Rowena’s Comments (group member since Jan 16, 2008)

Rowena’s comments from the Q&A with Rowena Cherry group.

10. I'm told that it's not a bodice ripper, but it sounds like one.

9. PS. I like bodice rippers.

8. It's going to take about eight hours to read.

7. The hero is an alpha male. I don't like books that give male chauvinist pigs a happy ending.

6. I don't identify with beautiful, spirited, young, virginal heroines who have some funny ideas about sex.

5. I can't get my tongue around the Dj- names. I know that I simply pronouce them as if the D isn't there, but all the Ds bother me.

4. I've heard that if I read Forced Mate in bed, my giggles and guffaws will annoy my significant other.

3. The alien hero uses alien swear words. Moreover, his command of English grammar isn't perfect. He says unsense instead of nonsense. I hate that!

2. The spirited heroine uses her wits and her tongue. I can never have enough of heroines who kick the heroes in the goolies.

1. I don't like fantasy books set in England. Or in outer space.

10. Insufficient Mating Material are not words I feel comfortable waving about in front of gentlemen.

9. If it's about a man with a small penis, I don't want to read that... I see enough of that at home/at the office/on TV.

8. It's going to take about eight hours to read

7b. I find it totally implausible that a male could have a tattoo on his male body parts... and as for one that flashes in the dark, I'm not interested in the slightest.

7. The hero is a loser. I don't like books that take the antagonist from a previous book and give him a happy ending.

6. I don't identify with a heroine who is a little bit overweight, and who wears a corset (or any other tummy taming garment).

5. The family tree is at the back of the book. I'll be furious when I find that I wasted all that energy trying to memorize the characters' names and relationships.

4. I've heard that if I read Insufficient Mating Material in bed, my giggles and guffaws will annoy my significant other.

3. The F- word is used by the hero both as an expletive and as a verb.

2. If "Survivorman" Les Stroud loved it, there's probably too much information about hunting, fishing, camping, and surviving in the wilderness.

1. Apparently, it contains "a sizzling passion hot enough to singe" my "fingers as I turn the pages".... that sounds uncomfortable


What would you have made reasons #1 and #10?

1. If you read it in public, someone may ask why the naked man on the cover is lying in a puddle

2. If you don't read every paragraph, you may ask yourself why the naked man is lying in a puddle

3. It's long. It has 340 pages, and most new Chapters do not begin on a fresh page.

4. It has a Prologue and an Epilogue. That's two beginnings, and two endings!

5. It's going to take about eight hours to read

6. Disrespectful words such as tallywacker and joystick are used with reference to male body parts

6b. The hero is a virgin and proud of it

7. The heroine is locked in a chastity belt, and she doesn't have a key

8. The family tree is so complicated they needed to spread it over two pages.

9. If you read in bed, your significant other might be disturbed by your giggles

10. The F- word is used, but only by villains, and only in conversation


Question: What did you think when you saw this topic?

By the way... I have this list up in a different order on the Dorchester Forums. However, I wanted something interesting in the top 3 lines.

I'm absolutely thrilled that Knight's Fork has been awarded a pnr Reviewers' Top Pick award for September!

Top Pick


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Yesterday, I chatted about fertility issues with Cindy Spencer Pape.

In her book CURSES, the hero is a werewolf who gets into a pretty pickle because of his supernatural powers of bodily regeneration.

He very sensibly underwent a vasectomy (while in human form), but his inner werewolf healed, and he became potent again.

I love this sort of twist! I also loved what vet Josh Artemeier said about the problems if a werewolf was a chocolate lover.

I think it was on Saturday that an interviewer circled around the subject of why aliens speak Latin. Did anyone else wonder?

When the gods come from outer space, and are the source of all human myths, also the origin of all legends all over the world about dragons, and the builders of pyramids, and the source of games such as chess, it is quite possible that they also left a form of Latin behind.

They count using a system of 5 symbols, though. [image error]

Jacquie,

Thank you very much for the compliment about, "The trouble with your bloody great Djinn gene pool is that there is no lifeguard on duty!"

I'm asked that quite often, if the topic turns to my passion for research.

If anyone here wishes to ask me that, or about any other research matter, please feel free. I've an answer for almost everything as long as it's printable and reasonably civil.

Have you ever read a book and found a typo or a discrepancy, and seriously wanted to write to the author and tell her?

The trouble is, unless the author is a really major star, or perhaps gets her rights back and goes to another publishing house, it's most unlikely that the presses will be disassembled (or whatever they do) to fix a couple of wickedly spelled words.

I found an error when I was with NBI, and Booksurge (the printer) told me that it would cost me $100 personally to re-upload a corrected file.

No doubt it would cost a great deal more these days.

Nevertheless, I know I'd love to get other authors' typos off my chest, so go ahead here about mine here, if you wish.

One question a reader asked me recently is why Devoron thought he'd smelled a mystery lady, and not the obvious suspect?

Did anyone else wonder?
Would it be a spoiler to discuss it?

When I wrote Forced Mate it was 500,000 words, and quite the saga.

By the time it was published, it was around 100,000 words, and it ended happily... at least for the hero, since he got what he wanted.

That's not a spoiler. It's a romance!

Are there any questions you think I didn't answer? Do ask.

It has recently come to my attention that small and vital (but unobtrusive) passages that were in this book or that when I checked the galleys, may possibly have been cut after I thought it was all set in stone.

"How come...?" may be rather an old-fashioned and very British way of starting a question about a perceived discrepancy in the author's plotting, but if you think you "missed something" or I "missed something" in Insufficient Mating Material, please feel free to challenge me!

Wow, Rose,

Thank you so much for your very kind words, and also for posting the link to Stephanie Laurens Keynote.

Ah, but the link doesn't work. No doubt I can google it.

Best wishes,
Rowena

If I hadn't been having this chat, here, with Gerald, I might never have known that Insufficient Mating Material won the 2008 Hollywood Book Festival Award (for the Romance Fiction category).

Thank you Gerald.

Sandi,

Oh, dear! Perhaps my tongue was too firmly in my cheek. I am glad you found "Forced Mate" funny. Yes, that was absolutely intentional.

At the time of writing it, I hadn't thought about a follow up, and it took quite a while to write Insufficient Mating Material, because it had to be different. The same joke doesn't work twice.

So Insufficient Mating Material is not a spoof. It is intended to be funny, too, but not in the same ways.

Hi, Gerald,

Thank you very much for your very kind comment, which I found somewhat mystifying.

Nevertheless, I enjoy your remarks.

:-)

For anyone who doesn't know what I'm talking about, Mating Net is an e-book.

It's very short, only 58 pages, which is why it is only an e-book, and it is darker and dirtier than my paperbacks.

Mating Net breaks a few important rules of "Romance". It had to do so, because it is a prequel, and therefore was written after a couple of vital plot points were already set in stone.

For anyone who doesn't know what I'm talking about, Mating Net is an e-book.

It's very short, only 58 pages, which is why it is only an e-book, and it is darker and dirtier than my paperbacks.

Mating Net breaks a few important rules of "Romance". It had to do so, because it is a prequel, and therefore was written after a couple of vital plot points were already set in stone.

I meant Listopia, of course. Listmania is Amazonian.

Gerald,

Thank you for a very thought provoking question. Since "Rowena Cherry answers..." implies a commitment to answer every question, I will respond, ready or not.

Thank goodness "Immediately" was not part of the pledge!

A sex drive comes in two basic models: male or female. There are optional variants, which the manufacturer may or may not recommend, but their workings are more complicated as regards appropriate maintenance, fuel, lubrication, additives and so forth. See handbook.

The most important driving tool of the male sex drive is known by many as "the joy stick" for reasons that will become obvious...

Partial answer. The loss of clusters will decrease performance and launch capability, and is to be avoided.