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

Personal foul, unnecessary bullshit against romance genre, use of “bodice ripper:” Laurel Maury, Los Angeles Times. 15 yard penalty, loss of down, and much mockage on the field. Taunting penalty against Smart Bitches is declined.

“The Jewel of Medina” is a second-rate bodice ripper or, rather, a second-rate bodice ripper-style romance (it doesn’t really have sex scenes). It’s readable enough, but it suffers from large swaths of purple prose. Paragraphs read like ad copy for a Rudolph Valentino movie.

“From my camel’s hump I could feel the leaf-kissed air moving like a cool, moist cloth across my brow as I inhaled the fresh clean scents of petal and blade and springs gilding the morning,” says A’isha. The newly founded Islamic community is fleeing Mecca, and she’s selling air freshener. Also, it’s unfortunate that Jones refers to male genitals as “the scorpion’s tail.” Perhaps this is an Arabic metaphor, like the Petrarchan conceit of lips like cherries, but it doesn’t work.

Thanks to Jessica M. via earlyword.com.

The Jewel of Medina is on sale in bookstores today, as Beaufort Books moved up the on sale date following attacks on the UK publisher. Media Bistro sat with author Sherry Jones to get her perspective on the eve of (finally) publication. Ron Hogan, Captain of the Great Ship KickAss, writes:

The problem (as we see it) stems from the flagrant mischaracterization of the novel by Islamic studies professor Denise Spellberg, whom Ballantine Books had approached hoping for a blurb, as “soft core pornography” and anti-Muslim propaganda; Spellberg’s zealous efforts to alert Muslims to the book’s impending publication were particularly effective in giving the public a distorted impression of its contents. And we do mean distorted: Now that we’ve read the novel for ourselves, and seen precisely two paragraphs that might be construed as sexually explicit (and that’s being extremely generous to one of them), Jones deserves a public apology from Spellberg for her public misrepresentations.

So far no word from professor Spellberg. But, according to the image posted by Ron, the book is already a bestseller in Serbia after it was re-released.

(Thanks to Rebecca for the link). 

We’ve teased you before, and… well, we’ll do it again.

Another sneak peek of the Smart Bitch Book cover art is right here for your viewing pleasure. What’s going on in this image?

A lot, lemme tell you. Boy howdy a lot. 

Last one of the day, from AMH:

I’m trying to track down a historical I had read years ago. I’m pitifully forgetful about just about everything about this book except that it was either an Avon or Zebra in the 90s around the same time Pamela Morsi released ‘Simple Jess’ and it was written by a big name at the time in romance.

It involved the discovery of a man raised by wolves. Here’s where I worry I’m mixing it up with Disney’s Tarzan. If memory serves me the heroine’s father took the feral man under his wing, as did the
daughter, while she fell in love with him. I remember some scene on the beach, the hero turning out to be a nobleman, and a jerk rival who thought pseudo-Mowgli should keep his hands off of the young miss. I’m pretty sure the cover was yellowish with a sunset scene.

This will be keeping me up at nights soon, so if any of your readers has any idea what this novel is will make me very, very happy.

Candy, who maintains a crush on Mowgli, would probably love this book. Especially if it’s horridtastic. 

Raina writes:

The story is about a young woman (I think she was a kindergarten teacher?). She’s claustrophobic, and while trying to visit her rich friends, she get’s stuck in an elevator in their building with a man.Freaking out, the man helps her get through the situation, and he takes her back to his apartment to calm her down. One thing leads to another and they end up sleeping together.

She leaves while he’s still asleep, and they both never find out each other’s names. He finally tracks her down somehow and learns she’s pregnant.

He’s a really successful lawyer. I think she’d moved to a new town, and told all her neighbours and coworkers that she had been married, and her husband had died...but then he shows up surprising everyone.

Please help! this has been bugging me forever!

Ok, Secret baby conceived in an elevator? That would make an AWESOME Aerosmith song, right? Right...!?