Romance Novels

[dangwhathaveu8]

aims said:

winkie said:

inkyblott said:

I wanted to comment on your vampire book, I just started a series called the DarkHunter series by Sherrilyn Kenyon who also writes Avalon (King Arthur) under Finlay someone but she has a great series, they are adventurous and dark, and I don't really read romances anymore but I really like these. Check them out if you get a chance. I love even more her Avalon Warrior series. But the DarkHunter series is awesome.

Isn't Kenyon the one that wrote the book about the sex slave guy that is cursed into a book for centuries? It has gods like cupid and such in it. It's hilarious because this guy that's cursed is walking around with an erection for pretty much the whole book.

Oh my god that made me laugh so hard at that description of that book. Now I have to track it down so I can have a good laugh . I recently entered a contest on Julia Quinn's website and she mailed me back her autograph as well as half a dozen other author's autographs on their respective book covers. I've been checking out those authors and they have all been really good books so far, especially Kerrelyn Sparks whom someone mentioned here before. She has a pretty good series, although some parts are a little ridiculous. I just finished Night Life by Elizabeth Guest also, and like it a lot. I've finally gotten over my embarrassment when I take my books up to the counter at the store so I'm getting all the books I want now without shame

[shawnalanne]

clady said:

That is why I stopped reading Nora Roberts way back when the In Death/JD Robb series was taking off and becoming popular. Between Roark and the men in her other books I couldn't take it any more. They are all exactly like you described, Erinnyes. I do wonder if she's really the one writing all these books. It seems like she comes out with a new one every month and that's a lot of writing even if you do have the same characters in every book!

I'm catching up on this thread. So sorry for responding to such an old post, but I remember years ago talking to someone who works in publishing and hearing that yes, Nora does have someone else writing books under her name. She comes up with the ideas and someone else rights them. It would explain why the quality of the writing varies so much.

[Witchie]

shawnalanne said:

clady said:

That is why I stopped reading Nora Roberts way back when the In Death/JD Robb series was taking off and becoming popular. Between Roark and the men in her other books I couldn't take it any more. They are all exactly like you described, Erinnyes. I do wonder if she's really the one writing all these books. It seems like she comes out with a new one every month and that's a lot of writing even if you do have the same characters in every book!

I'm catching up on this thread. So sorry for responding to such an old post, but I remember years ago talking to someone who works in publishing and hearing that yes, Nora does have someone else writing books under her name. She comes up with the ideas and someone else rights them. It would explain why the quality of the writing varies so much.

That depresses me for some reason.

Anyway, I came to ask if anyone has read Carly Phillips' Cross My Heart? I just finished it, and I swear I skipped most of the pages with the main couple on it. They bored me to tears. Their issues were underdeveloped or just plain stupid. I'm still at a loss to figure out why I should be rooting for these two. I don't know if it's due to how she started the book or what, but I was seriously bored with it. I have high hopes for the sequel since I was more interested in the secondary couple than the main one.

[cantienne]

Has anyone else been following the big brouhaha over Cassie Edwards and plagiarism? It's making the rounds on news sites, but was first blogged here. It's so bad that I can't believe her editors didn't notice - and she's been using this as a writing technique for multiple books. She'll take text directly from a research source and copy it as dialogue or description - how does an editor not scratch her head when a nineteenth-century character talks about the arctic land bridge? Or begins phrases with "Researchers say..."?

I've never been a Cassie Edwards reader - the whole Indian brave, white heroine theme always struck me as offensive and outdated - but she sells a lot of books. I'm a pretty selective romance reader, but have always thought that the genre deserves a lot more respect. Thanks, Cassie Edwards, for writing so shoddily that you live up to every stereotype the literary world holds about romance.

[Karen]

cantienne said:

She'll take text directly from a research source and copy it as dialogue or description - how does an editor not scratch her head when a nineteenth-century character talks about the arctic land bridge? Or begins phrases with "Researchers say..."?

It looks bad that her editors either didn't notice it or couldn't be bothered to do anything about it.

I knew that Edwards was a (the?) writer responsible for noble savage/white woman romances, but before that blog was pointed out to me I'd never read any of her work. She must be as bad as people say because she didn't find a way to rephrase the non-fiction texts, just changed a few words here and there.

[lemuralley]

I watched that unfold on Smart Bitches and then explode elsewhere. I'm extremely disappointed in Signet's response, especially given the examples they came up with on SBTB. This isn't a case of reorganizing ideas; it's full-scale copy-and-paste, something elementary school children know not to do.

[cantienne]

They've since posted a more considered, "we take plagiarism seriously and are looking into this" response, but their first response was really unwise and made them look irresponsible. Especially because it's so easy to both see and find more examples. Out of curiosity, I looked up one of her books on Amazon that has the "Look Inside!" feature, and searched for the name of the tribe she was writing about. On a page where it came up, I picked an unusual phrase that she used in association with a tribal tradition, then I opened a new tab and entered the phrase as a Google book search. It came up as the first hit - she'd copied it from an ethnic history from the 1970s. The whole thing took less than five minutes.

I'm intrigued as to how long she's been doing this. Her whole career? Or has she gotten lazier as years have gone by? And reading the examples SBTB lists was really bizarre - she's not just plagiarizing descriptions of, say, tribal rituals, but descriptions of waterfalls and stuff.

I'm going to have to look up some good romance to counteract the bad taste in my mouth. When's the next Judith Ivory coming out, anyway?

[aims]

dragonfly80 said:

Three Sisters is an example of how I have grown to hate her use of the mystical/supernatural/vampire junk. Three women all get men and discover their mystical witchy connection in a matter of months? The spells they chant are ridiculous and very junior high school wanna be Wiccan. Nora has also done the theme of women running away from their pasts and going to work in restaurants/catering companies in Angel Falls.

The Circle trilogy is the newest steaming pile o'turds from Nora. I admit Vampires aren't really my thing but I enjoyed some of Ann Rice's early works so I gave it a try. It's another typical group of 6 trying to defeat an ancient vampire while hooking up into 3 neat little couples and there is some time traveling and shape shifting thrown in for good measure.

Thank You!! I wasn't the only one rolling my eyes at the Three Sisters thing. 'so mote it be' or some such drivel. It was so awful!

I have seen the Angel Falls move with Heather Locklear. It was ok. So was Montana Sky.

Is the Circle trilogy where there are werewolves/vampires and they cross over into a different world to help defend it again the evil creatures ? I bought one called "valley of silence" or something like that for a long train trip. I'm stuck on a train with nothing else to read. Agony.

[Deleted]

cantienne said:

I'm going to have to look up some good romance to counteract the bad taste in my mouth. When's the next Judith Ivory coming out, anyway?

Cantienne, this was reported by Anne Marble at AAR in July about Judith Ivory:

"Sandy talked to Steven Axelrod of The Axelrod Agency, Judith Ivory's agent, and asked him about her next book. He reported that she hasn't turned in the book that was due and hasn't heard from her since. Sandy is sure that this is it and that we won't be getting any more Judith Ivory books, which is a damned shame and a loss for historical romance. "

[cantienne]

Thanks for the update, weekender. That's disappointing news - I liked her style so much.