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

It actually starts off quite well, with a rather lively writing style. At her father’s deathbed, Sarah Hamilton, our republican heroine (if I had a shot of alcohol every time the word “republican” was used in this book, I’d be dead from anaphylactic shock before page 90) promises to go to England to seek her uncle, the Earl of Westbrooke. Due to a series of unfortunate events, however, she loses her luggage and much of her money. On the eve of her arrival at the Westbrooke estate, she finds herself stuck at an inn and mistaken for a prostitute. She’s promptly hustled into a bedroom that she erroneously assumes is hers, where she undresses (no nightrail because of her lost luggage, so isn’t that terribly convenient?) and promptly falls asleep.

James Runyon, Duke of Alvord, like Galahad of old, is the flower of British manhood: pure and clean and virtuous. Also naked, but unlike the title suggests, he doesn’t spend much of his time in the book in the altogether. However, like many romance novel heroes, he suffers from hypertrophic penile dysfunction once he takes a gander at the beautimous, completely bare republican snoozing in his bed, and the condition persists for much of the book.* (Hey, have I mentioned how often Sarah is called a republican in this book? I have? The repetition is tiresome, isn’t it? I mean, I’ve made my point, why belabor it, right? Don’t you want me to shut up about this already? GOOD. This gives you an idea of how annoying this book becomes as it progresses.)

So where was I before the Spring Snark Attack dragged the last paragraph under? Oh yes, James. He sees a naked, pretty lady in his bed and tries to rouse her because really, he’s not into prostitutes, though he appreciates his best friend Robbie’s efforts to help him get laid. However, Sarah is so exhausted she doesn’t even so much as twitch, the poor lambie. So our Duke of Much Bareassedness, being pretty tired himself, hops into bed next to her, but like a true gentleman, doesn’t ravish her in her sleep despite his manfully turgid state.

Oh, the massive brouhaha when they wake up in the morning with the nekkidness and the virginal trembling and the outrage and the pillow tossing and the misunderstandings and mm-hey the glavin. (By the way, unlike tossing a salad, I don’t think there’s a prurient definition attached to tossing pillows—yet. Please feel free to suggest definitions in the comments. I’d love to come home tonight and huskily tell my husband to “toss my pillows, bitch.")

Once everything is sorted out and everyone and his (clothed) uncle come to check what the ruckus is about, James finds out the woman is not a dirrrty hoooor. She is, in fact, his best friend Robbie’s American (no, wait, republican) cousin. And Sarah is horrified to find out that her uncle died a year before. The man responsible for mistaking her for a prostitute and getting her in this mess in the first place is now her closest relative.

James, personally, is delighted at the turn of events because he has this BATSHIT FUCKING INSANE cousin who’s been trying to kill him, and he wants to get married and pop out sons as fast as possible. Sarah is beautiful, she’s his best friend’s cousin, she smells real purty, and he has very publicly ruined her, so hey, why not?

Sarah isn’t so thrilled and flatly refuses to marry James. She doesn’t want to marry a rake. But specifically, Sarah equates bad marriages and profligacy with the English ton and loving, happy marriages with being American. This borderline xenophobic fear of the English and her veneration of Americans as the models for all marital virtues makes me wonder what version of America she lived in. I mean, wasn’t there an extremely public scandal involving a certain Founding Father boinking someone else’s wife, then being forced into confessing it publicly? And I also seem to remember reading about another Founding Father facing widespread allegations of having a taste for the badonka-donk when he was serving his first term as president.

Anyway, this “no rakes for me” nonsense started to grate on me. He’s nice to her, he’s handsome, he kisses well, he smells good, he’s beyond patient with her, he treats her like a queen, and she keeps on assuming he’s a master cockmongerer without actually telling him her actual fears. And that’s another problem with the book: I have no freaking clue how or why these two fall in love since they don’t spend a lot of time alone with each other, and when they do, they don’t talk very much. James usually latches onto her ta-tas, which of course causes her knees to weaken, and hey presto, they’re making out like horny little weasels. When they do talk, the book is almost schizophrenic in tone. For instance, James can’t bear to say the word “whore” in front of Sarah, yet earlier in the book they engage in an excruciatingly detailed conversation about prostitution without so much as twitching an eyebrow. And of course clamping onto her nipples like a drowning man grabbing at a straw is perfectly acceptable. Seeing the two of them interact more often than not made me go “What the fuck?”

There’s a suspense side-plot of sorts involving Richard Runyon, James’s cousin and next in line to inherit the title. Richard wants to be the duke, and he’ll stoop at nothing to get it. And make no mistake, he could not be more villainous short of planting a giant red neon sign on his head that says “PSYCHOTIC VILLAIN HERE” with a blinky arrow that points down, and maybe cueing Darth Vader’s theme every time he walks onto a scene. Allow me to bust out a little bulleted list.

• He’s bisexual, and as y’all know, all you need to do to make a romance novel villain Super Evil++ is to have him be a Connoisseur of Cock.
• He rapes women.
• He kills with little to no provocation.
• He’s sadistic.
• This one is actually pretty funny: When Richard is enraged, he starts breaking shit. Throughout the book, he tosses and flings aside glasses, dishes, cream pots and teapots with great zest and abandon. No wonder he wants to succeed to the title and fortune so badly; replacing all the china and breakable tchotchkes he’s thrown about in a blind rage—and he’s in a blind rage A LOT—has to cost a mint.

Worst of all, the author never really bothers explaining why Richard is so insane. No, wait, actually she kind of does. It’s spoiler-ish, though, so you know what to do. Brace yourself, it’s a really, really stupid reason. Apparently Richard’s this way because his dad spanked him when he was four years old for being mean to James. No, I’m not kidding. I wish I was. That’s all the motivation the reader is provided for Richard’s batshittiness. GAAAH.

The book also contains a very amateurish mistake near the end of the book, but this isn’t just the author’s fault because the editors should’ve caught it, too. One moment James and Sarah are engaged and the announcement is in the papers (causing Richard fly into a passion and fling yet another piece of china at his hapless lover’s head), the next moment they’re getting married and nobody in the book has any idea they were engaged in the first place. Not only that, but an event that took place over 100 pages before and several weeks ago is also referenced as having taken place just the previous night. Whoever the copy editor is for this book, she needs to be deprived of cookies until she learns to do her job properly. Bad copy editor, no sweeties for you! *slaps wrist*

Despite the multitude of problems—a plot that doesn’t make much sense, the silliest villain I’ve ever encountered, a heroine who’s an annoying prig, a hero who’s nice enough but is pretty much unremarkable, and for the bonus round, a big honkin’ continuity mistake—the book was surprisingly readable. The tone swings wildly from Regency England ("making micefeet of things") to twentieth-century American (”Okay, sweetheart"), but given the other problems, this actually didn’t bother me too much. There were spots though, such as the very beginning of the book, that had a pleasant liveliness to it, and those few spots were what saved this book from the Dreaded F.

*A side note: Romance novel heroes really need to learn to masturbate instead of walking around with a persistent hard-on all through the book. Really, it’s not that hard. *pause, snicker* OK, it IS hard, but if you take matters in your own hands and give the matters a little rub-a-dub-dub, it takes care of things quite nicely and the hardness subsides. See? Congratulations, you’re now a 28-year-old who has finally learned to master his domain, something most males figure out by the time they’re 13.

Candy: 1. Right now, Rupert Carsington of Mr. Impossible is very, very high on the list. Besides his ability to defenestrate pesky villains with great dispatch and efficiency, he’s funny and he likes smart women. And Philip Brooks of Lightning that Lingers. He’s a biologist! Who rehabilitates baby owls! And he’s hot enough to be a stripper! And he likes bookish women! Eeee!

Sarah: 1. See this is a tough question (and I wrote it, darn it) because my favorite heros are the ones who slowly but surely fight how they feel, and a one-night stand wouldn’t do much for my impression of their hotness. Among my favorite fighting-their-feelings heroes are Anthony Bridgerton from Julia Quinn’s Bridgerton family, and Jason Fielding from Once and Always and Zach Benedict from Perfect by Judith McNaught. Especially that last one - rwow. I’m going to have to go stare at my “keeper” shelf to make sure there aren’t any heros I’ve forgotten.

And I am so embarrassed to admit this, because you are going to laugh out loud, but Magnus Erikson from Sandra Hill’s A Very Virile Viking. He’s got 11 kids, but half of them he knows couldn’t be his though he takes care of them anyway, and when they all get pushed forward in time, they have a “family meeting” to discuss what everyone thinks and what they want to do. I love Magnus.

Ok, stop laughing.

Candy: 2. Very probably Justin Vallerand of Only With Your Love. He’s an asshole, but he’s friggin’ HOT, so some torrid action while stuck in an elevator would be the perfect amount of time to spend with someone like him.

Heroine--I’ll have to say Anne Verlaine of To Love and To Cherish. I liked her so much as a character that I felt just a bit wistful that she wasn’t real.

Sarah: 2. Trapped in an elevator? Oh my. Cal from Bet Me, no question. And as for heroine, I’d want to be stuck in an elevator with Daphne from Julia Quinn’s The Duke and I. She was one of those heroines that I just loved reading about. She could stand up to all her brothers, so she could stand up to anyone.

Candy: 3. Patricia Gaffney, because we corresponded very briefly a few years ago, and she seems incredibly smart and incredibly nice. Plus I dig her books. And Jennifer Crusie, because I think it’d be fun to snark and dish with her.

Sarah: 3. Julia Quinn. I am kissing up to Quinn in this meme and it’s weird, but I once wrote her about a discrepancy in her first novel - and her reply was so nice that I would love to have her over for an afternoon.

Candy: 4. It would definitely be a contemporary comedy. My job would be cooler; I’d like to be a vet, please. My two cats would get to be animal sidekicks, the way Crusie’s pets do. Cussing and fart jokes and references to Monty Python would be a plus. Oh, and LOTS of pratfalls.

True story: coming back from the grocery store with the Very Tall Husband a few years ago, I saw a big old stick lying across the sidewalk, several feet in front of me. I told myself, “Self, watch out for that stick. I know you, and if you’re not careful, you’re going to trip your stupid-ass self and rip up your knees AGAIN. So step over the stick, not on it or under it.” And what did I do? I tripped myself on the goddamn stick so badly that I literally went flying for a couple of feet, landing face-down and with the bread and vegetables in my bag careening merrily into the street. Knees: ripped. Palms of hands: scraped. Dignity: What? I know not this word.

Luckily the VTH was the one carrying the eggs. To this day I make the VTH carry the bag with the eggs and anything else breakable.

Sadly, this isn’t even the most spectacular pratfall I’ve made to date. There was the time I was running down a sand dune in Florence (Oregon, not Italy), tripped, literally landed on my head, and cartwheeled all the way down the dune in classic head-ass-head-ass form, a distance of about 20 feet. The judges would’ve given me a 9.8 if I had only stuck the landing.

Sarah: 4. I am such a dork, but I bet it would be a paranormal comedy. Not that I’m all psychically gifted, but a story about me would be best augmented and magnified for fiction if I had some kind of cool-moe-dee power, and if not me, then certainly the dog or one of the cats.

And if not a paranormal, then definitely an historical, with me as a snarky bluestocking heiress long on the shelf because all the guys are scared of my wicked sharp brain. And along comes Lord Hubby of Cutenesshire, sdazzling with this smartness and hotness, who tells me to get over myself. And we live happily ever after.

Candy: 5. I have a hard time with questions like these because I usually can’t picture anyone in their roles other than the people I’ve made up in my head. But Eric Bana is a decent physical fit for what I picture Rupert Carsington in Mr. Impossible to look like. Whether he can pull off the character would be another question. Kate Winslet would fit Daphne, the heroine, quite well, and the characters she’s played previously are a pretty good fit for Daphne’s personality.

Sarah: 5. I was wondering the other day why more Crusie’s aren’t turned into good movies. But if I had to cast “Bet Me,” which is right now my fave of the Crusies, I’d put someone debonair and smooth-looking as Cal, like Rupert Everett, or, in a stretch, Johnny Depp (all that intelligence clearly going on in the brain there). And as Min, Kate Winslet was who I saw when I read the book originally, and even though Winslet is always held up as the “real woman sized actress,” I think Min might be bigger and shaplier than she is. Maybe Kate Dillon.

The challenge, I think, with a contemporary is that the author has to write a book set in a time that is close to, or related to, the reader’s reality. I’m supposed to believe, as the reader, that all this mess is happening right now. I’m not expecting the greatest history lesson ever told, and I’m not expecting to learn the inner workings of x-ray machines if the heroine is a medical technician, or the finer points of pool if the hero is a shark, but I do expect a reality I can believe in, even if the story takes place in a state or country I’ve never visited.

Crazy for You is the story of Quinn and Nick, residents of the small town of Tibbett, and long-time best friends. Right away, I’ll just tell you, I am a sucker for best-friends-who-fall-in-love books. Quinn is dating Bill, a tall blonde man who pretty much steers Quinn’s life for her, until Quinn adopts a little dog named Katie who inspires Quinn to stop letting life happen to her, and to start living her life deliberately and with a good deal of daring.

The idea of switching from the role of passive passenger to active driver in one’s life applies to just about every character in the novel, as Quinn’s decision to break up with her “beige boyfriend” and move out of their “beige apartment” first horrifies, then inspires everyone in her life, from her parents to her friends. Quinn lived a good portion of her life as “the good one,” “the fixer,” “the peacemaker,” “the quiet one,” “the dependable one,” existing in the shadow of her sister Zoe, a wild-at-heart adventuresome woman who has settled into wedded bliss after a short and disastrous marriage to Nick twenty years prior.

Nick harbors a secret, ardent desire for Quinn, but being her friend and her ex-brother-in-law is enough to cause him to keep his hands to himself, not to mention her relationships with good, stable Bill, the high school championship-winning coach.

Quinn’s breakup with Bill and decision to live boldly on her own cause shock waves of reaction in all directions, most notably that she becomes aware of Nick’s feelings for her, and watching her wear him down is the most electrically charged reading I’ve enjoyed in awhile.

Let me address the negative points of this book first, because the positives tip the scale towards a much more favorable rating, though the negatives do have to be addressed. First, and how to say this without giving away too much? The nature of Bill’s continued involvement was obvious to me from the very start, and perhaps that was intentional. Perhaps I was supposed to observe his behavior and treatment of Quinn and root for her to get away from him as soon as possible. But Crusie’s efforts in the vilification of Bill seemed to turn rapidly from the subtle to the glaringly, horribly obvious. I won’t give away too much, as I said, but I’ve complained about this before as a technique for evilization, and I will tell you, he ain’t gay.

Further, this is a thin book for a Crusie novel, and what’s missing is the development of the secondary characters to the point where you care about them. In Crazy for You, there was so little backstory and introduction of the secondary set of characters, particularly the women, that I had a really hard time keeping them all straight. I thought for half the book that one of them was the heroine’s second sister, and couldn’t figure out why Quinn never mentioned her when she spoke on the phone to Zoe. One of the valuable and enjoyable aspects of a good Crusie story is that the secondary characters, and the parallel love story that compliments that of the hero and heroine, are clever, interesting people that you care about. You like the hero and heroine better because you like their friends. In this novel, the interaction between Quinn and her friends seemed to assume that I knew them already, when really, I didn’t.

For example, the secondary romance between Nick’s brother Max and his wife was fraught with big misunderstandings and a lot of drastic hair cuts and slammed bedroom doors. It was meant to compliment Quinn’s transformation from passive to active participant in her life, and in some respects watching an existing marriage re-energize itself, though sometimes through some hurtful and passive-aggressive measures, applied the idea of taking charge of one’s life to more than just the young, single heroine types. But after awhile, the slamming of doors and the “you’re not getting any and I’m not telling you why,” got real old.

The final element that really pissed my switch off is a spoiler so you know what to do. I’ll come right out and say it here, Bill turns into a stalker. First he refuses to accept that Quinn has moved out, and continues to try to bulldoze her back into his life and into “their apartment.” Then his behavior grows rapidly bizarre. He breaks shutters on her new house so he can watch her, he abuses her dog because she growls at him when he breaks into her home, he copies a spare key he finds in the house and lets himself in to lie in her bed and steal her clothes, he sabotages her house to the point of causing serious and potentially lethal damage, and in the climax of his bizarreness, he breaks into her house again to move in with her uninvited.

By far my biggest problem: a shady reference to Bill going to jail for “years and years.” Horse. Fucking. Pucky. Stalkers to not go to jail for years and years. Celebrities with documented cases of weird people trying to break in to marry them in the middle of the night can’t prosecute their stalkers successfully, so why would a small town coach be convicted and sent to jail for years and years? Stalking is not punished to nearly the degree that it should be, and to make an exception for a happily ever after yanked me right out of the fantasy and pissed me off.

But now, the good parts, and oh, were there good parts. Candy challenged me to explain why I love a hero that resists, a big lug of a man who tries desperately to fight how he feels for the heroine, trying to convince himself that he’s happier without her, that getting involved will just break his little world in to messy, hard-to-clean pieces. The reason I love this particular type of romance is simple: I met my husband in high school, and for over two years we were great friends while he fought how he felt for me, until he gave up and we became a couple.

He told me later that he knew when we met senior year of high school that I’d “make a lousy girlfriend” but I’d “be a great wife.” This is from a 17-year-old - but you understand that it pissed me off until he explained: if he got involved with me, it would be permanent, and serious, and at 17 he didn’t want that. He wasn’t sure he ever wanted that serious a relationship. But after years of being friends and years of fighting how he felt, he gave in and now he enjoys our romance as hard as he fought it originally. We’ll be married five years in May.

Reading about heroes that are friends with the heroine, while trying desperately to avoid and deny their growing feelings for her, is the best kind of romance for me. Crusie’s development of Nick and Quinn’s romance, well, to quote Candy, when Crusie does it well, I feel it all the way to my tippy toes, and gosh I was blushing on the train I was so happy to watch these two come together. He fought and rationalized and tried to talk himself away from her, and then he made a move on her, she realized how he felt, noticed him in a whole new light, and slowly wore him down until he…well, I can’t spoil that part for you, now can I?

The villain might have been clumsily done at times, but the pure passion and tingly wonderfulness that was Nick and Quinn’s romance made this book a serious treat for me, and I had to stop myself from finishing the book too fast.

As I mentioned when I started, my expectations of a contemporary, particularly a Crusie, are pretty high, and I tolerate a lot less mishigas with the plot and the characters when the novel takes place close to the present time. While the antagonist and the resolution of the elements working against the couple weren’t ideal, the romance more than made up for it.

I just read back over this review and realize I spent more time writing about what the problems were than about what Crusie does right. “The romance is great, trust me” doesn’t seem like enough of a recommendation, but please, do trust me. The emotional depths and internal wrangling from the hero, the heroine’s slow realization that her friend is more to her than she thought – oh, it is just breathtaking, and there’s no one quote that can illustrate it. Small moments and passing thoughts on both sides add up to a marvelous emotional climax as well as a sexual one.

I’ve had to change my rubric: If I’m sorry that I have to send it back because I won’t be able to reread and visit with the characters again, it’s damn good.