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

“I picture the author trying to come up with a masterful adverb or a devastating adjective, and unwittingly using the standby seen in hundreds of other works, even as the author tries to deviate from the pack.”

Perhaps this is one of the reasons that “good” purple prose is a thing of the past? When the authors I think Rebecca was referring to used it, it was new and lush and exciting. Now, it’s trite and overdone, almost like authors depend far too much on the romances of old that they grew up with, and the phrases found therein.

I’ve only ever read one Bertrice Small book and while it certainly was titilating it was also......unique - yea that’s a good word, unique.  I was very laughingly titilated while reading it.

Well, there goes everything I was gonna guest-bitch about. Damn.

Can you see me jumping up and down and shrieking “Yes! Yes!” a la Paula Abdul? No? Good, because it was embarassing enough that all of America saw her do it!

Sarah - I’ll just mix things up a bit and call it “aubergine”—they’ll never notice…

Meljean: I think there’s a qualitative difference between the descriptive prose people like Dickens, Melville and Mitchell indulge in, if not necessarily a quantitative difference, compared to, say, Kathleen Woodiwiss or Bertrice Small. Although, hmmmm, Melville DID devote paragraph upon paragraph on the joys of squeezing the fragrant, slippery sperm with his fellow sailors.... (No, I’m not kidding--those of you who haven’t read Moby Dick should totally check out that scene, and those of you who have should totally re-read it so you can enjoy the finest homoeroticism American literature had to offer until Walt Whitman showed on the scene with his twenty-eight nekkid and frolicsome young men.)

And Beth: I don’t think we’ve even begun to mine the embarrassment of riches Foley offers.

Oh, oh, definitely a qualitative difference. I do find it interesting that the example used in the RTB column was from Melville instead of Woodiwiss—I really didn’t consider that purple prose in any way, so it was an odd example to see. If I had seen an evocative, lovely scene from Woodiwiss or another purply _romance_ author, it would have made more sense to me.

I guess what I meant was that the cliche aspect of it...I wonder if the over-the-top purple prose that is being called “good” is partly just a nostalgic look back on phrases and ways of talking that seemed new?

I have read authors who are descriptive and evocative and lyrical without going into purple territory—which is, to me, a cliche/overwrought way of writing.

So “good” purple prose seems odd to me; I realize that Rebecca is saying that the term is just getting a bum rap—but I also wonder if the defense of it goes back to a reader’s discovery of the genre, and a yearning for those days when certain phrases weren’t overdone, before they became cliche.

To me, evocative, lyrical prose excites me because of that feeling of newness—something is described in a way that I’ve never felt before (and I think you mentioned something like this as well in the RTB comments? Sorry if I’m retreading) It’s saying, “wow, I’ve never thought of this/seen it put this way before”.

And since many readers of romance discovered the genre through Woodiwiss or another purply author from the 70’s/early 80’s, I wonder if the yearning for the purple or appreciation of it is more of a desire to recall that “new to the genre” feeling, to recapture the sense of discovery. A sense of “new” that is not wholly different from the discovery of a really beautiful, lyrical passage (like you’d find in Melville).

Sigh. Not sure I’m making any sense :)

I’m with Angie.  Except I need to hold my boobs while I jump up and down. *g*

While I don’t think there’s any need to rehabilitate the term purple prose, I do think that writing is sometimes cut way back, to the point that I find it impossible to get into the story.  Lots is happening and I don’t care. 

In today’s books, I find this underwriting much more common than purple prose, though pp has the definite advantage of being easier to laugh at.  Apart from Beatrice Small (I think I read a chapter of hers once), are you finding much purple prose being written now?

Jorie: Like HelenKay, I can’t think of a single book I’ve read recently (much less a romance novel) that suffered from under-writing. D’you have any specific examples? Because I’d be interested in checking it out. It very well may be that my tolerance for under-writing (like my tolerance for eating foods featuring odd pork by-products) is unusually high.

Purple prose is definitely a lot less common nowadays; it’s fallen out of vogue.

And Meljean: I hear you about the novelty aspect of old-skool romances back when they were first read, but it seems like they bear a resemblance to eighteenth/nineteenth-century Gothics romances, only with more sex. And my issue with Woodiwiss et al lies every bit as much with how they can’t leave a damn noun or verb alone as with the recycling of cliches. When almost every word is modified to within an inch of its life, and these modifiers are more often than not hyperbolic or superlatives, my brain feels tired and numb--it’s as if somebody was constantly yelling and crying rightinmyear, you know what I mean?

My Captcha word is cent51, and I find that really funny. This isn’t just my two cents--I’m a long winded bitch! Have 51 of them, fools!

Is there over-the-top writing that sucks you in?

Not full-on over-the-top, if that makes any sense.  At least, I can’t think of any.  Now Linda Howard’s prose isn’t what I think of as over-the-top but her characterization can be and it sometimes sucks me in.  Shades of Twilight was one book I should have hated, but didn’t, say.

Or Jacqueline Carey’s prose is lush (though not over-the-top, I guess) but she keeps the emotions tightly reined to counter that.  (Not that I actually finished Kushiel’s Dart but I did love that opening third.)

Perhaps purple prose has been somewhat replaced by explorations of physical and emotional development in the characters, with some watercolor fragility on the part of the characters, instead of constant displays of manly virile strength on the part of the hero- and on the part of the writer’s use of adverbs and adjectives

Interesting and I think you’re onto something.  (Although I totally missed reading romance in most of the 80’s and 90’s so I don’t have much historical perspective.)

Jorie: Like HelenKay, I can’t think of a single book I’ve read recently (much less a romance novel) that suffered from under-writing. D’you have any specific examples?

Well, ymmv and all that, but I find it most common in series books and chicklit.  Though the latter’s breezy style is obviously popular.  To give an example, Wendy Markham’s Slightly Settled was a book I could have enjoyed if the writing didn’t feel so, er, slight.  I know I set aside James Patterson because it felt underwritten (to me!)

Now I may be conflating underwritten and lighter fare, or underwriting with lack of emotional depth.

I also find that some romantic suspense endings--especially in category, perhaps because of the shorter page count--are slight and underwritten, as if the meat of the story has gone into the middle and the author is either not comfortable or not as interested in the suspense wind-up.  But because I’m targetting RS (sorta), I’m not comfortable throwing up names.  You can certainly email me although I don’t think you read a lot of category romances, from what I’ve seen.

Anyway, I may well be overstating my case, but when I set books down it’s usually because I’m not engaged and underwriting does come into play there--as well as poor characterization, clichés, and plain lack of interest.

Candy:  Please, please let me post the comment about the angel wing eyebrows on my live journal.  My f-list will get a kick out of that one and surely run with it.  I just get this weird picture of a woman with a monstrous nervous tic in her forehead that makes her eyebrows go bananas.

Sarah:  Thanks for the laugh this morning.  I read Blaze Wyndham years ago but don’t remember anything of it.  I’d forgotten just how indigo B. Small could write.  The part where he deposits his love juices made me think some psychotic mailman was dumping nuclear waste into people’s mailboxes.  Ick.

Jorie: I used to read a fair amount of category romances, but not so much nowadays. Category romances bug me not necessarily because they’re under-written, but because the conflict and the hero/heroine getting together feel so rushed. Sometimes the hero is proposing to the heroine a week after they meet, and even if I enjoyed the story, at that point I’m thinking “Whuh? BAD IDEA.” But I guess under-written to me = inadequate use of description, and I can’t recall the last time I read a book and didn’t have a clear idea of what the setting looked like, or what the h/h’s hair color etc. was, whether they were tall/short/pudgy, whatever.

White Raven: Quote away, just make sure to mention that I was bastardizing Laura Kinsale’s prose while making a point about descriptiveness vs. purpleness :-) .

Thanks, Candy.  This will have several of them in stitches - and I’ll make certain they see both versions of the paragraph with your reference to the bastardization of Kinsale’s work.

Also, would you and/or Sarah consider posting an entry about silly/inappropriate descriptions?  Not necessarily purple prose, but stuff that doesn’t work with the reader the way the author intended. For example, I recently found this in a Linda Needham novel called Ever His Bride:

“How old?” he demanded.

He drew her closer still, until his teeth blinded her in the fireglight.

!st, how exactly does a word brush back against one’s mouth?  And second, what bleaching procedure did this guy use on his pearly whites to make them that florescent?

Candy - Thanks for the second.  I felt a bit alone in the wilderness yesterday.  It appears to be safe for me to venture into blogland again.

His teeth blinded her?? Goddamn. You know what image came to mind? Him burying his incissors into her eyeballs. MMM-MMMMM, romantic. Maybe we could create a new sub-genre of paranormals, though? Vampires who subsist on ocular vitreous humors instead of blood.

You so get mad props for use of the words “ocular vitreous humors.”

Damn.

And I could only think of “Blinded by the light, wrapped up like a douche.”

I confess, I had to look it up on Wikipedia. In my high-school biology class I learned it was called gelemaca, but I don’t know if it’s English or some kind of Malay term.

Oh nonono, quite the opposite: If my head weren’t attached to my neck, I’d probably lose it. I have extremely good recall when it comes to facts and figures, but when it comes to concrete reasoning, e.g. navigation, or everyday things like remembering where my purse is, I’m terrible. I can’t even tell you how many times I’ve been late to work because I absent-mindedly set my keys down in some exotic location, like a bookshelf or the refrigerator. One time I was even firmly convinced my car had been stolen because I forgot which level of the parking garage I’d left it.

His teeth blinded her?? Goddamn. You know what image came to mind? Him burying his incissors into her eyeballs.

Ick!  But very appropriate.  %-P

When I first read it, I immediately thought of Bruce the Shark from Finding Nemo.  Thank god, the hero’s next piece of dialogue didn’t start with a long drawn out “Hellooooo”.