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

You know the drill - first one to give us author, title, heroine’s name gets le Smart Bitche Title!

All my dresses might as well be purple, too

Impetuous and sophisticated-beyond-my-years gentry daughter with no dowry to speak of seeks a series of men to guide me from virginity to a great deal of experience. First, a benevolent, almost fatherly-aged gentleman to rescue my family from ruin, teach me the ins and outs of coitus in as many locations as possible, and introduce me to luuuuurve, baby, yeah. Then, a royal pain with a ginormous ass to bend me unwillingly into sexual servitude and political intrigue. Finally, a younger, more passionate, and ultimately appropriate man who allows me to keep my original title, my pride, and my happily ever after. 

I love stories of true romance as much as I love the fictional ones. Enjoy and try not to picture the movie version, because over-production would suck all the joy and beauty out of the simplicity of this story. 

Go forth and find out what your name REALLY means in the Sexy Name Decoder!

Here’s mine:

Ha. Ain’t that the troof. Though how does one adeptly need anything? Can I want something inadeptly?

Courtesy of Lore Sjoberg, the guy behind The Brunching Shuttlecocks, The Book of Ratings, the Cyborg Name Decoder and the Monster Name Decoder--in short, one sexy fucking geek.

p.s. Feel free to copy and paste the code into the comments so we can all see what you got. 

I’m the middle of reading Hot Spell, and a couple of nights ago, while reading Lora Leigh’s contribution ("The Breed Next Door"), I had to put the book down and sigh, just a little. See, I’d gotten to the part wherein the heroine laments that she attracts only computer nerds (she calls ‘em techies), and not real men.

Whoa. Ouch.

Also: does this mean I’m a lesbian? Or, at the very least, bisexual? My family already has a gay son, a daughter who had a kid out of wedlock with a married man and a son who ran off on his wife and two kids to be with a Philippino hairdresser. Maybe this is the niche I can fill in the family: I’ll be the daughter who really, really likes clam dip, if you know what I mean.

I know, I know: STOP THE PRESSES, a romance author has just used a lazy, inaccurate stereotype. Oh, the horror. What’s next? Virgin widows? Secret babies? Millionaire playboys who are mysteriously herpes-free?

A new art exhibit in London entitled Long Live Romance, Part II features the work of six emerging artists exploring the theme of romance. One of them does “huge and obsessively detailed studies of wounded or diseased children.” Yeah. I’m going to pass on that one. Not to be an art snob but I could barely stick a rectal thermometer up my one-week-old son’s bum, so the chances of my looking at detailed obsessive renderings of sick kids? Nil. (No fever here, by the way. Just nervous new mommy!)

Thinking about how emerging artists might approach romance got me wondering - what are the most romantic pieces of art I’ve seen?

Las Meninas by Velazquez is romantic to me, despite what I know about royal marriages.

The Painter’s Honeymoon by Leighton definitely makes my list, too.

What other pieces of artwork are romantic? If we were to create a Smart Bitch Gallery of Romance, what major works would we have to heist?