Recent reads

[annathepiper]

Nerd in Shining Armor was, as cafiorello promised, a fun read. Very, very fluffy, but at least it was a fun read. ;) I was extremely amused that Harrison Ford's flick Six Days Seven Nights was passingly referenced in this novel--because the whole atmosphere of the book was very much like that, except with more sex and fewer pirates. And the hero would probably have been better played by David Schwimmer than Harrison Ford, as he had that whole charmingly shy geek thing going on. Especially when he decided to stop going by Jackson and start going by Jack, as it sounded much more macho. Hee.

I liked that we were given a valid reason why our nerd in shining armor wore horribly mismatched clothing, and was rather charmed that both hero and heroine were trading off wearing the same pair of glasses. Our heroine's attachment to her goofy old pink suitcase, also charming. Where the plot wore thin for me was in the description of how our heroine's family hailed from "the Hollow" in Tennessee, which was apparently so backwards as to not even have electricity, and how both her mother and her brother were psychic. (On the other hand, I DID like the line her brother tosses off at the end when he, their mother, and the good guy from the software company finally reach the island where they get stranded.)

I'll most likely read The Nerd Who Loved Me soon, too.


The Jewel and the Sword was the second of the freebie romance novels out of my Writer's Weekend raffle basket, and published by the same press that put out Lady Dragon. This book, however, was a somewhat more enjoyable read even if it started off with the whole "enemy warrior tied up to the chaste maiden's bed because he's direly wounded but OH GOSH, he's cute, so the chaste maiden is passionately drawn to him as she's tending his awful wounds" thing. And you could tell that this was going to get milked for all it was worth, because that was a big selling point of the blurb on the back cover.

Once the plot got past that point, I did at least buy that the hero and heroine actually were attracted to one another. A lot of their scenes together were actually rather cute.

I also liked that there was a tiny bit of complication as to who was actually the villain, though I didn't buy how the 'obvious' villain so quickly reforms at the end. And I didn't buy the specious behavior of King Henry telling our hero "I cannot permit you to marry this girl" and not saying why. Nor did I buy him coming back at the end and saying "I've arranged for you to marry this other girl--oh, you don't want her? Okay FINE go marry the one you want anyway, even though I told you not to before". And there was, of course, the obligatory gratuitous sex scene; see previous commentary re: the apparent complete lack of nubile young women concerned about screwing their lives over for the sake of one fling of passion in the Romance Novel Universe.

Also, Ms. Jones really needs to do her readers a favor and back off on her rendering of Scottish accents just a tad. Every last little "ye" coming out of a Scottish character's mouth set my teeth on edge. And given that the heroine was in fact Scottish, this was a bit of a problem.

All this said, as mentioned, this was a better read than Lady Dragon--though that's not saying much. ;)

Comments

[mizkit.livejournal.com]

Also, Ms. Jones really needs to do her readers a favor and back off on her rendering of Scottish accents just a tad

I've got a book somewhere, or maybe I don't anymore, by one of the Sacramento romance writers. It's even signed. I tried reading it, I really did. Several times. I don't think I ever got more than about 40 pages into it, because it was set in the Highlands and every. Bloody. Sentence. That came out of the characters' mouths. Was written in dialect. It was unreadable. *GAAAAH*.

[annathepiper]

*winces in sympathy* Ugh. Ugh ugh ugh.

Now, Susanna Kearsley's The Shadowy Horses--there's a book that handles Scottish accents well. The hero is a Scotsman, but he is quite readable, and the thicker accents only show up periodically coming out of minor characters, just enough to add local color to the setting.

[jesshartley.livejournal.com]

The best book I've ever read with regards to Gaelic dialect was the sequel to "Daughter of the Forest" (I can't remember the sequel's name)... I swear, without ever using the obnoxious "ye ken woot Aye meen" stuff, she did a fantastic job of portraying the cadence and lilt of a brogue. It was easy to read, because it was all in "regular" speech, but you could just "hear" it as you read it... I don't know if I'm explaining it well, but it's worth a read.

[annathepiper]

You are indeed explaining it well! Thanks for the recommendation. It's a tricky thing, portraying accents--as I myself have been learning with Faerie Blood and my Newfoundland-accent-havin' hero therein. ;)

[astraether.livejournal.com]

Coincidentally enough, I just read "Nerd in Shining Armor" too -- right before I read "Rebecca" by DuMaurier. I pretty much agree with your assessment; total fluff, but fun fluff. I found myself laughing out loud at several passages -- most notably the bit where they're scaling the cliff and Jack says "Sorry. Can't laugh. Might go splat." It still makes me giggle.

Another thing I liked about it that set it a bit apart from most romance novels is that the author genuinely seems to like men. That is, I get the feeling that a lot of romance authors have a bone to pick with unfaithful spouses/boyfriends, and they often open with some wife being betrayed (and martyred), and then running off to find some ludicrously perfect guy who couldn't possibly exist in reality. I'm not saying that the characters in "Nerd" were terribly complex, but they had their flaws and failings, and were still loveable for it. I also enjoy humor in sex scenes, so I'll probably check out more by Thompson. :)

[annathepiper]

Yeah, the humor in the sex scenes was a refreshing change of pace from the standard "guy is the most tender and considerate lover that girl has ever had, and completely and totally blows her away" type of such scenes.

And I get what you mean about the men thing! Hrmm, I wonder which bucket Elizabeth Lowell falls into. Her Donovans series is chock full of ludicrously perfect guys that couldn't possibly exist in reality, and in fact a joke is made in the middle of one of the books about whether men have to pass a handsome test before being admitted to the Donovan empire. ;) She's all about the aforementioned standard type of sex scenes, though!

That's definitely one of the things I liked about Jack--even if I took issue with some of his dialogue (I mean, NO NERD I KNOW would actually be clueless enough to say to the face of a girl he's interested in that he'll program his computer to tell him when it's time to spend time with her), he seemed... real. :)

[cafiorello.livejournal.com]

Remind me to invite you and Keith to lunch at the WorldCon one day. He can show you the schedule on his PDA for when he has to let me talk about work (2X per week), when he has to buy me a present or a card (1X per 6 weeks).... OK, maybe he didn't say it to my face *early* in the relationship, but he got there! ;)

Cathy

[annathepiper]

*LOL* I stand corrected!

And we should have lunch during Worldcon anyway. ;D