Friday music girl crush

I can't believe this video is twenty years old! It's a fab punky cover of the old High Society number (Bing Crosby and Frank Sinatra in the film) Well Did You Evah? by Debbie Harry and Iggy Pop. It's tremendous fun and I love Debbie Harry who was so very very very very very very cool in the 80s (this came out in 1990).

I think this song is relatively little known? I think? It was on an album called Red Hot and Blue - a triple album of Cole Porter covers. There were a few really good songs on it - a Kirsty MacColl version of Miss Otis Regrets lingers in my memory too. Madam.

Hard refresh

So let me give you an update:

1. Just back from London with Mr T. Much goodness. Had a fabulous meal in a great Vietnamese place (and v cheap too!) and got a bit silly at Rumfest 2010. Am now the bewildered (joint)owner of a very lovely and expensive 'single malt' rum called Ron Zacapa. This somewhat unfortunate since drinking rum is not currently high on my 'to do' list. Needless to say this was an adults only trip.

2. During the blissfully quiet train journey to and from London, I read Double Cross by Carolyn Crane which I was Carolyn's CP on. I've read several drafts of this book already. I wondered how it would be, reading a book I know so well already - I hadn't seen the final final draft and wasn't sure how many additional changes there would be. Here are my conclusions both on the book and on the experience of reading a final version of a book you've CP'd on:

• Despite knowing all (and more besides) it was just like reading a book I'd never read. None of the versions I'd read before had been set in stone but in this bound and covered version, I was reading something that was fixed and final. So the act of reading was different. As a CP I tend to read questioningly, thinking always of what is happening and where it is going etc. This time I read purely as a reader and the experience was quite different.
• There was such a kick to be had in seeing and recognising the changes. I won't give away any of Carolyn's secrets but there was one very particular ingredient she added in, sprinkling all the way through that just gave me such pleasure every time it cropped up.
• CP malarkey aside, I really loved the book. It's a big, achy second part of three and so very right for the story arcs. I really love these characters and I'm so excited about the last instalment! Every one of Carolyn's characters just lives and breathes with so much colour and richness. I mean, Shelby! Simon! And I love the way she gives them these little tics, like the way Avery says This is my message to you.
• I could go on and on and on about all the things I love about this book but two things are stopping me: first, I don't want to do spoilers, and second, since I was a CP, I don't think I ought. But FWIW, there you are: I just loved it to pieces and I feel so evangelical about it!

3. I'm currently reading Lady of Sin by Madeline Hunter but after that there's not much on my TBR pile that's calling out to me. I crave a new-to-me author with a fresh voice - doesn't need to be someone writing now - could be someone from 10 years ago. Any reccs always very gratefully received.

I only kill bad people...

Sooner or later, every vampire had to kill.

Lucan didn't try to deny his nature, but on the occasions when he killed, it was by his choice, by his own rules. When he sought prey, he took primarily criminals, drug dealers, junkies and other low-lifes. He was judicious and efficient, never slaughtering simply for the sake of it. All of the Breed adhered to a similar code of honour; it was what separated them from their lawless Rogue brethern.

~~~~~

He'd been stalking a drug dealer whom he'd first spotted selling crack to a teenage streetwalker outside a seedy tavern..... Blood gushed against his tongue, nasty with the taint of drugs and disease. Lucan choked it down, swallow after swallow, clutching at his convulsing, gasping prey without mercy. He would kill this one, and he wouldn't care less.....Lucan took in the lifeless body of his prey with contempt. He crouched low, making a quick search of the greasy low-life....

Kiss at Midnight, Lara Adrian

I read this book over the weekend. Lucan is the hero.

I hesitate (briefly) to make an issue out of the above quotes, because there's nothing particularly unusual about them, is there? How often have you read similar passages? And not just in vampire/paranormals - in romantic suspense, historical etc.? So I'm not particularly picking out this book or this author. (Kiss at Midnight was otherwise an ok read - it ticked along at a reasonable pace and was pretty readable though it wasn't really my cup of tea).

The point of this blog post is this: this is the sort of passage I react negatively to. I see the point of it. He's a vampire, he kills. The author needs to get the reader comfortable with that. Different authors do that in different ways. For example, some authors will have vampire protaganists choosing synthetic blood, often at the expense of their satisfaction/appetite. In this book, the author has created a world in which (good Breed) vampires (unlike bad Rogue vampires) only need to kill rarely and when they do, they choose 'bad' people. We are even assured in the single scene in which we see him kill (quoted above) that he has witnessed his victim dealing drugs to a teenage prostitute.

That really didn't make me feel better.

Sometimes, as a reader, I edit books. Sometimes I take passages that I dislike, and lock them away in a mental cabinet. I can re-shape the book - if I wish. This is very much a conscious - or at least not a sub-conscious - thing. I think my willingness to do it is related, to a very great extent, to my level of enjoyment with the book. If I am richly enjoying a particular novel, I will do it. If I am having a lukewarm reaction to the book, I won't, even though it would make reading the book easier and more enjoyable. (Because of this, my reaction to books is somewhat unpredictable, and somewhat inconsistent. It's why I can say I dislike amoral violence in novels and then enjoy a book that features that very thing).

I would have preferred Lucan without his particular 'code of honour'. If he'd killed an anonymous, blameless passer-by without giving it a thought, he'd have been monstrous but at least I'd have been spared his really rather disturbing thoughts on drinking the nasty, tainted blood of the greasy low-life he chose as his victim.

Friday music features a great favourite

This is Hardcore isn't my fvery avourite Pulp song (that accolade probably belongs to one of Underwear, Es and Whizz, A Little Soul or Help the Aged) but the video is great. I love the Hitchcockian vibe - and the comment on exploitation, desire and media.

Politics in romance

I remember a blogger - and I wish I could remember who - complaining a couple of years ago about the lack of politics in romance. It's certainly the case that party politics doesn't tend to feature highly but more and more I'm noticing the politics-with-a-small-p in romance.

Politics is about what society should be; how we should live and be governed. Every romance novel depicts a society of some sort. Sometimes it is a society that the protagonist(s) are at war with, and sometimes it's a society they are happy in. Sometimes the events of the novel will reaffirm the rightness of that society and sometimes it will reject it. Sometimes the novel will actually depict a wholesale change in that society.

How the author describes the society in which the characters live and the characters themselves can be quite politically charged, albeit the text might lend itself to multiple interpretations, depending on the reader.

Take a book with a military protagonist. Perhaps one who has served in the Iraq War. Maybe one who has been decorated for bravery and returned home, retired from the services. Does the mere choosing of such a character have a political slant? Does that alone posit anything about the Iraq War, for example? Is your view changed if the character in question is male or female?

Or take a Regency novel with an aristocratic hero. We are told he feels a sense of keen responsibility to the people in his estate/village. What does this say to the reader? That patriarchal society is good? That the political system in Britain in the early nineteenth century with its limited suffrage was acceptable so long as those in the privileged position of the hero had a right and proper sense of responsibility to those born into lower positions than himself? What if the hero is depicted as the exception to the general rule, one responsible aristocrat among dozens of irreponsible ones? What if there is also a heroine who chafes against the patriarchy, perhaps literally in the form of a father figure? Does it make a difference if these characters go further and actually argue against the system?

Such layers can add degrees of nuance or, if taken further, may topple a book into preachiness (on which see this post at TMT). It's often plain when an author has a particular axe to grind, but hints of authorial-view will often escape despite best intentions.

The reader too has her part to play. In previous blog posts I've spoken about reader lenses and how these can influence how the text is received, as well as reader creativity, such as where readers 'fill the gaps' in a text with connections/material acceptable to them and sometimes even edit and actively 'change' existing text internally to enable them to complete and enjoy particular books.

I've avoided referring to particular books or authors in this post in an effort to talk generally about the way I see politics emerging in romance novels and how readers engage, perhaps even subconciously, with political ideas. However, I can think of a number of examples of books that I have reacted to, both positively and negatively, in this way.

What about you?