The Loinfire Club reads... Tempt Me with Darkness

Tempt me with Darkness, by Shayla Black

He’s an immortal knight hungering for satisfaction. . . .

As soon as Marrok sees Olivia Gray, he’s sure they met in eons past. He’s felt her soft, gentle curves writhing in pleasure beneath his own powerful body. . . Morganna! For centuries, towering Marrok, once the mightiest of King Arthur’s warriors, has endured a terrible curse the witch cast upon him when he spurned the witch.

She’s a modern woman about to discover ancient magic. . . .

Olivia shares a mystical—and irresistible—connection with brooding Marrok. Soon after the sexy warrior appears in her erotic dreams, he abducts her, demanding she uncurse him. Their intense passion is more powerful—and intimate—than either of them has ever known. Olivia may be the key to unlocking the diary that will break Morganna’s hold on his life. But in the wrong hands, the book also holds the power to destroy magickind. As they search for answers, a ruthless wizard returned from exile is building an army of evil. When he discovers Marrok and Olivia have the diary, only their love—with the help of a powerful group of magical Brethren—can save them.

After the Pillywiggen refreshes our memories with a grand declaiming of the rules of the drinking game and BoneGeek is reading:

PRESENT DAY
ENGLAND
BESIDE THE LUSH BANKS of a pond, a woman beckoned, familiar.
The Chronicler: "A pond is not sexy. Really."
Cathed: "Ponds make me think of ducks and I don't think there's an unsexier animal than a duck."
There follows a discussion about which is the unsexiest animal: ducks, slugs or frogs.

Yet Marrok of Cadbury had never seen her face in his life.
The Loinfire Club: "Cadbury?! "
The Anthropologist: "Did they just looked for something English? It ends in bury, so it must be quaint and English."
(The Chronicler wonders if this woman googles names before using them. Even if Black lives in a cardboard box in Texas surely she knows that naming her hero after the world's largest confectionery manufacturer is a mistake?)

 A cityscape towered in the background. None of that held his gaze rapt. Her bare-to-the-skin nakedness...
Cathed: "To the skin? What other kind of nakedness can you have?"
The Anthropologist: "Bare-to-the-cardigan nakedness?"
The Pedant: "Oh, those sexy bare-to-the-ligaments nakedness."

The woman’s sable hair swept over one pale shoulder, curling under the swell of a generous breast topped by a berry nipple
Cathed: "So, we've got the Cadbury guy and a berry nipple... this sounds like a desert."

...and framing a birthmark he knew well.
She no longer possessed the platinum tresses into which he’d once thrust his hands.
Azrael: "It sounds like he's torn out all her hair out accidentally..."

Her new face was delicate—higher cheekbones, pert nose, pillowy mouth...
Azrael poses with a pillow to demonstrate. He flips it around for the "unhappy" face. It's probably funnier if you were there.

Acid hatred mixed with clawing desire. He tried to look away, but his gaze caressed her small waist, her curved hips, the moist flesh between her thighs glistening...
Cathed: "Get in there, gaze!"

Morganna bewitched him more now than she had on their wind-drenched night of shared pleasure an eon ago.
The Chronicler: "Wind does not drench. You need moisture for that."

The strawberry mark low between her breasts brought back memories of pale moonlight surrounding them as he’d succumbed to temptation and tupped her senseless.
The Anthropologist: "Tupped? We'll need a category for Ye Olde Englishe."
There followed a brief description of the etymology of the word "tupped", its relation to goats and if could be used sexily in earnest.

For that mistake, he’d paid dearly.
With the last fifteen centuries.
The Pedant: "Everyone goes to sleep after sex."

Mist swirled around her like the mystical fog of legend, as if caressing her.
Luca: "Fog is legendary, now."
Pillywiggin: "What she means is, mist swirled like mist."
Azrael: "No, what she means is, mist swirled like cheap cinematic mist made of dry ice."

Though she was deadly, Morganna in this new form captivated him. Today, society had clinical terms for his obsession.
The Anthropologist: "He has some sort of medical problem.... I'd like to call it Evil."
Then followed a discussion about M. Scott Peck's  proposal to add Evil to Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.

 To yield would only mean further torture. But his body betrayed him, inching closer, his cock swelling painfully. Cursing, he closed his eyes.
The Anthropologist: "They do that a lot in these books. No one has reliable bodies, ever... wait, inching? Like a caterpillar?"
Bonegeek: "I was thinking that too."
Azrael pictured it more like an earthworm, but agreed that the caterpillars move in a more "inching" manner.

Perhaps due to an overdose of House-watching in the household, there occurred here something of a differential on Marrock's condition.
The Anthropologist: "I think he's got some kind of dissociative disorder."

Marrok opened his eyes as a fresh rush of desire slammed him.
The Anthropologist: "Again, like a battering ram? Or a line of invisible American Football players pummelling him repeatedly throughout the conversation?"

Want was a luxury; this woman he needed. The feeling was as new as a baby’s first breath…and as welcome as the plague.
Azrael: "A good bit of juxtaposition again. Neither are things you really want to think about when it comes to sex."

(The Chronicler later wonders if anyone could possibly compare anything – let alone sex – with the utter devastation of the Black Death if they had actually lived through it. After all, this man is fifteen hundred years old. Or maybe he's just completely sociopathic.)

 And likely illusory, merely one of Morganna’s tricks.
Cathed: "She's really good at that illusory breath play."

...then she waved her hand. Suddenly, she clutched to her naked breasts the ornate red book he knew meant the difference between his life and death...

The Anthropologist: "Oh no! She's a communist!"

Nay!
Bonegeek: "Nay has a line all to itself."
The Anthropologist: "Like an Ye Olde Version of the Darth Vader thing."
Cathed: "Doth not want!" 

Marrok launched himself at her. They fell to the ground in a tangle of breaths, arms, and legs.
Cathed (mishearing): "Entangling breasts, it can happen.

Her plea spiked his fevered lust.
The Anthropologist: "Medical complication."

He ached to sink deep into her.
The Anthropologist: "Medical complication."

But he had to resist this fatal woman.
The Chronicler: "Not sure that one counts."
The Anthropologist: "She has malaria."
Bonegeek: "Or plague. On her breath. That would make her fatal."

He was on fire for her. A heartbeat from explosion.
The Anthropologist: "Like that episode on House."
("A guy takes his heart rate, and the number he comes up with makes him either about to die or bad at math. They wait a bit, and since the guy doesn't die, House concludes that he sucks at math; he writes the patient a prescription for StickyBear Math Town." from Television without Pity)

As she wriggled under him, lightning chased across his skin.
Bonegeek: "The caterpillar metaphors haven't gone away yet..."
Pillywiggin (showing us all her picture): "We have the cock-a-pillar."
Cathed: "But what does it turn into afterwards?"
The Pedant is reminded of something creepy in Pan's Labyrinth.

Later, he’d remember all the reasons he could not.
Cathed: "I'll remember those later."
Pillywiggin: "Maybe he needs a mnemonic."
The Anthropologist: "Oh, yes, yes, she's actually a man.... how could I possibly forget!"
Cathed: "Maybe I should write it on my hand."
Pillywiggin has drawn the Fucker-fly, the next stage of the cock-a-piller.
The Anthropologist: "Is that what people mean when they say butterfly kisses?"

Marrok dropped his hands to her thighs and pried them wider.
The Chronicler: "As though she was resisting... how rape-like."
The Loinfire Club also makes a series of unoiled hinge noises.

“If you tempt me thus, you will take what I give you. All I give you.”
The Anthropologist: "I don't think that's how it works under the British legal system."

From one instant to the next, his clothes melted away and he poised himself at her entrance.
Pillywiggin: "What? His clothes melted?!"
The Pedant: "Well, he shouldn't have worn candyfloss then, should he?"

With a wave of her pale hand, Morganna unlocked the volume. The cover fell open, revealing a hint of its pages, as she faded away.
The Anthropologist: "Is it wrong that the book is described in more flirtatious terms than the woman?"

“Give it to me!”
He shouted at fog. She—and the book—were gone.
Again, she’d used her power against him. Desire sizzled deep but he was, as ever, cursed.
The Anthropologist: "Damn you, Mao!"

“I am the key.” Her soft entreaty swept through the wind. “Find me.”
Marrok dragged himself to his feet, suppressing a primal scream. He must hunt her. That cityscape behind the pond he recognized as London.
The Anthropologist (who is quite familiar with the city): "Oh, is this set in London then?"

Around him, something rattled. Marrok sat up with a startled gasp, his bed rumpled, eyes wide.
The Anthropologist: "Eyes wide... he's been eating flumps."
The Pedant: "He's been chomping down on Santa's North Pole..."

(The Pedant had bought some flump-knock-offs – essentially long thin marshmallows – that were called "Santa's North Poles." The innuendo was, of course, not missed and it became a theme for the rest of the evening. As Cathed was eating one, the Anthropologist remarked that her pupils were dilating, much to our alarm.)

Panting, he scanned his surroundings. Bare walls, carved bed. A sword beside his hand. Glock under his pillow.
Azrael: "A glock?!"
The Anthropologist: "Is that like a flump only more so?"

There is some discussion about whether or not the author means a gun, but then, the first things American gamers (or at least, in White Wolf setting documents) are told about England as a setting is that we have much, much stricter gun control over here.

His cottage, not a mist-draped clearing. No Morganna.
The Chronicler: "That'd be a very expensive cottage in London. That said, he could be a cotter and therefore his dwelling – no matter what it looked like – would be a cottage. But I'm quite sure the back of the book says he's a knight."

The book! Marrok whipped his gaze around. On his bedside table rested the leather-bound tome. The vehicle of his never-ending torment, the key to his freedom, was still here and still locked.
It had been but a dream.
Or perhaps a message? Though it had been centuries, Morganna had once enjoyed reaching from her exile to taunt him in sleep.
The Chronicler is utterly sick of modern portrayals of Morgan le Fay as a slutty evil woman and rants about it loudly. It's not even the evil that gets on her nerves, it's the combination of slutty, evil, beautiful and sex-centric plans. There will, no doubt, be a post itemizing her hatred in greater detail in the future.

Shadow and torment her he would...
Azrael: "Sounds almost Yoda-like."

A sharp rap against the cottage’s front window startled Marrok
Cathed: "Why is our Alpha Male hero who sleeps with swords and guns being startled by loud noises?"
The Anthropologist: "He just had a freaky dream about his cock turning into a caterpillar, cut him some slack."

He hadn’t had a visitor in a decade, and preferred it that way. Guests were both unexpected and unwelcome.
The Anthropologist: "In the middle of London, bloody hell!"
The Chronicler: "What? No door-to-door salesmen? No junk mail? Where does he live?"

As he slid around the corner, his heart raced with the anticipation of impending battle. [...] If someone had come to take the book from him, he would greet them with bloodshed.
Azrael: "Not the shedding of their blood, just bloodshed."
Cathed: "Maybe it's like Love Shack, but better."

Marrok crept forward, crouched for attack. The shadow disappeared.
The Chronicler: "I'm sure he's supposed to be all hardcore, but he only comes across as paranoid right now."

Heaving an annoyed sigh, Marrok yanked the door open to find a nightmare nearly as bad as the one that had awakened him. Golden hair spiked above sleek brows and wicked blue eyes. A glittery Hollywood smile...
The Anthropologist: "I'm still not convinced this man isn't batting for the flump team."

“If today is your day to conduct beheadings, count me out.” Bram flashed the million-dollar smile that had seduced magickind into seeing things his way for four hundred years.
Bonegeek attempts some sort of accent for this voice and there are many humorous attempts that the written medium simply cannot reproduce. We discovered in due course that the motherland of humanity is Pakistan due to it being where all accents drift to in the end. Bonegeek finally settled on a Welsh accent for this character, which gives him rather likable, laid back air which rather endears him to the Loinfire Club. That and Bram is only a letter off from Brad, the name of the Loinfire Club's favourite accountant non-hero. 

The Chronicler feels that the date of four hundred years ago may be significant and wonders if Bram was involved the Reformation. The Anthropologist is less optimistic and condemns it as simply a number Black picked out of thin air. 

Bram would not go away until he spilled his secret, though Marrok cared little what the wizard had to say. He must find Morganna in her new guise, then force, coerce, or beg her into unlocking that accursed book and setting him free.
Cathed: "So rape, rape again and ask nicely."

Marrok stared at his rumpled chinos.
The Anthropologist: "He wears chinos?!"
Bonegeek: "Sexy sexy old man chinos."

“Did you come all this way to be my mum?”
“If you need one…” Bram shrugged, mischief lurking in his eyes.
There is something about flump being the new euphemism of choice.

“To talk to you,” Bram said through the door. “You know that only something gravely important could bring me to the Creepified Forest.”
The Anthropologist makes a face at the stupidity of the name.
The Chronicler is reminded of the Creeping Brain for no good reason.

“All right, then. I am the only living being who knows of your immortality and still speaks to you.”
The Anthropologist: "Is that meant to be in a Gollum voice? Smeagols wills speaks to you..."

Marrok grunted and reached for his toothbrush. “I am not interested. I must hunt.”
“The local market too civilized for your Dark Ages upbringing?”
Azrael: "I'm going hunting with my toothbrush! I'm bored of hunting with this whole knives and guns thing!" 

Though the wizard loved to antagonize him, Marrok knew the darling of magickind would not visit without cause.
Pillywiggin: "Stop using the word magickind! It offends me!"
Bonegeek: "You don't have to say it." 
The Anthropologist: "I'm wondering if the darling of magickind is some kind of special title. Maybe elected."
Azrael: "No, more likely it's something that magazines would name every few years."

 Vision. Being in the same room with anything or anyone magical was enough to give him hives. Having Bram around was like a permanent case of leprosy.
The Anthropologist: "As opposed to those impermanent cases of leprosy that people get all the time."
Bonegeek: "I was out last night and my finger fell right off. Just a touch of leprosy."
The Chronicler again wonders at the flippant use of these diseases that in the middle ages was really rather serious.

The Chronicler reviews the rest of The Darkest Kiss

The Darkest Kiss, by Gena Showalter

After the Loinfire Club struggled through the first chapter of The Darkest Kiss, the Chronicler picked it up (always the masochist when it comes to terrible fiction

) and decided to finish it. Here follows a report for those who are curious about how the story about Anarchy and Death live happily ever after...

First of all, The Darkest Kiss is really quite a bad book, but it doesn't suffer from the stereotypical problems of normal romance novels. The heroine is more free of the classic I Am Not A Slut complex than most (with one or two incredibly annoying and notable exceptions, but I'll get to that.) The hero isn't full of rape and ravishment threats, doesn't stalk the heroine, invade her personal space and call it love.... And yet all this doesn't stop it from being really quite an annoying book.

The World Setting

The Chronicler is that most of The Darkest Kiss' readers probably don't care about the metaphysics of its fictional universe and exactly how it all operates. Given that it's the second book in the series, perhaps it should not be expected to lay down the setting with introductory simplicity. And yet it makes no effort to advertise it's Not-the-First-Book status.* That said, the Chronicler really doubts her problems with the setting are answered in the previous book.

The setting is riddled with sweeping statements and loopholes. For example, the origin story is mind-boggling:

Once upon a time, there was Pandora's Box (aka dimOuniak) and in it were lots of demons. These warriors, led by one who felt insulted he didn't get to guard it (?!), opened the box. As punishment, they were made into living prisons for the demons.

Now, this story seems simple. Or at least. Showalter thinks so. But it's not. She's vague as to how much our version applies. Was the pre-box-opening free from Death, Pain, Promiscuity, Lies and all that? Are these simply demons of the concepts as in they are the physical embodiment of them, free from personality and scheming or are they more sophisticated? Were they physical, as in, after release, did the demons personally kill/rape/torture/lie to everyone in their way or did they just possess people and make them do so?

The Chronicler really wants answers because it's actually relevant to the plot. Galen, the Keeper of Hope... wait, Hope is a good thing, right? It was in the original. So why was the demon of it imprisoned in the box along with the other demons? Was the pre-box-opening world also free from hope? And if it's a good thing, should he be allowed to go about and do his work, keeping people's spirits up despite all the death, promiscuity, lies, doubt, defeat (etc) that is happening all over the place?... Sorry, derailed myself there. Galen, who has demon of Hope imprisoned inside him, is running around being the leader of an organisation that busies itself tracking down the imprisoned demons** and killing them all, because the blame the demons for all the shitty things that happen.

The main characters are justified in not knowing what would happen if the imprisoned demons are killed, but they seem phenomenally uncurious about the effects of their death. Baden, Keeper of Distrust, has died and the world doesn't seem to be devoid of distrust, but you can't really fault the hopeful warriors of Galen to keep trying. I'm really okay with them being selfish about their own death versus the world being painless forever, but can they not at least consider the possibilities? What would answer my question is a description about the pre-box-opening world, but Showalter just doesn't want to share.

But then we get to other metaphysical problems. The Greek deities are real. Fair enough. And they differ somewhat from legend, which is again, fair enough. Though it would be better if Showalter actually acknowledges these differences and addressed them, since of all the pantheons the average person would have heard of Greek is quite high on the list. But the immediate question that follows is: Are any other pagan pantheons real? They certainly aren't geographically confined to their original continent, so where is everyone else? They don't have to exist, but it's just really odd because there is a Christian heaven and hell, where some select souls get to go after death (very select, I'll come to that), and yet there are no other gods. Showalter doesn't even feel the need to say, "I know the ancient Greeks believed in an underworld that's different, but that's because they're wrong and were off their tits on mushrooms." Most books employing an existing mythology in its world-building puts in a line or two, the standard: "What a silly superstition you humans have about garlic and vampires. We fear it not."

The Anthropologist suggests perhaps that Showalter simply doesn't realise that other religions have a different vision of heaven and hell. But then she does as she mentions Hades later, but it doesn't seem to feature in any great way.

It's just weird to try to fuse the two.

 

Lucien, Incarnation of Death

Which really quite neatly brings me to Death Himself. Now, beauty is the eye of the beholder and all that, but it really defeats the point of having an ugly hero if the heroine finds him irresistible. The point of Beauty and the Beast is that Beauty grows to love him despite his appearance and eventually grows to love his appearance as well (the latter part surfaces in modern retellings and I quite like it.) But if she thinks he's walking porn to begin with, then he might as well be walking porn to everyone else.

He scrubbed a hand over his face, the scars so puckered they abraded his palm. Had they scratched Anya?

Anya's over-the-top attraction to Lucien comes across as delusional. His descriptions of himself as horrifically scarred don't add up to her descriptions of him. He wonders if his scars are scratching her but whe

n we're reading from her point of view, Anya hasn't even noticed, which is weird considering how much attention she was paying to him.

Now that I think about it, who is the man on the cover? He has the mismatched eyes of Lucien, but he lacks the horrific scaring. Also, as the Anthropologist notes, MrCoverModel is incapable of ever moving his arms since it would distort his carefully placed shoulder tattoo.

Lucien's insecurities are ridiculous. He obsesses about how Anya is perfect and how he is so scarred all her attraction must be feigned... but what is most annoying is that he possesses the ability to see emotions with his damned SpirtEye. He saw her passion. But after this one use of his magic power, he doesn't really use it again in the book. He doesn't even use it to see if Anya's faking it. Seriously.

In this spiritual realm, Anya’s passion appeared a blazing pink. Real. Not faked, as a part of him had assumed. That pink trail glittered with a dazzle unlike anything he’d ever seen.

 

Lucien, Keeper of Death

But that's not really the bone I want to pick when it comes to Lucien and his job of soul-ferrying. He insists he hates his job and that he finds the taking of innocents distasteful, but he never really articulates this hatred as anything other than (as Azrael puts it) the hatred one has for an exceptionally dull desk job. If he believed that his own death would stop death forever in the world and if his existence was really that joyless... wouldn't he try to end it? Why doesn't he have some sort of philosophical stance on the necessity of death, if only to justify to himself his existence and not feel like a bastard?

Now he was charged with the responsibility of collecting human souls and escorting them to their final resting place. Even if he opposed the idea. He did not like taking innocents from their families, found no joy in delivering the wicked to their damnation, but he did both without question or hesitation

One isn't really sure how free will and the gods (keepers?) interact. Is he personally responsible for the deaths of his victims or not? He didn't chose to have the demon of death stuck inside him, but then if he believes what he's doing is truly Evil. He mysteriously thinks he is, but he arrives at the scene and sees the mangled bodies of the soon-to-be dead. (The Anthropologist notes a quick comparison thing to Death of the Pratchett's books, who sees his job as a necessity but doesn't see any reason to make it any worse for the people concerned.) Lucien thrusts his arm into the chests of the dying, retrieves their soul, teleports to the gates of either heaven or hell and tosses them in, all rather unceremoniously. I understand he's on a tight schedule, but really, it can't be pleasant. Nor does it seem very Greek since they have ideas about Charon, the ferryman of Hades.

He was still at a loss as the pearled gates opened wide, revealing golden streets and bejeweled, arched lampposts hanging like diamond-studded clouds. White-clothed angels lined the sides, singing a melodious welcome, their feathered white wings gliding gracefully behind them.

I can't get over how Christian heaven and hell are. Pearly gates with golden streets is very specifically Christian. It's straight out of The Book of Revelations, "The twelve gates were twelve pearls, each gate being made from a single pearl." There is nothing of this in Greek mythology and it is jarring. But that isn't what is getting to me.

“Lots of people die. Every minute. Every hour. Why don’t you have to escort all of them?”
“Some remain to wander Earth, some are reborn and get the chance to start anew. Some, I think, are escorted by angels.”

That practically makes him redundant. I know that he can't be too tied up with this whole soul-ferrying business since he needs to have time for being with Anya and hanging around with his heterosexual friends, but it really diminishes the character when we find out he doesn't deal with all death, that he's just one soul-collector amongst many.

HE WAS KNOWN AS THE Dark One. Malach ha-Maet. Yama. Azreal. Shadow Walker. Mairya. King of the Dead. He was all of those things and more, for he was a Lord of the Underworld...

The other odd thing is what qualifies as evil enough to land a soul in hell.

The man’s sins suddenly flickered through the demon’s awareness and in turn through Lucien’s. As the man had already proven, he had considered himself above the law, slaying anyone who got in his way—men, women, children—all in the name of a better world.
Bastard.
Maintaining a strong grip on the protesting spirit, he flashed to the entrance of hell. Not Hades—that gloomy underworld was reserved for those who did not deserve either the tortures of hell or the glories of heaven. This man deserved the flames. Though the gates to the fire pit were closed, Lucien could feel the intense heat radiating, could hear the symphony of tormented screams inside, the demonic laughter. The jeers. The stifling scent of sulfur permeated the entire area, enough to make a man gag.

Firstly, as the Anthropologist points out, considering himself above the law isn't really more than what Anya is doing in her daily life. Given how many legal systems Lucien must have lived through, it seems odd that he would attach that much significance to any actual law code.

But more importantly, this man wasn't just working for a better world. He was working for a world that is devoid of pain, suffering, death, war, lies... He is working for paradise on earth. I'm not saying that I feel this means he deserves heaven, I'm just saying that in his paradigm, it's justified and I'm uncomfortable with the idea that this man deserves eternal torment. I'm uncomfortable with the adamance with which the hero thinks this. I'm not saying that I personally believe that the ends justifies the means every time, but there are many things that have been done in the name of the Greater Good and these things do include the American War of Independence (picking an example that most Americans would like to think of as a Good Thing) and the French Revolution and the Cultural Revolution.***** Perhaps again it is that Showalter doesn't think that the audience may disagree on this point, that her reader won't read that and feel uncomfortable. It's that the Universe judges it so with Absolute Morality, not simply the hero's personal morality.

Two bodies lay on the floor, a man and a woman. The man, Lucien instantly knew thanks to his demon, had wrongly suspected the woman of cheating on him, had shot her and then turned the gun on himself.
Bastard, he thought, then stilled.

Now, I'm not saying that killing your girlfriend for cheating on you is morally right. But again, I'm uncomfortable with the idea that it deserves eternal torment in hell. Eternal is a very long time, like seriously. And he did kill himself afterwards. I'm not saying that I like him or that he deserves heaven, but eternity in hell?

Furthermore, what did that woman do to deserve heaven. Again, I'm not saying she necessarily doesn't, but what differentiates her so very much from everyone else since this is a setting where only a select few get into heaven.

She  [the dead spirt] saw him and gasped. “Naked,” she said, staring at him. “Am I in…heaven?”
Should have dressed first. “Not yet.”

Can you really respect Death who goes to work naked?

 

Anya, Minor Goddess of Anarchy

Yes, minor. 

“You are the minor goddess of Anarchy.”
“There’s nothing minor about me.” Minor meant unimportant, and she was just as important as the other, “higher” beings, damn it.

No, minor means she wasn't widely worshipped, which she wasn't. She doesn't have a cult, let alone a widespread one. She has no temples or shrines dedicated to her. She's minor and none of her quibbling is going to change that. Her petulant, foot-stomping tantrums come across like a six-year-old insisting that they're all grown up, because being a child is unimportant. She doesn't hold power in the divine courts of the Greeks, uninvolved in godly politics. She seems to serve no function in the everyday running of the world. I'm not sure you can get more minor than that.

When she’d first come to earth, she hadn’t known how to control her rebellious nature. Gods had been able to protect themselves from it, humans hadn’t. Besides that, she’d been almost…feral from her years in prison. A simple comment from her—you aren’t going to let your brother talk to you like that, are you?—and bloody feuds erupted between clans. An appearance at court—perhaps laughing at the rulers and their policies—and loyal knights attempted to assassinate their king.

Showalter has no idea what anarchy means. When Showalter describes Anya's deep need for anarchy, she describes pyromania and kleptomania. Anya controls her instincts to anarchy and disobedience by stealing, and whilst that is anarchic on a personal level in that she is disobeying the law that tells her not to steal... kleptomania just isn't anarchy. Neither is doodling moustaches on the original Mona Lisa. And really, it's quite unremarkable and dull.

Eventually she’d learned that if she fed her need for disorder with little things—petty theft, white lies and the occasional street fight—huge disasters could be averted.

What immediately came to mind as something she could be doing is feeding her desire for anarchy by inciting rebellion against tyrannical leaders across the world. She would justify to herself that many of the riots she incites may not succeed, but that freedom is a cause worth dying for. She would tell herself that she has a need to incite rebellion so she should at least do it in a place where she knows there is an unjust dictator. She could work ferrying equipment to guerrilla fighters and pass messages. She probably won't get personally invested in any cause too much, but she'd hang around salons  and bitch about dictators, though she wouldn't put much store in political idealism. Would that cut a little close to home for escapism? Perhaps, but it would make her so very much more interesting. That heroine is one I can root for... pit she only exists in my head.

“Once I attended a masked ball and dressed as the devil. Doesn’t sound like a big deal, but the year was eighteen-nineteen and I created quite a stir, let me tell you. When I asked Baron something-or-other to sell me his soul, he tried to stab me with a butter knife.”

It was great when Showalter finally decided to tell us a little of what Anya was doing for the last few millennia, but why she doesn't talk nostalgically about past rebellions? I disbelieve she wasn't there for the French Revolution, wasn't involved in the English Civil War or the Glorious Revolution, didn't care about the leaderless state of medieval Iceland.****

Showalter's blindspot really cripples Anya's potential as a character. She seems so very petty when compared with what she could be doing. Self absorbed and really... well, what claim has she in being a goddess when she isn't doing anything to affect the world? She's hardly the embodiment of a force if she isn't involved in places where anarchy is at its zenith. Surely not all rulers deserve their thrones? And not all laws are just?

 

The Goddess of Lawlessness and Sexual Sin

Dysnomia is really obscure a figure, usually coming in lists of personifications. She is named daughter of Eris...

"But abhorred Strife [Eris] bore painful Toil [Ponos] and Forgetfulness [Lethe] and Famine [Limos] and tearful Sorrows [Algea], Fightings [Hysminai] also, Battles [Machai], Murders [Phonoi], Manslaughters [Androctasiai], Quarrels [Neikea], Lying Words [Pseudea], Disputes [Amphillogiai], Lawlessness [Dysnomia] and Ruin [Ate], all of one nature, and Oath [Horkos] who most troubles men upon earth when anyone willfully swears a false oath." (Hesiod, Theogony 226; as quoted on Greek Mythology Link).

Now, in the context of that list, it is quite easy to see that Dysnomia is not associated with promiscuity. She is lawlessness in the sense of chaos and anarchy. She is lawlessness as in the world turned upside down. The opposite of ordered, stratified Greek society. She is by no means an important figure, but the reduction of her to some slutty goddess (which isn't really true in Hesiod, at least) who sleeps her way around Olympus seems a bit of a slap.

Her kiss had been sinful. Delightfully so. But the woman he’d held in his arms had not seemed evil. Sweet, yes. Amusing, absolutely. And, shockingly enough, vulnerable and wonderfully needy. Of him.

The whole novel is firmly set in the moral framework that views sex as sinful (the standard of romance novels) and it's really quite jarring. Anyone with a passing knowledge of the Greek pantheon would know that they hardly adhere to our sexual standards. A classicist would be able to describe all the nuances of Greek sexuality, but suffice to say it is hardly identical like our own. Read Thornton's Eros: The Myth of Ancient Greek Sexuality, for example. No, we don't know what it was like exactly and there is hardly critical consensus, but they are not exactly like us. If they were, it would be really dull. These are immortal warriors from the dawn of time, can't they at least think a little differently?

Why did he have to look so sexy standing there? The sun was acting like his lover, caressing him, weaving an angelic halo around his dark head. Yes, angelic. He was a fallen angel just then, causing her pulse points to throb and her stomach to quiver.

Even more perplexing is the constant reference to angels. At first the Chronicler simply thought it was metaphorical (which is odd since they don't exist in Greek Mythology) but then references to real angels happened. The reader is never told how they fit into the hierarchy. Presumably with the existence of demons there are also angels, but who are they working for? What purpose do they serve?

 

Anya the Warrior Princess

Showalter allow Anya to fight competently when it comes to the various combat sequences, but why does she dress her in the literary equivalent of cheesecake? I know she's busy bucking trends and expectations, I know she doesn't really need mobility since she can teleport but...

"Despite what you seem to think, I am a powerful being, and I choose whether or not to endanger myself." [...]
Finally, he looked at her—and immediately regretted it. She wore a white gossamer gown with gold threaded throughout, and was even lovelier than he remembered. With the golden glow of moonlight crowning her and emerald plants framing her, she was an ancient queen straight out of a storybook.
The top layers of her pale hair were piled on her head, the rest tumbling down and begging for his touch.

Firstly, he was there in the ancient times and he hardly has time for storybooks, so maybe she should be "an ancient queen like that one he saw in Sparta" or something.

Secondly, her comment that she is a powerful being is really rather undermined with the gossamer gown. Maybe mortal armour is useless for her and she likes the way it looks but Showalter never justifies Anya's battle wear, especially since she doesn't blast them with her lasers, she actually enters the melee.

 

The Canonical Characters were Mean to Me

The Darkest Kiss, as the Anthropologist pointed out, is a lot like Knight of Darkness in that the author is writing about a setting she seems to despise. Kenyon dramatically recast the Arthurian setting to conform to her ideas of manliness and relationships and ideal worlds, keeping almost none of the original concepts.*** Sandra Hill did the same to the Viking era and Showalter is doing the same now with Greek mythology. She uses so very little of the classical Greek religion, the big names of the pantheon barely make an appearance. Her use of Christian heaven and hell points to a world setting badly thought out. When gods from classical myth do turn up, it's only be mean to Anya and call her names in goddess-training-school. Showalter just doesn't seem to care about her source material.

 

Inexplicable Pop Culture References

The Anthropologist wondered about the pop culture references and the tendency for these books to feel dated really quickly. It doesn't make Anya any more connectable. Or likable. Where did she pick up all that slang anyway? Surely hanging around valley girls and chavs is hardly feeding her anarchic desires.

Shortly after, he’d found her a second time and threatened her with the Lords. Now here she and Lucien were, about to go Halo 3 on each other. Score one for Team Cronus.

What does "about to go Halo 3 on each other" even mean? Does it just mean "perpetrate some sort of violence"? Or is the hero going to be permanently stuck in some suit of power armour and aliens will descend from space? It's a shooter game and most of the violence in The Darkest Kiss is even gun violence....

 

To be continued... on the subject of The Darkest Kiss...
How Not to Write Sexual Tension
Distancing the Reader: Revelations of Backstory
Romance Novel Curses
The Other Keepers

 

---

* Perhaps it's publishers wishing to appeal to readers who shy away from reading books out of order, but this decision to not imprint a large number on the spine really does impair one's ability to understand the world setting and actually get into the book. MrsGiggles has complained on many an occasion about the false advertising of non-standalone books. And every dedicated Harry Potter reader is well sick of Rowling's insistence on reiterating the plot of the previous books in her first few chapters.... So, a compromise is need. This the Chronicler well understands. But the point is: two pages of things-you-should-know situated just before the beginning of the story really can't be that much effort to produce. Or maybe they feel it'd scare away readers who want to just leap into the romance and feel uncomfortable with needing to acquire prior knowledge.
But that is the crux of the problem: pretending the book can stand alone when it can't. 

** Why are they called "Lords of the Underworld" anyway? They don't possess an underworld, which presumably is Hades, but this setting has a curiously Christian afterlife. There's a heaven, complete with pearly gates and a sulphurous hell. What is the Underworld, in that case? And why does being a walking prison make them lords of it?

*** To be fair, every era does this, but the Chronicler is often annoyed when a thing goes from being interesting to boring and nonsensical.

**** Some anarchists hold that medieval Iceland is the closest thing to a realised ideal system in their book. A government where there is only one paid official (the lawspeaker) and regular gatherings to settle issues. Minimalist government, eh?

***** I'm not happy about the things that happened in the Cultural Revolution. It was horrific. Thinking about it makes my uncomfortable. But I'm not going to say I believe that everyone who participated in it was evil with a capital "E" and deserving of hell.

The Anthropologist Reviews: 'A Hunger Like No Other' by Kresley Cole

Some might say that faithful devotees of the Loinfire Club are connoisseurs of pain. Truly awful writing can cause several different kinds of pain in readers: pain both acute (screaming "GAH!" and flinging the book across the room) and chronic (lying on the floor and groaning as though you've eaten too much bad ham- Chapter 1 of 'The Darkest Kiss' seems to bring out this response in people). Lord Sin's minions expect a certain number of unpleasant symptoms from a new book: in 'A Hunger Like No Other's case, we were stocking up on aspirin in anticipation of a particularly headache-inducing case of Fantasy Eugenics*. However, as it turned out, we didn't especially care about the stupidity of the book's magic system, nor the author's lack of knowledge of realworld geography, nor the irritating attempts to sound 'hip' and 'cutting edge' in a way which will no doubt look hopelessly dated within a few years from now**.

These all paled in comparison to our horrified reaction to Lachlain, the book's hero. Again, the horror came not from the fact that he is a Scottish werewolf billionaire, nor from the fact that he believes the best way to keep a wife happy is to constantly buy her things (one new piece of priceless antique jewelery every day, apparently). It's the fact that he is a persistent liar, a kidnapper, a domestic abuser, and a rapist. I've been pained by the actions of many a stupid hero in the past, but I can categorically state that Lachlain is the first romance novel protagonist who ever made me feel physically ill. By the end of Chapter 3 I was shaking with rage and too sick to my stomach to eat any of the Chronicler's delicious Japanese curry. If Kresley Cole was trying to write the next 'Silence of the Lambs', this would be a compliment. However, as the Chronicler has noted, the book is being marketed as 'romance' and the heroine allegedly ends up blissfully in love with this man, so I can only assume that this wasn't the intended response.

'Rapist' is a word that gets thrown around quite a lot in response to the highly dubious sex scenes in many of the Loinfire Club's books. So, in the interest of clarity, let me state that under British law, Lachlain is not a rapist. Technically speaking, it looks like he's just guilty of somewhere between three and six counts of sexual assault (plus at least one count of abduction with intent to commit a serious sex offence). I'm not a lawyer (nor do I play one on TV), but looking at the June 2000 British Home Office report:

"we recommend that these offences should be redefined in the following way:

• that rape be redefined to include penetration of the mouth, anus or female genitalia by a penis;
• a new offence of sexual assault by penetration to deal with all other forms of sexual penetration of the anus and genitalia;
• rape and sexual assault by penetration should be seen as equally serious, and both should carry a maximum penalty of life imprisonment;
• a new offence of sexual assault to replace other nonpenetrative sexual touching now contained in the offence of indecent assault."
  

Furthermore:

"Both rape and sexual assault by penetration are dependant on lack of consent, as rape is at present, but this concept is so important that we recommend: [that] consent should be defined as ‘free agreement’ [...] the definition of recklessness in sex offences should include the lack of any thought as to consent which can be described as ‘could not care less about consent'.

...The law should include a non-exhaustive list of examples of where consent is not present such as where a person:

• submits or is unable to resist because of force or fear of force;
• submits because of threats or fear of serious harm or serious detriment of any type to themselves or another person;
• was asleep, unconscious, or too affected by alcohol or drugs to give free agreement;
• did not understand the purpose of the act, whether because they lacked the capacity to understand, or were deceived as to the purpose of the act;
• was mistaken or deceived as to the identity of the person or the nature of the act;
• submits or is unable to resist because they are abducted or unlawfully detained;
• has agreement given for them by a third party."
  (http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/documents/set_summ.pdf?view=Binary)
  

Amazingly, the last bullet point seems to be the only rule on consent which ISN'T broken by Lachlain at some point (and that's possibly purely because there's never a third party present who COULD have consented on her behalf). Having said this, the Chronicler is of the opinion that Fate is doing its best to consent on Emma's behalf throughout the book, due to the idiotic way that the 'lifemate' mechanism works. More on that later.

Her first sight of him is him charging across a tourist-filled square towards her, hurling tables out of the way as he screams at her. She runs away and thinks she's managed to escape, before "she felt claws sink into her ankle a second before she was dragged to the muddy ground and thrown onto her back" (p.9). He covers her mouth to keep her from screaming. Then when he's had a good look at her, he forcibly pins her down by her wrists and throat and kisses her while she begs him to stop ("N-no. Please. You have the wrong woman. Don't do this! Please!" -p.10). He then forcibly strips her with his claws (bear in mind, they're in a public park), before ordering her to take him to her hotel room (while she does her best to hold her shredded clothing together to cover herself).

He keeps a tight hold on her all the way to the hotel room, "dragging" her along with a "vise-like grip" (p.13). He only relaxes his guard for a moment, when he's dragging her across the road and almost gets hit by a car (he responds by punching the car "claws crumpling the metal like tinfoil, sending it skidding. When it finally stopped, the engine block dropped to the street with a thud. The driver threw open the door, dived for the street, then darted away" -p.12). When they get to the hotel, she notes that the room is ten floors up and completely soundproof, giving her no way to escape.

"He found the bathroom, yanked her inside, then tilted his head at the fixtures. “Clean yourself.”
“P-privacy?” she croaked. Amusement.
“You have none.” He leaned his shoulder against the wall and crossed his muscled arms, as if awaiting a show. “Now, undress for me and let me see what’s mine.”" (p.16)

She manages to lock the bathroom door while he's distracted by the need to steal food from a terrified room service clerk.

""He limped to the door to the bathing chamber and found it locked. He shook his head as he broke the knob easily, then entered a room so thick with steam he could hardly spy her balled up against the opposite wall. He lifted her up by her arms, scowling to find her still wet and dirty.
 “You’ve no’ cleaned yourself?”
When she only stared down at the ground, he demanded, “Why?”
She shrugged miserably." (p.19)

He takes off all his clothes and informs her that if she strips voluntarily, then he'll let her contact her family (although even as he says this, he's aware that it's a lie- "in fact, keeping her from her vampire kin would just be the beginning of his revenge." -p.20).

"When he loomed closer, she peeled the wet jacket and blouse away, then the shredded undergarment beneath them, hastily draping a thin arm over her breasts.
“Please. I-I don’t know who you think I am, but—”
“I think”—before she could blink, he’d ripped her skirt clean from her body and tossed it to the ground—“that I should at least know your name before I set to touchin’ you.”She shook harder if possible, her arm tightening over her breasts." (p.21)

Honestly, I don't think there's any way to summarise how revolting the rest of the scene is: I'll just have to quote as selectively as possible:

"“Put your foot there.” He motioned to the narrow bench along the shower’s back wall. And spread her thighs? “Um, I don’t—”He lifted her knee and placed it there himself. When she began to move it, he snapped, “Doona dare. Now, lean your head back against me.”" (p.24)

"His fingers inched lower. “Keep your legs open to me.”
She’d just been about to shove them together again. She’d never been touched there. Or anywhere else, for that matter.She’d never even held a man’s hand.Swallowing nervously, she watched as his hand trailed down to her sex. “B-but you said—”
“That I would no’ fuck you. Trust me, you’ll know when I’m about to.”" (p.25)

"Her eyes had been heavy-lidded with lust, but now they widened in panic again. “Y-you said you wouldn’t.”
“Changed my mind when I felt you wet and needing.”
She did want him—as she was supposed to. He frowned, uncomprehending when she struggled. Even in his weakened state, quelling her fight took little more effort than holding a wildcat. He pressed her against the wall, pinning her there [...] She’d gone tight again. If he tried to fuck her like this, he’d tear her—but he didn’t care." (p.26)

"Need to be inside her. Haze. She would make him wait longer for the mindlessness he craved? Torturing me just as her kindred did. He bellowed with rage, his hands shooting out on each side of her head to crush the marble behind her.Her eyes went stark once more. [...] He wanted her willing. But he’d take what fate had given.
“I’m going tae be inside you tonight. Best relax.” She gazed up at him with her brows drawn as though with despair.

“You said you wouldn’t hurt me. You p-promised.” Did the witch think that promise would be enough to save her? He gripped his cock, dragged her leg up to his hip…
“But you said,” she whispered, devastated that she’d believed him. She hated being lied to, especially since she could never lie back.
“You said….”" (p.27)

"He stilled. With a deep growl, he released her leg and hit the wall again. Her eyes widened when he grabbed her and turned her around. Right when she was about to scratch him, bite him, he pulled her into his arms again, her back against his chest. He shoved her hand to his erection, inhaling sharply at the first touch.
His voice gone guttural, he said, “Stroke me.”
Glad for the reprieve, she tentatively held him, in no way able to fit her palm around him. When she didn’t begin at once, he bucked his hips. She finally ran her hand over him in long strokes, looking away.
“Harder.” She tightened her fingers, face hot with embarrassment." (p.27-8)

"Taking a towel, he dried her completely. He even pinned her still—by hugging an arm around her waist—to run the cloth slowly between her legs. Her eyes grew wider as he continued to inspect her as if she were a prospective purchase. He palmed the curves of her bottom, then brought his hand down hard on each side, making sounds of…approval?He must have noticed her bewildered expression, because he said, “You doona like me learning you?”
“Of course not!”
“I’ll allow you to do the same.” He placed her palm flat on his chest, dragging it down, a challenging look in his eyes.
“I’ll pass,” she squeaked, jerking her hand back.Before she could even cry out, he swooped her up in his arms and carried her to the bed, roughly tossing her there." [...] Enough!

“I—can—dress—myself,” she snapped.He yanked her around to face him, and his tone went deadly.
“Doona displease me, vampire. You canna imagine how many years of rage I’ve got pent up, ready to be tapped.”
She glanced past him, and her jaw slackened when she saw the distinct claw marks that had rent the bedside table.
He’s a madman.She helplessly raised her arms." (p.30)

So it's clear: he doesn't technically "rape" her, as far as British law is concerned (that is, he realises that she's so tight, presumably from panic, that he's likely to tear something if he puts his penis inside her- and, after a certain amount of thought, he decides that he doesn't want to injure her right this minute). So instead he settles for 'only' digitally penetrating her while she begs him to stop, then forcing her to give him a handjob. He gropes her a bit more, despite her clearly stating that she doesn't want him to. Then he throws her to the bed and forces her to dress in nightclothes that he's picked out for her. She makes another escape attempt. Just in case you wondered what kind of person he is, he "enjoyed letting her think she was about to succeed before he dragged her back and tucked her into his side. She went limp, then passed out. He didn’t know if she’d fainted or not. Didn’t particularly care." (p.34)

He then forces her to fall asleep next to him (which she does, because vampires don't seem to have any choice over whether they fall asleep after sunrise- they're effectively in a coma during daylight hours). While she's asleep, he takes the opportunity to steal her credit card and go shopping for designer clothes, "though he continually found his thoughts returning to his new prize" (p.39). There is some difficulty due to the fact that the stolen card belongs to a 'Ms Troy'...

"Initially, there had been some hesitation on the man’s part. He’d asked if “Mr. Troy” could provide any identification whatsoever.
Lachlain had inched forward in his seat, staring him down for long moments, his expression balanced between anger at the question and embarrassment for the man for asking. “No.’’ The answer was casually threatening, succinct, subject-ending.
The man had jumped at the word as he might at an unexpected gun report. Then he’d swallowed and hesitated no more, even at the most bizarre demands." (p.39)

Lachlain's purchases include clothes for himself and for Emma (when dressing her, he specifically chooses very revealing underwear but very conservative overclothes, because he doesn't want other men looking at his property). He also rents them a Mercedes. Presumably he's going on the basis that she was renting a very expensive hotel room; we eventually learn that he's managed to rack up a six-figure credit card bill (see p.346).

When he comes back, she's still unconscious, so he passes the time by going down on her while she's incapable of resisting (which is also explicitly a type of sexual assault under British law- he's penetrating her with his tongue while she is "asleep, unconscious, or too affected by alcohol or drugs to give free agreement". She wakes up at sunset, realises what's going on, and manages to kick him hard enough to get him off her. His response?

"A red haze covered his sight and confused his mind. He roared as he charged her, throwing her to the bed and pinning her down. He freed his trews and gripped himself, about to shove into her, crazed with his rage and lust..." (p.42)

Yes, how dare the stupid bitch reject him like that? No wonder the man is angry!

"Maybe fucking her regularly, taking his pain out on her, was what he was supposed to do. Of course. He felt himself calming at the thought. Yes, he’d been given a vampire solely for his pleasure, for his revenge." (p.43)

As it happens, she manages to narrowly escape being brutally raped, by using her magic powers to scream loud enough to shatter glass and nearly burst his eardrums. This distracts him for just long enough for her to attempt suicide.

Yes, you heard that right. The first encounter with the hero of this ROMANCE NOVEL is so traumatic that the heroine literally wants to kill herself (by jumping off a tenth-floor balcony).

"She whispered, “Why are you doing this to me?”Because I’ve wanted what’s mine. Because I need you and I hate you. 
“Come down now,” he ordered. She shook her head slowly.“You canna die from this. From sun, or losing your head, but no’ from a fall.” He made his tone casual, though he was uncertain. They were how many floors up? If she was weak…“And I’ll easily follow you down to bring you back here.” (p.44)

This guy should totally be a suicide counsellor. When it comes to reasons not to kill yourself, "because you'll only survive and be horribly injured and then I can easily hunt you down and rape you" is quite a compelling argument.

"She seemed to wake up, her brows drawing together, her eyes bleak. “I just want to go home,” she said in a small voice.
“You will. I vow you’ll go home.” To your new home. “Just help me get to mine.”
“If I help you, you swear you’ll release me?” 
Never. “Aye.”" (p.46)

So, having explicitly lied about eventually letting her go, he manages to convince her to get down from the balcony. The tense neardeath experience over, he decides this is an excellent time to threaten her with rape again:

"If she’d assumed he would give her privacy because he’d learned a lesson, she’d have been wrong. He walked right in and opened the shower stall door. She jumped, startled, fumbling not to drop the conditioner bottle before catching it on the pad of her forefinger.She saw his fists clench and open, and that finger went limp. The bottle thudded.One hit…
The image of the shredded bedside table flashed in her mind, then the memory of the car he’d batted like a crumpled piece of paper. Chunks of marble that hadn’t been pulverized still littered the shower floor. Fool. She’d been a fool to think he wouldn’t hurt her. Of all the things she should fear, she feared pain the most. And now a Lykae [werewolf] clenched his fists in anger. At her.She turned into the corner, giving him her side to try to shield her nudity. And because if he hit, she could sink down and draw her knees to her chest. But with some foreign curse, he stalked off." (p.51)

"She turned into the corner, giving him her side to try to shield her nudity. And because if he hit, she could sink down and draw her knees to her chest." Ask yourself, does that sound more like something that belongs in a romance novel, or in a harrowing account of sexual abuse?

He follows this up by allowing her to make a phonecall to her family (who are sick with worry over the fact that she missed her plane after he kidnapped her. They haven't been able to reach her mobile since it was broken while he was violently assaulting her). Obviously he secretly listens in on the phoneline to make sure she doesn't try to tell them where she's being held.

Emma calls her Aunt Regin (who is the last of some undescribed race of flangebeasts called the Radiant Ones, and hunts down supernatural predators for fun). Regin informs Emma that she's in even bigger trouble than she suspected: not only is she being held prisoner by a violent sex offender, there is also evidence that she's being hunted down by a murderous and hideously-powerful vampire.

And then a very strange thing happens. Emma tells Regin that she is with a man. Regin immediately assumes that Emma, being half-vampire, has persuaded a man to allow her to drink his blood (which she's never done- she feeds only from blood banks).

“If not to drink him, then what would you want with a man? Huh?”
Her voice quavering with anger, Emma said, “What any woman wants! I’m no different from you—”
“You want to, like, sleep with him?”Why did she sound that disbelieving?
“Maybe I do!" (p.59)

"...[Emma] felt a glimmer of hope. She’d been aroused by Lachlain. She’d felt regular lust—not blood lust. And she’d been so close. Even tonight, she’d been to the edge with him. [...] "All right, you want to know? I think he’s…he’s wildly handsome!” With emphasis on wild. “He knows what I am and we’re leaving Paris together.”
“Great Freya, you’re serious. What’s he like?”
“He’s strong. Said he’d protect me.” Great kisser. Intermittently insane. With a broad chest she’d wanted to lick like ice cream.
 In a scoffing tone, Regin asked, “Strong enough to take down a vampire?”
“You have no idea.” (p.60)

“When are you leaving Paris?”
“Tonight. Right now, actually.”
“That’s good, at least. Tell me where you’re going.”
“So Annika can come drag me home by my ear?” And fight Lachlain to the death?
“Nope. Tell her I’ll be home week after next at the latest, and that if she tries to find me, I’ll know she doesn’t trust that I am more than capable of taking care of myself—”
Regin snorted, then laughed outright.
“I can take care of myself.” Her tone hurt, she asked, “Why is that funny?”
Shrieking laughter.
“Piss off, Regin! You know what? I’ll send you a postcard!” She slammed the phone down, then snatched up her boots. Stomping into the first one, she muttered angrily, “I will so go.” Another boot shoved on. “And I won’t be catching any Stockholm syndrome." (p.61)

In this context, references to Stockholm Syndrome seem less like a lighthearted quip and more like an entirely accurate psychiatric diagnosis. It's probably less than an hour since she woke up and found him assaulting her in her sleep. Since she had to bodily fight him off from RAPING her. Since she threatened suicide because that was her only chance of escape. Now she has a chance to call for help. OK, there's a good chance he's listening in, and he's clearly psychotic; so even if she tries to come up with some kind of codeword for "I've been kidnapped", he might work it out and be so angry that he rapes and/or murders her. Given his previous behaviour, that seems entirely possible. But just a short while ago she concluded that remaining his captive was literally a fate worse than death. What's changed since then? His behaviour? He broke into her bathroom again and then sulked when her only response was to desperately huddle in the corner, but I suppose that this might count as gentlemanly, relative to him forcing himself on her in the shower.

Just to drive the point home- remember that whole weird "it's not consent if the victim submits because of threats or fear of serious harm" thing that the British Home Office has got going on?

"I'll take you here on the grass on your hands and knees, till well after the sun rises." (p.12. Reader, remember that he knows full well that she's a vampire, and that if she's out in direct sunlight for more than a few seconds, she'll physically catch fire).
Kiss me back, witch, while I decide if I should spare your life. Kiss me like you want to live.
She did [kiss him]. Not because she wanted to live overmuch, but because she thought he would make sure her death was slow and torturing." (p.15)

"Looking at the door like that? I’ll catch you before you make it from this room."
(p.20)

"I doona have to grant you anything! I could just take you in here and then in the bed.” (p.21)

"You canna escape me. You only provoke my anger.” [...]
"I-I don’t want to anger you,” she said with a shaky breath. “I just want to go-” “Do you know how many vampires I’ve killed?” he murmured, either ignoring or not hearing her words."
“No,” she whispered. She wondered if he truly saw her.
“I’ve killed thousands. I hunted them for sport, stalking their lairs.” He ran the back of his dark claw across her neck. “And with one swipe of my claws I severed their heads—before they even woke.” His lips brushed over her neck where he’d trailed his claw, making her shudder. “I could kill you as easily as taking a breath.”
[...]
“Are you going to k-kill me?”He smoothed a strand of hair from her lip.
“I have no’ decided. I’ve never hesitated a second before you.” He was shaking from holding his position above her. “When I wake from this haze—when this madness clears, if I still believe you are what you are…who knows?”
[...]
“You would hurt me that way? [referring to rape]”
“Without a second thought.” His lips curled. His gaze seemed intent on her face, but his eyes were still vacant.
“And that’s just the beginning of the things I’ll do to you, vampire.”(p.33)

---

*Fantasy Eugenics is our current placeholder name for the fiction subgenre in which authors appear to be trying to deliberately cross-breed idiotic fantasy species with badly-defined superpowers, thus giving rise to generations of hideous and over-powered offspring. In AHLNO, for example, the heroine has one vampire parent and one valkyrie parent. The vampire side gives her the ability to teleport and mindread people by drinking their blood. The valkyrie side means that whenever she is feeling a strong sensation, her eyes go silver and lightning begins striking the surrounding area. The novel speculates (on p.264) that this must make it exceptionally difficult for valkyries to masturbate discreetly. She also has pointy ears: the book doesn't mention these as either a vampire OR a valkyrie trait, so perhaps they're just some kind of minor unrelated birth defect. In addition, she acquires the werewolf template as the result of drinking werewolf blood. This presumably means that the eventual offspring of Emma and Lachlain will be part-vampire, part-valkyrie, part-human, part-wolf-spirit, part-biscuit.

**Examples: loud and pointed references to leetspeak, iPods, Buffy and Crazy Frog ringtones.

The Loinfire Club reads... A Hunger Like No Other

A Hunger Like No Other, by Kresley Cole

The Chronicler remembers all the heated debate back on "Dear Author" over a romance trilogy that ended with vampire hero's death at the hands of the heroine. A romance novel is defined by its happy ending and anything else would result in the readers feeling cheated. Jane wrote: "I kept thinking as Candace Steele engaged in various relationships with men other than Ash that - huh, this doesn’t sound like a romance but I will hang on. After all, the spine of the book says romance. Ballantine says this is a romance. It must be a romance right? I can live through the multiple partners and the separation so long as the hero and heroine end up together."

Well, let's put it this way:

When reading through A Hunger Like No Other, the Chronicler wondered about whether or not it was a romance novel. After all, it was sold as a romance. The quote on the front cover called it one. It even won a RITA, and those are really prestigious, the veritable Oscars of the romance novel world. The spine and the blurb certainly weren't calling the book anything else... Azrael came out and said it and I think he's right: "This book isn't a romance novel. It's just about rape. Seriously. It's crossed the line."

The Chronicler has no problem with people wanting to write about their rape fantasies (or any other, for that matter) as long as they is plenty of warning on the tin and preferably heavily flanked with caveats about how rape really isn't okay in the real world. More importantly, don't try to sell me that fantasy as a romance novel. I don't just feel cheated, I feel concerned about how no one else seems to have noticed this gaping flaw and allowed the book to win a RITA. I wonder if we were even reading the same book.

The Restitution was quite repulsive enough with its heroine waltzing off into her happily ever after with her rapist who never really apologises. It was all part of God's plan that she suffer through her rape to save that man's black, black soul and wasn't it worth it in the end? He could have raped her hundreds of times when he was holding her captive and he only raped her one, wasn't that nice of him?

But really, this pales in comparison. If only because The Restitution actually acknowledges that rape is quite a traumatic thing for a woman.

Now, admittedly, the Loinfire Club throws around the word "rape", quite a bit, and for that we know we're bad people. Often the situation described is more in the realms of dubious consent and sexual harassment, but Kresley Cole's A Hunger Like No Other really defies all expectations and previous experiences. This isn't a forced seduction or a punishing kiss... 

At the point where we put down the novel, several chapters into the book, the werewolf hero has broken free of his fiery prison under Paris, forced himself onto the heroine. He rips her blouse off in the middle of Paris. He then forces her to show him the way to her place and asks her to clean herself. When she refuses, he strips her naked, gropes her in the shower, fingers her and, deciding against ripping her open with his massive cock, relents and asks her to use her hands instead. He toys with her throughout the night, allowing her to think she's managing to escape but catching her the last minute with superhuman strength. He wakes her up by going down on her and then forces her to call her aunts and tell them she'll be away for a while. He listens in, worried that she might tell them to descend with their supernatural powers, but the good little heroine doesn't and they set off to Scotland.

Now, all this happens without werewolf hero asking for consent of any form or at least informing Emma that she's his soulmate and that fate has willed it they be together forever and ever. Emma alternates between being confused, aroused and scared. I am well aware that Mr-Rapist-hero has been imprisoned for a hundred and fifty years in a fiery hell and, presumably, chaste for every minute of it. I am also aware that he hates vampires and would be killing Emma if she didn't smell of true love... but none of this really seems to justify his actions even a little bit. The only way you could possibly believe frustration justifies rape is if you believe male lust is this overpowering, uncontrollable drive that strips they of rational thought, morality and human empathy. And I don't believe that. Seriously. 

I don't care that he's enraged about her being a vampire and that he's been tortured by vampires for centuries. That doesn't justify rape. That especially doesn't justify him thinking to himself that Fate is chaining Emma to him forevermore with the whole soulmate business so that he can take out his rage over being tortured on her. I don't care that he's attractive or that she's a bit aroused -attractiveness isn't a free pass and arousal is certainly not consent. I don't care that they're predestined mates, since funnily enough, rape can happen within marriages. I don't care that he doesn't quite bring himself to penetrate her vaginally; it's hardly any mercy on his part. I don't care that Socrates thinks there's a beast in the best of us. It's really, really no excuse. I don't care that he's surprisingly gentle, it's still no substitute for consent.

That we aren't give any cultural touchstone of any sort ("Werewolf chicks dig rape", "where I come from, this is how you say hi")  makes it even more difficult to see any reason to justify the rapist-hero's behaviour. It's not that cultural upbringing justifies this behaviour, but that the author seems to not feel it necessary, that the reader would simply sympathise with the lying, manipulative sex offender.

At no point in the first few chapters is the heroine in control of her situation. At no point was she consenting to all the sexual contact the hero inflicted on her. Really, this point is becoming laboured, so I'll move onto the whole abduction business. He takes over her life, steals her money and her credit card. He decides where they're going and what they're doing. He decides how she'll dress, what underwear she'll wear and watches as she changes. He listens in on her conversations, threatens her with rape, torture and death.... 

It is also baffling how baffled the heroine is. He told her repeatedly and without ambiguity that he intends to rape her. Maybe she's so sheltered she's never read the odd case of woman-kept-in-basement-and-repeatedly-raped-etc in the newspapers. Maybe its his Scottish accent obscuring his meaning.

Oh, and a real half-valkyrie would have castrated him by now.

(Rant out of system now. It may be a little while before the Chronicler manages to face Cole's again and post the full write-up...)

The Loinfire Club reads... The Darkest Kiss

The Darkest Kiss, by Gena Showalter

She has tempted many men… but never found her equal.

Until now.

Though she has lived for centuries, Anya, goddess of anarchy, has never known pleasure. Until Lucien, the incarnation of death—a warrior eternally doomed to take souls to the hereafter. He draws her like no other. And Anya will risk anything to have him.

But when the merciless Lord of the Underworld is ordered by the gods to claim Anya herself, their uncontrollable attraction becomes an anguished pursuit. Now they must defeat the unconquerable forces that control them, before their thirst for one another demands a sacrifice of love beyond imagining...

Preamble and Dedications

Cathed has been re-reading Cupid's Melody this morning, apparently.

The Anthropologist: "You have to remind yourself how bad these things are. Or else it'll be like grade inflation, but not. We'll forget how bad and wrong the old ones are and the judgment would be skewed... it's like Connie Mason's lactation fetish. It's weeks before I think of that these days."

This week (at the Anthropologist's urging) we are reading is Gena Showalter's The Darkest Kiss.

(The Anthropologist has recently found F.A.T.A.L. and if that becomes the theme of this week's meeting... well, the point is, there were many digressions about it and anything she says is merely a rehash of the horrors of the actual review. If you, dear reader, feel like poking your eyes out with a spork, this is a valid alternative.)

The Balance decides to start by reading the (unusually long) dedication...

To Kresley Cole. You would let me wear your skin if at all possible—and I won't mention what you’d let me do to your eyeballs...

Pillywiggin: "What?! Eyeballs?"

To Marjorie Liu. Because you spank on and there's nothing cooler!

The Anthropologist: "Mental image I didn't need!"

(The Chronicler notes that Majorie Liu is also a paranormal romance novel writer.)

To Jill Monroe. You are a sister of my heart— hearter? sisart?—and even though you stole my gnome, I can't imagine a life without you. For realsies.

The Anthropologist: "WHAT?!"

Pillywiggin: "I don't think book dedications is a good idea."

The Chronicler: "I don't think book dedications this length is a good idea."

Art director Kathleen Oudit and designer Juliana Kolesova—I owe you big-time! The lips on this cover…Shiver! And you didn't blink twice when I mentioned one brown eye and one blue eye.

The Anthropologist: "Because they don't expect that, romance novel cover artists, mismatched eyes."

(Also, the cover is really freaky. The more you stare at it, the more weird it seems. For a start, that man's arm is now forever fixed in that position as any movement will distort his butterfly tattoo. Secondly, his head is far, far too small for his torso and his pecks glow... the Anthropologist thinks he has a birth defect which means he looks as though his head is photo-shopped on.)

HE WAS KNOWN AS THE Dark One. 

Cathed: "As they are."

Malach ha-Maet. Yama. Azreal....

Cathed (pointing): "He's Azrael! But he's Azrael!"

The Balance: "Different spelling. It's spelt Az-real."

Azrael: "That's okay, then."

Long ago he had opened dimOuniak, a powerful box made from the bones of a goddess...

Cathed: "As you do."

... unleashing a horde of demons upon the earth.

Pillywiggin: "You make it sound so casual."

Cathed: "Like trying to open a restaurant."

The Anthropologist: "And what, he couldn't hire any good waitresses because of they just kept falling in love with him?"

Pillywiggin: "He could always hire lesbians and old people."

The Anthropologist: "Around this man, lesbians aren't lesbians for long..."

As punishment, he and the warriors who aided him were forced to house those demons inside themselves, melding light and darkness, order and chaos...

Pillywiggin: "So, a mobile, sentient prison is better than a non-mobile, non-sentient one."

(The Balance: "Yes, the best way of preventing these demons from escaping is by putting them inside sentient prisons who don't want them to have them inside them.")

Because he was the one to open the box, he had been given the demon of Death. A fair exchange, he supposed, for his action had nearly caused the demise of the world...

Cathed: "God! If I'd known that I wouldn't have done it!"

Now he was charged with the responsibility of collecting human souls and escorting them to their final resting place. Even if he opposed the idea.

Azrael: "He opposes the idea of death in general?"

He did not like taking innocents from their families, found no joy in delivering the wicked to their damnation...

The Anthropologist: "Taking innocents from families... remember what that means normally in these books..."

Pillywiggin: "Death... Death of rats... Death of hymens..."

Azrael: "Skeleton with artfully lodged scythe."

Resistance, he’d soon learned, brought something far worse than death to his door. Resistance brought an agony so complete, so inexorable, even the gods trembled at the thought.

Cathed: "Oh dear."

The Chronicler: "Exactly why are the gods contemplating his punishment with anything other than glee?"

Did his obedience mean he was gentle? Caring? Nurturing? No. Oh, no. He could not afford softer emotion. Love, compassion and mercy were enemies to his plight.

Anger, though? Rage? Those he sometimes embraced.

Azrael: "Both anger and rage."

Woe to anyone who pushed him too far, for man would become fully demon. A beast. A sinister entity who would not hesitate to curl his fingers around a human heart and squeeze...

Loinfire Club laughs.

The Anthropologist (referring to the new Halloween toy): "We have to get the heart!"

Squeeze so tightly that human would lose his breath and beg for the sweet kiss of eternal sleep only he could offer...

The Loinfire Club each squeeze the "Throbbing Heart" in turn.

With that thought, the Prologue ends and the first chapter begins...