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11:28 a.m. on 2001-11-27 Here's a few thoughts I had on the trash novels that the women love. ---------------------------------------- Trash-o-rama: My two day affair with Fabio. ----------------------------------------Alone in a friends bathroom the other night, I indulged in that forbidden activity most guys have never undertaken. Within the confines of that bathroom, I began reading a romance novel. My friend, who just so happens to be a female, had left it there. This scenario already confused me, before even opening the book. Did she really think the best time to read a novel about young people in the throes of passion was while taking a shit? I could almost envision her sitting there on the bowl, clutching her heart in one hand, the book in the other, and smiling warmly, all the while partaking in that most natural form of waste expulsion. Perhaps it was her way of saying, “love is shit” – you know, like a metaphor. Metaphors in romance novels are something I’ll get into later. Almost immediately, I found the pacing in regards to the plot in this romance novel very troubling. My ass had barely graced the porcelain, and already, the two main characters were having sex. In fact, they had just been introduced to one another. I later learned that the term “cut out the middleman” all too well applies to romance novels. True enough, there is no courtship or meeting the parents in romance novels. Surely, these little details would just slow down the non-stop sexual locomotive that charges from page to page. Therefore, the formula to any “successful” romance novel is a simple “Hello” followed immediately by sex. Further sexual encounters ensue, only in every different room of the house. Yes, even the pantry. I looked through a few other romance novels and noticed that most masqueraded as “period pieces” or epics. Quite often, romance novels are set against the backdrop of an epic war. Normally sinister characters, like pirates, can undergo remarkable transformations of demeanor when placed in the role of romantic protagonist. In between looting and murdering, the pirate finds time for a “meaningful” relationship. Tragically, his vocabulary is still only limited to that old pirate catchphrase of “ARRRRRRR!!!” It doesn’t matter, though. They don’t talk…just fuck. Very often, the male of the romance novel is some kind of war hero. In one book, we are told that Louis Bredeaux is a French hero of the revolution. Putting “French” and “hero” together is most certainly an oxymoron. Furthermore, exactly what heroic deeds is Louis Bredeaux performing? He spends the entire novel on top of Marie Corseau, attempting to complete that ever-complicated heroic task of fucking her brains out. Viva le France!!! Maybe the biggest key to romance novel success is how the author can turn ordinary acts of lovemaking into something descriptively arousing. The most commonly occurring phrase in romance novels is in regards to the male’s physical state just prior to the act of sex: “He looked at her sitting there. His loins began to burn and rage with a fire.” I’m suggesting-perhaps wrongly that authors who use this term run into some problematic issues regarding word usage. I’m no expert on thermonuclear genitalia, but describing loins as “burning” doesn’t sound too kosher. Of course, we are meant to believe that the male is so overcome with desire for the female that all of his sexual energy has been converted to his “package” a.k.a. Head Quarters for Sex Central. Or, the male might have the clap. There’s a good chance that if you’re loins are burning, you should not be having 150 pages of promiscuous sex. Rather, you should go see a doctor. Soon. On the off chance that I might be giving romance novels a bad rap, I checked some more out. I began to see an abundance of metaphors and words disguised as other words. After all, any woman will tell you that she describes her genitals as the “wet forest, soaked with the sweat of desire.” For some reason, things pertaining to sex in the romance novel must be shrouded in mystery. One scene describes Pierre, upon seeing Dame Lucinda on his bed: “Pierre consumed Lucinda with his eyes as she lay out on the bed. A familiar old bulge began to press against the denim of his pants…” Done without so much poetic license, we read this as: “Pierre was staring at Lucinda on the bed. He had gotten hard-ons in the past, so he knew his meat rod was ready to bust a hole through his Levi’s.” For the sake of arousal, I guess this wouldn’t have sufficed. I was also unaware that a hierarchy exists in the world of romance novel writers. A girl I know was reading a Danielle Steele novel. I commented, “I didn’t know you read trash novels?” Astonished at my comment, she became wild with rage, foaming at the mouth and telling me I had “nerve” to defame Danielle Steele as a writer of trash. Really, she was right. Not one Danielle Steele novel features a cover with the mug of that great thespian, Fabio. All of her covers are the same, just like her books. In Danielle Steele books, only the woman’s illness or deficiency changes. Her books are tame compared to the Harlequin romance novels I’d gotten used to. Danielle Steele is highbrow in a strictly lowbrow literary medium. Romance novels don’t want courtships, especially not with gimpy women. I guess the moral here is that I will stay out of women’s bathrooms…and I will take the shit, not read it.
in the slammer - up for parole CLIX |
