Review: The Proposal by Mary Balogh

Recently I read an awesome quote, and I think it's one I am going to live by. Kurt Busiek is one of my favorite graphic artists. If you haven't checked out his Astro City, you absolutely should. If you hate graphic novels, comic books, or works with illustrations or any kind, you can still enjoy his sage wisdom.

Busiek Rule 1: Don't buy books you hate in hopes they'll get better. Buy books you like. If the bad books get better you'll hear about it. - Kurt Busiek


And thus, I break up with Mary Balogh. 


The Proposal is not a bad book. It is a book of missed opportunity. Balogh builds a wealth of back history for the characters and then does nothing with it. All of their conflict is internal and unrelated to either that history or each other. Major sources of pain or conflict in their life are swept aside. I knew I was in trouble on when the annoying friend of the heroine is first seen by the Duke and he thinks to himself (as everyone in this book always thinks - to themselves and at great length) that this 34 year old woman has really let herself go.


"She also carried too much weight upon her frame, and most of it had settled quite unbecomingly beneath her chin and about her bosom and hips. Her brown hair had lost any youthful luster it might once have had" - The Proposal by Mary Balogh, Page 43


Really? That's what middle aged dukes spent their time thinking about? Mind you, this character is being set up as selfish, needy, tiresome and social climbing. But my god, she's FAT? Well. The heroine obviously deserves better companions. I'm not sure why. At this point in the book she'd little to recommend her. Toward the end I knew I was done for the series. Our hero (spoiler alert) has gone to war after a falling out with his father, a falling out reconciled only on his father's deathbed. Their once close relationship was ruined by his young stepmother after she attempted to seduce him. He ran off to war. His father eventually died. His stepmother continued to manipulate all around her. When this predator haltingly apologizes for her actions he dismisses it with a blithe "It was my choice". There are tons of these moments. A huge build up to a possible scandal is averted by a bizarre (and frankly unlikely) save from another character. Issues of class are largely brushed aside even as they are used for the main wedge between our alleged lovers. I say alleged because Gwen and Hugo are so tepid in their emotions that I was left uncertain if their first sexual encounter was even enjoyed. I'm not one for the sex scenes (a reason for my long standing Balogh love) yet I generally leave knowing if the principals would do it again. I frankly thought we were headed for one of those It Gets Better speeches from the hero. Instead, after a few chapters, I ascertained that Gwen was perfectly happy with how things had gone.


Hugo was equally confusing. He has fallen for Gwen because she is the heroine. Hugo dislikes the aristocracy in principal, he openly states his main reason for wanting to marry is being able to get sex at home, and he - wait, let's back up. I don't care enough about Hugo to keep discussing him. I am so tired of romance discussing whores and brothels and paid sex like the people paying were forced to do so. The sex trade was alive in the past as it is alive today. Real women, real children, real people are used to feed it. Objecting to the sex trade on a matter of principle makes me respect the hero. Participating in the sex trade because he is a product of his time makes me accept the hero. Sneering a bit at the women who work it while worrying about how paying for sex makes him look is a quick route to hero hatred for me. Hugo is a plain spoken man who honors daily labor. He should honor women forced to make a living off men like him. At the least, he should recognize them as people.  He doesn't. He thinks of them as slightly shameful and rather inconvenient. He is a hypocrite of high order. 


I don't know. There is plenty to enjoy in The Proposal. I was held back from doing so by excessive ruminations and a feeling of excessive cliche. Balogh is launching a new series of largely disabled heros with The Proposal. Given the way she handles the heroine's racehorse fragile ankle I am not sure I care to see what she does with her blind or crippled veterans. Hugo carries Gwen around like a package. Being carried is not such an easy feeling, nor is it so easily achieved. I wonder if the disabilities of the others are going to be so lightly worn? Further, there is a casual insult to her treatment of Gwen. At one point she is carried downstairs so she doesn't miss the company - no tray in her room for Gwen! After a brief conversation, she is given a tray in the drawing room and the party removes to eat. Gwen is refused the comfort and privacy of her room but not fully included in their evening. To what end? Moments like this make me wary of Balogh's next work. 

Review: She Tempts The Duke by Lorraine Heath

If you are ever in Indiana I suggest you check out a place called Arni's. On the rare occasions I find myself in Lafayette I HAVE to go and get a pizza. I don't know why. Nothing about it seems like a good idea. I generally eat way too much and regret it for a week or two after. On paper, there is so much wrong with their pizza I can hardly tell where to start. On my plate, it's delicious and devoured.

There is so very much wrong with She Tempts The Duke. I read it cover to cover. (I wish I had an Arni's to go with it. In a different location there's this cute little train that delivers drinks to the tables and... oh right. Books.) She Tempts The Duke takes a basic Beauty & the Beast plot then turns the melodrama up past eleventy. Add to that a completely wonky sense of place and a fairly stale trilogy framework. On paper, this thing is a disaster. We start with three young orphans locked in a tower awaiting their murderous uncle. (As they do) Escape presents itself and the lads scatter to the far corners of plotsville to determine their future narratives.

Our Duke, whose name I've already forgotten, joins the military and fights in a few bazillion wars, leading to his scarred and sinister appearance. He carries a bag of dirt around in his pocket so he can huff it and dream of the land he lost, the land he will reclaim, the property that not even foreclosure by murder could wrest from his hands. (Super melodrama. I am telling you.) On the way he dropped one brother off at a workhouse so he could rise through the ranks of the underworld to become a gaming hell mob lord. (Yawn.) I don't know why our young Duke thought a workhouse was a great idea. I can't imagine my go to girl Paris Hilton thinking "Hey, we totally need to drop Baron off in juvvie, that's going to work out fine." Next he sells his twin brother to a ship. Because ship captains will totally buy your brother off you, especially when the two of you are completely interchangeable. (Now we have our Pirate.) He leaves behind his childhood sweetheart. (I had to go look her name up. Mary and Sebastian, those are our young lovers.) Mary tells her dad that she thinks Sebastian's uncle might be totally evil. Her dad's response is to lock her in a convent and become an alcoholic. As you do.

Pop quiz! What's our time period?

I cannot believe how many of you got it right. YES, shortly after the marriage of Queen Victoria. God, you people are good. I had no idea. When they started talking about Vic's dress I was totally blindsided. Sebastian comes to reclaim his heritage, which happens off the canvas. He and his brothers meet back up after umpteen years apart to have their revenge. Their uncle hasn't declared them dead because he thought it might look bad to accept they aren't just missing until all of them are of legal age. Apparently with all those properties, servants and employees the suddenly missing sons of a suddenly dead Duke didn't raise any red flags before that. Days before he is to declare his spoils well won, those pesky kids show up to keep him from getting away with it. Somehow Sebastian has taken steps to "secure his inheritance" without tipping off his Uncle. I'm not sure how he did that. It was apparently really quick and easy, taking just a couple of days and no legal folk involved at all. So reclaiming his London home is just a matter of a surprise appearance, a melodramatic speech, and a call for the vile one to vacate at once. Of course Sebastian flies into a murderous rage in the process so the gentle hand of Mary can stay him.

Mary just got sprung from the nunnery herownself and is marrying up with a pretty decent guy. Lord Whoever doesn't want much, but he would appreciate it if she'd stop letting herself into Sebastian's house and charging his bedroom. Chaperones still seem pretty important too. Right, so fast forward to (huge spoiler!) Mary and Sebastian getting married. Mary is all we should totally have sex. Sebastian is all wow, sex would be great but it must be on my land because that will make it way hotter for me. Also, I'm really into total darkness. I've got body issues like woah. Mary is like, ok dude, whatever gets you going, but it's just a house. Then they fight. Then Sebastian has the sorts of emotional breakdowns you will after running away from home for like, ever and getting a shot and burned and stabbed in the process. Eventually there is a near death experience and a villain unmasked and all the rest. Then it's baby time!

*PS - Avon cracked on the Agency price with this title, so you can check it out for $5 USD instead of $8. I think that's a better price point.


*PPS - Further reflection on this title makes the choice to send the youngest brother to a workhouse even less understandable. White poverty was criminalized in a way that black poverty is today. The white poor were often sterilized, they were considered mentally deficient and innately immoral. Especially in the early Victorian age, when this sort of social judgement was picking up the steam that would eventually lead to measuring skulls and eugenic theory. I know, it's a romance but C'mon son.

Review: Third Grave Dead Ahead by Darynda Jones

I didn't like it.

I'm so incredibly disappointed by this that I can't think how to begin. I've been cheerleading the Charley Davidson series as the best thing to happen to light and ridiculous paranormal since Sookie Stackhouse. Third Grave Dead Ahead has me wondering if I will ever read another volume. Remember that moment in the Harper Connelly series where you realized Harris really was going all in on the pseudo incest? It's sort of like that. The abuse dynamics in Third Grave are turned way, way up. Intolerably hot. It's not even the sort of abuse dynamic where you can say "But he doesn't hit her!" because he does. He absolutely does. Then there's the painful info dumping. (If you want to hear 23 times that Charley bound Reyes into his corporeal form, then be my guest. Walk right past this review and get to reading.)

Everything you'd need to know for a book four can be extracted from book three and summarized into two sentences. The overall plot gets two sentences of advancement. Possibly one if I chose my words carefully. From the opening chapter to the last third of the book the story drags it's heels. Opening with a clown named Ronald (classic Charley but not an attention grabber) the reader is bogged down in multiple and lengthy asides recapping the prior two books. This is not an author who has grasped the delicate art of giving just enough to keep the new reader engaged without destroying the very soul of the established fan. Not even a little bit. So, strike one for Holy Info Dump, strike two for plodding pace (for the first 2/3) and strike three for abuse dynamics. Adding insult to injury is the final plot reveal.

Charley gets off on Reyes being the super bad boy son of Satan guy. Attempts are made at establishing triangles but it's always been clear that Charley is as hung up on Reyes as Bella is on Edward. He is the one boy in all the world for her. While Reyes was in a coma all the dire warnings from people that knew him better fell on deaf ears. Meanwhile, Charley had crazy incorporeal sex or was saved from imminent harm by her dark lover. (Can we take a second here for a PSA? I don't care how great the guy is in the sack, if people are telling you that you don't know him, that he isn't the guy you think he is, that he is bad news and the ultimate destroyer you better wake up to face some reality. Every damn time the news story starts with "She thought she understood his soul" and ends with caskets.) Ok, so Charley, banging Reyes. Reyes so misunderstood. Reyes so damaged. In this book Reyes is awake and angry at Charley. If she tries to sleep for even a second, she is instantly having "angry sex" or as I like to call it, rape. Her enjoyment is not her consent. If she was consenting, she'd be sleeping. Mainlining coffee for 14 days is not consent. Reyes claims she is raping him, as he cannot stop his actions. According to Reyes, Charley is totally asking for it, controlling his actions, and forcing him to come to her when she slumbers. He is angry at her for her actions in waking life, for her lack of knowledge of her supernatural side and her having nonconsensual sex with him. All of this is deeply problematic. Then he starts hurting her. Which she punishes him for by kissing someone else. FFS, really? He kidnaps her, threatens to kill her family (oh, but he doesn't MEAN it), knocks her out, blackens her eye, duct tapes her mouth, ties her, handcuffs her,  sets her up to be stalked and tortured by a crazed killer and tells her she brought it on herself. She's too attractive. She's too independent. She forces him to hurt her. The author tries to offset this by showing Reyes being horribly abused in childhood (after coming to earth seeking out Charley) and being badly injured when Charley naps (forcing him asleep as well). So when he is injured, it is her fault. When she is injured, it is her fault. Things are Charley's fault. All the time. How hot is that?

Right. Not at all.

Charley's response is to get angry and ... not much else. She still cries over him, she still obsesses over him, cusses him out and kisses a biker. She's so independent and self actualized! Charley has gone from interesting character to absolute victim. As always, Jones telegraphs her plot moves. Given that the Davidson books are WTF popcorn reads, I can't really fault her for that. I can fault her that one of those moves had me silently begging her to stop. I absolutely never use the phrase "jump the shark". I hate it. I hated the Happy Days episode it's based on, I hate the way it's used like salt on the salad of internet conversations. I loathe it. You know what I loathe more? The spoiler I'm about to reveal. Charley picks up a guardian. The angels of Heaven have sent her a Caretaker for protection against non-living beings. Yes, Charley gets a dead dog. A Rottweiler to be precise. Consider that shark well and truly jumped.

Review: A Rogue By Any Other Name by Sarah MacLean

Bodices are ripped in the making of this novel.

I am not even kidding. It's like an internet video as our hero channels The Incredible Hulk and rips not one but two articles of clothing off the heroine. The first time she is shocked. (As are we. Didn't bodice ripping go out with the 80's? She is bundled up in winter wear. Has the author ever tried to rip a few layers of wool apart, even with well sewn buttons being the focus? And a nightgown - get one, put it on, ask someone to grab the front edges and give it a tear. Then wait a really, really, really long time. Eventually they might get it, but unless you perforated it in advance it's not the quick one two move popular imagination paints it. Ok, I might have just damaged a cheap shirt from Target giving it the college try, but that was on the seam. Does our heroine have front seams on all her attire?) The second time she sort of digs it. Penelope, she's not big on the self preservation.

It's fitting that the focus of this cover is the heroine. She is the redemption of the book (until she isn't) and the primary reason I'd recommend it as a read. While there is a bit of late in book ass covering (Early on Penelope seems unconcerned at the thought of her father dying while she is unwed despite having a Boy Next Door example of what happens when your parents die on you. Late in the book she's yelling about how her father could have died while she was unwed and how could anyone think she hadn't considered that? Y'know, that sort of thing.) overall Penelope is the awesome kind of heroine I'd like to see more. She's not that into trading her self worth for male approval, she has interests and goals, she doesn't lie to herself, she faces reality and she makes the best of whatever life hands her. We could totally do lunch. Toward the end it all goes a bit ass over teakettle as everyone falls in love with her and she shows an astonishing propensity for beginner's luck when it comes to gambling, but hey. While it's good it's great. If you're going to read A Rogue By Any Other Name, read it for the heroine.

The hero is an immature ass. But he has some really cool artwork. Actually, I'm not sure why he has the really cool artwork. He's a gambling addict who is a partner in a gaming club that boasts a multi level two way stained glass window of Lucifer. The club itself I'd totally check out if it had live music instead of gambling. It's all about the glossy woods and the saturated colors with the bold graphics of damnation pulsing through the party. I think he has the really cool artwork to make you interested in the club and to stop you from thinking about why he owns part of it. The guy who really owns it is said (late in the book) to have plucked Bourne off the streets to run his games and tell him the ways of the aristos, yet early in the book Bourne just seems to be good at bitching about his life. Bourne makes a point of being ignorant about the aristo world, while the dude who plucked him off the street knows all about it. It's inconsistent. What do you expect when your hero is a a gambling addict who lost everything in a game of 21 yet spends his life obsessed with revenge while taking everything from other gambling addicts? They are losing their estates because they are weak, foolish addicts and he lost his estate because his guardian was a big meanie that cheated him. (The cheating allegation comes quite late in the book and is part of the effort to villainize the villain so you'll get over Bourne being a whiny bitch.)

Right, so Bourne loses it all gambling, makes it all back gambling, and focuses his life on penalizing the dude he lost it to. (Oh Hello, Self Awareness. Table for none?) His childhood sweetheart Penelope (star of an earlier book as well) is languishing at home when her father makes her the new holder of Bourne's land (which he got while gambling despite our villain having previously refused all offers for it) and suggests she get married already. Penelope goes for a melancholic walk in the woods in the middle of the night while it snows (as you do) and Bourne appears to rip her dress in half. Rather than just, you know, ask Penelope to marry him he's devised this ginormous plan of entrapment and artifice so he can get on with the revenging already. Their dynamic is a weird hybrid of abusive and tedious. I totally believe they will stay together forever and be drama queens into eternity but I think Bourne is right when he says Penelope deserves so much more. I also believe her when she says he's all she wants. Life has stripped the self worth off her enough for her to think he's a good catch.

Everything about this book would have been improved by the villain not being a villain. If the big denouncement scene had ended with the villain saying "Well Bourne, you were stupid as the day is long and therefore bound to lose it to someone. As your guardian who better to ensure your assets remained intact until you got some damn sense? And so what if I adopted a kid? I should leave my brother's son to a life of grinding poverty and shame? What kind of man does that make me? Glad you grew a pair, here's your stuff back." But no, he's an evil scheming woman smacking bad guy who wronged our poor self pitying Bourne. Let's all hold Bourne's hand while he cries. Again. Bourne could have been a compelling hero. His hitting bottom as an addict, his walking away from his life and his love, his reinvention from the ashes using the very thing that destroyed him - all the bones of epic greatness are here. For me, greatness goes unrealized.

Yet I didn't hate the book. I loved the lush descriptions. I loved the sense of place (if not time). I loved the family dynamics and the internal conflicts of Penelope as she struggled to rebuild her sense of self over and again. I stayed in the story even as I wished for a sudden change of hero. The constant rehashes of events already known to me were brushed aside. I forgave the blatant sequel bait as little hooks were dangled for future tales, tidbits barely relevant to the events at hand. I accepted yet another world where everyone goes by one name like Madonna. No one has a near death experience, although Penelope does have stupidly unlikely beginner's luck at any game of chance she sets her mind to. Overall there was plenty to like about A Rogue By Any Other Name. I just needed more than a late book revelation of What Is Really Important to buy Bourne as a guy worth wanting.

Review: How Miss Rutherford Got Her Groove Back by Sophia Barnes

This cover suggests Boxing Helena to me. Miss Rutherford is presented as a headless torso in an open position. It feels somewhat soulless, which brings me to the title. A genre that is aggressively Caucasian mimicking a very popular contemporary African American title is problematic. Add in that How Stella Got Her Groove Back was a thinly disguised tip to the author's own (now failed) marriage and certain problems in Barnes' book are thrown into even sharper relief. Emily is a complete Mary Sue, and a manic one at that.

When we first meet Emily she could put Snow White to shame. Living in a cottage with her sisters after being disinherited by her evil step-relative, she whistles while she works. Scrubbing floors and living for the one day a year she is invited to the ball, Emily dreams of marrying her neighbor, her childhood sweetheart, her savior. When this fails to pass, she becomes suicidal. (She is fond of saying things like she should have been "left to die".)  It is not that Emily breaks as much as she dents. Her suicidal depression leaves as quickly as it arrives. Emily walks through a series of cliches that range from the allowable to the completely infuriating while those around her hold her hand and weep over her noble purity of feeling. Those who bruise the tender fruit of Emily's soul are heartless creatures, while Emily herself is excused of all responsibility.

Given that the side characters are so thinly drawn it hardly matters that their emotions are barely noted. At one point Emily is put in possession of an elderly chaperone who immediately goes to her room and fails to appear until close to the end of the book. (Much like the eldest Martin child in the American serial All My Children, who walked upstairs in the 1970's and was never seen again.) Gone and forgotten, when she is mentioned again I had to flip back to recall who they were discussing. Further removing the reader from an ability to sympathize is the author's inability to choose a path and stay on it. In one scene Emily urges her former fiance and his intended to enjoy every second of their betrothal ball as she could not stand to diminish it in any way. With her very next breath she berates them as undeserving of her. Whiplash moments like these abound. Later in the book Emily rushes off to see the previously rejected BFF as "I have no quarrel with her, you know." Emily is prone to this kind of passive aggressive bullshit when she isn't making her own life infinitely harder through impulsive and ill considered actions. The author drops in and out of these implausible shifts with equally awkward conversations.  Not naturally, or in a way that makes internal sense, but to point out the author realizes this is kind of a left field event. As a reader, I was as bewildered as Emily's former fiance. In addition to the emotional curveballs the author keeps the plot curveballs coming too. (What's that, Lassie? Emily must marry in a month or her sisters lose all? Why didn't anyone mention this 2/3 of the book ago?)

So. Emily kisses childhood friend, Emily jokes about marrying childhood friend, entire town and both families expect it to occur, Emily (when faced with a need to marry) does not tell him. She lives on the neglected corners of his life scrubbing her own floors and waits.  Emily charms the birds from the trees with her gaiety. Childhood friend runs off to London and falls in love with BFF who returns to town but doesn't tell Emily who she is engaged to marry so that it can be a shocking revelation at the ball. This makes no sense. I can buy both of them as completely clueless about Emily's air castles, but to not tell your BFF you're marrying a mutual friend? Not to challenge your son on his fiance's changed circumstances? Not to tell your parents ahead of the ball you will announce the engagement at that you're marrying? Like the rest of the book, these events have to happen for other events to happen. At one point I wrote "Miss Barnes has gone a cliche too far."

The real one eyed reading occurs at the end of the book. Our hero has been harboring the deep dark secret that he is a surrogate child. His father was so enraptured by the surrogate that he installed her in all their homes, preferring her to his wife and living openly with her after his wife's suicide. Since his death said evil doer has been blackmailing our hero for fairly absurd sums of money on the basis of a signed letter confessing all! Why our hero's father would write such a letter set aside, why the hero wouldn't just let her give her plot a shot, all of this you have to take on faith. (After all, this is the guy who thinks Emily isn't like the rest of us but means that in a good way.)  Kate (the former BFF) runs to Emily (because she hasn't had enough gas-lighting) and tells Emily that the hero's biological mother is actually his mistress. Rather than run suicidally off into the night like the last time, Emily runs suicidally off to a formerly barely mentioned and shortly never to be mentioned again diabolical relative. She'd rather marry him (here we discover the must marry in a month timetable) than face Hero McIncestCheaterpants again!! (Histrionic, much?) Emily arrives, determined to marry Edward. I was sort of hoping he'd ask Emily if she'd ever consider a soothing drink and a nice cooling cloth, but he's as over the top as the rest of them.

First he gloats about his feelings of inadequacy and then he proclaims he's going to rape her. Emily can't go back to her sisters, her life or our hero. Remember, her former BFF who is engaged to her pretend fiance told her that a woman old enough to be his mother is sleeping with the hero! Rape is her only option!!! Emily starts to take her clothes off like the good little martyr she is. (I think the only way I followed this bit is my southern heritage. Convoluted explanations are our birthright.) Luckily Emily is saved by the hero and Edward is whisked off the canvas with a "Sorry, my bad" after the hero stakes his prior claim. While we were waiting for Emily to finish taking her clothes off Kate was being berated (yet again) by Emily's equally reality challenged sister. How could Kate make such an allegation? Doesn't she know Emily self harms?? (I hope Kate learns her lesson here and puts as much distance between this toxic family and herself as possible.) Emily is whisked off to marry the hero in secret, since he stopped off at the Get A Special Permit Store and took care of business. At his home, he confesses all (after first dillydallying about confessing anything) and they decide to trick the blackmailer into revealing the location of the letter.

Crazy things happen (big shock) that I am really not interested in reliving. In the course of them the blackmailer reveals a secret addition to the dead Earl's will that leaves her buckets of things. She will trade Emily the letter in return for access to the home (that she already had access to earlier in the book, and earlier in her life) so she may retrieve it. But what's this! As the hero braces himself to learn how his father further betrayed him he discovers the codicil is a giant "Pwnd!" intended for the blackmailer. It reveals that the letter in question has a fake signature! It can't be used! He knows his wife didn't commit suicide but was killed by his mistress and he kept sleeping with her because... I can't even. Why would you write either document? Man up, dead Earl. Quit abandoning your wife, your son and your duty to the estate. Don't leave her with an inheritance and a blackmail letter and a lot of bad sex memories! On the other hand, if he hadn't then our blackmailer couldn't do what we were all longing to do at this point. She whips out a hidden gun and shoots Emily.

Sadly, Emily survives.

*Since I wrote this (and scheduled it) my kindler, gentler, less annoyed short form review was the subject of one of many sock puppets out in force for those who dare to dislike this book. My personal puppet was as unable to pick a lane and stay in it as Emily herself. (Bless.) Someone should hold a class on Effective Puppetry For The Debut Author with a section on Making It Look At Least Plausibly Organic.  That someone won't be me. I can't be bothered. I left How Miss Rutherford Got Her Groove Back intending to try the author's next book. Despite some style issues there were indications that (freed from her melodramatic bent) Barnes could deliver an entertaining tale. Watching the drama playing out over multiple sites I would rather make my break with Miss Barnes as clean as my break with Emily.  

Review: A Lady Awakened by Cecilia Grant

Dude, I totally hated this book. I know everyone and their mother loved it. I struggled to finish it for a month and only brought it home as an end of 2011 resolution, complete with live tweets. Grant and I, we're just going to quietly settle the bill and agree not to share a Taxi. To explain why is going to require spoilers. Lots and lots of them. Don't read this review unless you have already finished A Lady Awakened or have sworn off reading books. Maybe both. I am thinking of you here.

Grant can write, her talent isn't in question. I can see Grant writing a book I would rave over as people are raving over this one. The problem is after finishing A Lady Awakened I don't think I'd pick up a second title. I hate books where I spend a lot of time wondering why. Why doesn't Martha want to live with her family? Why is Martha willing to have sex with a stranger for a month when she clearly despises it? Why is Theo ready to have sex every possible moment? Why does he return to sleep with a women so disinterested that her contempt causes him impotence? There are so many WTF moments in A Lady Awakened and the answers shift about like sand. Martha doesn't want to live at home because she just doesn't want to. Then she doesn't because she earned her home in her 11 months of marriage. Then she doesn't because the heir is a creepy rapist and her school will close. Then she totally wants to give the house up because the creepy rapist has sons. Creepy rapist is going to sign an agreement (oh, well then!) that will give his wife and kids rights to the house and he (after an intervention by the neighbors explaining that they don't like him) will abandon that family. In what year?? How is that binding on him, rational of him, or even slightly likely? Plus, Martha is claiming her child is the rightful heir, obviously (if she is willing to give up the property) it is not - so why wouldn't he seize on that tidbit? It is a bucket of WTF. Things happen because they have to happen for the story to happen not because the people (as brilliantly drawn as they are) would be likely to do these things.

Take Theo. Some chick he doesn't know approaches him and offers a small fortune for sex (which he never claims) so he says hey, why not? I will give him that. I will even give him being willing to cheat a neighboring landowner simply on the say so of a widow. When Theo shows up, it's as close to rape as consensual sex can be. She not only dislikes sex she ruminates to herself on how disgusting the male body is when compared to a female one. (Gaydar! Our heroine is either asexual or lesbian. Oh wait, all this falls away later when we discover she does like the male figure and secretly self pleasures thinking about it. WTF?) Ok, so long story short, Martha had a year of bad sex and her answer to that is to deny herself any physical responses so she can maintain power and control in her life. Because of course the rational choice of a woman embarking on a month of sex is to make it as unpleasant for herself as possible. Anyway, she says awesome things to Theo like "Are you done yet?" and he discovers a new world in impotence. But hey, his word is his bond, so back in the saddle he comes. WTF? He's attractive, 26 and not exactly destitute. There have to be options that don't involve fraud and pseudo rape!  (I asked others their view of Theo's actions. The response was "Is it science fiction? Because that's not happening in this world.")

Through unsatisfying sex they discover social crusades, invent collective farming and fall in love. (No, they pretty much do.) Martha resolves to make him a better man through the careful nudging of female approval, as though this poor simple minded man needs only her warm regard to change. In her defense, apparently she is right. Suddenly Theo is roofing homes and building economic safety nets. Also, he vomits when someone implies he'd rape a disabled teen - seems a bit extreme, but maybe he has a sensitive stomach. The disabled teen has a perpetually pregnant mother. On one occasion Theo slips and calls Martha by her first name in front of the woman. Martha is distressed and shocked so naturally she turns to the woman and says hey, I heard my brother in law raped you. (Martha, WTF?) For most of the book this woman is portrayed as stressed beyond her ability to cope, her children neglected by her fatigue and her home in utter disarray. Suddenly we discover she has a loyal and caring husband, a childhood sweetheart who lets her take the lead in life and who puts her cares above his own. So why are his kids neglected? Why is his wife overburdened? She grew up in the community so why does she lack support? If it is because of a rape 16 years ago why does that same community suddenly rally for the aforementioned intervention with the brother in law? See all the Why we've got going on?

Martha, who considered offering this woman cash for her unborn child, never puts anything together. A woman who keeps a mentally disabled child arising from rape is going to sell you her son so he can be lord of the manor? How do you think that's going to happen? How is her husband going to be down with that? Martha's rationale is that obviously the woman has too many children to handle already and will be glad to lighten her load. Martha goes from unsympathetic to evil in one musing. Class issues, she has them. Luckily Martha changes her mind because Theo finally teaches her to like sex! All it takes is him asking her to tie him up and they're off to the races. Is this a new convention? From I-can't-stand-you-touching-me to let-me-blow-you-baby all with one carefully placed stocking? Now we have the inevitable failure to communicate as estate-free Martha finds Theo has fled from her lack of love. Because telling him you've decided to marry him would have made too much sense. Obviously Martha's control issues have overridden her planning personality. Faced with no estate and a return to her family, Martha is saved by Theo's determined return.

I gotta wish him luck. God only knows what Martha's going to come up with next. That chick has crazy eyes.

Review: Shatner Rules by William Shatner and Chris Regan

What do you say about William Shatner that hasn't already been said? Revered or reviled, Lionized or devoured, he is an American institution (all while being Canadian). At a certain point I wondered what Shatner would say about himself. (Disclosure; I've read books by Nichelle Nichols, Jimmy Doohan and George Takei.) I approached Shatner Rules wondering if Shatner is a deeply misunderstood man or a raging egomanic with an improper understanding of his talents.

The answer is yes.

 He's sort of a less destructive Charlie Sheen. When he yells winning, you get the idea that it requires others to be losing. After going after (almost) all of his former costars for various reasons (they were not the stars, they are fame whores, etc etc) he then claims all their hard feelings are born from their own imaginations. He's apologized for any imagined slights (as opposed, I imagine to the ones in the book) and moved on. Why do they still feel so angry? If I loved the guy and he talked about me the way he does his ex costars I'd have to rethink it.

There's a lot of that who-could-possibly-know faux innocence to Shatner. He invites Henry Rollins to the same event as Rush Limbaugh and expects everyone to make nice. (Why would there be a problem there?)  Rollins handles it with incredible grace, but the fact that Shatner never gave it a thought shows a lot about his personality. Discussing the absolute brilliant cover of Common People he did with Joe Jackson, Shatner takes several swipes at Joe. While ending with an acknowledgement of Jackson's utter genius, he leads with a ton of negativity in front of the praise. I imagine this is just how Shatner operates. It's not the most effective way to make friends.

So. Does Shatner think he is a brilliantly underrated performer who does not deserve the mocking he's graciously borne over the years? Absolutely. He is not entirely wrong. Shatner has a serious work ethic that demands the best he can offer from himself and others. Shatner has created multiple memorable characters in a career where people are lucky to produce one. He delivers what he is hired for, no matter what that might be. Shatner is a pro. His musical attempts are often better then he has been credited for. They are not, however, even close to his own assessment of them. The contradiction of William Shatner is that both sides are right. He is a charismatic and professional talent. He is also far from innocent of the various charges lain at his feet. In the end, Shatner Rules is an illuminating look at both sides of the man, the side he prefers to see and the side he unwittingly reveals. I am absolutely a fan.

Review: The Girl's Guide to Homelessness by Brianna Karp

I wanted to like this book. Actually, I wanted to love this book. Sadly, Brianna Karp has done the unforgivable with The Girl's Guide to Homelessness. She has forced me to defend Fox News.

"Baby, you can't watch this. This is Fox News. It's not real news. No wonder " Duh. I grabbed the remote from his hand before he could hurl it in Nancy Grace's monologuing face. "How about we try a little CNN?" - Brianna Karp, TGGTH, 2011.


The most obvious problem is that Nancy Grace is not an employee of Fox News. If Nancy Grace is speaking, they are already watching CNN. The second is her tone. Her lover is making an error in his ignorance that she can make all better through her higher knowledge. Except she's wrong. So she's adopting this arch silly boy my culture let me show you it pose on a topic she knows nothing about. This isn't a small error of fact, this is proof of fiction. I don't doubt she and her lover watch television news.  I do doubt the truth of Brianna Karp's presentation of her life. She is simply too victimized and too noble and too good and those around her are too flawed and too evil and too everything else. As we used to say on the playground, "Get off the cross. We need the wood."

Karp takes pains to show how much better she is than every single soul she knows. When her trailer is towed after a written warning, she is not at fault. She had a verbal statement from the local manager that the written warning was simply corporate's posturing. Nothing to worry about! The little boss has said the big boss is all smoke! When her lover has a child with another woman, that woman is at fault for improper planning. When she has her own unplanned pregnancy*, the other woman is still at fault for manipulating her lover through their now present child. If only her lover had listened to her it would all be different! She knew what a problem that woman would be! (Insert her diatribe on how women don't appreciate men after they give birth and the good men she's seen wronged by crazy hormonal new mothers as a result. Oh yea, she goes there.) Her unemployed, cheating, unmedicated lover was just too sweet to see it. Wait a few pages though, he turns into a heartless monster who leaves her to die in the snow. Better to freeze than disbelieve, I suppose.

Karp starts off strong, but what begins as a journey into housing uncertainty (even she agrees she is not fully homeless) becomes a long list of ways she has done everything right only to be cruelly betrayed. This is a personality type I am more than a bit familiar with, so here Karp sets my BS meter off again. For example, the reader is supposed to believe that she is doing everything she can to change her situation, but Karp continually redirects money into nonessential areas.  She also prides herself on not using programs meant to assist her into stable housing, because those are for people that need help, not people like herself. (Yet she's willing to pursue Walmart for money after her illegally parked trailer is legally removed from their property. Go figure. She is absolutely one of those 'it's the principle of the thing' types.)

I felt tired after spending time with Karp. While the problem of homelessness and housing uncertainty is very real in America, Brianna Karp doesn't offer much to the reader's understanding of either. I believe a memoir from the other people in her life would illustrate a very different tale of a young life going wrong, and for that she has my compassion. What she doesn't have is my endorsement. If her goal was to change one person, she's changed me. I have often tried to explain my mother's propensity for hoarding with the line "She probably has the wrappers from her first trip to McDonald's." Now that Karp has used a similar phrase I will have to move on. I never want to be accused of lifting from her material.

*I find a great deal about this unplanned pregnancy and the subsequent loss of her child troubling. If true, she shows herself to be a deeply damaged woman. If not true, she shows herself to be the same. No matter which way the reader decides the truth lies, the result is a fervent hope that no child is placed in her care. It is an uncomfortable judgement to make about a stranger, but it is an extraordinary series of events the reader is asked to accept.