I see that Americans went for the safe and sanitized rocker, Lee Dewyze, for the win. No doubt all the text-happy tweens, pre-menopausal women, and Christian evangelists had a hand in crowning him the winner. Nothing new there then.

I guess I was hoping that voters would choose the winner based on actual talent, rather than on who they’d most like to sleep with.

Listen, I liked Lee, I did, but there was no way he was more talented than Crystal. Even he knew that.

Last year when safe, and sanitized tween-magnet, Kris Allen beat out Adam Lambert, I knew how the script was going to go. Kris would probably die in obscurity, because the people who voted for him probably wouldn’t buy his records, whilst the decidedly unsafe and unpredictable Adam would probably dance amongst the stars. I wasn’t wrong was I? Adam will be Lady Gaga to Kris’s Taylor Swift. One is an American darling who will fade once her fans grow breasts, and the other is an international star, whose stock will continue to rise for a long time to come.

It’s funny how many of the losers have gone on to do better than the actual winners.
Chris Daughtry was on one of the earlier Idol shows with his band, and he didn’t even make it to the semis did he? I’m still convinced that the only reason Kelly Clarkson won was because Americans thought she was the safe choice. Nine seasons gone, and Americans have only gotten it right two times it seems.

I give American Idol one more season without Simon. Simon Cowell is American Idol. It would be like going to see the Beatles without Paul McCartney, and who the fuck wants to do that? (Actually, I wouldn’t want to see them even with McCartney, but that’s beside the point).

Good luck Lee, but I think you know as well as we do that Crystal will outsell you massively. It’s an American Idol tradition these days. At least Crystal wont have to turn into an Idol-Bot, churning out shit music, album after album.

I should be grateful that at least the pretty boy with the girly hair didn’t make it to the final. Now that would have been ridiculous.

1. I’m far too hot to blog properly.

2. I haven’t read a book in two weeks.

3. I’m back on my annual holiday health kick and I managed to lose a whopping 9lbs this week, bikini here I come, whoop, whoop!

4. Derek Hough from Dancing With The Stars is a creative genius, and I think I have a slight crush on him.

5. Shemar Moore who plays Derek Morgan in Criminal Minds makes me want to squee like a girl.

6. TTG looks hot without his shirt on.

7. Why hasn’t Julia Spencer Fleming released her next Clare Fergusson/Russ Van Alstyne novel yet? I don’t want to wait until next bloody year!

8. My garden looks beautiful in this light.

9. I have some of the best female friends ever. Fact.

10. I have a new niece coming in September, and I’m so damned excited!

11. This weekend has been a feast of fun and it’s s shame it’s nearly over.

12. I have no idea what’s been going on in RomLand.

13. It’s the World Cup soon, yay!!! Come on England!!!

Jessica, of the most excellent Read, React, Review (formerly, Racy Romance Reviews), posted a couple of links to a kerfuffle involving Dear Author. Since these days I skip more than I read over there, I hadn’t realized that a recent review of Sinful (erotic romance by Charlotte Featherstone) was written by a 15 year old.

I left a couple of comments over at Jessica‘s, but since I’m still thinking about the issue, I’m going to expand a bit here:

Unless there is clear danger–a kid is leaning over a bridge’s handrail and there is no adult keeping an eye on the kid… a kid is hanging upside down from a thin branch three six feet high, and there’s no adult below ready to catch him if the branch breaks… there’s a toddler running on the street and no adult in sight… there’s a barefoot child stepping on grass where you know there are nettles… there’s a bunch of children taunting, pushing, shoving, hitting another child… there are adults abusing a child…–unless the situation is clearly damaging to the child’s well being,

please do not parent other people’s children.

Perhaps I feel strongly about this because a few years back I got taken to task by a group of women–fellow readers, over the now-defunct Suzanne Brockmann board–for allowing my then-fourteen year old to read Linda Howard’s Mr Perfect.

OMG, how dared I! (more…)

Laura Resnick a.k.a Laura Leone left a very interesting comment on my review of Fallen From Grace. It was such an interesting tale that I’m going to post it on here for you guys to read:

Laura Resnick (a.k.a. Laura Leone) here. How nice to see someone discovering this book!

It was the last romance novel I sold (my fourteenth), and it was VERY hard to find a market for it. The agent I had at the time castigated me for writing the proposal. Other agents whom I approached declined to handle it, telling me that “women aren’t interested in reading about this.” Eight or nine publishing houses turned it down, all of them saying it was “too left of center,” “too wild,” and “too dark,” etc. I believed they were wrong, but I set it aside for about a year while I tried to rethink how to break through that market barrier (and meanwhile kept writing fantasy, which–due to years of having precisely this kind of problem when marketing my romance novels–had by then become my full-time genre).

Then one day a male science fiction and fantasy editor who happened to be temporarily acquiring romance for a small press was chatting with me, and he asked, out of idle curiosity, why I had left romance. And, having recently come off this experience, BOY, did I give him an earful! He was curious and asked to see the book. The upshot was that he loved it and was determined to acquire it; and although I had originally hoped to sell the book to a house capable of much wider distribution, I was by then just so glad to find an editor who was enthused and “got” the book that I was delighted.

This book that EVERY major romance program assured me that romance readers WOULD NOT WANT to read… became a Rita Award finalist in comtemporary single title romance; was named a Desert Island Keeper by AllAboutRomance.com; and was recently listed on DearAuthor.com’s list of the Top 100 Romance Novels.

However, my last two sales in the romance genre, which occurred years apart and only after the books had been rejected everywhere else, were BOTH sales I made to sf/f editors who temporarily happened to be acquiring romance novels for small programs that didn’t last. And I can’t build an audience or making a living that way.

I also tried to sell these same two books (FALLEN FROM GRACE and FEVER DREAMS) to a mid-size romance reprint program about 18 months ago. Not only did the editor reject the books… she actually telephoned me to tell me (at excruciating length) just how bad she thought they were and how sure she was that romance readers would hate them, finding it too much of an “effort” to “wade through” my turgid prose.

Meanwhile, I’m heavily contracted in fantasy, where the only thing editors want from me to that I write faster, because they want to release more of my books. (At the present rate of my fantasy publishers’ demands, I may be able to take a weekend off some time in 2014.) Personally, I think I’m a reasonably good romance writer… but in more than a decade of marketing my books, I never once found a romance editor who thought so. So I’ve been a full-time fantasy writer for quite some time now, and this seems likely to be a permanent situation. I’d -like- to write more romance… but barring a substantial change in how romance editors think of romance fiction, it doesn’t seem very likely to happen; and I am very fortunate to have a lot of commitments in fantasy, a genre I love writing.

However, thanks to new technologies, the out-of-print situation with some of my old romances will soon change. As soon as there’s a let-up in my fantasy writing schedule (currently, I’m coming off one killer deadline and immdeiately entering another), I’ll get these books into affordable e-publishing and POD format. That’s vaguely on my To Do list for this year. Updated information about that will be on my website!

Anyhow, thanks for reading and reviewing this book!

I find it hard to believe that so many romance publishers refused this book. The criticism about it being too left of the centre makes me wonder if the majority of romance publishers at that time had right-wing leanings?

Anyway, I found her story totally fascinating.

Meet Dave (AKA Moonhead). He’s a Conservative.

He has a new best friend, Nick Clegg (AKA Just William), who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats.

Dave Cameron didn’t win enough votes to form a majority government, so he has to share with Nick and his cronies. Thus, Britain has a new coalition government. Jesus.

I hope for the sake of the country, that this partnership works. I really do.

Two and a half hours of my life that I wont be getting back any time soon. I totally agree with Eve. What a shit fucking film. Jesus, talk about fucking overhyped. Urrrrgghhhh!!!!

I’d like to know how many women genuinely enjoyed this piece of shit film? Seriously, I was ready to shoot myself in the head after just twenty minutes.

It’s finally here, Dee Tenorio’s fantabulous
“Tempting The Enemy” Trailer Contest!

May 5th-June 10th:
Enter this contest on two fronts–via a blog or twitter!
Winners to be announced June 11th!

Before we get to the rules, how about we get to the trailer?

Like it? Great! Share the trailer and win!

Blog Contest: Post the “Tempting The Enemy” YouTube trailer on your blog and link back to this post for your entry to be counted. Every pingback will be entered for the grand prize random drawing of an ARC of “Tempting The Enemy” from Carina Press and a $75.00(USD) gift card to winner’s choice of one of the following vendors: Apple, iTunes, Amazon, Borders or Barnes & Noble Bookstore.

Twitter Contest: Follow @DeeTenorio and post the following:

Seen the trailer for “Tempting The Enemy” by @DeeTenorio? Check it out: http://bit.ly/biCS9g #GetTempted and win!

All entries from followers with the #GetTempted hash tag & link will be accepted for the random drawing. Grand prize for the Twitter contest is an ARC of “Tempting The Enemy” from Carina Press and a $25.00(USD) gift card from winners choice of either Apple, iTunes, Amazon, Borders or Barnes&Noble Bookstore.

Please note: Winners can only win on one front–meaning you can win the blog prize OR the twitter prize, however entries for both are allowed and encouraged! Enter as many times as you like!

So…are you game?
Dee

“I’m me, and I’m like nobody else.”

Amen.

As most of you may have noticed, Jane’s rather light-hearted Romantic Times conference recap got hi-jacked by one of the Mr Romance contestants after he took exception to….. erm….ahh who the fuck knows?

If I’m honest, his story changed so many times that I’m pretty confused about what his actual problem was.

Anyway, this post isn’t really about him.

Blogger, Sidhe Vicious wrote a long and rambling rant, firstly sympathising with Antonio Angeletti’s plight, having been sexually abused by a bunch of “disgusting drunk fat women”. (She swears blind her rant wasn’t aimed at anybody specifically, but we all know how that works.) Admittedly the use of the quote was slightly out of context, but I think you get the gist.

Anyway, she was also incensed about people treating Angeletti like shit, just because he was a stripper. I’m not even sure that holds any water seeing as the readers and commenters were perfectly fine with that other RT contestant, Andrew something-or-other. Maybe because he came across as lucid and rational, who knows?

Sidhe wrote:

Can I just say that I am truly disappointed in the human race today… I feel terrible for all the Mr. Romantic Times contestants, models, strippers, etc. Whether or not these men are paid to be there to entertain in whatever capacity they are, there is no excuse to treat any of them like a piece of meat! Sure, maybe there are 1 or 2 in every bunch who’s actions may invite it, but again, do not judge them all by that one or two individuals actions.

I consider myself pretty liberal-minded about most things, however there are some things that I refuse to be all lily-livered about. And strippers who bitch about being treated like pieces of meat are one of them. (more…)

Yet another over thirty year old male virgin writes:

I’m in the exact position of Chris #38. Hilarious how similar our stories are. Although, I have been on several dates.

I basically gave up on women in my 20s for that very reason. I got a late start as it is–only started dating in my mid ’20s. But by that time there was no such thing as ‘dating’, for the females it seemed like some kind of panicked progression on the ladder to marriage/kids that I wanted nothing to do with.

There have been a few close calls, but I could never seal the deal because I was pretty honest about me being a biological dead end.

It’s funny because occasionally I’ll attract some random chick out of the blue but once she finds out about my V-Card status it’s all over. I must be some kind of FREAK! The heroin addict, wife beater, or violent felon you were dating before meeting me was totally normal though. : ) Hilarious–but utterly predictable.

I recently got into shape (used to be really fat) and seem to attract attention from females, but I don’t have that pavlovian response to vagina that would get me to act on these supposed signs I’ve been noticing. Which is why I advise all men to get laid before they’re 20–if you plan on having any kind of passion at all.

Anyway–athiest, mid-30s, childfree virgins unite!

Are women in their twenties truly only using the dating game as a means to an end? Do they all really only want to date just to get married?