Uber Spy Is Unloving-able

Heading to Charleston for the Low Country Workshop this Friday, folks! I'll be driving and without my usual roadtrip buddy, sniff*. I'm also going to so miss my little Jiggle Low. He's been a shadow and actually likes to climb on top of me to sleep ;-P. So much so, that he's become an argument between me and the S.O. because well, the bad puppy thinks I'm his and no males are allowed to sleep close by. It amuses me no end.

So poor Jiggle Low is going to be without his momsie for the weekend. Sigh. Only I can get so darn connected to a furbaby.

His Jedness, in one scene, had to be in one country while Hell was working in another. This is the first time he'd ever kept wondering (I call it worrying, but he keeps saying it's wondering) about another operative's safety. It's all about his actions, that Jed, because he uses those big words from that dictionary of his to obsfucate the truth. ;-) He would disagree, of course.

I received an email yesterday which complained that Jed isn't a loving kind of character. I'm not sure how to respond to that. Going to have to sit on this and brood about it. There are many words I'd use to describe His Jedness but "loving" wouldn't be one of them.

The email went on to say that that since the hero is so "unlovingable," (is this word in Jed's dictionary?), then the romance between my heroine and him is also unacceptable. I wanted to pound out a quick reply to say, "Whoa...I haven't even gotten to the romance yet, dear reader!" But I stopped myself.

Part of my dilemma is a pseudo-rule I set for myself about fan/reader mail. Without a specific question, I will not write an explanation or defense of my story or my characters. A reader has the right to his/her opinion, and even the worst criticism is part of the writing for the public process.

For example, remember that hate-mail from that librarian dude who wrote that my book was trash? I know I gave a tongue-in-cheek reply saying that he must have wandered into the wrong aisle, but I also tacked on the suggestion that he returned the book, since he hated it so much. It was only when he replied several times after that to add that I should be ashamed of myself for writing his equivalent of excrement and that in future, I shouldn't write books like VHis anymore, and that if I don't follow his advice, my writing career will be a nothing, that I took offense. Yeah, hate the book, fine, but don't tell me what I can or cannot write.

So this reader feels VHis is a failed romance because Jed is "unlovingable" and doesn't "communicate his love." Then she tacked on, "The hero sucks so better luck next time." Argghhhhhhhhh.

Jiggle Low tells me what he thinks by his actions. The bad boy still lifts his legs and pees to mark his dominance. Unacceptable. Especially when he does it to the pillow on which someone else has slept. Totally unromantic. But he's communicating his feelings to me. There are different ways to communicate love. Just saying.

I need some sexy veges. They always put me in my Zen place.

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I So Wrote A Romance Too!

IMO, THIS is one of the better written reviews of Virtually His. The reviewer did an excellent job summing up Book One in the first few paragraphs, something that I* had trouble doing for my proposal, LOL. I should hire her to sum up my other Virtual books!

This is the review that says that Virtually His isn't a romance because there is no romance found inside the pages. I can see where the reviewer is coming from, of course, because there is no direct interaction between Hell and her trainer, and even though Jed DOES appear physically several times, it was more as a tease for Hell while she tries to figure her trainer's identity. In that sense, there's no romance within the book.

But, if one loosely generalizes the parts of a romance as:
1) set up
2) heroine meets hero
3) sexual tension
4) conflict (external and internal)
5) bonding
6) revelation,

I can defend that these elements are present in Virtually His. Granted, they don't exactly "meet" in a physical manner, but hey, there was a romance recently that was written mostly in email form between the protagonist, yes? Sexual tension is always present in a romance but can it be sustained throughout a series? For me, in many books, once the hero and heroine start going at it like horny rabbits, much of the tension afterwards is lost.

As for the romantic conflict, well, for me, and obviously for Hell, is what she is feeling real? That is the main conflict and will still be the real conflict in Book Two. Even after she meets Jed in person, there is this itsy bitsy problem of the sexual trigger. And her accidental bumping into another remote viewer and absorbing his perverted sexual "cache." And the knowledge that she is one independent GEM operative. It's a BIG itsy bitsy problem in a budding romance.

The bonding and revelation. There was a physical get-together. Did you think Jed was just going to be normal about their sexual encounter? Not the first time, surely. Nor the second or the third. He's going to be his manipulative self, always looking for a way out of saying that it is anything but sex. Is the reader going to dislike him? Well, that's the gamble when I chose Jed as the hero to this series. He's not a LIKEABLE fellow. Lickable, yes ;-).

The final revelation isn't "I love you" or "Will you marry me" or any other committed phrase. It's Hell finally finding out, through her remote viewing skill, who her trainer is. Yeah, I could have been more succinct, written in a confrontation. There were different ways to end it but no matter what, it was going to be a cliffhanger anyway. Even if Jed walks enters her apartment in the flesh and says, "I'm Jed and yes, I'm your trainer," and I end there, some readers would still want more.

As it stands, the way I ended it was a writer's decision to make it look like a TV season finale. Sort of Jack Bauer-ish ;-). Because, as you know, I love that TV series (except for Day 6, when I just love parts of it).

Although I really enjoyed this review, I've to disagree with this sentence from the last paragraph: After investing a great deal of time reading this almost 400 page book that sets the stage for the climactic revelation of identity of Hades, the story just stops, and we are left hanging in midair wondering who Hades really is. IMHO, I think that it was quite clearly Jed McNeil who is the monitor. Throughout the book, I took pains in describing the eye color or clothing of every of the commando that was introduced. Flyboy with the blond hair and blue eyes. Armando with his Asian features and cloak. Jed and his silver eyes and those jeans. Heath and his chocolate melty eyes. Diamond and his nakedness ;-). Where the story ended, with Hell seeing silver eyes and blue jeans, well, take a wild guess as to who the hero of the next book is...go on...;-P.

Question: Did you have trouble guessing the monitor's identity? Did you get the clues (or were you too busy drooling over them like Hell, heh heh)? And if you know Jed from the other books, do you agree that he acted consistently?

I want to thank you Romance Reviews Today for reviewing the book and giving me a great blogging entry! In Virtually Hers, less techy, more Jedness!

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Not A Romance or Not Romantic?

The Malaysian Abroad article about me was supposedly going to be up today. I couldn't find it.

Romance Reviews Today was going to post a review of VIRTUALLY HIS yesterday. The reviewer brought up something interesting that I never considered. She said Virtually His wasn't a romance, or rather, there was no romance in the story. But the review isn't up at their site yet, so I can't bring that up for discussion.

The review itself was very well written and recommended Virtually His. I liked it that the reviewer relayed what worked and didn't work for her, so readers can see the different elements of the story. I knew there would be lots of hate generated from the techy stuff, but never ever did it cross my mind that I wasn't writing a romance. It's not romantic, yeah. Well, it's book one and the start of a very strange relationship, so there can't be too much "I want you, I love you, you are mine" declarations.

Oh well. More tomorrow if the article is up by then. I'd love to hear your thoughts whether you consider VHIS a romance. Not whether it's romantic, which is a different creature entirely. Also, were the clues to the trainer that vague to the reader not familiar with the COS commandos? I'm biased, of course; I thought with all the eye colors I kept throwing out, and the revelation of the monitor's eyes at the end, it's pretty obvious that the trainer/monitor was no other than Jed McNeil himself.

The review ends with a question, wondering how the author (me) was going to handle the disclosure of Jed as the trainer.

Ah. Well. I can disclose that no problem. Courtesy from Lauren Dane, there will be lots of this:

(AND AIMEE, HE IS MINE MINE MINE, so you can't have him!!!! Not after this short video! Heh.)



Yup. And nope, it's not going to be romantic sex either. Solly. Jed doesn't do romantic sex. ;-P And if you think the sex between Stefan (Jed) and Sia-Sia was a bit much in The Protector, what with the use of the drug and chains, I'm afraid to think what you're going to think about Jed and Helen's sexual scenes. Because in Book Two, there's no reason to hold back. Right? Ahem. RIGHT?

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