Dear Author: Romance Novel Reviews, Industry News, and Commentary » DNF Reviews

REVIEW: No Greater Pleasure by Megan Hart

Janine — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 21:00:01 +0000

Dear Ms. Hart,

I’ve enjoyed several of your books, and three of them, the novels Dirty and Broken, and the novella collection Pleasure and Purpose, are among the best books I’ve read in recent years. I was thrilled by Pleasure and Purpose and greatly looking forward to No Greater Pleasure, its sequel, so I’m genuinely sorry to report that I found the first half of the book unsatisfying enough to put the novel down unfinished. The following, then, will not be a full review but rather an attempt to articulate the reasons I stopped reading.

Like Pleasure and Purpose, No Greater Pleasure takes place in (to crib from my review of the earlier book) “a fantasy setting which resembles mid nineteenth century Europe in terms of its technological development.”

It is the prevailing religious belief that each time a soul finds perfect solace, even if only for a moment, an arrow appears in the god Sinder’s quiver. According to legend — and many people’s faith — when the quiver is full, Sinder, his wife and his son, The Holy Family, will reunite, bringing peace and harmony to mankind.

To that end, the Order of Solace was created. The women who enter the order, called handmaidens, make it their task to bring solace to the patrons who engage their services. Sometimes doing that involves sex, but there is more to it than that. To give an idea of the handmaidens’ outlook, here are the five principles which comprise the tenets of the Order of Solace’s philosophy:

“1. There is no greater pleasure than providing absolute solace.
2. True patience is its own reward.
3. A flower is made more beautiful by its thorns.
4. Selfish is the heart that thinks first of itself.
5. Women we begin and women we shall end.”

Tranquilla (”Quilla”) Caden, a handmaiden in the Order of Solace, arrives at a house called Glad Tidings as No Greater Pleasure begins. The owner of the house is Tranquilla’s newest patron, Gabriel Delessan.

Quilla is greeted with suspicion by Florentine, Gabriel’s chatelaine and cook, and with surliness by Gabriel himself. Gabriel is an alchemist and has retained Quilla’s services to have his comfort and order in his laboratory seen to, not to attain solace. As he explains to Quilla, he requested a handmaiden so that he would not have to put up with “lies” and “pandering.” He does not want to hear that it’s her pleasure to please him, merely that she will do her job, which will not involve sex.

Quilla does her best to perform her task, seeing to it that Gabriel doesn’t forget to eat, replacing his broken teacups with whole ones and oiling a squeaky hinge on one of the doors, cleaning his lab, conversing with him when he seems to want conversation, and keeping silent when he doesn’t.

From Florentine, Quilla learns that Gabriel is married to a beautiful woman who may or may not be mad. Saradin cheated on Gabriel and drank some potion from his lab in an attempt to abort a baby. Her son was born healthy, though it is unclear whether or not Gabriel is the father. Sometimes Saradin screams in the middle of the night, but at other times, she seems completely sane, if oblivious to Quilla.

Gabriel does not discuss his wife with Quilla, but he does tell her that his own mother betrayed his father in a similar fashion. Gabriel’s half-brother Jericho is the result of an affair between Gabriel’s mother and her brother-in-law, Gabriel’s uncle. Gabriel is disgusted with his now deceased mother and uncle, but he does not take out his anger on Jericho, who is not to blame for the circumstances of his birth.

As time goes on, Quilla feels thwarted to realize that Gabriel does not want joy or solace. He will not cooperate with any of her attempts to help him become happier. Yet he doesn’t send her away, even though Quilla feels she is doing every task but the one that gives her purpose.

Gabriel’s half-brother Jericho arrives at Glad Tidings and is instantly smitten with Quilla, but Quilla doesn’t trust his sincerity. Jericho flirts with Quilla and makes it clear that he wants to pursue a relationship with her, something Quilla cannot indulge in while Gabriel remains her patron.

Quilla is startled to comprehend that she is beginning to feel jealous of Saradin for holding Gabriel’s attention. In previous assignments for married patrons, Quilla has never envied a spouse, nor was she sorry if her presence in a house brought a married couple closer together. But now she finds herself feeling differently.

No Greater Pleasure was a frustrating read for me because its premise sounded so intriguing and I hoped for an emotional reading experience. Instead, I found myself feeling relatively indifferent to Quilla and Gabriel’s fate.

One of the problems was that in the first quarter or so of the book, there was a lot of dialogue that seemed geared at explaining the principles of the Order of Solace, as well as the nature of a handmaiden’s role and work. Since I had read Pleasure and Purpose, I was already familiar with all of this, and I felt I was treading well-worn ground.

It didn’t help that some elements of the scenario — the surly patron who does not believe in solace or in the order, the skeptical servant who sees the handmaiden as a whore — were present in your wonderful novella “Stillness” and were therefore familiar to me as well. I suspect that to readers who have not read Pleasure and Purpose, this material might feel more fresh.

Quilla wasn’t unsympathetic, but she also wasn’t as compelling to me as the three handmaidens in Pleasure and Purpose. True to her name, her mood stayed even for a good part of the section I read. Although this wasn’t always the case, she often took things in stride to such a degree that I found her difficult to relate to. Since she did not seem to feel things that deeply, it was hard for me to feel deeply for her.

As for Gabriel, in the first half of the book, at least, he was sullen much of the time and therefore not very appealing to me. Although the book was written in third person, in its first half we never got Gabriel’s viewpoint (or anyone else’s other than Quilla’s), so even though Gabriel’s position wasn’t enviable, and I was willing to sympathize with him, I never truly experienced deep sympathy.

The situation Gabriel and Quilla found themselves in wasn’t particularly romantic to me. Understand, I’m not categorically opposed to adultery in books. For me, it all depends on the circumstances. But with Saradin, Gabriel’s shrewish wife, under the same roof with Quilla and Gabriel, it was hard to get into a romantic mood.

Perhaps that shouldn’t matter, since I’m not certain if the book is a romance. I have to admit that I often read for the romantic elements even in books outside the genre, and that may be a factor in my response.

Speaking of genre, I’m also not certain whether the erotic novel label would be appropriate in this case, because in the section I read, over half the book, there was no sex to speak of, unless you count the time Quilla was briefly subjected to overhearing Gabriel and Saradin going at it. I expect this changes eventually, but I didn’t get that far.

Quilla did not even kiss anyone in the book’s first half, though a few people tugged on her braid. I was frustrated enough by this state of affairs (or should I say, non-affairs) that I almost wished she would forget about solace and tumble into bed with Jericho, who, though probably untrustworthy, at least showed interest in her.

There are some good things about No Greater Pleasure which are worth mentioning. The gaslight fantasy setting is unusual, the Order of Solace premise truly inspired, and the prose is generally solid and at times evocative.

I had the feeling that this novel was heading for some kind of major development, but in the end, it pace of getting there was too slow for me. My interest kept wavering, I kept putting the book down, and finally I concluded that this book was not for me.

Just as I have enjoyed your other books, I’m sure there are other readers who will enjoy the unusual setting and premise in this one enough to overlook the things that bothered me, readers to whom the plot and characters will appeal more than they did to me. I wish I were one of them, but for me, No Greater Pleasure is a DNF.

Sincerely,

Janine

This book can be purchased at Amazon or in ebook format from Sony or other etailers on October 6, 2009.

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Harlequin Really Lightning Reviews

Jane — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 21:00:13 +0000

Ruthless Tycoon, Inexperienced Mistress by Cathy Williams

Cesar is tired of bailing his younger brother out of hot water so when Ferdinado asks for access to his trust fund, Cesar heads out to see who it is that has her gold digging claws in Ferndando. He finds not a statuesque model blonde, but a mannish, petite redhead. Not Ferdinado’s type and certainly not his. The two get stuck in a snowstorm. They have sex. Jude becomes pregnant and the real fireworks begin. Cesar is standard HP hero (alpha, hot, assholic). Jude isn’t a doormat but falls pretty easily for Cesar. B-

This book can be purchased at Amazon or in ebook format from Sony or other etailers.

Up Close and Dangerously Sexy by Karen Anders

Given that the haikus have come to a close here at Dear Author, I submit my own:

Stranger danger here
As long as he gives good Os
No worries, she thinks

I stopped after the second scene. The heroine is in the sister’s apartment. Some stranger comes in and thinks she’s the heroine’s twin. He gets in bed with her and brings her to orgasm with his hand. “She had an orgasms with a complete stranger, a man who was close to her sister.” Then he handcuffs her, threatens here, and she continues to flirt with him. I had to stop reading to protect my Sony Reader.

This book can be purchased at Amazon or in ebook format from Sony or other etailers.

Travis’ Appeal by Marie Farerrarella

I stopped at Chapter 11 because I just got bored with the story. There was no conflict at all. Travis was a hard working lawyer. Shanna is a devoted daughter who gives massages to anyone. She also wore gyspsy blouses (all the better to see your breasts, my child). Chapters 1-11 is full of talking and ruminating about stuff. Workaholic lawyer fiinds love in the arms of free spirit. The end.

This book can be purchased at Amazon or in ebook format from Sony or other etailers.

Under the Influence by Nancy Warren

I liked this one and not just because the secondary romance involved a hot Asian guy (unheard of for romances) but because it was just a little different. Premise is the opposite of Travis’ Appeal. In Under the Influence, overworked female business consultant finds love in the arms of a free spirit. I think where the story fell down is when the heroine, Natalie, demands some kind of showing of stability from Johnny, the bartender, and we find out that he is, of course, financially secure. Either you love him because he’s a free spirit or you don’t. The ending, in other words, seemed like a cheat to me. B-

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Thursday Afternoon Haiku Moment: City of Bones by Cassandra Clare

Jaiku — Thu, 28 May 2009 22:00:16 +0000

Beware: There May Be Spoilers Ahoy.

I’m going in blind
Never read your HP fic
Bought for hot cover

Looking for a fix
I need a new series to
Get my ‘crack’ fix on

Sorry – this ain’t it
I tried, I really did try
But you soon lost me

Here’s a quick recap
Clary sees a cute boy at
a club…and he’s killed

But his killers? Hot!
And only Clary sees them!
Plot unfolds from there.

Right away, I have
Many, many issues with
Heroine Clary

She’s a hardcore Sue.
Clary Sue can see ‘Hunters
She is SPECIAL, guys!

- Show quoted text -
Miss Perfect? Miss Chosen One?
Misses the big clues

SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER (maybe this should be spoiler-cut all the way to
the end)

Clary Sue’s mom was
Married to the bad guy and
Then ran away, hid.

Never told Clary
Sue about her missing dad.
Big “Who is dad” plot.

IT’S THE BAD GUY. WHY CAN NO ONE SEE THIS BUT ME. WTF.

Ahem. Sorry. Cough.
That’s the big ‘gasp’ plot reveal
She is evil’s kid.

Cue lots of ‘oh noes’
And then? Epic wallbanger
moment happens here.

Hot hero guy Jace?
She’s been kissing? Get ready.
‘Nother big reveal

Won’t spoil it here but
It rhymes with TWINCEST. So. Yeah.
Book hits wall. I’m done.

DNF.

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Thursday Afternoon Haiku Moment: Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Seth Grahame-Smith

Jane — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 22:00:51 +0000

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: The Classic Regency Romance – Now with Ultraviolent Zombie Mayhem! by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith

Auto-buy for me
Jane Austen and zombies? This
is my dream come true.

At first, I’m puzzled.
Why is Jane Austen sharing
copyright with Seth?

Public domain book
But I read and it is clear
more ripoff than new.

The text, dialogue
word for word what Austen wrote
…with minor changes.

This book reads more like
wild usage of “Find/Replace”
tool in MS Word.

At first, this is cute.
Men are judged by number of
kills, not money. Nice.

Darcy is a catch
Because he is a master
of zombie slaying.

The Bennett daughters
act the same, talk the same
but they are…ninjas.

My eyebrows? Raised but
I still read. Netherfield Ball?
Invaded by dead.

Darcy slights Lizzy
Instead of laughing it off,
she wants to…gut him????

This is where you start
to lose me. Despite Bennett
bloodthirst, I press on

But when Darcy asks
Lizzy to dance with him,
the story has changed.

Instead of the Austen
version where she declines, she
gives him ‘cut direct’

I realize at
this point that Grahame-Smith?
Doesn’t know his Jane.

I don’t mind a spoof
Of beloved author. BUT.
You missed the basics.

Give the cut direct?
MAJOR deal in Regency.
But no one here blinks.

I realize that it’s
A bit silly to get mad
over a detail.

But missing that small
detail showed me something big.
You skipped your homework.

This is not a fan’s
Loving homage. This is a
shameless grab for cash.

Maybe a cute gift
for people that appreciate schtick
But fans of Jane? Pass.

DNF

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REVIEW: New Blood by Gail Dayton

Janine — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 22:00:48 +0000

Dear Ms. Dayton,

Unlike some of my fellow reviewers here at Dear Author, I don’t try books by new-to-me authors as frequently as I probably should. A lot of that is simply due to the fact that I am a slow reader and it takes a lot of my reading time to keep up with new books by authors whose previous works I’ve liked. But another piece of it is that although I can enjoy books in a wide variety of genres, I am, even so, a finicky reader with very specific tastes. Nine times out of ten, when I try an author I haven’t read before, those tastes go unsatisfied.

Such was the case with New Blood, which I decided to try after hearing it was steampunk and reading an excerpt that intrigued me. I don’t feel that New Blood was a bad book–I have certainly read much worse, and the fact that I made it to the one-third point shows that it is stronger than many of the other books I’ve tried, only to put down much earlier. But for me, New Blood also wasn’t a very absorbing book. It was very easy to put down and I ultimately decided not to finish reading it.

New Blood is set in alternate version of nineteenth century Europe, one in which some men practice magic while women are forbidden to do so. There is one type of magic, however, that women have particular affinity for: blood sorcery.

The story begins when an Englishman known only as Jax finds the object of his long search in a Transylvanian forest. Amanusa is the daughter of a Romanian woman and an Englishman. She lives alone in her cottage and practices healing and the minor spells which women can get away with casting in Eastern Europe.

Amanusa has suffered loss and abuses in the past, so when Jax appears in her garden she is reluctant to trust him, even after he introduces himself as the former blood servant of Yvaine, a deceased blood sorceress from England. Before she died, Yvaine commanded Jax to find her successor, and that is what Jax believes Amanusa to be.

Jax becomes possessed by Yvaine’s magic, and the dead sorceress communicates with Amanusa through him, telling Amanusa that a great evil is rising and that blood sorcery will be needed to combat it. Amanusa begins to feel sympathy for Jax, but she is afraid to accept his offer to teach her blood magic. She knows that to learn true sorcery is to risk the persecution of the Inquisition, which hunts down women who practice powerful magic.

Still, Amanusa is hungry for justice, so when Jax explains that blood magic is the working of justice rather than evil, it does not take Amanusa long to change her mind. She is only beginning to learn how to use her abilities when a group of anarchists whose camp isn’t far from her cottage insist that she come and heal one of their wounded.

One of the anarchists, Teo, clearly wants to rape Amanusa, but Jax, who pretends to be slow-witted so that the anarchists will allow him to accompany Amanusa to the camp, is determined to protect her.

At the anarchist camp, Amanusa and Jax encounter an insectile machine made of metal that has injured a man and exudes evil. They manage to contain the thing, which they sense is anti-magic, in a box.

Eventually, Teo pushes his luck and Amanusa’s blood magic is set loose. Jax and Amanusa escape the camp, but rumors follow them, and they soon find themselves in the hands of the Inquisition. They must attempt another daring getaway, and hope that they reach England safely.

Meanwhile, in France, English wizards are investigating the appearance of a patch of evil space inhabited by insectile machines which have killed children. A similar patch has appeared in England. One of the wizards, Henry, thinks blood magic will be needed to combat this evil. But only women have an affinity for blood magic, and the other wizards think no good can come of teaching magic to women. Not only that, there are no blood sorceresses left…

I began New Blood with high hopes. I love the concept of the steampunk genre which blends fantasy, science fiction or paranormal elements with the setting of our own nineteenth century or a world which contains nineteenth century level technology (I believe that the “steam” part of the term “steampunk” refers to the nineteenth century railroads and boats which were powered by steam engines).

In this case, though, I felt that I didn’t get as much of a feel for the setting as I had hoped. Occasionally there was a mention of some period item such as hoop skirts or railroads, but there was not enough period detail for me to feel transported a century and half back in time. There was also not as strong a regional and cultural flavor to the depictions of the Romania and Paris settings as I would have liked.

Another problem for me was the characters. Amanusa and Jax are both sympathetic characters who gradually grow to care about one another, but neither one was compelling to me. I felt that I could stop reading without wondering about what happened to them in their future.

When I tried to figure out why I felt this way, I realized that, in the section that I read, neither one of them had conflicted feelings for very long, nor did they badly want anything that they could not attain.

True, Amanusa did resist accepting the role of blood sorceress at first, but it didn’t take her long to change her mind. And yes, Amanusa did want justice for her loved ones, but it didn’t take her that long to attain it. And even there, Amanusa kept thinking of her need in terms of justice, but since we weren’t given specific memories of her dead loved ones, nor her feelings of sorrow for them, it was hard for me to feel invested in seeing this justice attained.

As for Jax, he was a fairly muted character and after the opening scene, in which he feared Amanusa, he did not seem to have deep feelings beyond his liking for Amanusa and his occasional anger or worry when she was threatened. I understand that his feelings were sublimated partly was because he was under Yvaine’s spells for so long, but still, it made it hard for me to care deeply about his fate.

The part of the book that I read had an episodic feel to it. Amanusa and Jax seemed to go from one situation to another but these felt more like separate incidents that happened to the same characters than like a whole, connected story about the two of them.

The main, overarching plot wasn’t the story of Jax’s mission to find Amanusa in the nick of time, or of Amanusa’s quest for justice; it was the story of the evil patches rising across Europe and of Amanusa’s training in the use of blood magic. This story failed to compel me for two reasons. The first is that stories of the rise of a dangerous evil shrouded in mystery which threatens the land and must be combated through magic have been a mainstay of the fantasy genre at least since Tolkien, and therefore, it’s not a premise that feels very fresh to me.

Secondly, I fully acknowledge that I am probably not a member of the target audience for this book. I read more for compelling characters than I do for dramatic plots (though I love it when I get both in the same book). I was also hoping for more romantic development than I got in the first third of the New Blood. The book is labeled “Paranormal Romance,” but to me, the fantasy elements seemed more pronounced than the romantic ones.

I suspect that readers of epic sword-and-sorcery fantasy might enjoy this book, though. The prose is solid, the characters sympathetic and I also appreciate that in their relationship, Amanusa and Jax don’t fall into typical gender roles. I wish that the section I read had gelled better for me, and kept me turning the pages. I also wish the book luck in finding its audience. For me, New Blood is a DNF.

Sincerely,

Janine

This book can be purchased in mass market from Amazon. No ebook format yet.

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Harlequin Lightning Reviews: January 2009 Edition

Jane — Sat, 17 Jan 2009 18:00:35 +0000

Tycoon’s Pregnant Mistress by Maya Banks.

I laughed a little when I finished this book because it had virtually all the common HP/SD tropes smushed into one small category. We have the secret baby, amnesia, asshole boyfriend with trust issues, evil other woman, and an abduction for added spice (plus the requisite travel to an exotic locale).

There is something kind of fun about a secret baby mistress abduction amnesia story but the melodrama level was a bit too high for me. Essentially the heroine is the mistress of a wealthy developer and she is unjustly accused of selling secrets to his competitor. She’s virtually tossed out of his home and then kidnapped. But once the kidnappers realize that there is no use for her, she is released unharmed. This stretched my credibility even for an HP. As a result of her trauma, she gets amnesia and her lover comes to take care of her and as a result learns that she could not have possibly sold secrets to his competitor. Of course, why he couldn’t have figured out that before, I’m not sure. C

This book can be purchased in mass market from Amazon or ebook format from the Sony Store and other etailers.

Antonides’ Forbidden Wife by Anne McAllister

Two words: Asian Heroine. I’m giving this book a B just for that. This might be my new grading scale. Every book with an Asian heroine starts at a B grade from the beginning. Actually, I think I would have given this book a B even without my personal race bias.

PJ Antonides marries Ally (half Japanese) as a favor over 10 years ago and neither bothered to get a divorce. PJ kind of liked the excuse of being married. It was an easy way to fob off his family and other women even though no one was really sure whether to believe him. Ally decides she is going to marry this nice doctor and trots off to see the PJ to get her divorce, only PJ isn’t so sure that he wants this divorce. He tells Ally that he isn’t going to sign the papers unless she pretends to be his wife for an upcoming family reunion. This is a story of mini misunderstandings, unrequited feelings, misaligned stars, and PJ’s charming Greek family.

Note to Harlequin: just because the model has straight hair doesn’t make her Asian.

This book can be purchased in mass market from Amazon or ebook format from the Sony Store and other etailers.

Her Ruthless Italian Boss by Christine Hollis

I read this book with a look of wtfery on my face. I could feel it. My face was contorted for at least the first 20 pages, as I tried to figure out what the hell was going on with the characters. Beth met Luca Francesco a few years ago when Luca was in the army. They were in love but Beth didn’t want to marry a soldier. Or maybe she didn’t want to marry someone poor. Or maybe she wanted to marry Luca but he turned her down. Luca is now one of the richest men in Europe, Beth has no money, and his heart was broken so much that he wants revenge or he doesn’t want revenge, he wants to court her, or something. Seriously, I had no idea what was going on in this story. The motivations of the character were more slippery than a wet fish. Beth was a doormat throughout much of what I read, first lamenting her monetary loss but then deriding any efforts to see to her comfort. Luca hates Beth for leaving him and vows something but also treats her like spun glass.

Ultimately I gave up because, well, it just didn’t make sense. DNF

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REVIEW: Mr. Cavendish, I Presume by Julia Quinn

Jayne — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 09:00:15 +0000

Dear Mrs. Quinn,

I didn’t start reading your books until the publication of the second Bridgerton novel. The hoopla surrounding it was impossible to miss. Once I’d finished it, I had to go back and read the first book and then each of the following books in the series. My favorite remains Colin and Penelope’s story. As I read each novel after book four, I noticed that my enjoyment dimmed slightly. Not by much but, yes, there was a downward trend. But at eight books it was a lengthy series and such is to be expected.

I wasn’t thrilled with the book that came next, Miranda Cheever, as shown by my C+ review grade. But I heard that this was an older manuscript you’d pulled out, dusted off and polished up for publication while you worked on two all new books. So, okay I was still willing to keep reading your novels. And with “The Lost Duke of Wyndham,” at first it looked like you and I were sympatico again.

But even though my final grade for “Duke” was better than “Cheever,” I couldn’t help but notice that certain aspects of the writing style were beginning to stand out as annoying for me. When I began to read “Mr. Cavendish,” what had been slightly annoying in the later Bridgerton books and vastly irritating at the beginning of “Duke” became something I couldn’t overcome. Namely, the over bantering dialogue. It’s like the book is trying to be a 30’s sophisticated movie on steroids.

The circle blathering, mental and verbal, is enough to drive me insane. You didn’t used to write this way. I’m sure of it and Jane feels the same way. I made it through the last book because it seemed to die down after about the 1/2 way mark but this time, I’ve had it. I just can’t take it anymore. As Amelia and Thomas jibbered on to each other, talked over each other and repeated each other, to me, literally ad nauseum, I ended up huffing (at my ereader) “just bloody well get the *&^$@# on with this scene.” They didn’t. At which point I fumed,” Shut up. Just _shut_ up!” To no avail.

Then Amelia heads off in mental la la land so often that the other characters often have to yank her back and tell her what they all said during the 5 minutes she was off in space.

It wasn’t just the craft that didn’t work for me but the story as well. There’s the hook of this book. Namely, that we see Thomas and Amelia’s PsOV for the events that were covered in “Wyndham.” I was curious and admit to looking forward to watching you handle this. I also liked Thomas a great deal in book one but in this one, he was more a snotty nosed brat for much of what I read. Amelia had her moments as well. At the start, I had thought this could prove interesting- hidden depths and all – but then she began to annoy me too.

As for the dual plot told from different PsOV, nah, didn’t work too well. Maybe if I’d enjoyed the actual writing style used for the story, then it could have. But endless yammering + same plot = annoying –> nuts.

I hope that this isn’t the parting of ways for me and your books. And obviously your writing style is still working well for tons of readers so I have no expectations that you’ll change it. Perhaps a fresh plot will rejuvenate my interest but alas, for “Mr. Cavendish” it’s a DNF.

~Jayne

This book can be purchased in mass market from Amazon or Powells or ebook format.

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REVIEW: The Spymaster’s Lady by Joanna Bourne

Janine — Mon, 19 May 2008 20:00:50 +0000

Dear Ms. Bourne,

It’s taken me a while to get around to reading your debut, The Spymaster’s Lady. Back in the winter, Robin asked me if I would review it in a conversational review with her before your next book came out, and I promised that I would. When I got to reading it last week, my repsonse to The Spymaster’s Lady was far from Robin’s own experience of the book and she suggested that I convert the notes I had prepared for a conversational review into this letter instead, so that the review could stand on its own.

Readers who have not yet done so can find a plot summary for The Spymaster’s Lady in Jane’s A- review. Another opinion can be found in Jayne’s A- review. And readers should also be aware that this review will contain spoilers.

The writing in The Spymaster’s Lady is crystalline in its beauty and sharpness. The prose is just gorgeous, scintillating, and as others have noted, the French dialogue and Annique’s POV thoughts in French are absolutely spot on in capturing the cadences of the French tongue. You are a brilliant stylist, a wordsmith of the first order, and I am just in awe of your gift for language.

Therefore, I want so badly to love this book and give it my whole heart, and it is frustrating that I can’t.

My frustration centers on Annique’s character, but I don’t really dislike Annique herself. I feel that she is cute and therefore could have been endearing, but the problem I run into is that I don’t feel that her portrayal is consistent, or that she is all that she is being described as. To explain what I’m saying, I will go through my issues one by one.

First, we are told that Annique is an amazing spy, but as a good friend of mine pointed out when we discussed the book, every time Annique and Grey grapple in any way, he always gets the upper hand. When he wants to entrap her in chapter two, he succeeds (and he does it by using her thirst for water against her, as if she were a wild animal). When she tries to escape in the carriage, he stops her. When she tried to escape again (being softhearted and not wanting to kill him in the process), he knocks her away and hurts her. When he decides to drug her with opium so that she won’t attempt another escape, she does not detect the opium in her coffee, even though she’s blind and so her other senses are supposedly acute. And on it goes… He gets the upper hand every time, and puts one over on her more than once in the process.

There were a few times when Annique was able to do something that showed a bit of competence, especially toward the beginning of the book. I would get my hopes up that maybe the strong, successful spy described in everyone’s POV thoughts would materialize, but then Grey would set out to best her again, and she’d fall for his next trick. This made the feel stymied, especially in the book’s first half. By the second half, when Annique began to give away the most important state secrets she possessed to a man whom she thought was a complete stranger, I had given up my hopes that there was a brilliant female spy to be found in the pages of The Spymaster’s Lady.

Second, Annique also seems too vulnerable and innocent to me for someone who has been spying since childhood. I felt that her innocence and sense of wonder were childlike to a point where the age and power gaps between her and Grey were disturbing and made me uncomfortable at times, most especially when they were having sex.

There are places where the dialogue reinforces Annique’s extreme youth and inexperience, for example, Adrian actually says to her “Annique, you will not grow up to be big and strong if you don’t eat your vegetables” (I realize this was a witty remark, but it encapsulates the way I saw Annique). And Grey says, “You’re not a child, Annique. Stop acting like one.” Adrian calls her “Ma pauvre” and Grey, “My little halibut.” To me these sound like the kinds of things parents say to children. It made me feel that the heroine was being infantilized.

Third, I feel that Annique’s virginity is very improbable given how she makes her living. When Grey realizes that she doesn’t have much sexual experience, he has this thought:

How many men, Annique? Not many, I’ll bet. Did your masters keep you unawakened so you could play the boy more convincingly? Their mistake. It left her vulnerable. Achingly, ignorantly vulnerable. He’d use that against her, sooner or later.

It’s that “Achingly, ignorantly vulnerable” that I have a problem with in a character who is said to be a super-competent spy. And I also don’t understand why staying a virgin would make it easier for Annique to act the part of a boy. It’s my opinion that one is either a good actor, or a bad actor. I don’t see how sexual experience or lack thereof makes a difference.

Since I don’t feel that it’s a logical motive to keep a spy a virgin, especially when she already knows how to act the part of a courtesan and could no doubt glean important secrets through sex, I feel that the real reason for Annique’s virginity is to telegraph to readers that despite her being a French spy, Annique is a good girl and pure of heart. And using a heroine’s sexual ignorance to show that she is virtuous is admittedly not my favorite trope in romance.

I felt that the virginity=virtue trope was reinforced by the way Grey at first thought of Annique as both evil and a whore, and even tried to dress her in a whore’s clothing until he came to the realization that she was not an evil killer and not sexually experienced. The two realizations coincided with one another and came at the same point in the story.

This reminded me a bit of some of the romances from the 1970s and 1980s, like Woodiwiss’s The Flame and the Flower, where the hero thinks the heroine is a whore and treats her badly until he finds physical proof of her virginity. I am glad that Grey did not go that far, but he did treat Annique coldly at first and his realization that she was neither sexually experienced not evil came on the heels of a scene in which they come close to loveless sex, so I was very strongly reminded of this “whore or virgin” trope.

A fourth reason why Annique’s character does not work so well for me is that she is a paragon. Vulnerable, brave, supposedly smart and said to excel at her job, brilliant at memorization, virginal, pure and gallant — not a personality flaw in sight. Nothing to give her a shade of gray. And that, especially when combined with her improbable virginity, makes her less than believable for me, and harder to relate to.

A fifth problem I had with the book was not in Annique herself but in the British spies’ reactions to Annique. Not only was she a paragon, but I kept feeling I was being told (in the hero and his friends’ thoughts and dialogue) what a paragon she was. How clever, how brave, how good, how expert a spy.

The hero and the secondary characters’ going on about Annique’s virtues made me feel that I was being told how to interpret Annique’s character. In other words, it felt heavy-handed. And since I did not agree with their assessment of Annique as a great spy, the feeling that I was constantly being told that she was something that she wasn’t was extremely frustrating to me.

There were times when other things felt heavy-handed to me as well, for example, there’s a conversation between Grey and his men when he tells them that Annique was in Bruges when some of their fellow spies died. Adrian and Doyle start recapping who died there, who they served with in the past, and how it was supposed to be an easy exchange of the Albion plans for the gold. But I saw no reason for Adrian and Doyle to be telling Grey that — he’s the section head spymaster, so he already knows all this. Which makes me feel like the information is there only for readers, and not because it is a natural subject matter for the characters.

Something else that felt heavy-handed to me was Annique’s admiration for the English spies. It was like the mirror image of their admiration for her, and those were places where I felt that rather than being left the room to interpret the characters of Grey, Doyle and Adrian for myself, I was being told what to think of them.

And that brings me to another topic, which is that the way entire British Service behaved around Annique seemed out of character for spies and interrogators who needed the information she held so badly.

In a nutshell, my problems with The Spymaster’s Lady all come down to the issue of believability. Spying is a rather ruthless and dirty business, and that was not reflected in the book, at least, not to my satisfaction.

I had difficulty suspending disbelief and that’s where I feel that I needed more — more competence from Annique, whose ineptitude only grew in the book’s second half, more ruthlessness and shades of gray from all the characters, more showing and less telling me (via the chorus of Annique’s admirers) what to think and feel. One of the things I look for in a book is room for interpretation, a place for my own imagination to connect with the characters, and for all the gorgeous writing, I don’t feel that I got that here.

At this point I have reached page 311 (chapter thirty-three), but the more I read, the more frustrated I grow. I don’t think I’d have made it this far if not for my original commitment to Robin. I’ve now read well over four-fifths of the book, so I could force myself to finish, but then I’d have to grade it, and there is simply no grade I could give The Spymaster’s Lady that would be reflective of both my appreciation of the beauty of the language, and my growing frustration that I did not find this book believable, realistic, or convincing. The more I read, the more the latter overshadows the former, and so, I think it best that I stop here. DNF.

Sincerely,

Janine

This book can be purchased in mass market from Amazon or Powells or ebook format.

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What Happens in Vegas by Jodi Lynn Copeland, Lauren Dane, Kit Tunstall and Anya Bast

Jane — Thu, 15 May 2008 09:00:47 +0000

Hot for You by Jodi Lynn Copeland. This is a friends to lovers story (the first of two in the anthology). Carinna was a cocktail waitress at The Liege, a resort in Las Vegas. She likes her men like her martinis “dirty as a girl could get ‘em.” The man she want right now is her good friend, Jack. Jack is a local fireman who is working to parlay his mastery at the poker table into a classic car restoration business. Carrina loves Jack and Jack loves Carrina but Carrina can’t allow herself to have a relationship.

The story is told in alternating first person. I don’t mind this technique and I thought the author did a good job showing the distinct personalities through the varying narration but I did feel that Jack’s narration was a bit florid with unintentionally comic results:

The thought of her warm pussy sucking at my tongue had me returning to that fateful night four months ago.

“Pussy sucking” and “fateful nights” aren’t two phrases that I ordinarily would put together in the mind of one man. The paragraph goes on having Jack ponder their “intertwined destiny”. The problem with this story along with all but Dane’s is that the non stop sex (aka pussy sucking) overshadowed any character development (fateful nights). Carrina’s rationale for not wanting permanency with Jack was a common one (for romances) but not well developed which made her look foolish and sometimes mean. C-

Stripped by Lauren Dane. Dahlia is a burlesque dancer at The Dollhouse. She’s dancing to pay for graduate school. Nash Emery, brother of the owner of The Dollhouse, sees Dahlia and crassly hits on her, assuming that private performances can easily be obtained. Dahlia turns him down flat. Nash is intrigued and begins showing up on a regular basis and continues to pursue Dahlia.

The problem I had with this story was that it lacked conflict until the very last. It was a good conflict wherein Dahlia questions whether she, a burlesque dancer, can fit in with Nash’s upper crust, wealthy society crowd. I did feel this was undercut a bit by the fact that Nash’s brother owns The Dollhouse, but it was sold fairly well. The problem was that it was too little, too late. C

Red-Handed by Kit Tunstall. Amy and her cousin, Kevin, try to rip off The Liege and get caught. Amy is hauled to a back room and is threatened with owner and knife wielding maniac, Roan Cavello. Immediately upon discovering that Amy is a woman and not the young boy Cavello thought she was, he gets a hard on and starts thinking about “driving his cock into her pussy”.

“Torn between guilt and curiosity, he continued his perusal, deciding she had nice legs from what he could see under the baggy denim. In her current state, she was a six, but, with the right tools, she could definitely be an eight.”

So he carts the thief off to his bedroom where she bargains off her debt by serving as his sub for six weeks. At this point, the sexual tension was so contrived that I just had no desire to keep reading about these two. I know that space is short in an anthology contribution, but there was no transition from hating cheaters to enslaving them as a sex sub. Roan goes from holding a knife to her to calling her “Beloved little cheat” within the space of about five pages and Amy being told “Your body already knows who its new master is” within that same space. He’s lying on top of her, fondling her breasts and her body suddenly knows that there is a new master? That breast must be some kind of receptor. DNF.

The Deal by Anya Bast. Cassidy is a shill at The Liege where she goes around gambling with house money and encouraging patrons to play more freely. James carter was a dealer at The Liege and the best friend of Cassidy’s former fiance, Damian. Damian had stood her up at the altar much to James’ delight and guilt. Delight because James had always wanted Cassidy and guilt because he was happy that Damian stood her up.

James has been biding his time until he can approach Cassidy and once they physically get together, he believes the deal is sealed. Cassidy is determined that the physical aspect of their relationship not affect their friendship in anyway. James response to this is to bet Cassidy a card game where the winner gets to decide five nights of sex. I had no idea what the card game had to do with keeping the physical aspect of the friendship separate from the friendship. It seemed that it would only exacerbate the mixed feelings that Cassidy was trying to balance, but since this was an erotic romance, who cares about those nit picky plot things. Bast is actually one of my favorite erotic romance anthology writers but this one seemed all sex and no emotional connection. C-

What Happens in Vegas is an erotic romance but the emphasis was on the sex and not so much on the romance.

This book can be purchased in trade paperback from Amazon or Powells or ebook format.

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Manga First Impressions 3: Land of the Blindfolded, I.O.N., Sand Chronicles

ジェーン(Jān) — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 20:40:17 +0000

Dear Readers,

Two more vol 1’s from Viz. But the first is a Vol 1 from CMX, another publisher who brings quality shoujo to the US.

Land of the Blindfolded by Tsukuba Sakura. CMX. Retail $9.99. Not rated, but I’d say high school and up. 9 volumes (complete in Japan and in the US.)

(I should mention that the main story only takes up about 2/3 of the first book. There are also two unrelated short stories at the end that are rather sweet, both romantic.)

I actually heard of this story back when I first started reading manga and the concept intrigued me. I never knew it was released over here though until recently, and so I bought the first volume. It’s definitely a cut above other shoujo.

The story involves a high school girl named Kanade who can sometimes see the future when people touch her. She thinks of it like living in the land of the blindfolded, only her blindfold sometimes slips. One day she bumps into a young man in the hallway, Arou. He can see the past when he touches someone. He’s a bit bitter about the fact that he can’t change anything, but Kanade can. Kanade thinks she was given her gift to make things better. Arou’s philosophy is that they were given this gift to observe, and he won’t help Kanade.

The book plays with both of these ideas a lot, showing the good and bad of interference and non-interference, and how both Kanade and Arou are torn by what they have and what they can and can’t do with it. It hurts, being able to see what they do when they can’t change things, or when they screw them up worse. This draws them to each other, because no one else understands what they’re going through.

There are a few interesting side characters in this book as well. Kanade’s best friend, who is shallow and self-depreciating in her pursuit of the boy she likes, but completely aware of what she is doing and why. The boy she’s chasing almost qualifies as @sshole of the year, until the author shows that maybe that girl got through to him. And then there’s the new kid at school, another psychic who can see the future, but one who likes to play games with it, a jerk but one there seems to be hope for. All of them are three dimensional, and I look forward to reading more about them.

Most high school romances don’t concern themselves with the ethics of the special gifts the characters have, or about the characters surrounding them. The fact that this one does, and does it well, makes it a special series above and beyond the average shoujo romance. I hope it sustains that. B+.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I.O.N. by Arina Tanemura. Viz. Retail $9.99. Rated: T for Teen. 1 volume, complete.

Ms Tanemura is the mangaka of the very popular Full Moon wo Sagashite and Kamikaze Kaitou Jeanne, so I was familiar with her work. KKJ doesn’t have much depth and really is rather silly (a magical girl reincarnation of Joan of Arc who fights demon-possessed paintings? Okaaay.), but Full Moon wo Sagashite does have depth and I recommend it, only be prepared to cry. But considering how different those two works are I had no idea what to expect from this single volume story.

ION turns out to be a fairly standard shoujo romance that didn’t do much for me. Like Monkey High the characters are quite young looking, and act it. And while I don’t mind this in a book like oh, Kitchen Princess where the focus isn’t so much romance but following your dream, when the focus is solely on romance older is just better for me.

The book is about a young girl, Ion, who chants her name when she’s in trouble because it makes her feel better, maybe like a mantra or something (funny, when I do that it sounds conceited). But when she comes in contact with an experimental substance made by the psychic research club at school and starts chanting, she’s suddenly telekinetic! This leads to hijinks galore!

Young teens might think this is a cute story. Or they might be bored from comments I’ve seen on message boards. I tended to agree with the message board commenters. Another DNF.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sand Chronicles by Hinako Ashihara. Viz. Retail $9.99. T+ for Older Teens. 10 Volumes (complete in Japan, 2 out here)

I instantly fell in love with this series. It’s so good. 26 year old Ann is getting ready to marry and move overseas, and is packing up her things. An old hourglass falls out and makes her remember when she got it 14 years before, the year she met, I think, her husband to be.

It starts when her parents have just divorced and she and her mother have gone to live in the country with her grandmother. She’s such a real 12 year old, emotional, volatile, cynical, vulnerable, trying so hard to act the adult and help her mom make it through tough times yet still child enough to enjoy the world around her. Her own older self comments at one point, “I was still so innocent.”

I think everyone could identify with Ann. Her troubles are shown honestly, from her serious family ones to less serious problems with her period and friends. But the fun times are shown honestly too. Her friends never let her forget to laugh. Sometimes it’s the only thing they can give her. That leads to some incredibly funny moments, as does the mangaka showcasing everyone’s foibles through asides and comments in the background.

Volume one shows Ann gradually making friends, in the real way young people drift toward one another in small communities. Two of her best friends are boys her own age, the athletic Daigo, who she falls for and who likes her, and the upper class Fuji, who falls for her. It’s a love triangle that I have the feeling will last for the next 14 years, and we won’t know the outcome until we see just who she’s going to marry in the future. The whole set up lets me know that these relationships will be treated seriously, and that there will be some hard decisions for all three after they learn to see themselves and each other honestly. This has the makings of a great romance.

If there’s a short-coming, it’s in the second half of the story where for a moment it veers close to shoujo cliché territory when a rival for Daigo appears. But the reason for that section is all in how Fuji and Daigo respond, which seems to foreshadow an awful lot to me.

OK Viz, you sold me. I am a complete and utter fan. I want more of this story NOW. A-.

Sincerely,

ジェーン

(Jān)

These can be purchased or pre-ordered at most bookstores, or they can be found at a discount at one of my favorites places to buy manga here:Land of the Blindfolded, I.O.N., Sand Chronicles

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