Sakura of DOOM

The two bloggers behind snarky romance review blog Smart Bitches, Trashy Books wrote this. I don't know if the book matches the expectations of their readers, since I don't read the blog, but it is definitely snarky and full of man-titty, swearing, and double intendres.

I also read this two or three weeks ago and returned it to the library, so I tack on my usual warning that my memory is like a sieve.

Much of the territory in the book is not particularly surprising to me, even though I don't read as many romances as most romance fans. Wendell and Tan go through the origin of the term "bodice ripper," talk about the alpha hero and the TSTL heroine, and mention the problem of rape in romances. They are more feminist and snarky than most romance reviews I have seen in the past, but they are still not feminist and snarky enough to satisfy me. I kept wanting to push them on the alpha hero and "forced seduction" and the status of the heroine, because yes, like them, I am glad of the changes that have been taking place in the genre, but I want it to go SO MUCH FURTHER. Also, I think they are much more tolerant of asshat heroes than I am.

I vaguely remember them discussing sexual agency in the hero and the heroine, but I am not sure if they mention how rarely we get a dominant woman (either in terms of BDSM or just taking the lead in the bedroom).

There's also a chapter on race and sexual orientation in romance that didn't go nearly as far as I wanted. Wendell and Tan talk about bookstore categorization and the way Black romances are usually shelved in African-American fiction, but I don't think they go much into racism in romances themselves, from Orientalism and exoticism to Magical Indians and we-sha-sha to What These People Need Is a Honky. They talk a little about the rise of gay romances, but I wish they would examine the appropriation of gay romance more closely.

I say all this, but I was also very entertained by the book. There's a Choose Your Own Romance game, there's snark at covers, there's poking fun at all the same things I poke fun of even as you can tell Wendell and Tan love romances.

So... a fun and fast read, and with more critique than other books on the romance genre I've read, but I keep wanting a much more radical critique than I get.

Original post

I'm a little behind on comments, though I am thoroughly enjoying the discussion. I also wanted to clarify some points that I realized in comments and throw out further thoughts. I note that much of what I reference in terms of social constructs of femininity is a white, middle-to-upper-class social construct, and that I'm using that particular construct because the majority of romance authors and heroines tend to fall into that category (slooowly changing.... also, I do not have stats on reader demographics, argh!) and because I haven't read enough romances by and about POC to note how things are the same and different with women of color.

1. ( Definitions )


2. ( Problems of terminology )


3. ( Alpha females )


4. ( Violence )


5. ( Intent )


6. ( Fantasy and wish fulfillment )


7. ( Romance today )

Because I am having a very interesting conversation with Justine right now...

What are the romance tropes and conventions that drive you nuts? Why?

And which ones almost always work for you? Why?

And which ones are the ones in-between? I.e. if done well, they totally work, and if done poorly, they prompt chucking the book at a wall.

Bonus question: does Doomed Love work for you? What counts as Doomed (or, should I say, DOOMED)? What about love triangles/quadrangles/geometric shapes?

(Note: these aren't limited to romance novels, but to any narrative that involves romance-with-a-small-r.)

Also, please put spoilers in spoiler text! <span style="color:#333333;background:#333333">Spoilers go here</span>

rachelmanija has this great post with people suggesting their cool bits, aka, what they love reading about, and I have decided that my perfect, absolutely insane, could probably only be done by Yuki Kaori or Laura Kinsale level of cracktastic thing to read would be:

("cool bits" in blue)

During the ongoing war between a corrupt Heaven and rebellious Hell, an angel (winged, of course) falls for a demon -- let's make her an assassin -- and this forbidden love has them somehow be persecuted or whatnot (handwavy plot things go here). (also, the persecution part isn't blue because I don't care so much for that)

Oh wait, let's make them meet while she's dressed as a guy. Let's also make her the nth incarnation of Lucifer. Also, they have to meet while she's on a sekrit undercover mission to (handwavy plot thing) do something of great strategic importance in Heaven, so of course she goes in as a courtesan. Yes, they have courtesans in Heaven. What do you mean, this doesn't make sense? ;)

Also, Angel!Guy has glasses.

In the ensuing completely complicated political machinations going on in Heaven, Angel!Guy ends up disguising himself as a courtesan as well (insert handwavy plot thing), possibly to figure out what Demon!Girl is doing, which of course has to involve poison, assassination, secret passages in the palaces of Heaven, and a complex cipher that somehow Angel!Guy figures out and they use to communicate with each other. Demon!Girl gets to have much fun maneuvering in the courts of Heaven (yay, I get to make Heaven have courts and secret passages!) and of course uses fans and other such signals. I'm sure somehow Angel!Guy and Demon!Girl manage to have a duel of wits and swords, which somehow resolves in hot against-a-wall sex involving the undoing of many buttons, a head falling back against the wall, and a blowjob in which the power lies with Demon!Girl and the subsequent breaking of Angel!Guy's reserved exterior.

Naturally, something greatly tragic happens, forcing Angel!Boy and Demon!Girl to go down in non-literal flames together (you can never tell in Heaven and Hell). Naturally, they do this despite knowing that they're doomed. Magic Plot Device Fairy comes in and allows them to choose a memory wipe for both and reinstatement in Heaven and Hell, or many painful reincarnations on Earth. Of course, reincarnation option comes with the catch that neither will remember their previous lives.

Guess which one I make them pick?

This means I get to have reincarnations set in turn-of-the-century Europe, complete with bustles and corsets, along with one set in Meiji Japan in which Angel!Guy gets to wear bowler hats and hakama. Of course, all the reincarnations end tragically.

Handwavy plot device takes over, leading to Angel!Boy getting a few memories back and looking through the ages for Demon!Girl, which of course leads to love from afar with Demon!Girl not knowing (amnesia, y'know?). Also, because Angel!Boy is quietly angsty, yet nice and reserved and polite with good-manners, while Demon!Girl is quiet and deadly and cold, just a hand on the shoulder is huge. Naturally, even though Demon!Girl doesn't know what's going on, they become a sort-of family of broken people who are less broken around each other. Also, sex scene in which Demon!Girl loses control finally and illustrates the fine line between pleasure and pain.

And of course they get to learn about living and being alive together.

Before Heaven and Hell come back in the picture, Demon!Girl gets her memories back and much more handwavy plot stuff happens.

Ok, I think I got most things in except a love of knowledge and crafty things, but I suspect making Demon!Girl or Angel!Boy a knitter may be stretching things.

So that's the portrait of my id!

Tell me yours! (if you do it in your own LJ, I'd love to get a link to it so I can read it!)

It's fifteen things about books! How could I possibly not do this?

Also, I adore reading everyone else's version of this meme, because there's so often that "Me too!" of recognition when I thought I was the only one neurotic bibliophilic enough to do it. (I have a lot of neurotic habits.)

( Fifteen things about books )

rachelmanija posted lately on strange sub-genres.

I think mine are:

1. Super intrigue-y courts with layers and layers of subterfuge and hidden meanings. And it doesn't count if court outsiders go in and have to learn the way of the court and make everyone adore them for their forthrightness -- that's an entirely different subgenre. Learning-court-intrigue scenes are perfectly acceptable, but only if it means court intrigue continues.
   Ex. Dune, Daughter of the Empire



2. Smart spies/assassins/thieves books with lots of nifty codes and tricks and gadgets and getaways, but not so much that there's more gadgetry than intellect. I actually haven't read that many of these (most are bits and pieces of the court intrigue books), but I should probably read John le Carre sometime, huh. I actually get more of these with movies, which is why I like caper movies and the like. Also, female spies/assassins/thieves are a bonus.
   
   I note that this is definitely a romance sub-genre, except the romance novel hero/heroine spies/assassins/thieves usually act so stupid that they definitely don't scratch this itch. Actually, they tend to make me want to throw something.



3. Retold fairy tales, which isn't so much a strange sub-genre now and is rapidly growing larger. I seem to have to pick up absolutely anything that even references a fairy tale, no matter how bad it looks. Retold myths or legends rate a little lower, unless it's a retold non-Greek/Roman/Egyptian/Celtic one.
   
   Actually, they don't even have to be retold. If something is original but written with fairy tale imagery or with certain themes or a certain style, I will totally get it as well. Books on Faerie/Fae/Sidhe are an entirely different entity.
   
   Favs are the Windling/Datlow anthologies, McKillip, McKinley, Emma Donoghue's Kissing the Witch.
   
   I do know I need to read Angela Carter and Anne Sexton.



4. Epistolary fantasy novels. Eh, at least, I think this is a favorite sub-genre, given that I've only read two books in it (Sorcery and Cecelia and Freedom and Necessity, both of which I adore to bits and pieces). I am of yet unaware if the fantasy element can be taken away and still keep me interested in the book, but I really want to pick up Les Liaisons Dangereuses and find out.



5. Really nice heroes falling for emotionally distant and/or morally ambiguous heroines. Or actually anyone except an alpha bastard falling for an emotionally distant and/or morally ambiguous heroine. The key is to have the hero fall first.



6. Quiet, unobstrusive girls growing up to be heroines. Eh, yes, this may be some wish fulfillment here ;). I was never as sucked in by the in-your-face outcast girl, since I wasn't even loud enough to be an outcast. I was just sort of wallflower-ish.


Recs? Anyone else post theirs? I want this to be a meme ^_^.

Hee, I accidentally submitted a review for Rebecca Tingle's The Edge on the Sword, a YA historical, to Broadsheet even though I know full well that Broadsheet is for women writers of speculative fiction. Apparently my brain must somehow equate pre-modern times and girls with swords with fantasy. My brain is quite odd. But to be honest, historical fiction has about the same appeals fantasy often holds for me. For the shallow aspects, you've got people wearing fancy clothes and swords and kingdoms and the like, which, unfortunately often turns into derivative junk. But on a deeper level, both of them seem to be about world-building, about creating (or re-creating) a world with enough detail and facts and sensations so that I begin to fully believe that I live there, that I know that world almost as well as I know my own. I know both must have their own difficulties -- creating a world from scratch is very different from trying to resurrect a world from the past. And it must be rather nice to be the only specialist on the world you have created, knowing all the little nooks and crannies that aren't necessarily let out to the reader but are there in the background all the same. Historical fiction is subject to more nitpicking on a purely factual level (much like me sitting and having lots of fun listening to two otaku nitpick The Last Samurai. Ok, I admit, I was doing a good deal of nitpicking in my head as well). But then, having tried to create a world out of scratch in my own head before, I'm not sure which is the scarier option ;). Researching a known period, having facts on your side, is also very comforting (so speaks she who is enamoured of research). Anyhow, historical fiction and solid world-building fantasy occupy the same space in my head, apparently.

But I think the more magical type of fantasy in which the world-building isn't quite as important as the characters and the images is usually equated with fairy tale, fable, myth, and legend.

Still, no wonder I've been on such a fantasy kick after reading Dunnett. And no wonder I keep picking up YA historicals.

Called my mom today. She has been greatly encouraged by the fact that I have seemingly taken her advice and started exercising. Very minimally exercising, but still exercising. So now she has decided that since I do apparently listen to what she says, she should begin urging me to exercise even more! And to cook! *sigh* I should have know caving wouldn't make her stop complaining ;). Oh well. As my boss says, she's a mom. Of course she does this.

I keep almost getting into a big gender-role-inspired rant on why everyone keeps asking me if I cook and why everyone keeps encouraging me to cook. This is particularly annoying when people start offering me American recipes. I'm sure it is meant with the best of intentions, but to be honest, I'm Chinese. I prefer to cook Chinese food. I don't think anyone is really implying anything -- rather, they're all being quite enthusiastic about the things they like to cook, or things they find easy to cook. And I don't want to be snobby or anything. But, I mean, I've eaten Chinese food for most of my life, and the thought of cooking something like a taco salad or meatloaf or the like is much further away than the thought of cooking good rice porridge. I suppose mostly it's people of good intention not quite realizing that, to me, Chinese food is comfort food, not strange and exotic and difficult to cook. Actually, that's probably a very good metaphor for much of my life -- people tend to assume I'm a fully integrated Asian-American with great knowledge of pop culture and whatnot, which I am not, or they assume I'm a fully integrated Chinese person in Taiwan (before I open my mouth, that is... and not using the term "Taiwanese" because I'm still not quite sure if it is an ethnic label or not, and seeing as how my grandparents are from China...), which I am also not. Mostly I feel like a person for whom all things are vaguely foreign and exotic. Anyhow, back to the almost-rant. I keep wanting to start ranting on why people only seem to push me to cook, and not the boy, but luckily the boy has nipped this mid-bud and said his parents annoy him about it too. Although sometimes when I am there, it feels suspiciously as though they are urging me to cook for him, which is vaguely creepy.

In other news, I have found out that I sort of know fannishly's cousin from Taiwan!!!! OMG SO WEIRD!! SO COOL!! And I had no idea when I found her LJ (or she found mine)!! The internet (and Taiwan) is a very small world indeed. Actually, I attribute this more to the Taiwan factor, since apparently everyone with some sort of connection to Taiwan who has ever been in America will somehow end up connected with someone else I know with a connection to Taiwan. And if you think I'm bad, it's ten times more extreme with my parents. I used to joke that my dad would meet someone he knew every time he walked through an airport.

Randomly: Is there any sort of good "how to write book reviews" website ala all those good "how to write sci-fi/fantasy" sites out there? Nyargh, must remember not to be too ambitious, but I suppose there is no harm in trying, yes?

*sniff* Last day of work today. Very strange. Sigh, am going to miss the bookstore, but I have people's emails, and must remember, it is just down the street. And also must remind myself that I don't have to shelve books next week! Woot.

But it was very nice, and everyone said bye, and they even had a cake and a card. I feel very appreciated now. It is nice knowing that they thought I was quite a wonderful employee -- counteracts the ughness of ibanking. Also, heh, I like having my ego stroked (I told this to the boy and he responded by stroking my hair. "That's not where my ego is!" I said.). I also bought another giant load of books. I probably have enough non-fiction to last me through the year. Sigh. And then I had to return everything I had borrowed, half of which I haven't even finished yet, which made me remember that I can't just pop in there and borrow stuff anymore. Best library ever.

Then the boy and I went to see Shaun of the Dead and left half-nauseated, half-amused. The first part was great, absolutely hilarious, but then it starting hunkering down and really being a zombie movie, which is when I started getting nauseous. So yeah, that's about all the zombie movie I can take. That got me thinking: I instrinsically dislike horror. I can't off the top of my head think of any other genre that I intrinsically dislike. I mean, I am indifferent toward mystery but can be persuaded by good characters or humor or the like. Obviously I enjoy romances (depending on the quality of the writing). I tend toward scoffing at thrillers, but again, it depends on the level of characterization mostly. Also, a lack of comparing one's hero to an aging Indiana Jones helps (*cough*DanBrown*cough*). But I will not watch or read or listen to horror.

Unless, of course, the horror is extremely minimal, and even then, I dislike the horror elements (yes, I closed my eyes through half of Sixth Sense). I think perhaps the big exception to this with me is Buffy, in which case I take the scary portions, like Hush or Conversations with Dead People, because the rest of the show is wonderful. Basically, when it comes down to it, I'm incredibly squeamish (ergo the general un-excitement about thrillers) and really hate being scared. Slightly frightened I can do, but I don't want to be given nightmares or the like.

So I wonder if people who don't like romance or sci-fi or fantasy or mystery have this same sort of visceral reaction. And I wonder what it's to? The pseudo-historical settings in fantasy? The magic? The intrinsic not-of-this-world-ness? A story focused on emotions? It's strange thinking about it, because obviously I enjoy the genres and as such, can't quite bend my head around what other people would find off-putting.

Random thoughts sparked by various discussions on Amazon.com reviews, on book reviews in general, on the prevalence of writers on my FL, and other such things. (Not sure if I need a disclaimer, but none of this is meant to single out anyone on the FL, er, unless one of you is secretly OSC, nor is it meant to be offensive.)

It's very interesting reading my FL because so many of the people talking about books on it are people who are writing books and short stories and the like. It's a very different perspective from what I'm used to -- I'm very much a reader, and I've never felt the desire to be a writer, despite occasional adolescent dabbling. And I've spent a great deal of life reading without thinking of the author, or, if I do, I had a concept of the author as some sort of all-powerful being who was very far removed from this world. Also, being in Taiwan for eight years sort of limits one's opportunities to go to signings and the like. Going to my first signing (this year, Orson Scott Card) was very strange. I think sometimes I like that distance from the author, particularly in OSC's case, seeing as how I violently disagree with some of his personal views and his interpretation of his books.

The strangest part of it was feeling very protective of his books while reading or hearing his opinions on those books -- I mean, he's the author, he wrote them, obviously they mean something personal to him. But I wanted to figuratively grab the book and hug it to my chest and not let him tamper with my view of the book, or my experiences of reading the book, because it was my book that I had read in sixth grade and it had probably changed my mental landscape rather dramatically. I also come from the school of thought in literature that while authorial intent matters, it is not the be-all-end-all to interpretation. Sometimes I like knowing authorial intent, and I like knowing that such-and-such was intended as a homage to so-and-so, or that the author was reading Dunnett at the time, or that the author was responding to another book. Other times, I don't want to know, because there's another version of the book in my own head, and the intention of the author gets in the way of that. I don't know if my version is the "right" version, or even if there is a right version, but it's my own version, formed by all the books I've read in the past, by my own experiences, by where I was and how I was feeling when I read it.

This feeling is generally more awkward when the author is alive and says or publishes something that contradicts with what I think.

Also, as a reader, I do things detrimental to authors, like borrowing millions of books from the library, frequenting (and currently working in) used bookstores, going to library sales, etc. To be honest, when I do that, I don't think about the author's sales. Mostly I am just concerned with preserving my own paycheck, given the fact that I buy anything between 5-10 books a month. Depending. I have gone horribly over limit this month due to library sale and the anticipation of not having my employee's discount anymore. Plus, my personal goal is to read as many books as possible while spending as little money as possible, and I don't like buying books I haven't read at cover price unless I succumb to the temptation of sequels, or new books by authors I like, or sometimes just really pretty cover art. I buy books used and new, I borrow anything I can get my hands on, I scrounge for free books. I also don't think about good things like supporting my local independent bookstore instead of going to Borders or B&N or Amazon, mostly because I read a lot of genre, and half the time I can't find what I'm looking for in little independent bookstores. I do make a special attempt to get lots of stuff at Borderlands though, because I like them. I probably also contribute an embarrassingly large amount to the bookstore I work at currently.

When I talk about books in my LJ, mostly I'm thinking of other readers when I do it, not of the authors. It's actually very strange thinking about how much I think about books and read books and spend time and money on books, while not really keeping the author in mind the entire time I do it. I think of the author as a sort of brand name actually. It's so odd reading about everyone's struggles to write the next book or story, to sell it, and to realize that I'm the one sitting there reading it, that more often than not, I skim a few paragraphs of someone's hard work and pass judgment on it. I feel I read scholarly non-fiction a little differently because after writing so many papers (and the thesis) during school, I understand more what the author had to go through to compile data, to research, to present ideas clearly. I have a grasp of what had to go into every single sentence. I never really think about fiction in that way because I've never really had to take it apart and tinker with it in my head.

Anyhow, just things that randomly popped in my head these past few months.

mrissa was recently asking questions on adult books (as opposed to YA or children's, not necessarily erotica or porn) and when various people started reading them, if they were ever restricted from doing so, etc.

I think one of the interesting byproducts of growing up basically speaking a different language than my parents meant that they had no idea what I was reading. Still probably don't. I figure that by now my mom has probably found my hidden romance novel stash back at home and sort of knows what they are, but by now I don't care as much as I did back in high school. I should also give my parents points for knowing more than they let on, but seeing as how I have yet to experience parenthood for myself, I have no idea what they know and what they pretend to not-know, and I find it rather comforting to pretend all around that there are general subjects everyone just not-does and not-knows about.

Anyhow. I think the very first adult book I read was Lord of the Rings back in sixth grade (11 yrs. old?). Previously I had pretty much always stayed in the kids' section of the library and dug out books like Gordon Korman (I should reread those and see if they're still funny), various classics, etc. Lord of the Rings was a giant, giant eye-opener. First, I used to constantly sift through all the books in the kids' section looking for fairy tales and myths and various retellings, and in LotR, I discovered that there was an entire new world, a fat world that filled three volumes and didn't explicitly retell any fairy tales or myths. After Lord of the Rings, I headed up to the adult section to look for more books like it (it's really hard to do when there are no genre categories and one is making judgments based on spines) and found Terry Brooks, and, subsequently, the genre known as fantasy.

I've never been told that I was too young for a book (although some time down the line I realized for myself that that was the case). I've never been personally stopped from reading something I wanted to read. I've only actually talked about books and reading to very few people in my life prior to LJ because, well, most people don't quite understand the excitement or most people haven't read the books I wanted to talk about. LJ's been a giant blessing because it's finally allowed me to burble on about reading and books and bibliophilia in general to people who don't think I'm nuts for reading all the time. I sort of felt invisible in a good way when I was reading -- outside of a select group of people, no one really ever knew what I was reading or what I thought about it.

( Post is getting long... )