taking over the family business for his father after a massive health crisis, and while his father was still in the hospital. At the time of their breakup, I suspect both parties were in desperate need of some growing up. They both need more time in the crock pot of life experience, but I don’t have the patience to endure reading any more of their reflections.

Love on the Rocks is available from Amazon.com, Book Depository,Powell’s, and eHarlequin.com.