Reading While Black

From the cover flap:

“Beautiful, impressionable Hellen North meets Oliver Marathon when he is on holiday. Blessed with looks, determination, and a family background so illustrious that is has smoothed his way into the upper echelons of British Government Service in colonial Hong Kong in 1920, Oliver sweeps Hellen away with a marriage proposal. They ignore the whispers and warnings of people who say that a simple farm girl is not an acceptable Marathon bride, and plan to marry in Hong Kong.So when Oliver is summoned back East peremptorily, he asks Hellen to follow. But her courage falters during her long voyage. The more she learns about Oliver’s family, the more she despairs of being accepted. In this vulnerable state she meets George Curtain, a man with a dubious reputation, but just enough gentlemanly behavior to fool Hellen. He lures her ashore in Singapore and entangles her in a cruel trap. Finding Oliver seems an impossibility as Hellen makes her way in a world of passion and intrigue, where anything can happen.”

I have a soft spot for the 1920s as well as China, so snapping up a romance set not only in the 1920s, but in China was a no-brainer. Not only does Worboys possess a knack for painting a vivid picture of life in upper class circles at “Home” and abroad in one of Britain’s many colonies, but also for creating exuberant characters with a minimal number of words. No elaborate back stories or heaps of exposition here; the plot moves at a brisk and lively pace despite the many obstacles strewn in Hellen’s path to Oliver Marathon.

The relationship between Hellen and Oliver falls on the Barbara Cartland side, with both of them instantly in love, certain they were destined to be with one another. In fact, throughout the book the two of them seem to exist in a sort of dream world where their actions have no consequences, and true enough, Worboys allows them the liberty of coming together in Hong Kong despite Hellen’s marriage to the louse George Curtain. Hellen is both naive and shrewd, an incongruous mixture of personality traits that somehow works in this book. While Oliver is never fully fleshed out beyond the charming and privileged young man with the world at his fingertips and the book grew predictable towards the last third, I couldn’t help but really enjoy China Silk and wish more romances were written with this much élan and wonderful use of an “unusual” setting.

I’m on an assassin kick having picked up this one, Kelley Armstrong’s Exit Strategy and Leslie Langtry’s debut. Call it a delayed reaction from missing Sydney Bristow.

I wish books came with disclaimers. For all the title and the blurb advertises, Selena McCaffrey is not an assassin. In fact, she’s only killed one man and it was in self-defense. Brain-washed and wounded, Selena is ordered by her “Uncle William” to pack up her bungalow in Key West and move to Tulsa, Oklahoma to keep watch on the cop assigned to the vigilante case tormenting the city.

Though the book spends a good deal of time covering the case and introducing the friends and family of Detective Tony Ceola, the book is pretty well-paced and interesting enough to keep my attention. The spine says “Romantic Suspense” and I’d say the percentage of romance to suspense is 45/55. I liked Tony–a pretty inoffensive, expectedly sexy male protagonist whom I found very likable despite his lack of depth. My trouble with this book? The very person the series is supposed to revolve around. Butler gave Selena a suitably wounded background what with being an abused mixed-race orphan whose life was manipulated by a complete bastard, but she never lept from the page.

The product of her mother’s infidelity with a black man, she was raised first in Puerto Rico, then in Jamaica and when her “uncle” finds her, in a Swiss boarding school. Pretty straightforward one would think, but I didn’t find it so. Tony, among others, kept describing Selena as an “island girl”(which I found highly annoying), but there was nothing about her characterization to suggest that she was from the Caribbean despite her explanations of her heritage. Another issue I found with Selena was her incessant moaning over her mixed heritage and how she didn’t fit in anywhere.

Quite odd considering the ties between the Latino and black communities in America, the presence of black Latinas (I’m baffled over whether her unknown father was a black Latino or a black American, and hello: Zoe Saldana and Gina Torres!!), the Caribbean’s acknowledged mixture of many ethnicities, and the fact that Selena wasn’t even raised in America to have the sort of hang-ups bi-racial Americans are alluded to share. Instead of treating Selena as an individual who has black ancestry, she came across as a “white” interpretation of what goes on in the mind of a black woman.

I’ve read the book twice over the weekend and while it does possess a certain charm that urges me to continue the series, it’s ultimately forgettable and disappointing when placed vis-a-vis with long-time thriller/suspense writers.

Whenever I browse author blogs I see them posting information given to them by agents and editors about what they want. Nowadays, the paranormal market is squeezed, and I’ve seen many a post where an editor or agent advises unpublished authors aspiring to break into that market to work on their world-building. However, nowhere do I see agents or editors advising authors who want to break into the historical market to do this. Mostly I’ve seen them emphasizing cultivating a unique “voice”.Sheesh…and you wonder why historical romances still carry the “bodice ripper” moniker.

What really bothers me is the fact that readers complain that they don’t want “history tomes”, that shortened attention spans and the cost of paper and ink are always cited when it comes to the decreasing value of the history in the historical romance, yet these readers happily gobble up 400 to 400+ pages of urban fantasy and paranormal romance rife with world-building, multiple characters and rich settings. Looking at the most popular series, J.R. Ward’s Brotherhood, the latest, Lover Revealed, is 480 pages, and the next installment, is a whopping 528 pages. Uh uhn you say, Ward is an established author, so she gets the extra pages. Well, Book One, before anyone even knew who she was clocks in at 416 pages.

Someone must be taxing their brains to stretch their attention span for Ward to be hitting the NYT Best-seller lists.

You see, I want a historical romance that well, has history in it–or at least the history plays a part in the story and the characters. If I want a frothy Regency, at least let it be accurate. Less of the h/h pawing at one another in a kitchen pantry or at a ball, and more of them matching wits and engaging in forbidden caresses as they traipse about the ton. And please, I beg of you, no more Almack’s and Lady Jersey–there are so many places for characters to go in London besides the tiny enclave that is the West End. For a Victorian, I want to feel that this is not the Regency era. I’m so sick and tired of reading so-called Victorian-set Historicals only to discover that the author just took some popular Regency plot and slipped in a few mentions of crinolines and Queen Victoria.

For spy historicals, please be based in reality. Whether it be smugglers or spies running about the ton, the villains and the reason for spying is so lame and fantastical I now automatically ignore any historical romance with a mention of spying–even from authors I’ve enjoyed in the past. It’s one thing to say (in a Regency Historical) the French are the enemies, but what about bringing real fears of the English into the story? (Like the fact that for a few years, the English were terrified out of their wits that Napoleon would invade the country. Or people trying to break Napoleon’s code. Or just having spies who are spies and how dishonorable a position it was considered.) What about the Peninsular War? Or the diplomatic games played on the Continent?

When it comes to moving from era to era, I would dearly wish the actions of the characters matched the setting. If I see one more militant suffragist heroine prior to 1905, I think I might cry. Or a hero in the Victorian era who is an out and out rake, and is accepted willingly into the homes of society (rule #1: “thou shalt not be found out”). Please let the clothing be accurate and the movements of the characters match. If you’re writing books set in the 1860s, your heroines are wearing really wide hoop skirts. The Victorian hero is not going to sleep in the nude: he is going to wear a nightshirt, and later, pyjamas. Stop making your servants the best-friends of the aristocratic characters. The relationship between servant and mistress/master was a unique one that had nothing to do with servants being some type of oppressed subordinate.

I’d generally like to see a cast of characters outside of the hero and heroine and the suitable number of sequel baits. I’d like to see heroes who have jobs or positions, who are politicians or business owners–even if they are titled. I’d like to know what different parts of England look, feel, and smell like, not some generic shire only known as “Kent” or “Shropshire”. I want to see the consequences of a characters action because of that setting or social circle. But most of all, I’d like my desire for the inclusion of history into the historical romance to be viewed as “elitist”, and no, I don’t want to read Historical Fiction, and I have read non-fiction a lot more livelier than some of the historical romances lying on bookshelves.

Set in contemporary Atlanta, Getting Even is the story of three friends–Claudia, Annelise, & Lishelle–involved in volatile relationships with men they trust and what happens when that trust is shattered.
Claudia is the perfect Black American Princess (or, BAP for short). Beautiful, poised, wealthy and well-connected, she is engaged to her male counterpart, Adam. Adam and Claudia have a smoking sex life: anywhere and everywhere and anything. Except it is initiated by Adam. Claudia, wanting to please the man she is marrying in two months eagerly participates in the raunchy antics Adam cooks up despite her nagging doubts.

Annelise is a photographer who has finally got her business on the fast track to success. Married to a successful lawyer and blessed with all the luxuries she desires, life is just about perfect–except for one thing: she and her husband, Charles, haven’t had sex in a little over a year. Desperate for his attention, for his appreciation, for anything, Annelise takes the advice of her stripper sister and takes the plunge into the world of sex shops.

Lishelle is one of Atlanta’s well-known anchorwomen. With a great career and great money, everything is on track. Except she can’t find a good man. After one disastrous blind date, she is delighted, nay ecstatic, to discover the man she’d loved and who made her weak in the knees is back and ready to marry her.

Told in alternating first-person POVs, Getting Even is full of raunchy sex and believable dialogue. Perrin skillfully weaves the narrative to its stunning climax, and “a woman scorned” cliches have never been this good. Hell hath no fury indeed as all three friends gradually discover that the men they expected to spend the rest of their lives with are dirty, no-good dogs. As the story progressed, my outrage over their men’s behavior grew and I was left hooting with laughter and . Perrin’s writing style is so smooth, so crisp, and so tight that it crackles, that I read the book in a few hours, so engaged my eyes didn’t leave the page for a second. What follows is a rip-roaring ride of revenge that doesn’t disappoint and leaves me anxious to read the sequel, Getting Some.