Victoria Janssen's Blog, page 29
August 26, 2013
August 15, 2013
In Search of Balance: Forever and Ever by Patricia Gaffney
The main discussion posts on the Wyckerley Trilogy may be found at Something More.
My main takeaway from Forever and Ever by Patricia Gaffney is that it’s a story of a relationship between equals. This might seem an odd thing to say, when the heroine owns a copper mine and comes from wealth, and the hero from a family of poor miners who expended great effort to educate him. Their class differences are a major part of the plot, and give rise to a lot of conflict between them. But in the en...
July 29, 2013
More Preview Posts!
I speculated here on what might happen in book 3 of S.U. Pacat’s Captive Prince series.
I’ve also had more book previews go live.
A Woman Entangled by Cecilia Grant – a really excellent historical romance.
The Doll by Taylor Stevens – a thriller with a heroine who reminded me a bit of James Bond.
Twilight is Not Good For Maidens by Lou Allin – contemporary mystery set on Vancouver Island, with a female RCMP officer.
The Summer of Dead Toys by Antonio Hill – a hardbitten police procedural set...
July 22, 2013
Readercon 2013 Report
Belatedly, here’s my rambling report on the 2013 Readercon! I did three panels this year, leading one of them, and a kaffeeklatsch. All of my programming happened on Saturday, so unusually for me, I had Friday completely free. Most of the time when I am attending a con, I don’t have enough mental energy to attend panels I’m not on, but this time I went through the Friday schedule and made a list of everything that seemed interesting. Which of course meant that for some time slots there w...
July 15, 2013
To Love and To Cherish, Patricia Gaffney
Liz at Something More mentioned that she was planning to read Patricia Gaffney’s Wyckerley trilogy and post about it; I’d only read the middle book, To Have and to Hold, so I decided it would be fun to join in, and also post about my experience, in a rambling way. Spoilers ahead! Many of them!
To Love and to Cherish is first in the Wyckerley trilogy.
Here’s the summary: He is a local vicar, whose handsome, noble features resemble those of an angel. And with his golden-haired good looks and...
July 8, 2013
Readercon 2013 Schedule
I’ll be at Readercon this weekend, July 11 – 14.
You can find me on the following program items:
Saturday July 13, 9:00 AM, RHODE ISLAND
“The Works of Patricia A. McKillip.”
Brian Attebery, Shira Daemon (moderator), Victoria Janssen, Faye Ringel.
In a long and lauded career Patricia A. McKillip has questioned the shapes of genre stories, taking an egalitarian and polyphonic approach to point of view. In harmony with this questioning has been her thoughtful examination of identity, land, and t...
June 24, 2013
The Angle of Jeopardy – Vintage Erotica Covers
I found it very interesting that all of these covers present the female figure at the same angle; two are posed virtually the same. All of them show women in some sort of jeopardy at the hands of a man, physical in two cases, almost physical in a third (she’s being menaced by his shadow as he approaches). One appears to be emotional jeopardy, instead (the man’s back is turned; she’s been rejected).
June 3, 2013
Recent Guest Blog Posts
I was reminded of my post Mary Balogh’s Tangled: An Erotic Romance? recently, and thought I would give it a plug here.
Preview of A Spear of Summer Grass by Deanna Raybourn, a romantic mystery (or romance with mystery elements) set in colonized 1920s Kenya.
Preview of Nicholas by Grace Burrowes, a historical romance.
Thorn Abbey by Nancy Ohlin, a supernatural YA rewrite of Rebecca. Sort of.
Every Contact Leaves a Trace by Elanor Dymott, a contemporary mystery that leans toward the literary...
May 27, 2013
“Princeton May, 1917,” Alfred Noyes
Princeton May 1917
Here Freedom stood by slaughtered friend and foe,
And, ere the wrath paled or that sunset died,
Looked through the ages; then, with eyes aglow,
Laid them to wait that future, side by side.
(Lines for a monument to the American and British soldiers of the Revolutionary War who fell on the Princeton battlefield and were buried in one grave.)
Now lamp-lit gardens in the blue dusk shine
Through dogwood, red and white;
And round the grey quadrangles, line by line,
The windows...
May 20, 2013
Wolves in Fantasy – Read This!
Terrific essay from Foz Meadows on The Truth Of Wolves, Or: The Alpha Problem.
I think/have thought about some of the issues she raises quite a lot, but not as insightfully. Below are some of my own posts relating to shapeshifters in romance and urban fantasy.
