Fifteen Authors In Fifteen Minutes

Write down here the names of the first fifteen romance authors that have influenced your reading the most.  Just write the names down without thinking too much; whether you hate them now or still enjoy their works, their writing styles and stories are what will always be your favorite go-to themes.  You'll start to dig deeper after the first six names or so, but you mustn't analyze too much! Just keep writing down the names as they appear on your mind.

Me:

Linda Howard
Nora Roberts
Rosemary Rogers
Laurell K. Hamilton
Ann Rice
Christine Feehan
Helen Bianchin
Merline Lovelace
Iris Johannsen
Susan Johnson
Christina Dodd
Katherine Sutcliffe
Anne Stuart
Carolyn Jewel
Debra Dixon

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The first three names are easy enough.  Linda Howard opened the world to me to the possibilities of different types of romance stories, besides the usual contemporaries.  Her name is coupled with Nora in my head because I collected their stuff incessantly when I re-started my romance with the genre. 

Rogers' Sweet Savage Love was the probably the first "single title" historical I ever read in the seventies, after a steady diet of Mills and Boons (series romance).  That I remembered the story, the title, and the author in the 90s, twenty years after reading it and fifteen years after I dropped out of reading romances, proved how influential this book was of my reading.  I've reread it in the 90s and can't say that I enjoyed the experience as much as when I was an impressionable teen, but there were certain scenes that still riveted me, and even the horrifying and disgusting ones were still WTH-must-have-gone-thru'-my-teenage-mind worthy.

I know Ann Rice isn't a romance author but there were romantic elements in her books that started my love of the dark, vampire genre, and definitely influenced me into imagining the world of the vampire differently. 

You'll also notice that once you come up with a name, another name pops up that is connected to the one before, suggesting that you're attracted to these clusters because of certain similarities.  For example, my writing down LKH immediately brought up Ann Rice, and then Christine Feehan, back-to-back-to-back, even though I read these authors years apart.  This, to me, shows my awareness of how these three authors built on my fascination with the vampire genre. 

Sutcliffe brought up Stuart, showing how I tie these two authors--dark stories, dark heros.  I'm still trying to figure out why Bianchin gave me Lovelace as next, since they aren't similar in style or story at all.

So, come on, let's see your list!  I know many of you will probably name more recent authors because YES I AM ANCIENT when it comes to reading romance.  The exercise is fun because it bunches together past and present writers.  I was very surprised by the appearance of Carolyn Jewel, for instance.  I do love her writing, but never would have put her ahead of a few of my other favorite authors, but on second thought, yeah, I've always had a thing about the way she writes her heros ;-).  Which, of course, brings me Anne Stuart, the queen of my heros.

TADA.

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Jack Bauer Is Back! Rooferwriter Excited

Each season, watching Jack Bauer is my crackalicious duty. The over-the-top plots, the crazy characters, the lack of logic--somehow I'm still riveted. Jack Bauer fascinates and amuses me as a character, with his alpha toughness that borders on lunacy (but in a good, protect-the-world way) and his inability to communicate other than with weapons. And of course, there's always the thigh-shooting and the JackSack (TM) that holds all weapons and yet look so innocently empty when he's carrying it. We Jack fans cackle every time a thigh is shot, with much beverage consumed for each mention of "perimeter."

It's great how we get to love certain characters, in books and shows, and stay with them through their journey. We enjoy their ticks and mannerisms; we love them in spite of their faults. How many of us have whole series of books with characters that have become part of our reading family (Eve and Roarke come to mind)? When they do bone-headed things, we yell at them; when they're in danger or in pain, we're totally concerned about their safety and emotional well-being, looking eagerly for the next chapter or book to let us know all is well...for a little while ;-).

That's why I'm enjoying writing my Virtual series. It's an exercise in learning how to write with many eyes. I've discovered that it's like being on an escalator that goes up pass different floors, one that I can choose to stop on the way to the top. Each floor has different "stores," ones that I could explore, if I chose to get off, and the stores give me items that tell yet another layer of my hero's and heroine's stories.

As a writer, knowing that there are readers who are taking an interest in one's characters to commit to a series is humbling, exciting, scary, exhilarating, and so much more. It can also be overwhelming because the challenges can turn into quicksand and cut off one's air.

Like Jack Bauer's plot lines, how much more over-the-top can it get before the fans walk away? For now, I'm still willing to let Jack Bauer save the day. Why? Because the character is iconic: he moves around in a time with the ease of Bionic Man when all of us are mired in a frozen state. He is unbelievable and unbelievably amazing, but then all superheros are supposed to be both.

It's more difficult in a romance with action because the writer has to take care of the romance, have the hero heroic without crossing that gray line of being unredeemable. That Jack Bauer is aware of how far gone he is makes him a challenging romantic hero, if one is inclined to pick up the challenge to give him a romance plot line ;-). I heard that this season, he might meet a heroine dark and damaged enough to actually take him on. Can't wait!

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The Older You Get The Older The Hero Gets

As I slowly work my way through editing and updating Grace's story, a few things struck me about this particular manuscript.

1) The heroine is my youngest ever.
This being Grace--you know, Jed's daughter--she's a little different from most young ladies. She's around 22. Her story starts around five years after Big Bad Wolf. To give perspective, it's also roughly a bit after that period of time His Jedness gets entangled with a certain Hell ;-).

Anyway, the way Grace behaves and thinks is a challenge because she has that "I'm young and immortal" psyche crossed with "I'm uber spy's daughter and I've seen stuff" attitude. There are moments when she acts overly-confident thus driving her lover up the wall because he has trouble seeing her beyond that 22 year-old facade.

2) This is also the biggest age difference between h/h. The hero is around 31, nine years older than Grace. To the old girl in me, he's really just sliding into real manhood ;-) but while writing Grace, I have to see him through her eyes. When I was around 20, anyone 30 or older is out of my league and vice-versa. The nine-year age gap is bigger during that time than between a 26 and a 35 year-old.

So Grace (and I) has a lot of fun out-witting this poor OLD dude of 31 who doesn't know that he's messing around with Number Nine's daughter. Needless to say, the youth thing keeps tripping him up.

As you know, I wrote this book many years ago. I have to update the lingo and technology as I rewrite. It also made me think whether I could write another story with such a youthful couple. They are quite different compared to later couples I created who are a few years older. Grace doesn't have that sophisticated layer that her GEM friends have nor does she have any baggage. In fact, she's pretty well-balanced in spite of her strange upbringing. If you've read her in BBW, you'll find that she hasn't changed much since then.

My curiosity then is this--how old do you like your couples? Especially the hero?

When I started reading romances in my teens, the heroines were forever around 18 or 20, with the heros at the disgusting ages of 36-39. This vast difference in age was quite normal back then, and yeah, even though I loved those stories, I was always quite horrified at the thought of my hero being that OLD. When I returned to romances a decade later, a lot have changed, including the age difference. The heroines are now older too, usually between mid- to late- twenties. The heros are also younger, thank God. Reflection of the times and all that.

However, I'm now past the disgusting ages of 36-39 and suddenly, early forties heros are quite reasonably acceptable in my mind again ;-). Hey, early forties can be the new sexy, you know. Isn't that funny how that works?

So now I'm curious because I have both Grace-age readers and readers who are in that "disgusting" age group ;-). What do you younger readers think of the older heros? Conversely, what do you more, ahem, experienced ladies think of the younger heros? Admittedly, 31 here is quite acceptable, but I'm not sure whether I'd get into a romance with, let's say, a 25 year-old hero.

For example, the youngest hero I've ever read was in a Susan Johnson historical and he was a very, very, very, very, very, VERY experienced 18. I couldn't get into that story at all because well...18 is a BOY, no matter how sexy. I kept seeing my neighbor's son while reading it. Ugh.

I'm looking forward to reading about your take on hero's and heroine's ages/age difference, so please chime in.

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Warrior Heros in Books

I'm going to list some Warrior Heros from the books on my shelf by the laptop:

Keir in Elizabeth Vaughan's Warprize
Lachlain in Kresley Cole's A Hunger Like No Other
Wyatt in Linda Howard's Drop Dead Gorgeous
Cam in Linda Howard's Up Close and Dangerous (still reading it!)
Wrath in J.R. Ward's Darkh Lhover
Stephen in Christina Dodd's Lost In Your Arms
Roarke in J.D. Robb's Born In Death

The rest I have there are Bad Boys! I guess my preference is showing ;-).

Look at your closest shelf and add to my list. Doesn't have to be current books, as you can see.

I see my book Facing Fear on the shelf but I couldn't decide whether Rick is a bad boy or a warrior, so I'm leaving that to you.

Warriors vs Bad Boys -- would they get along, you think? I'll have to let that simmer on my mind today.

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P/S Last night at Walmart, out of curiosity, I read the last two pages of the new Karin Slaughter book. SPOILERS AHEAD.
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Wow. Talk about cruelty, dude! The couple was so happy about their lives together till the very last page. Then... Cold, man. I hurt for the readers who love this couple.

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An Uber Valentine Hero

It's Valentine's Day tomorrow. I'm wondering whether I'll be getting a box of chocolate. Something would be nice, wouldn't it?

The perfect man. Isn't that what we all love to read about? In the many books on my keeper shelf that give me that loving feeling, it's the hero that makes it so for me. How many times have you sat around discussing a book and the first thing that comes up is: "OMG. ***The hero*** Nummilicious!"

The perfect hero isn't a paragon of virtue either. He just has that ooooomph that makes us sigh. And he'll never forget to give you something special for Valentine's ;-).

I found this on YouTube, created by someone who can't decide who to play her Roarke, who is one of those ultimate fantasy hero:



I think she covers just about everyone available that would fit that role, don't you think?!

I have a soft spot for Eduardo Verastegui but I'm keeping him for one of my commandos, sorry! ;-)

So what is your ultimate Roarke like?

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Edited to add: Can you do me a favor, please? Click to FYEO and see whether you ca read any of the old posts from previous years. New Blogger has really effed up my system. I hate them. I hate them. I hate them.

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