by SB Sarah • Thursday, January 08, 2009 at 04:42 AM
Time for another advice question, solved with the power of Lurrrve™ and the wisdom of Ye Olde Romance Novels.
Dear SB Sarah:
I need advice. I am a 32 year old professional woman. I have never been married, have no kids, and have had 3-4 seriously significant relationships in my life. The problem is this - every one of my exes have contacted me this past year. Starting with the Very First Real Boyfriend and ending with last year’s therapy sessions. In the space of six months every man I have ever told I loved (there have been 3 of them) and every man I have ever almost thought it was possible to love (there have been 4 of them) contacted me. Most of them wanted to tell me how happy they are with their lives. How much they loved their wives (5 of them are married) and how perfect things are with them. They all asked about me and how I was and then proceeded to lose their minds. The one thing they all had in common was their need to tell me what an amazing girl/woman I was and how they wished they had realized what they had when they had it.
Some of these relationships ended badly, some of them not so much. I was engaged to one, spent 12 years playing cat and mouse with another, and lost my heart at 18 to another. Without exception though, I enjoyed these relationships. Some are doctors now, some are still students. Some work with their hands and some with their minds. They really have nothing in common with each other except me. So WHY WHY WHY did they all decide to gang up on me this year? What am I supposed to take from it? How do you deal with an ex calling you up to tell you how perfect his life is without you, but damn, he wished you were still in it?
Signed,
MM
Let me guess: you signed up for Facebook? People come out of the woodwork to show off their happiness and joy on Facebook. It’s bizarre. And strangely addictive. Oh, no, you said they called. Well, now. The experience you’ve described must be both flattering and alarming - you definitely sound a bit overwhelmed. Unfortunately for me and my advice column, each of your questions is best answered by you. But that won’t stop me from ruminating for awhile.
Why did they all contact you this year? Couldn’t tell you. Dudes are strange, and often unpredictable. But if a bunch of men who were important to you at various times in your life all, independently of one another, convene to tell you you’re awesome, take that at face value: you’re awesome. Being complimented is always a nice thing.
What are you supposed to take from it? I say two things. First, see above re: compliment. Second: if you have been perhaps doubting the future of your love life, or doubting yourself, this is a strong indication that you have a great deal to offer someone, and people who have had you in their lives recognize the power of your awesome.
But your third question is the kicker: How do you deal with an ex calling you up to tell you how perfect his life is without you, but damn, he wished you were still in it?
That’s a big question. If I’m doing my math correctly, and likely I am not, there are 7 men telling you that you’re an amazing part of their pasts, and five of those men are married. Guess which five I’d ignore in favor of the other two? Infidelity is hardly ever romantic, and I definitely do not recommend it.
If the two who aren’t married are worth keeping in touch with - you mentioned “last year’s therapy sessions” so I don’t want to advise you to open yourself to a world of hurt - then perhaps you might consider being back in their lives in one form or another. If you still like them, or are even inclined to be friends, there’s no reason not to, unless you think or feel it would be a bad idea. There’s not enough detail for me to know which gentleman you may prefer, but I think the point of your letter was “OMGWTFBBQ—What do I do?” and not so much “What do I do now?”
Most romances that feature exes getting back together or former childhood flames reconnecting as adults share a few common traits. One notable feature is an enduring attraction and magnetic draw to that other person, regardless of the hurt feelings and nuclear breakups that may have interfered in the past. Despite some pain and fallout, that person is still hot smokin’ booyah and always has been. Repairing a broken relationship is hard work, even years after the breaking, but most of the time the protagonists have grown up and grown wiser, and have the wherewithal and the what-what to take on the repair and the reviving of an old relationship. Perhaps this is where you and one of the gentleman are. Or perhaps you’re now ready to take a chance on someone else. Either way, your story is the stuff great conflict and potential great happy endings are made.
Bottom line: you should take from this experience that you are, in fact, an amazing person, and people are proud to have had you in their lives. That’s a compliment like no other to feast on in cold moments. Eventually, if this is one of your goals, I hope you find someone about whom you feel that way as well: that your life is amazing with him in it, and vice versa. You deserve nothing less.
by SB Sarah • Thursday, January 08, 2009 at 01:34 AM
Every Thanksgiving, I try to watch my copy of Babette’s Feast, which, if you haven’t seen it, is an amazing and beautiful film.
So this seems especially cool, though totally out of my price range: as part of Zagat’s Vintage Dinner Series this year, on 12 January, Café des Artistes will present the entire menu from the movie, from turtle soup to quail in puff pastry. A lecture on the film will follow the dinner, which is priced at $160.00 per person.
If I could send myself and some readers, I totally would, but there’s no freaking way. But! I can give a luck ready a DVD copy of the movie. So if you’d like to win a copy of Babette’s Feast, leave a comment and tell me your favorite dish that you like to prepare. Recipe optional. Me, my favorite recipe to prepare on winter nights is a red bean and barley soup with sweet and hot Italian sausage. The whole house smells warm, friendly, and slightly spicy - which is perfect.
by SB Sarah • Wednesday, January 07, 2009 at 06:45 PM
From the “You’ve Got to be Fucking Kidding Me” department comes this story via GalleyCat: spiritual author Neale Donald Walsch admitted to plagiarizing a story by another writer, Candy Chand. In the NY Times article, Walsch is quoted as saying
In a telephone interview, Mr. Walsch, 65, who said he regularly gave 10 to 20 speeches a year, said he had been retelling the anecdote in public as his own for years. “I am chagrined and astonished that my mind could play such a trick on me,” he said.
Pardon my French, but Bull Almighty Fucking Shit. I’ve got the worst memory in the history of Milton Bradley and I can do better than that.
Ms. Chand isn’t buying it either:
Ms. Chand said in a telephone interview that she did not believe Mr. Walsch’s explanation. “If he knew this was wrong, he should have known it was wrong before he got caught,” she said. “Quite frankly, I’m not buying it.”
But wait, there’s more! On Walsch’s personal blog, after he confessed all and admitted he’d made a big honking mistake, over 100 readers and fans fell all over themselves to reassure him that he was still, in fact, the man. Among the highlights of what-the-fuckery:
I don’t see the big deal in what happened, and I mean no disrespect to Ms. Chand. Stuff like that happens to me, and all of us, all the time.
...
When I thought it through, I realized that this idea could have been seeded into many minds through the collective consciousness, and that it was in no way plagiarism on your part. Heck, I could have heard something like that somewhere and wrote away, its possible.
...
I sinscerely pray that Ms. Chand accepts your gracious apology in light of the circumstances that you have attempted to correct the misconception.... I can imagine a possibility that Ms. Chand might even be flattered by an author of your stature finding in her work such quality that it moved him to breed further life into it by putting it on this very public and popular forum. I can even conceive of the possibility that Ms. Chand, whom sadly I have never heard, might actually benefit from the attention given it.
...
This Candy Chand is also a spiritual writer. Neale was spiritual enough to recognize his mistake, let’s hope Candy Chand and Beliefnet are spiritual enough to forgive it.
While a few readers call Walsch to task for his deceit, most reassure him and beg him to continue writing, even though BeliefNet, where Walsch’s plagiarising of Chand’s story occurred on 28 December 2008, has withdrawn Walsch from their group of writers. In most of the comments online, plagiarism yet again is a theft that is made into a minor borrowing when a bigger celebrity does the word harvesting.
In a rather eerie coincidence noticed only by, well, me, this week marks the date of the first post one year ago about another plagiarism scandal. Only instead of “the authors ought to be flattered” comments, our story garnered, and we still receive, “You are evil and you’re going to hell and I’ll be the one to send you there” email.
Plagiarism: still making readers batshit crazy after all these years.
by SB Sarah • Wednesday, January 07, 2009 at 10:41 AM
Looking for free ebooks? Of course you are! If you’re inclined to read sci-fi and fantasy, which often has that delightful thing we call the Luuuuuuurve™ in it as well, Baen has a free ebooks library online at WebScription, with piles upon piles of free download options. Whee!
[Thanks to Gry for the link.]
by SB Sarah • Wednesday, January 07, 2009 at 01:27 AM
Our Grade:
Title: Honey Trap
Author: Julie Cohen
Publication Info: Little Black Dress 2008, ISBN: 0755341376
Genre: Contemporary Romance
I’m a fangirl of Julie Cohen’s writing, particularly because she can blend sharp, smart, witty writing with characters who contain emotional depth and a unique perspective on UK-set contemporary romance. Cohen is funny, intelligent, and vivid in her stories, and I love reading them. But while I loved the hero and the setting of this book, the heroine and the mystery in the plot left me wanting more.
Sophie Tennant is a private investigator who specializes in honey traps. She’s hired by women who suspect their husbands or boyfriends are cheating. Sophie then lures them into situations wherein she records them making passes at her, and provides the evidence to her client. But when a honey trap turns violent, Sophie closes up her shop, changes careers, and relocates to a small town. When she’s hired as the aromatherapist for an 80’s rock band on tour trying to stage a comeback, Sophie finds out that the bassist is Dominick Steele: a washed up former rock star - and her first honey trap. When Dominick realizes that Sophie is on tour with the group, he nearly walks, but he needs the chance to play music, and more specifically, he needs the money. He thinks she’s still a private investigator, and suspects her every move, but he can’t resist her. And Sophie can’t stay away from him.
Dominick is amazing. He’s struggling to remain sober after nearly killing himself with drinking, and is trying to turn his life into something worth while after being on top of the world and falling suddenly into a pit of self-made destruction. As an alcoholic and druggie trying to stay straight, Dominick’s struggles to avoid temptation, particularly on a rock tour, are heartbreaking, and Cohen does a plain amazing job of balancing Dominick’s flaws and weaknesses with his determination and talent. Plus, Cohen sets up a tangle for herself in terms of the hero and the heroine’s nobility and morality in the eyes of the reader: Sophie was very nearly Dominick’s “other woman” when he was drinking, using, and cheating on his wife. Sophie suspects him, Dominick doesn’t trust her, and they’re both ferociously attracted to each other.
At the heart of the story is Dominick’s struggles. Dominick is trying to be a better person, and trying to resist the oblivion and soothing numbness of being drunk and high. He’s trying, basically, to resist all temptation - and that includes Sophie. So witnessing his attempts to navigate a sexual temptation when he’s convinced he needs to remain abstinent of everything gives the reader a unique perspective on the tortured hero, and, for me personally, a wealth of respect for Dominick as a character.
However, what fell flat for me was the ending: the mystery was solved, the dastardly fools involved apprehended, and there was a somewhat hopeful yet tentative happy ending. But while the hero grew a lot, I thought the heroine, rather than appreciating her own accomplishments and her own ability to survive and grow, merely made room for more of the same things she didn’t like to begin with. When the story opens, she’s a private investigator who specializes in honey traps, most likely because she’s a young attractive female possessing of the allure of honey. Then she becomes an aroma and massage therapist, because that was among the limited options she had before her.
There’s one scene that illustrates what I’m talking about as far as Sophie’s development or lack thereof. When she’s studying to become an aromatherapist, her heart isn’t in it. She’d wanted to be a private investigator since she was a little girl, but when her job seizes too much of her safety, she moves on to something else. She takes courses and certifies in aromatherapy, and she painstakingly researches the perfect location to set up shop with her new skills, but her attitude toward her new job is not a credit to her character, and makes her seem shallow and somewhat deceitful:
Faithlessness, betrayal, lust, and greed: it would be a relief… to inhabit a world where everything could be cured by a few whiffs of a pleasant scent. Her fellow students on the aromatherapy course had been so optimistic...and Sophie had done her best to be like them. She’s always had a talent for blending in; she’d received top marks and one of her instructors had told her confidentially that she was one of the most gifted aromatherapists he’d ever trained.
She’s inherently talented, but she thinks the concept of aromatherapy is bunk. Her private investigation career is, in her opinion, no longer an option that makes her happy. So, this would be a perfect opportunity for Sophie to discover who she really is, and learn to appreciate the depths of talents she has, right? Well, sort of. At the end of the story, Sophie goes back to her shop and hangs a sign: private investigations and aromatherapy. She doesn’t so much become herself as make room for all these different parts of herself without really, it seems, learning who it is that she wants to be.
Despite that, Cohen’s story is a hoot. The interaction between the aging tour members - who are all unique and likable while remaining complex and real - is hilarious, from the musicians to the crew. There’s one scene when Sophie is treating the drummer with various therapies, and I literally giggled out loud:
“Come on, Mad Dog,” she said. “Juniper, black pepper and eucalyptus for your wrists. Muscle-healing and relaxation.”
“Wicked, a sneezy drunk koala bear,” said Mad Dog, and presented his wrists to her.
Honey Trap is about realizing that someone is more than a stereotype, and that proves true for all of the characters, except Sophie. I wished as a finished it that she had come to realize more about herself, but with the hopeful ending, I can choose to believe she did.
