On ducal seduction and other inducements

This is something of a stream of consciousness.

1. ~duc~ is French for duke. In Britain, a duke is the highest ranking peer below the monarch.

2. Above is a portrait - a rather handsome one! - of uber-duc, the Duke of Wellington, commander of the British army at Waterloo, high tory and sometime British Prime Minister. He was born the fourth son of an Irish earl (the Honourable Arthur Wellesley) and granted his dukedom and countless other honours and titles for various military achievements.

3. Ducs/dukes dominate historical romances and rightly so! There is no more beautifully masculine, pithy and alliterative word. Consider the convenience with which it can be connected to the words Dangerous, Desire, Diabolical, Devilish, Destiny, Dashing, and many, many more.

4. ~duc~ or ~duct~ is the latin root, meaning lead or take, of many important romance-related English words. Consider seduce (lead astray, obviously), induce (lead into, temptation usually) and abduct (take from, swift horses often involved). Even produce (think fluids), deduct (romantic suspense, natch) and conduct (affairs...). Of all of these, however, by far the most important is seduce.

5. Seduce is a wonderfully ambiguous word, used sometimes positively (in the sense of enticing to something good) and sometimes negatively (leading someone into wrongfulness). Perfect for romance in which the story is so very often about a character giving into something they at first resist.

6. Seduction was a crime under old English common law. The crime was the inducement of a woman by a man to have sex with him by false promises. The right to take action belonged to the woman's father; he was seen as the wronged party rather than his daughter

7. Which brings to mind JessicaRRR's recent post on Unsavoury Seduction.

8. Interestingly, in my mind, seduction is primarily a positive word. Perhaps this is due to my immersion in the romance genre in which it is generally a force for good? Or perhaps it says interesting things about the journey of women since those days in which seduction was crime to a present in which notions of female consent, choice and agency are very different? There's something fascinating here that I've not fully interrogated yet. It was hovering on the horizons of my consciousness when I read Jessica's post and it feels as though it's just coming into some sort of shape now... On which...

9. ... I often find, when I blog, that a number of seemingly disparate things that have interested me over the previous days begin to coalesce into something thematic and logical. I often wonder whether this is a real phenomenon, or if one of the peculiarities of my brain is a tendency to induce connections.

10. The connection I am thinking of now is a preponderence of posts around ideas of consent and sex: Jessica's aforementioned one, this one of Laura V's in which she talks about rape myths, this latest review, again of Jessica's which talks about Shiloh Walker's Beg Me which was also reviewed somewhere else though I'm afraid I can't remember where. And then Jill Sorenson was talking about erotica and what people like/don't like about it, in response to which I commented about disliking being lectured to by authors about the rights and wrongs of sexual behaviour, and further that the "really interesting stuff usually happens in the ambiguous margins". It seems to me that there's a real tension in romance around exploring those margins, as can be seen from the comments in response to Robin's fascinating post on Dear Author on reader consent.

11. All of which brings to me this: some of my favourite romance novels are seductions. They lead the reader astray, into those interesting margins. And then the bad promises are made good; succumbing to temptation pays off. It all turns out for the best.

Maybe it's all a hymn to self-indulgence? On which, see this.

Tumperkin gets evangelical again

Oh my word! I am so enjoying The Trip on BBC just now! I'm not sure if you can even get this outside the UK.

If you caught A Cock and Bull Story, a Michael Winterbottom film, a few years ago, you might have an idea of what I mean when I say that the central conceit is that Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon play versions of themselves in this series. Steve Coogan (possibly known to some of you only as a slightly puzzling British actor who has cropped in films like Night At the Museum as the tiny centurion) has supposedly been asked to act as a food review critic for the Observer on a trip round the north of England. He was supposed to be accompanied by his beautiful American girlfriend but she doesn't come when she gets a career break and so he asks Rob Brydon instead. The whole series is them travelling around together, going to fabulous restaurants and talking about pretty much everything.

As a special treat they do lots of impressions (and competing impressions) of various actors complete with dialogues on what they are doing. The video embedded below begins with a brilliant exchange of James Bond impressions - Roger Moore and Pierce Brosnan - seaguing into Liam Neeson, Antony Hopkins, Al Pacino and then, brilliantly by Steve Coogan, Richard Gere.



What I really love about this series though is not just these brilliant comedic exchanges but the real pathos (in the Jack Lemmon sense spoken about by Coogan in the video). Brydon is portrayed as a happily married, domesticated man who is content with his cuddly public image though somewhat resentful of Coogan's suggestion that he is mediocre. Coogan is portrayed as a somewhat rootless type with bigger artistic ambitions and a streak of shallow egoism. How true this is of their real selves is unclear. In the latest episode, Holbeck Ghyll, this is beautifully played with and in just 30 mins, Winterbottom asks questions about what art is, whether domestic happiness is the enemy of art, what happiness is, whether and how you can find it or if it is only be found in yourself. And without explicitly posing any of those questions even once.

Both Coogan and Brydon just shine: Brydon as the happy but occasionally defensive housewives' favourite and Coogan as the misanthropic comic genius.

Seriously, watch the video. It's great.

A coffee with my Friday music

I drink too much coffee. And I also go on a lot about drinking too much coffee. I quite often find myself in meetings slightly frantically telling people about the fact that I've already had too much coffee that day.

The trouble is, I'm quite sensitive to caffeine. If I have two standard (two-shot) coffees in a working day (as I often do) I feel really quite rushy and trembly. If I have a coffee after 6pm, I'll lie awake in bed with eyes wide open.

It's not just that I like the taste and the ritual of it, I'm addicted to that feeling you get afterwards of slightly manic competency. About two thirds of the way through that second two-shot coffee, I feel like I can do minor miracles. Unfortunately by the end of that cup, I'm bouncing off the walls like Tigger on speed.

What about you? Are you a coffee drinker?

Love this song.

5 things

Thing the first : Blogger now gives stats! When did that start? Looks like a few months ago but I only just noticed. Whatever, it's good and I'm glad I didn't faff about trying to sort that out for myself before now. The info seems pretty thorough too.

Thing the second : I've been going crazy-nuts with the online library reservation system. I picked up 8 books yesterday. As the librarian was checking them out, I was mortified to realise that no less than 3 of them have either 'seduction' or 'seduced' in the title! The haul is:

- Masked Deception by Mary Balogh (her first novel!)

- Seduced by An Angel by Mary Balogh (4th in the Huxtable series)

- White Lies by Linda Howard (my third dip into her considerable oeuvre)

- No Choice but Seduction by Johanna Lindsey (new to me author!!)

- Proof by Seduction by Courtenay Milan (new to me author!!)

- Tempted All Night by Liz Carlyle (love LizC - this one slipped through the net somehow)

- The Rebel Bride by Catherine Coulter (read one Coulter before; the infamous 'marital cream' one)

- Silent in the Grave - Deanna Raybourn (new to me author!!)

Thing the third : I've already read Masked Deception which was coincidentally reviewed by Janine over at Dear Author this week. I liked it better than she did - quite a bit actually. It wasn't half bad, all in all,I thought. Though it did feature a denouement common in the Regency genre that I a bit irritating usually: all-the-characters-converging-on-the-same-inn-for-multiple-misunderstandings. This particular ending was odd in that it was mainly (as is usual, and Heyer-like) played for laughs - except between the H/H; their dealings in this denouement are quite angsty. That rescued it for me but did mean the tone was quite changeable.

Thing the fourth : Mr T is glomming Mad Men via LoveFilm. I have a hazy, glimpsed-over-the-top-of-my-laptop sense of what is going on. I'm rather drawn to the cad that is Don Draper. Mr T finds this ludicrous but he doesn't see what I see. A classic romance hero; despair in his eyes.

Thing the fifth : I'm really close to finishing my wip at last. It's been a year and a half. A year and a half. God.

Unwilling character identification...and Friday music

The woman in the picture is a Victorian female coal mine worker.

I grew up in a working class household. My dad's family were all coal miners and left-wing trade unionists. Strong political views were forcefully expressed around me when I was a child.

Stay with me. This is about romance, I swear.

I grew up, as we all do, and formed my own set of opinions. I rejected some of the ideas I was brought up with, carried others with me. One thing I rejected was a tendency to romanticise the 'working class'. But there's always a kernel left, isn't there, of those childhood orthodoxies? Witness my strange reaction to the way some people write '7s'. Childhood indoctrination is very difficult to lose.

And so it is, that whenever I come across a working class character in an historical romance I can't help a certain sense of identification coming over me. This is infuriating because the character will usually be very minor, broadly sketched, often a caricature and not a flattering one.

Anyone who reads this blog will know I love historical romance and somehow I can ignore the fact that the dangerously reckless dukes are exploiting the masses and living useless parasitic lives - really, I can. But as soon as some random member of the working classes pops up to iron a few shirts or something, my unwilling identification-radar goes off and if there's any patronising or rude behaviour towards them, I really resent it. As for depictions of servants as fawning acolytes of the main characters, don't even get me started - I can't bear that! Ugh.

You know what? I think it's guilt. My conscience nudges me - I should know better - and it affects suspension of disbelief for me in a way that a STD-free ducal rake never will.

A review! Yes, really!

I went through a major Kresley Cole glom a couple of years ago. It culminated with me reading Kiss of A Demon King and writing this review with JessicaRRR in which I likened reading that book to eating the last slice of an entire chocolate cheesecake. I'd glommed Cole hard for several months - that was the sixth Immortals After Dark book I'd read in just a couple of months. Was my lukewarm reaction to the book driven partly by Cole-fatigue? It's certainly possible.

A few months ago I read the ninth(?) book in the series about Lucia and Garreth - and liked it quite a bit. However, with Demon From the Dark, which I read with glee over the weekend, I have fallen in love with this series again.

It's the story of Carrow, a witch and Malkom a VEMON. Yes, a VEMON. Demon-turned-vampire; Vemon. Malkom is bigger, badder, quicker, faster, more-everythinger than any other hero ever!

The story: Carrow has been abducted by The Order (sinister human organisation; big set-up for next book with Regin the Radiant and Aiden the Fierce). Lots of other Lore creatures have also been captured by them, including Ruby, a 7 year old witch who has just lost her mother, and who Carrow has decided to adopt. The Order use Ruby as leverage to force Carrow to enter a portal to another Hell-like plane where Malkom Slaine dwells in the depths of a lonely mountain. She is to return with him six days later. The Order wish to vivisect him.

Thanks to the name Slaine, this was my mental image for Malkom, despite the fact that - once washed - he turned out to be a blond:

Malkom is described as a "wild, lost male" by Cole throughout the book. He's fierce and basic, dirty and ragged, animalistic. He's also illiterate and a virgin. A 400 year old virgin, of course. With a tragic backstory.

Malkom sees Carrow and knows she is his mate. He is immediately certain they belong together. His initial reaction is that he will command her to return home with him and his first attempt at flirtation involves him throwing the decapitated head of his enemy at her feet. Very soon, however, he realises he is going to have to court her. For her part, Carrow knows she is going to have to betray Malkom in order to protect Ruby, a fact that disturbs her from the beginning and becomes intolerable as she begins to warm to him.

One of the most fascinating and enjoyable aspects of the book is Malkom and Carrow's attempts to communicate with one another. They don't speak each other's languages. Malkom knew English once but hates the sound of it as he associates with his abuse. He has to access those memories in order to recover that language and enable him to speak with Carrow.

Interestingly, Carrow makes no real effort to learn Demonish. There seems to be an unwritten assumption in the novel - despite Carrow having no idea that Malkom has a deep-buried knowledge of English - that Malkom will learn her language rather than her learning his. It's a subtle sort of cultural imperialism; in their verbal exchanges Malkom (ironically the 'multi-lingual' one) seems at a disadvantage to Carrow, trying and failing to communicate with her in the 'right' language. This inability to communicate with Carrow verbally, along with his virginal status (and attendant worries about whether he can please her) and lack of education give Malkom qualities of innocence and child-like vulnerability that are entirely at odds with his ferocious appearance.

Cole's books have a tendency to veer to the extremes and this is plainly in evidence here. It's difficult to imagine many other authors being able to make a seven-foot-tall-400-year-old-vampire-demon-virgin-hero so appealing but Malkom is undeniably compelling. I found myself wondering if he sits right at the farthest end of her hero spectrum, or if she can possibly come up with another hero to beat him.

You know what else I liked? This book is just so confident; so sure of itself. In the review linked to above, I said something about feeling expertly manipulated when I read a Cole book. And I had that experience very strongly again reading this one. Manipulate is not the right word though - it sounds negative, as though I'm saying it's put together cynically or something. I suppose what I'm trying to say is that it feels - as the reader - like she knows exactly where she's going. She knows, I think, the essentials of her story inside-out and I felt able to really trust that confidence and just allow myself to enter the Lore world again, with every expectation of enjoyment.

I've not seen - or haven't noticed - any other reviews of this book in blogland, which surprises me. Have you read it? What did you think?

Friday music: neural pathways to happy thoughts

You know how sometimes a particular song takes you back to a specific time and place in your life?

This song.

This song takes me back to the summer of 1992, when I was 19.

God, the opening bars of this song - the first, what 10 seconds? First the guitar and then that wonderful woody double bass with that gorgeously extravagant sliding introduction; the tinkling of bells. Then his voice.

And I will stroll the merry way and jump the hedges first

I always thought he was saying prairie boats in that first verse, but it was ferry boats.

In comes the snare drum.

It's the same tempo but that snare drum makes you feel like you're getting quicker, reaching for something. And all of it just rollicking along together: the guitar, the double bass, the drums, the bells. His voice, a not-beautiful voice, begins singing. At some stage, a flute comes in.

And I shall drive my chariot down your streets and cry

Hey, it's me, I'm dynamite, and I don't know why

This tempo, this tune, these woody, stringy instruments, these words: they makes me think about jogging down a country lane, and being happy. (Even though I never did that while listening to this song). It's the album cover too of course: the trees, the green. And having been 19 and all the surrounding circumstances in which I came to love and listen to this album. It's that it's always felt *good* to me; that when I listen to it, I feels like all is well with the world.

We shall walk and talk in gardens all misty wet, all misty wet with rain now

Don't even get me started on the rest of this album. The chaotic xylophonic funkiness of The Way Young Lovers Do, the Dylan-defying-duration of Madame George, the gnomic obfuscations of the eponymous track, Astral Weeks (If I ventured in the slipstream, between the viaducts of your dreams, Where immobile steel rims crack, And the ditch in the backroads stop, could you find me? Would you - kiss-a my eyes?).

I love this album so very much.

Another stream of consciousness post

You might say, indeed you might very well say, that my blogging habits have devolved into a selection of random musings and music posts. It's been a while since I had the desire to write a detailed post on a single book. Maybe that's partly down to what I've been reading?

Anyway another stream of consciousness post for you.

1. Two things have happened recently that have evoked the 1980s for me. The first is that I joined the library! I was last a library member when I was a student (in the 90s, I hasten to add but the last time I borrowed a romance novel from a library was in the 1980s). I have been having fun browsing the library catalogue and placing reservation requests. Also taking the children with me has been an added bonus (if not terribly conducive to browsing...). My little boy isn't at school yet and can't read but insisted on getting out "chapter books" on Saturday. Classic aspirational second child.

2. The second 1980s-evoking thing is that Mr T and I decided to buy a turntable - you know, one of those things you play vinyl on? We have been playing some of our many old LPs this week. Just when you never thought you'd hear Graceland again in your life....

3. Have I ever mentioned how very dearly I love biscuits? I had quite an important personal moment this week, when I found myself admitting to the distressingly youthful trainee solicitor I sit next to at work that Oreos aren't all that bad. I have a built-in prejudice against Foreign Biscuits (I'm not generally xenophobic but we all have our triggers) but I have to admit that there's something about the saltiness in the nearly-black-biscuit-parts of Oreos that's really quite pleasing. If you like biscuits, this is a very good site with a comprehensive range of reviews. The essay on Fox's Ginger Creams is well worth reading. I can't tell you how very accurate it is - I agree with every particular! I wish I could say the same of book review sites.

4. What have I been reading this week? Quite a range of things. I met up with Laura V and she passed me a pile of books. The first I read was Haunted Dreams by Charlotte Lamb, perennial Tumperkin favourite. I was struck by the threatening and violent depiction of the much older hero (40 to the heroine's 20). Laura and I had an interesting discussion about the extent to which metaphor is used deliberately and/or subconsciously in catergories. Charlotte Lamb is an author who I think used metaphor very deliberately at times. Perhaps I was influenced by our conversation but as I was reading Haunted Dreams it seemed to me that the story was a metaphor for gaining sexual knowledge/ growing up. Or perhaps I decided to read it through that lens to help me deal with the disturbing last quarter in which the hero assaults the heroine...?

5. I've also just finished To Beguile A Beast by Elizabeth Hoyt, the third in the Four Horsemen quartet. I hadn't been much struck by her recent books but I really enjoyed this story of Helen who finds refuge with her two children in the run-down home of Alasdair, an unhappy, maimed recluse. I have a very soft spot for maimed heroes so I was predisposed to like this and I also enjoyed the depiction of a heroine who had made poor choices in the past and who counts as a personal fault a tendency to fall in love too easily. Not a common characteristic amongst romance protagonists. I deduct at least two points for rushing the first half. Helen breaks through Alasdair's defences too quickly and easily. I wanted more resistance from him. But really, overall a nice book.

Wherever you may be, may you be reading a nice book and having a lovely biscuit and cup of tea.

Olde Scottish Proverb