Belated review: O Come All Ye Kinky anthology

O Come All Ye Kinky

A BDSM holiday anthology edited by Sarah Frantz

Disclosure:  review copy provided by Dr. Frantz.

© 2012 Riptide Publishing

I’ve started and then deleted this post over and over in the last couple of weeks — nothing intelligent wants to come from my fingertips.  But the longer I go without posting, the less likely it is that I’ll post anything at all.  So here, in brief, are my thoughts on each of the stories.

Tree Topper, by Jane Davitt

Martin’s new to the scene, and his sub Stan has recently stopped taking him seriously. Their tree has floggers, clamps, and cuffs underneath it, but will they ever be used? Frustrated and confused, Martin knows it will take more than a star to guide him on his way to becoming the Dom Stan needs—but their path to happiness might be shorter than he thinks.

A sweet story about a new Dom who feels like he’s failing at his first D/s relationship.  The conflict here was all about lack of communication, which can be a delicate trope to employ without making the MCs either TSTL or unsympathetic, but it worked here.  I really liked that the MCs of this story TALKED to each other in the end about what was going on (or not) in their relationship in order to solve their problem. (B)

 ’Twas the Night, by Ava March

Percival Owen yearns for the nights when he can kneel before his lover, even though no self-respecting gentleman willingly submits to another. Michael wants his first Christmas with Percy to be perfect, but is frustrated by Percy’s inability to ask for what he wants. The gift Michael offers Percy—and that Percy offers in return—is the best Percy could ever hope to receive: his will to submit.

Historical m/m set in the English Regency or thereabout is hit or miss for me, because the HEA often can feel forced to fit modern expectations about gay relationships that were generally not acceptable or standard at the time, but the setting works here.  In this story, a new sub is struggling with his desires as wicked, and Christmas spent with his lover, being forced to articulate what he wants, helps him come to terms with them.  The HFN is tender but also notes the social and legal risk of their relationship. (B)

Fireworks, by Katie Porter

Rachel’s job is taking her to Tokyo, which means leaving behind her lover and submissive, Emma. When she summons Emma for one last hurrah on New Year’s Eve, Emma answers, hoping desperately to be able to break through her ma’am’s emotional barriers and find the spark of love among the glittering fireworks.

Personal quirk:  I hate the word “helluva”.  In dialogue, I can let it slide, much the way “gonna” gets a pass.  Early use of it in this short story distracted me, and didn’t entirely suit the voice of the narrator using it (IMO).  I appreciated the f/f entry in the primarily m/m anthology, but didn’t love this story, mostly because the conflict felt weak, hinging on the personality and background of one MC who hadn’t been developed enough. (C+)

Candy Caning, by L.A. Witt

Nate is dreading the annual Christmas visit with his family, during which they will ignore or insult his partner and Dominant. Stephen tries hard to take Nate’s mind off the trip with the promise—and threat—of a three-foot-long candy cane. It’s a race to see if Nate’s resolve or the candy cane will shatter first.

There are things you put up with because you love your partner, and usually those things involve unpleasant holidays and/or family members; in this case, it’s both all at once, since Nate’s mother denigrates Stephen publicly during their holiday get-togethers.  Even anticipating it is causing tension between the two in the run up to the holiday.  While I was concerned about the potential use of the candy cane (so brittle and easily broken, even the large ones), I liked the teasing and anticipation, followed by the mushy relationshipy exchange that follows the play. (B)

Submissive Angel, by Joey W. Hill

After Robert found Ange bleeding in an alley, he employed the man in his vintage toy store as an act of charity. However, this Christmas, the eccentric young dancer will offer his thanks—and himself—to teach a brokenhearted Master how to open himself to love again.

My favorite story in the anthology, Submissive Angel reads like a holiday fairytale come to life.  In fact, I wondered if there was going to be a supernatural story behind Ange’s appearance at first.  Beautifully emotional and erotic. (A)

Open Return, by Elyan Smith

Fifteen years ago, Zach left the small Midwestern town he grew up in, confused and scared and determined to figure out who he was. Now transformed, he’s drawn back by the memory and promise of the dominant couple he left behind. Laura and Scott are still together, and as the year draws to a close, they explore old feelings and new ones as they discover they’ve all been waiting for Zach to come home.

This was an ambitious story involving a triad and a returning transgender MC that never really gelled for me.  Perhaps it was the isolation and angst of the narrator?  I liked the base plot but it didn’t really fit into the confines of a short story. (C)

Ring Out the Old and In the New, by Alexa Snow

Recovering from a mugging on the London Underground, Evan has barely left the house in weeks. His partner and Dom, Russell, finally manages to drag him outside on Christmas Eve, but it’s the surprise that Russell has waiting for him back home that helps Evan get past his trauma and remember what’s important: being on his knees for the man he loves.

The narrator in this story left me alternately sympathetic toward and frustrated by his almost-agoraphobia and ostrich-like behavior in the wake of his violent mugging.  The interaction with his partner is by turns aggravated, tender, and extremely hot.  Yet in the end I feel ambivalent about this story:  I liked the couple working through the aftermath, but wonder about the lack of professional mental health care. (Yes, yes, I know it’s fiction.  But fiction seems to gloss over so many serious problems, including mental health issues, with “love cures everything” even when that is manifestly not the case.)  (B-)

His Very Last Chance, by Kim Dare

Drew screwed up. So when his master, Kingsley, summons him on New Year’s Eve, he knows he deserves the punishment in store for him. Everything changed for Kingsley when he overheard Drew running his mouth to his friends on Boxing Day. Now, there’s only one way he can possibly ring in the New Year: starting over fresh, either with an ending or a new beginning.

The beginning of this story confused me: the narrator is expecting to be given his walking papers by his dom, in addition to being punished for oversharing in public, but I wasn’t clear why that drastic an end to their relationship is anticipated.  The expectation creates drama for Drew but feels overdone when Kingsley’s POV is provided, like a trumped up Big Mis.  Still, the story was well paced and I liked the relationship dynamic otherwise.  (B)

 

The stories are not linked in any way other than the involvement of BDSM in each story, which is probably for the best IMO — it is hard to have multiple authors with very different voices and styles write individual stories with common characters or settings.  Overall, I enjoyed this anthology and would be interested in reading other work by the new-to-me authors or revisiting the authors I haven’t tried lately.

Formatting and editing:  I have heard good things about Riptide’s editorial process, and if this book is an exemplar I’ll be looking to read more from them.  There were no highlighted passages with notes about punctuation abuse, homophone misuse, or run-on sentences…which is sadly uncommon in my ebook reading.  Very pleased.

Recommended.

Recently read

The Hot Floor by Josephine Myles

Really like this author’s voice, although not all the books I’ve tried work for me.  This one did for the most part.  It is one of very few m/m/m books that works as something other than straight up porn, or has the third character as anything other than a brief distraction.  I thought the narrator needed a little development or more background, but otherwise was pleased with this book.  (B-)

A Younger Man by Cameron Dane

This book succumbs to pretty stereotypical bifurcation of gay men into masculine tops and feminine bottoms, in terms of equating sexual behavior with public/daily life.   In addition to having all the traditional female characteristics, the younger man was a victim/martyr (I think I was supposed to sympathize but it was Too Much) who engaged in TSTL behavior to create the two big outside conflicts.  The logic behind one Big Conflict was lacking and also playing into the Evil Woman m/m fiction trope.  Also, there was way too much sex on the page – which bogged down the pacing and made the book drag.  (D+)

Mourning Heaven by Amy Lane

This book was a complete mess.  The narrator is an utter Mary Sue who is also spineless and a creepy voyeur.  The other main character needs serious mental health care:  there’s a difference between being damaged and being broken, and love isn’t a panacea, despite the narrator’s opinion and activities.  The women in the book are either: 1) victims; 2)  losers; 3) irresponsible sluts; or 4) close-minded bigots.  In fact, the women are to blame for pretty much every bad thing that happens in the book.  The whole thing was an angsty wankfest of misery with a chaser of painful, awkward, seriously squick-inducing sex.  I kept reading because of the train wreck factor – I wouldn’t recommend it and can’t say I enjoyed it, but I couldn’t look away.  (F)

As usual, YMMV.  Both of the train wrecks have gotten fairly high ratings at Good Reads and Amazon, so…

Random observation

I’ve seen a few tweets about JR Ward’s book signing and excitement about her next BDB book, which is going to include a gay romance. (Yay? That whole series is a hot mess, so I’m not waiting with baited breath.)

Anyway, I find it somewhat entertaining that one very vocal fan of this couple is a reader who at RWA 2009 stood up in Ward’s Q&A and said that she totally didn’t get/see/feel the homoerotic vibe from Ward’s books that other readers did.

Perhaps on reread it struck her?

Good and bad and temptation

In reverse order:

The temptation.  Audible.com is having a sale on classics through September 30th:  two books for one credit.  I bought copies of Don Quijote, Middlemarch, A Passage to India, and North & South.  I’ll have audio material for ages now, although I feel vaguely guilty about buying yet another version of DQ (5th – ebook and 2 editions in English, 1 edition in Spanish, and now the audio English).  Actually, in addition to the bargain price of the books, the narrator was the draw for two of them.  Juliet Stevenson did a fabulous job with Persuasion, and she narrates Middlemarch and North & South.  I’m going to end up buying audio versions of all Austen’s work…and A Room of One’s Own…and Lady Windermere’s Fan. Oh gods, my budget.

The bad.  I downloaded Chaser by Rick Reed; I can’t remember who recommended it originally, but the blurb was kind of interesting, in part because it had an overweight hero, which is as rare in m/m as an overweight heroine is in het romance, if not more so.  The writing wasn’t terrible, in terms of mechanics, although I did highlight some weird phrasing and punctuation.  But the stereotypes!  The manipulative, exploitative, sexually-overdone, shallow, cosmetically and gym enhanced BFF.  The hero who let his BFF walk all over him, who was ashamed of who he was attracted to, who jumped to conclusions at the drop of a hat, and engaged in diva-ish behavior.  The other hero could’ve been interesting, but he was just a straw man.  After two hot nights of sex, he was motivated to change himself for his One Tru Wuv (to whom he couldn’t actually talk about his body issues or the big changes he was making in his life), but there was no foundation for who he had been before or why he was changing other than to appeal to the other MC.  Who was, basically, an asshole who couldn’t face his own fetishes even in the safety of a therapist’s office and never bothered to mention that he liked large men but then got pissed off when his two night stand lost a bunch of weight.   This could have been a great story, but ended up being a shrill, gay version of all the het romances in which characters only get an HEA or HFN if they are buff and gym-polished.  F to the nth degree.

The good.  The End of Nowhere by Elizabeth George.  Really enjoyed this book and have things to say about it but want to reread it before attempting what will likely be a spoilerific review.  This is George’s YA debut, and her afterword notes how much her editor had to guide her and how steep her learning curve was for this new genre.  Which makes me wonder:  another big name author jumping on the bandwagon of YA in light of its recent popularity?  Back at RWA2009, one of the panels I attended was about how to write YA.  One of the key points of the panel was that things that work in adult fiction do not work for YA fiction and not all authors can or should attempt to publish in the genre.  On one hand, this read as YA, not adult fiction edited into YA format or wedged into its constraints.  On the other hand, at some point the YA market will be saturated; as much as I like YA, I like adult fiction more and am not willing to read ever increasing amounts of YA as former adult fiction authors transition to the current money maker.

 

Read/reading now

I’ve recently read a few things that I’m not going to review in full or even in brief but I do want to mention them.

Kill You Twice by Chelsea Cain.  Book 5 of the Archie Sheridan series.  I commented over at AvidMysteryReader‘s blog that this is it for me with this series.  I started out loving the utterly twisted dynamic between Archie Sheridan and Gretchen Lowell, the serial killer who tortured him but chose not to kill him, because it was so different from anything else I had read in mysteries/thrillers.  It’s dysfunctional and fascinating but is growing stale for me as a reader:  I want the narrator/protagonist to progress as the series progresses, and it feels like Archie really isn’t, and that he doesn’t want to.  And at this point, I don’t trust that Cain will let him, because Gretchen as arch-nemesis sells books.  Beyond that, most of the major plot points felt extremely coincidental and/or utterly predictable and disappointing.  Not badly written, but not up to the standards of HeartSick.

He Speaks Dead by Adrienne Wilder.  M/m paranormal/horror.  The narrator is dead.  He’s a ghost, in love with a live guy who is psychic, and they have sex by taking possession of horny drunks, which seriously squicked me; not because of the sex but because the mental/ghost possession felt like a brain or psyche rape to me.  And their excuses parallel those of date rapists — she wanted it.  I found narrator pretty unsympathetic on the whole and the entire relationship seemed profoundly unhealthy — falling in love with a dead guy you never knew while he was alive?  The other hero needed serious therapy for a variety of things, not the least being his choice in lovers.   And the ending was a complete cop out.  If this had been a paper book, it would’ve hit the wall.

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J.K. Rowling.  This is the first Potter book that I read immediately upon publication, since I came to the series fairly late.  I haven’t re-read this book since it was published, and upon re-read the storytelling stands up but the writing does not.  Rowling could have stood a firmer editorial hand with this book, as well as the next two probably.

I’m working my way into Tana French’s new mystery, Broken Harbor.  I’ve never read her before.  Love the writing and the narrator’s voice, but I haven’t felt compelled to sit down and read the book cover to cover.  Perhaps this was the wrong place to start?

 

Review: But My Boyfriend Is

Title:  But My Boyfriend Is

Author:  K.A. Mitchell

(c) 2012, Samhain Publishing

Source:  eARC

Excerpt here.

Available for purchase August 21, 2012 at the usual electronic outlets.

Part of Mitchell’s Jacksonville-set series…even though it’s set in Austin, Texas.  A reader could pick up this book and understand all the action without reading the earlier books of the series.

Dylan Williams is not gay. Sometimes he gets off with other guys, but so what? He plans to get married someday—really married, like with a wife and kids. And he’s determined that his future family’s life will be the normal one he and his brothers never had.

Mike Aurietta is gay, but his job keeps him in the closet. He doesn’t usually risk frequenting infamous cruising places like Webber Park. But when he’s cutting through one night, he finds himself defending a victim from gay bashers.

It’s all Dylan can do to process the shock that anyone would want to hurt his quiet twin brother. At first he needs Mike’s eyewitness report to satisfy the gut-wrenching desire for revenge. Then he finds himself needing Mike’s solid, comforting presence…and the heat that unexpectedly flares between them.

 In the aftermath, Mike quickly learns not to expect too much from his conflicted lover. Though he never thought his good deed would come back to bite him in the ass. Or that hanging on to the possibility of love could force too many secrets out of the closet—and cost them both everything.

This book in PDF is 270 pages, including all the usual book contents – cover page, copyright page, author info, etc.  And there is a lot of action and heavy stuff packaged into the pages:  inter-racial dating…when you’re bisexual and not even out to yourself, becoming an adult abruptly, and separation anxiety, all mixed up with a healthy dollop of guilt.

The book opens with Dylan rushing into the ER, having learned that his identical twin, Darryl, was jumped as he walked through Webber Park, an area known for its cruising.  Except Darryl isn’t gay, Dylan is certain.  Dylan, on the other hand, is not unfamiliar with the park, which has provided him with string-free orgasms that don’t impinge on his fantasy future.  So what was Darryl doing in the park?  And who is this Mike dude who rescued him?  This sets up the external conflict for the book, catching the gay-bashers who bashed a straight guy by mistake, and the internal conflict in which Dylan is attracted to Mike but utterly resistant to the idea that he’s gay or bisexual, because that would mess up the perfect life he has planned.  Both characters have their lives set up the way they like them, with certain people and activities in separate boxes, and Daryl’s assault ultimately makes them dismantle the boxes or at least blur the lines separating the different areas of their lives.  What’s different from a lot of other m/m romances  in the internal conflict is that Mike, for all that he calls Dylan on his I’m not gay bullshit, isn’t an advocate for him to come out, just for him to accept himself as he is.

Dylan is twenty-two, a line chef at The Cheesecake Factory, living with his twin while he finishes up an engineering degree at UT.  Mike is an assistant athletic trainer for the Longhorns.  UT alumni and football fans are fanatical in their loyalty, so his devotion to his job and living on the DL to keep it seem pretty consistent to me:  Austin is a pretty laid-back place and is relatively liberal, but it’s still Texas and collegiate and professional sports remain one of the biggest bastions of homophobia.

In addition to the Dylan/Mike push-me-pull-you, there’s Dylan’s relationship with his twin.  This part of the story is very interesting to me (disclosure: I am a twin).  Because Darryl is absent for most of the book, readers don’t get to see the two interact much.  He isn’t a POV character so their relationship is viewed only through Dylan’s perspective and the snippets of information provided by other characters.  Darryl is a huge part of who Dylan is, and Dylan is clinging to that even as they are reaching a point when their contemporaries are going their separate ways, starting new careers, etc.

Given their ages and the content of the book, the New Adult label might be appropriate.  (Also, the fact that I wanted to give Dylan a sharp smack to the head, much the same way I want to deal with some of the 20-22 y.o. interns I work with. Technically adults under the law but really not so much.)

Recommendation:  very much enjoyed this book, would recommend it especially to readers looking for younger heroes.

I’m a fan of K.A. Mitchell’s work:  her voice and humor suit my taste.  There are a couple of books in her backlist that I have not *loved*, but as a rule her books are auto-buys and comfort re-reads for me.  Top three favorites:  No Souvenirs, Bad Boyfriend, Collision Course.  But My Boyfriend Is would come next on the list:  good stuff, not my favorite of Mitchell’s work but close to it.

What I’ve read lately

I meant to write full reviews for these two books, but the further I get from reading them, the less likely that becomes.  Instead, here are quick thoughts.

Indian Maidens Bust Loose by Vidya Samson

Borrowed this via Kindle Lending after it was reviewed by Sunita & Jayne at DearAuthor.  The first chapter didn’t immediately draw me in, so it wound up just sitting on my Kindle for a few weeks; when I was clearing out samples, I found it and decided to read it before returning.

There’s no romance on the page, although there are marital machinations, so the blurb about waiting for Prince Charming is misleading and not great marketing IMO.  Pretty standard for chick lit, even with the Indian aspect.  The pacing was a little wonky:  it could’ve used some editing or trimming; as the end of the book approached, it felt like a string of slapstick moments strung together.   Despite very slow pacing through the middle, the end arrived very quickly and wrapped everything up a little too neatly.  Over all, an enjoyable read by an author I would try again, but not a keeper.

Lessons for Survivors by Charlie Cochrane

This is another Cambridge Fellows Mystery, set post WW1.  It’s published by Cheyenne Publishing; the series had been with Samhain for the last several books, so I’m kind of curious about what prompted the publisher change.  Price-wise, it was a little expensive ($6.99) for the length (185 pages) compared to earlier editions.  I enjoyed the book as I read, because I like The Adventures of Orlando and Jonty, and yet in some ways it felt needlessly convoluted and also as if some opportunities were wasted.  The blurb mentions the huge threat of the sleuths being outed by a rival, yet that aspect of the story didn’t get much attention.  Not bad but not the best installment of the series IMO.

Frog by Mary Calmes

Title:  Frog (a tired prince/frog allusion)

Author:  Mary Calmes (new to me)

Publisher:  Dreamspinner (against my better judgment)

Why this book?  I liked the cover art and the idea of a modern day cowboy hero.

Weber Yates’s dreams of stardom are about to be reduced to a ranch hand’s job in Texas, and his one relationship is with a guy so far out of his league he might as well be on the moon. Or at least in San Francisco, where Weber stops to see him one last time before settling down to the humble, lonely life he figures a frog like him has coming.

 Cyrus Benning is a successful neurosurgeon, so details are never lost on him. He spotted the prince in a broken-down bull rider’s clothing from day one. But watching Weber walk out on him keeps getting harder, and he’s not sure how much more his heart can take. Now Cyrus has one last chance to prove to Weber that it’s not Weber’s job that makes him Cyrus’s perfect man, it’s Weber himself. With the help of his sister’s newly broken family, he’s ready to show Weber that the home the man’s been searching for has always been right there, with him. Cyrus might have laid down an ultimatum once, but now it’s turned into a vow—he’s never going to let Weber out of his life again. 

The long and short of it:  tell tell tell with very little show, and all told by a Gary Stu.  Includes the insta-family trope along with unprotected sex as demonstration of true love.

More specifically:

The book is narrated by Weber, an over-the-hill cowboy — he’s not old, relatively speaking, except for his chosen profession, in which he has not been successful.  He’s broke and on his way to a possible job in Alaska (not Texas) when he looks up his ex.  Cyrus, readers are told, is a very successful neurosurgeon who gave Weber an ultimatum the last time he drifted into town, but who still desperately loves Weber.   Cyrus is wealthy and handsome and at the top of his profession — he’s very much like a category hero, although unlike most categories, which have the wealthy, handsome hero be the one who does the leaving and steering of the relationship, he’s the needier, more passive partner, taking whatever time Weber has been willing to give him in the past.  Cyrus’s profession really isn’t relevant to the book, except as a reason in Weber’s mind for them not to be together — it affords him a nice lifestyle but otherwise doesn’t impinge on the plot in any way; he could have been any name-a-high-profile-and-pay profession.

At the same time as Weber’s return, Cyrus’s brother-in-law, the villain of the piece, runs off with the nanny, leaving his sister without child care.  And of course she immediately entrusts her three children to a random stranger because he’s dating her brother and therefore must be trustworthy.  Forget looking for someone whose qualifications run beyond ranching and rodeoing.  But of course Weber has the magic touch when it comes to children, getting the mute to talk and  instilling manners effortlessly.  (There’s one exchange in the book that I think was supposed to highlight Web’s courtly, cowboy manners (standard good manners to this reader), but which came across to me as backhanded criticism of Carolyn’s parenting.)

Since Weber is the narrator, his reliability is key.  I found his judgment to be less than reliable and verging on TSTL when it comes to the relationship, with his hesitation and wibbling about how Cyrus only loves him for his cowboy persona despite the fact that Cyrus says outright that isn’t what he wants/loves about Weber.  [It was never really clear to me what they loved about each other beyond the sex.]  As an extension of this, the lack of a sense of place or setting contributes to the disconnect:  Cyrus is willing to relocate and nothing about the plot seemed fixed in San Francisco, yet Weber is hung up on the distance between Texas (apparently the only place in the US where he can get a ranch hand job?) and San Francisco.  Aren’t there jobs for neurosurgeons in Texas?  Surely there are ranches near Dallas and other large cities in the Lone Star state.  That excuse just seemed weak to me.

The difference between Weber’s “cowboy” grammar and speaking style is jarringly different from his POV/narration style and vocabulary, which seems more sophisticated.  Also, the use of “loving on” to describe affection between adults and children seriously squicked me, even though I confirmed via Twitter that it is normal, colloquial usage in rural, eastern Texas.

The vast majority of the information about Cyrus and their relationship is told rather than shown.   Readers learn that Cyrus is a completely different person when Weber is around…because Cyrus’s dad says so.  Readers learn about Web’s history and family through, “As you know, Bob,” conversations.  Even Weber’s realizations about “what-made-a-man-a-man” happen off stage and are just described as having occurred rather than shown, which is disappointing since his is the only POV readers get.

The insta-family is problematic for me on a couple of levels.  First, it makes me uncomfortable, the way the children’s mother is relegated to a secondary parental role in favor of a near-stranger.  You could argue that her role is similar to the more traditional male/father role, in that she remains employed and leaves the child-rearing to someone else, even if that someone else is a sort-of-paid caretaker.  (Except, wait! Weber doesn’t take money for being a nanny.  He’s basically a SAHD for his nephews.)  Second, the immediacy of three children plus a sibling living in the same home as the new couple seems awkward for that early stage of their relationship.

Other quibbles:  Weber’s age and the age of his brother when he died don’t really quite work out right.  The use of direct address commas is intermittent, which is more irritating than not using them at all because it’s just sloppy.  There are also several instances of commas being used instead of periods — based on context and the paragraph breaks, a comma could not possibly be the appropriate punctuation there.  Also, “giving up” child support — a giant pet peeve of mine, because authors seem to use this as shorthand for post-marriage independence, but it makes me question their grasp of the economic realities of single parenting and also equates all parental responsibility with treats economic responsibility — the two are not identical.

In the end:  there is some awkward phrasing and punctuation abuse that should have been fixed at the editing stage, but the larger problem for me is the tell rather than show style and the waste of an opportunity to explore gender role expectations (if you can get over the unlikelihood of a rodeo rider turned nanny).  Ultimately, it all comes down to taste:  other readers have enjoyed this book, but the irritations overrode the enjoyment as I read.

Would I try this author again?  Maybe if I found one of her books on sale or as a Kindle giveaway, but not at DSP’s standard prices.  Otherwise, no.

SBD: blah

If I’m reading but not romance, is it really a slump?  Maybe not.  But I’m missing that feeling that I get when I read a romance novel and then feel the need to blog or tweet about it immediately, to squee to other readers that they have got to read this book right now!  The books I’ve read weren’t bad but they just didn’t inspire me as a reader.

The Rebuilding Year by Kaje Harper is a m/m contemporary that feels a lot like a Harlequin Super Romance except with two heroes rather than hero and heroine.  It fits a lot of HSR’s parameters:  slightly older characters, settled in their lives and/or rebuilding, at least one divorced with children and a custody issue.  There’s a suspense subplot tacked on in a really awkward way:  it contributes little or nothing to the story, and takes page space that might better be devoted to resolving the family issues or addressing the Gay4U issue…because both men are ostensibly straight into their thirties until they meet up.  TRY isn’t badly written, it just feels sort of unfinished or unpolished.

I’m sorry to say that almost any romance novel I pick up lately leaves me feeling bored.  Am I romanced out?  I hope not, but in the meantime, nonfiction is working much better for me.  Maybe it’s just working as a palate cleanser and after a few books on linguistics and history, I’ll rebound to romance and other genres with romance threads.  And even if not, I’ve got several Nesbo books TBR, along with two Sarah Tolerance books and several others.

Also on the reading front, I’m somewhat surprised that I managed to pick the final eight books, despite doing pretty poorly in the early rounds of the DABWAHA tournament.  I picked K.A. Mitchell’s Bad Boyfriend to win it all.  Perhaps not a realistic choice, but I picked books I liked (or titles I recognized, since I’d read about 25% of the brackets) rather than going with the conventional wisdom and picking a more mainstream novel.  Maybe I’ll be more pragmatic when picking my second chance tourney brackets…or maybe not.

My translation of the Altair magazine on Peru is going slowly.  It’s a lot simpler to read and comprehend something written in another language than it is to translate it for someone else to read.  Of course, it would go faster if I spent more than ten minutes at a time on it.

 

SBD: BOATK/Shelter comparison and Thurman’s Blackout

Today’s SBD:  my weekend reading and re-read.

First, please forgive any typos or incoherent sentences that you may encounter.  The Red Parrot had its grand opening this evening, and I had a gigantic My Thai Mai Tai with my Deadliest Catch sushi roll (very good), so my fingers are a little clumsy right now.  But I wanted to get this posted before time passes.

In the aftermath of the allegations of Bear, Otter and the Kid’s potential plagiarism of the movie Shelter, I decided to re-watch the film and re-read the e-book.  I’d earlier reviewed the book (here) and mentioned the plot similarity, but plagiarism had not occurred to me at the time.  Frankly, I found the book to be problematic in its writing and style without regard for the material’s source.

I enjoyed Shelter, but have reservations about its portrayal of women in general: they are either saints or whores.  Only in the very end, as she abandons her child, does Jeannie show any sort of humanity or kindness with respect to Zach’s situation; otherwise she’s been a smoking, drinking, possibly drug abusing, cheap woman who shows little interest in her child and takes advantage of her brother’s spinelessness.

This time around I managed only to finish about 35% of Bear, Otter, and the Kid.  To say that I found the writing to be painful would be putting it mildly[1].  Verb tense changes in passages that make no sense and the first person POV used to convey the POV of someone other than the narrator were just awkward.   As I read a second time, I wondered if BOATK began as Shelter fan fiction, since the verb tenses, POV, and use of italics to convey thoughts and  internal dialogue are consistent with ff tropes/styles.

Beyond that, I found BOATK’s treatment of women to be even more exaggerated than Shelter’s.  Both the film and movie reinforce double standards and gender role stereotypes in a way that I find disturbing.  The women are pilloried for abandoning their children, yet the fathers who have also abandoned their children merit little or no mention.  Meanwhile, the young men who take responsibility for their extended families are heroic for doing what a sister would be expected to do as a matter of course.

Do I think the author plagiarized Shelter?  I don’t know and am probably not the best judge – professionally, I am expected to borrow from the work of others in order to indicate that the relief I’m requesting has precedence (assuming that work is cited and credited properly, of course).  Certainly there are many common elements in the movie and the portion of the book I re-read, ranging from the larger theme to the jobs/talents and other details related to the main characters and their financial and social situations to the BFF and GF to the employment of the MCs.  Of course, there are differences too.  Since I didn’t re-read the whole book, I’m reluctant to join the accusations of plagiarism and also disinclined to defend the author.  But I am still suspicious.  If the book began as fan fiction or was inspired by Shelter, a note to that effect would go a long way toward making me more comfortable about the provenance of the work as a reader.  It seems unlikely at this point, given the responses from the author and the publisher.

Semi-related to that, I’m not boycotting the publisher, which is what some comments at the DA thread advocate.  I don’t buy DSP books any longer, but it has nothing to do with BOATK or DSP’s stance on filing off the distinguishing characteristics of fan fiction in order to publish for profit; no, I stopped buying DSP’s books because I’ve been consistently disappointed with the products they produce.

In addition to attempting to re-read BOATK, I read Rob Thurman’s Blackout over the weekend.  It’s the sixth book in her Cal Leandros series.  (Book five reviewed here and book four also reviewed.)  Although I bought the book when it came out last year, I didn’t read it, wasn’t sure I wanted to read it.  The book before, Roadkill, seemed like possibly a good stopping place and I wasn’t sure I wanted to read the further adventures of Cal and Niko, primarily because the series has gradually gotten darker and it doesn’t seem like it will end well for Cal.  But a new book is coming out tomorrow and I wanted to read it, so…

Blackout deals with a memory-less Cal.  He wakes up in South Carolina, not knowing who he is other than a killer.  Killer as distinct from murderer.  This memory-less Cal is a lighter character than regular Cal, less grim and unburdened by the knowledge of who/what he is.  Nature vs. nurture and free will are the core of this book, as Cal has an opportunity to be what he might have been without the Auphe.  Pretty good, although not my favorite book of the series (that is probably going to be Roadkill) in part because the author hammers at the nature theme constantly.

It was interesting to read a book in which the key relationship is fraternal, and to compare it to the fraternal relationship in BOATK.  Niko Leandros’ sacrifices for his brother, whom he has raised as much or more so than either Zach in Shelter or Bear in BOATK, are gigantic and are much less a topic of angst through the series, although they do play a central role in this particular book as the end approaches and return of Cal’s memory becomes imperative.

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[1] I first read BOATK while on vacation. Perhaps the abundance of time to spare made me more patient and willing to wade through that hot mess?  Or maybe knowing the outcome of the plot made me less tolerant?  Or maybe knowing that Novik’s Crucible of Gold was waiting for me just resulted in a lack of patience.  Who knows?  All I can say is that I am disinclined to spend more time re-reading BOATK right now.