I have a fondness for romances. You know, the ones that look like real literature and that, even if you're just gagging for the bit when Captain Wentworth writes the note to Anne Eliot, or a man turns up on a horse sweating a bit, or David Copperfield gets it on with Dora. (Not French ones though. They only ever end badly.) But I like the other ones too. The pink English ones written after 1995. I refuse to use the term chick-lit, as I am not a "chick" (the word implies thigh-high boots, ironed streaked blonde hair, a rather plain face and nights out on the town with the girls in nightclubs in Cheltenham); and I'm not sure that they're "literature" either, whatever that is. But if I'm feeling weak in the head, or a bit ill, or just generally a bit drippy, one of the most effective cures is a quick trip to a charity shop with a fiver in your pocket which will, on average, buy you three novels with squirly writing on the front and the promise of a happy ending. And that to me is an afternoon's escapism, from which I emerge revived and ready to fight with bears in the street, using only my bare hands and a small jar of Bovril.
That Daisy Goodwin has had a programme on the telly recently that has proven with Scientific Fact that reading romances is good for you. Apparently they lower your heart rate to an almost standstill on the sofa, which I have known for years. She gets bang on my tits, what with her little poetry collections and her Executive Producing and her own televisual entertainment programmes, and she's got an annoying voice and that, but I have to thank her - even vaguely - for making me feel slightly better about my Dark Habit. I mean her programme was on BBC4 and everything, which means it must be OK.
Most of them are un-readable, mind you. About 70% of the books I buy from Oxfam when weak in the head are hurled across the room in disgust before I scrape them back up, slightly battered, and return them to Oxfam to sell again. The thing is, I want to hate Miriam Keane, but I don't. Maeve Binchy is very soothing. I read a Jenny Colgan book last Tuesday afternoon and it was really quite funny, although I can't actually remember what it was about. I think there was a dog in it. I once spent a week reading The Barchester Chronicles and Jilly Cooper. Not at the same time, obv - I sort of mixed them up a bit. (The Warden/Octavia. Barchester Towers/Polo. That sort of thing. Very interesting.)
Last night I was in an insomniac mangle. There are only ever three solutions to insomnia: 1) a list; 2) Tamazepam; 3) a rubbish novel. (The fourth is prodding awake a slumbering Gentleman Caller and asking for a quick game of Scrabble, but gentlemen I am interested in are not freely available for board games at the time of writing.) And what did I find? P.S. I love you by Cecelia Ahern, the 12 year old half-wit daughter of an Irish Prime Minister who did a 'Media and Communications Degree' (what is this thing?) and is, I think, the sister-in-law of a member of boyband favourites, Westlife. Apparently it was top of the best-seller charts in Germany for fifty-two weeks. Apparently Hilary Swank is going to be in the film they're making of it in the Hollywood. Apparently it is a "wonderfully life-affirming witty debut". No it is not. It is cock, and it is unreadable. Let me share with you some extracts of Miss Ahern's wonderfully life-affirming prose. "Her heart leaped as he lowered his boxers, caught them on the tip of his toes and flung them at her where they landed on her head."
"Leo paused in what he was doing and watched her with amusement. 'I always thought you were for the madhouse. No one ever listens to me.'
She laughed even harder. 'Oh, I'm sorry Leo. I don't know what's wrong with me, I just can't stop.' Holly's stomach ached from laughing so hard and she was aware of all the curious glances she was attracting but she just couldn't help it. It was as if all the missed mirth from the past couple of months were tumbling out at once."
"She had settled on wearing an all-black outfit to suit her current mood. Black fitted trousers slimmed her legs and were tailored perfectly to sit over her black boots. A black corset that made her look like she had a bigger chest finished the outfit off perfectly. Leo had done a wonderful job on her hair, tying it up and allowing strands to fall in loose waves around her shoulders. Holly ran her fingers through her hair and smiled at the memory of her time at the hairdressers..."
If this 503 page cavalcade of wank (written in the style of Muffin the Mule with a packet of crayons) has made someone into a best-selling author, then take heart. Anything you have ever written is better than this. So if you're trying to write a book and you're crippled with self-doubt, I suggest getting down to Oxfam and buying this book. (You'll find at least ten copies nestled next to 1976's splendid Dairy Book of Home Cookery). One glance at Ahern and you'll have written next year's Nobel Prize winner by the end of the week.
13 comments:
Quite far-sighted of Holly, choosing a hairdresser for a lover, although not a very nimble one - if a bloke ever kicked his pants on my head he would be kneed in the bollocks before he knew it was Tuesday. On the other hand, Leo's not a very good hairdresser. I'd prefer a really good cut to an imperfect and messy ponytail.
So, she has fat thighs and a flat chest and needs to dress to disguise them. Oh dear. I don't think Leo is the one though, did Mr Right turn up on page 497?
I must confess, dear Z, that I have not, and will not, make it past page 42. It is simply too Dreary. Also, bad news: what happens is Holly marries some bloke who dies, but he leaves her a list of things she must do every month "do karaoke, ps I love you", "buy a disco outfit, ps I love you"; the obvious conclusion being that by the time the letters have run out, she will have met someone else. (It is only 42 pages in, but already I have Identified Who). Anyway, the bad news is that Leo is a gay hairdresser who 'perches his tiny bottom' on things and has hair that matches his skin; apparently also all his clientele hate him because he is more glamorous than them. It really pushes all the boundaries, this one, I tells ya.
Well, that makes it even ruder that he kicked his knickers on her lovely, if tousled, head. Silly cow, lucky for her that the dominant-from-the-grave husband died.
Is there a Crap Book formula, that the really awful ones just drone on and on for hundreds of pages? Never mind the quality, feel the width?
I do declare they are three separate passages from different pages, but I have not made that clear and have made it look like they run on. Still, if it makes sense that way we merely have Further Proof of her crap-ness.
Aren't there only three stories in the world, or something? I think the formula is: there is a girl. something goes wrong. (has horrid boyfriend/husband dies/is too fat/has to look after cats left to her by aunt). She has two best friends: one is gay, the other is a girl who is prettier than her. She meets and falls in love wth a horrid man. A nice man appears. She is Friends with him. The horrid man does something mean. One day she realises nice man has lovely hair, or something. Then about a week later she is in Difficulties and the Nice Man sorts her out, and she falls in love with him and everyone laughs.
Something like that. We're gonna make a million. (Yes as rule of thumb the thicker they are the worse they are, e.g. Ulysses and Clarissa).
Please, if you ever really do see a copy of the Dairy Book of Home Cookery, get me another one. Ta!
"Her heart leaped as he lowered his boxers, caught them on the tip of his toes and flung them at her where they landed on her head" is the best line I have ever read anywhere, ever.
And I read at least once a day.
NWM, I much enjoyed your lit crit post, you are funny as hell, yes, publishers wet themselves often over writing that has no substance, it is sadly a sign of our times. I speak as one who was courted and seduced, but then rejected by an agent because as far as 'sick-lit' went, (the publishers' term, not mine), my book was 'too literary and subtle' for its own good, and therefore 'tricky to market' (yes, that old chestnut. . .). And, I agree, Daisy Goodwin is very annoying. And also that was a lovely story about Julian Lennon's monkey.
"...Then about a week later she is in Difficulties and the Nice Man sorts her out, and she falls in love with him and everyone laughs".
Yes but then she finds out that SOYLENT GREEN IS PEOPLE ! IT'S PEOPLE !!!" And horrid man comes around and he's wearing a HOCKEY MASK and a CHAIN SAW. Nice man picks her up in fast car (a NISSAN Z350, say) and they flee on the highway with ONCOMING TRAFFIC but they are chased by a black HELICOPTER driven by a VELOCIRAPTOR, who fortunately flies straight into a BIG MOUNTAIN after being distracted by girl with BIG BOOBS since it is SPRING BREAK and BLINK182 plays the final credits.
Make the check out the Johnny De La Boy, thanks.
Why these books are for women, and only women:
They are gianter in height than normal books.
So, men don't read these books because they make their cocks look small when they're lying naked in bed reading the sex bits.
Therefore, men are offended and slighted, and will snort derisively and throw these books across the room.
Men prefer floppier or stubbier reading material for naked reading.
So I hear.
Clearly I must read this book to calm my doubts about my own writing... Trouble is, the thought that she has been paid bazillions of pounds for writing it, and the film rights, will turn me into a machete wielding homicidal maniac, given that my own royalties generally come from the greengrocer in the form of a sack of peanuts.
Apparently James Marsters is to be in the film, though, and I like him
JB - cheque on its way.
PBC - I salute your honesty.
Wendy - Yes, but you shall have Integrity, and this is Important (although it only pays peanuts). Hang on ... that doesn't work, does it. In fact, don't read it - it's awful and that alone will be enough to depress you.
I suspect that there can only be two reasons that anyone would read that book. Either a) they bought it from Oxfam or b) because it came free with someone else's copy of Glamour magazine.
It sounds horrible, although I understand the desire to read junk when feeling shit. For me a bad crime thriller takes all problems away.
I am frightened of guns, otherwise I'd agree with you, L. And they STILL stock it in WHSmith (I checked today like a twat)
C, It's a good idea, badly executed, and that's what makes it so fucking galling. If halfwits like her (main market for book) could be sat in a room churning out 'ideas' that they would like to read, only for the 'ideas' to be handed on to people who could actually write, it may be interesting. Fuck me. We're gonna make a million.
Post a Comment