Category: General Writing

It's easy to read a romance novel and get caught up in all the big, bad brawls, the political intrigue or the business wheeling and dealing. You can see the men standing around and talking to each other about how they rule their roost and manage their woman. Often, of course, it's the bachelors boasting and issuing proclamations that they wish to wed a nice, biddable female. Any happily married man in the story will snort, guffaw or issue a vague warning --  you'll see. 

Those bachelors may get what they think they want.  If they do, they'll end up in a typical society marriage where they share a house and not much else.  If the bachelors end up happily married, they'll see that the women rule the house and set the pace.  And if the women do it right, the men won't mind a bit.  That's one type of female power.

Male power works like men's minds, men's interests, and men's bodies - it's open, obvious and hard to miss.  Female power works like women's minds, women's interests, and women's bodies - it's subtle, secretive and hidden. Men use their power to run governments and businesses.  It helps them build an empire and control it.  Women use their power to run men.  It helps them to rule the world softly, gently, and in the wonderful world of historicals, they do it without ever having to soil their tender hands with working outside the home. 

Where She Force is wielded in the hands of a good author, it defines and controls and does it without ever being obvious.  In Flame And The Flower  Brandon makes several vows of what he will and won't do, and by the end of the book, as a prior post addressed, he's broken them all but has arrived at the happier ever after he swore he never wanted.  In Johanna Lindsey's Mallory novels, Georgie gets James to break his promise never to wed by tying him in so many knots that he forces her brothers to force the wedding.  Amy gets Warren to trust women again, makes him compromise her, refuses to wed him if he's forced, and coerces him to propose properly.  In Nicole Jordan's Bride series three male best friends who don't want to marry meet three sisters who want to be independent.  The men chase the women, try to compromise the women and ultimately, it's the women who come to the men and make the marriages on their own terms. 

Female power works quietly and stealthily.  It's not motivated by force or will but rather by love and tender persuasion.  Which force is stronger?  All the loud, brash clashes of testosterone in the world can't compete with the soft force that changes men's vows, aims and goals and ultimately shapes the world.  She may do it over the breakfast table or in the bedroom, but look behind any happily married man and you'll find the woman shaping the policy, making the rules and defining the world.

Today, many -most (me too)- women are forced to be out in the everyday working world.  A lot of us would like to be like those ladies in historicals, working our magic from behind the scene.  Perhaps that's part of the charm of regencies and historicals - they paint a world we'd like to live in.  And why would we like to live in an age where men held the power?  Because we know they never did.

Or rather, in historicals, men held the power women didn't want.  It freed ladies to shape and manage the power they wanted, and to exercise it from the homes, the worlds, they built.  Economy has forced most of us out into the greater universe.  We should go there recalling that behind the shouts and shoves of men lurks the quiet intensity of women whose work makes the world go round as surely as it allows life itself to continue.

And when the working world gets to be too much, and the shouting and shoving makes us want to rip our hair out by the roots, we can pull out a romance novel and take a refresher course.  Then, with revived strength, recharged batteries and the recollection that the brash efforts of male employers or co-workers will never, can never, erode our She Force, we quietly keep ruling the world. 

The next time you read your favorite romance novels, or treat yourself to a new one (My new book, Golden, is an excellent example of female power)  look behind the obvious and notice how the women exercise their power.  The next time you're in the working world, notice how many of the men's decisions are really made by women laboring quietly at keyboards, running the show from behind the scenes.

She Force beats He Force every time and does it without ever letting the men realize that women run the world.  But then again, the smart ones do know.  Remember the happily married man talking to the boasting bachelors I mentioned at the beginning of this post?  He could tell the bachelors the secret truths behind "Yes, Dear."   But likely he won't.  He'll let them figure it out on their own and we get to enjoy each man's lessons, one page at a time.

I recently commented to a post on Romancing The Blog where the author mentioned some of the first romance novels she'd read.  I believe she referenced the term "bodice rippers" and mentioned genius and genre matriarch Kathleen E. Woodiwiss and her book, one of my all time favorites, The Flame And The Flower.   It's considered, I believe, a politically correct way to refer to the book.  In my humble and not a'tall revered opinion, the politically correct reference fits Flame  as well as a shoe fits a flounder.

Flame starts with power appearing to be firmly in the hand of the hero, Brandon Birmingham.  He thinks Heather Simmons is a prostitute when he meets her and takes her aboard his ship on his first night in London. Despite the misconception, what Heather makes Brandon feel compels him to spend the time in London searching for her.  He's determined to set her up as his mistress,  even though he'd arrived with the intent that this would be his last voyage.  The power has already begun to shift.

When Heather's vile Aunt and ineffectual Uncle find out she's pregnant, they transport her from their little village to London.  A friend of her late Father's, a politician with power, seizes Captain Birmingham and threatens to impound his ship and imprison his crew if he doesn't wed Heather.  We never hear him mention that he's engaged to a woman back home, a fact that might have swayed the politician.   Brandon allegedly capitulates to the threat and marries the girl.  Of course, any reader who's been paying attention already knows the Captain not to be the kind of chap to be bullied so easily.  Why does he wed Heather?  He already knows he can't lose her and never intended to sail away from her forever.  The threat didn't motivate the marriage, Heather did that, all on her own.  The power shifts a little more.

Still, the Captain has a temper and he is, after all, male, so he tells Heather she shall have no more of him than he's been forced to give already.  In other words, they shall not share a bed as man and wife.  But Heather's not the kind of lass a man can wed and forget so easily.  Before they leave port to sail for Brandon's home in Charleston, her allure and beguiling ways challenge his vow.  He's promised never to touch her, intended never to want her, but each minute in her presence sharpens the claws of desire and need and things he can't admit to yet.  The power is shifting fast and furiously.

After the couple is back in Charleston, as Heather settles into her public role as wife, the claws digging into Brandon grow into spurs and then swords.  Although the Captain claims Heather will never share his bed, while she is too heavy with child to satisfy him, when he takes a trip up North to sell his ship and staff his mill, strumpets offer to share his bed but Brandon says no.  He's faithful to the wife who doesn't share his bed.  Who's holding the power at that point?

A sufficient time after Heather bears their son, Brandon "demands" his husbandly rights but Heather turns the tables on him.  When the lord of the manor enters the room, he doesn't see his wife at first, and fears she's run from him.  She hasn't.  In fact, she's taken control of the encounter just like she's taken control of their relationship. 

Female power differs from male power in as many ways as men differ from women.  My next blog post will talk a little more about the essence of female power.  But for now, consider that in Flame  Ms. Woodiwiss puts all the apparent, all the traditional power in male hands.  However, all of the hidden but far stronger REAL power over the relationship, the household and how the couple meets the world ends up in Heather's feminine hands.

Flame And The Flower may meet some of the P.C. Police's standards for a bodice ripper in that it does deal with sexual power plays.  The problem with the definition and with the P.C. Police generally is a tendency to look only at the surface and to judge the surface armed with "their" labels.  In the minds of the P.C. faction, power can only mean one thing and it can only land in the hands of the one who rips the bodice.

Sometimes the real power lies in the hands of the heroine whose bodice got ripped.  It may be his game, but she's gonna play it her way.  That means, she won before the first seam got torn.

If you've never read The Flame And The Flower (shame on you), then you should pick up a copy today.  Like the defining classic of the romance genre it is, it stands the test of time without showing a single wrinkle.  It's had a place on my saver shelf for years and if you buy it today, it'll be on yours tomorrow.

I don't see a priest or a confessional.  Heck, I'm not even Catholic.  Guess I'll just make the confession right here to all of you - I LIKE MIND HOPPING. 

There.  I said it.  Right out in the open.  Feels kind of nice to be out of the closet, or the hard drive. 

Whether it's the hero or the heroine, the protagonist, a second fiddle, a third fiddle or a maid who never laid hands on a fiddle, I want to know what they're thinking.  I'm a mind junkie.   If a character speaks, the words are out there for the whole room to process.  But if a character thinks something, but doesn't say it, then only he or she AND THE READER are privy to that inside knowledge.  And I like being an insider.

I want to know that even if the hero and heroine are hissing and clawing in public, that in private, they'd like to be grubbing and pawing.  I want to know that he finds the way she sometimes slips and pronounces R's as W's adorable.  I want to know that she'd like to brush that fallen lock of his raven black hair back into place with her tongue.  I want to know if the heroine's sister sees the secret looks passing between the lead couple and thinks they've done more than kiss, that her sister is in over her head, or that Da will go off the rails over the whole affair.

In real life, I wonder how daft my husband thinks I am.  I wonder if my eldest son would really hurt me if I snuck up on him during the night and shaved that abominable beard he's grown.  I wonder if my youngest lives inside his head as much as I think he does and where that amazing imagination might take him.  When I pick up a book, I don't want to have to wonder, imagine, or work out clues from dialogue and physical actions.

I want the author to let me know what the character thinks and feels.  That's much more important to me than how he looks or what she wears.  And by the great green toad frog, we all know that it's more important than what either of them says.  Let me inside the characters' heads and hearts so that I can understand.  As life kicks them around and love doesn't go their way I can care.  And when love and fate and karma smile and the characters overcome the obstacles to find their way to each other, I can cheer.  Then I can close the book and tuck it away in my "keeper" pile and recommend it to all my friends. 

All those books where the author wants me to decide what the characters are thinking or feeling from visual or verbal clues?  They remind me of business lunches where I don't know anyone.  I'm glad to get out as soon as I can and do it without the least desire to go back. 

When I'm at my computer crafting my own stories, I do my best to bring the reader along.  The mind hopping express departs daily from my hard drive.

ALL ABOARD!!

When is a book too graphic and when is it not graphic enough?

Erotic is in and these days, many if not most, romance novels feature some hot and heavy, sweating to the friction kind of action.  Authors handle the sex scenes differently.  But in one way or another, in books that are going to get down and dirty and in others where they'll hold out 'till they have papers on each other,  all of the writers will have to deal with the bleep factor. 

I got criticized by some publishing professionals early on for not calling it a c*ck or a p**sy.  Call it what it is, they said.  These days, readers want it straight up, no-holds-barred, graphic.  So,  I edited early work and used the terms in later stuff.  Later, I ran some of that work by groups of readers and other writers who said the terms jerked them right out of the stories.  Before I published anything, I had to reconsider this issue. 

I realized that some writers use the terms and use them effectively because those writers are comfortable with the language.  I was a wee bit uneasy at some of the terms, but mostly, I missed the creative opportunities, the out and out fun, I got from not calling it a bleep.  If I don't use the word, then I get to describe it or make up my own terms that can fit with what else is going on in the scene.  I decided graphic terms, whether they're for body parts or to describe the groping and grubbing sessions, work for the reader if they work for the writer. 

Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to come off all prim and proper here. Heck, my day job is being a lawyer.  I've used the word d*ck for my hubby's package, sure enough, but I've also used it when describing certain other lawyers, judges, and the occasional client.  I've used it outside the office for the guy or gal who cuts me off in traffic and for the idiot who slows me down in line at the grocery store.  Those words fit real life occasions when I'm a little too stressed to be creative. 

In my writing, I have more fun not using those terms.  And if I have more fun, I hope my readers do too.  So this time, I think Shakespeare got it right.  A bleep by any other name is still a bleep.  It's just that sometimes, by another name it can be more and do more - it can make you smile, or make you think or sometimes, just sometimes, it can do both. 

No matter how much it will upset my college professors to hear an English major say this, I don't always agree with Shakespeare.  Like all that stuff about killing lawyers...not so much.  But hey, maybe that's just me  -- and all those I practice with, in front of or for, d*cks included. 

Let's save the in-your-face reality for the real world, when we need to be a little more graphic.  When we pick up a book, or better yet, a Kindle or a PC, (let's pick up lots of those) then we can enjoy the heated encounters, the dirty deeds and the knock-down, drag out fights by calling them what they feel like at the time.  Maybe some of those creative terms can find their way into our daily lives.  The next time somebody cuts you off in traffic or slows you down at the grocery store  try calling them a re-fried frog instead of a bleep.  At least, it'll make you smile.   

And let's not kill ALL the lawyers.

Some folks write great historicals that include very detailed information about the era in question. They'll include everything from specific accounts of political events to how cooks prepared meals in the Medieval Era, on the Western Frontier, or in Ancient Rome. Whether it's how they did laundry, polished armor, or got the Queen awake and dressed, I really don't care that much about it. If I want to know about political intrigue, I'll turn on the TV to one of the 24-hour news outlets. I have enough reality in my day to day life. That's not why I read.

I like to read - and write- books where history either sets the mood or sets the bar. The Regency period conjures images of one set of rules and expectations. A civil-war era Texas ranch or Charleston mansion conjures an entirely different set of images, rules and social mores. I find it fun to use history as wallpaper to set the mood and then bring in characters to knock down the wall.

It must be the Rebel in me, but I like to read and write about characters that push the limits and defy expectations. Of course, I enjoy it most when my hero or heroine is behaving badly because they're madly in love, or willing to break every rule to get back the one who got away.

 I admire writers who can construct carefully crafted historicals. I cheer for readers who have the patience to wade through them. They're not my cup of tea. I want to escape the details and routine of my life when I read or write. Give me lust and love, danger and desire, rowdy fights and ravenous make-up sex.

The real world lives at my desk, behind the wheel of my car, on the television news and outside my window. Keep it out of my books.