ivyfic | (no subject)

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you...

I don't know what I like best:
-The awfulness of the title and author's pen name!
-The psychedelic colors. They foiled and embossed this sucker, too!
-The indeterminate gender of the figures on the cover!
-The mysterious chess piece on the back!
-The front cover quote from "Survivorman"!
-The back cover copy! I mean, come on: his best tool of seduction bears a damning tattoo. Whoa. The mental image I got from that one.

For those curious, from dictionary.com:
fu'met (n.) - The dung of deer.

But wait! It gets better. The author has a website! Take a few minutes. Poke around.

You'll find out that all her character names start with "Dj," with a silent D. Names like Djerrold, Djustine, Djonn, Djetthro and Djason. Now that's what I call world-building. That silent "d" makes them soooo alien.

You'll learn that this book is part of a series on intergalactic royal chess sex slaves... or something.

You'll see an "authentic" hill figure in Dorset, England, and, "see what FORCED MATE's alien hero's sarcastic human side-kick has to say about the Giant's 30 linear foot erection."

And there are excerpts! Excerpts! Like the following:
"I want to do it all," he breathed. "I want to make love to you according to the ways of every sexually reproducing species in all the Communicating Worlds. Every one. From frogs to Great Djinn. After that, we'll work up to thrusting Tantric sex."
"Oh, Stars," she gasped.
"And I take that as informed consent."

Wait -- you want to have sex like yeast do? And, uh, flowers? You want to ejaculate in the water and have her swim through it, like a fish? Or, you want her to bite off your head while you copulate, like some insects? What?

I just like the confirmation that there is, in fact, worse erotic writing than you find on ff.net. And this author doesn't even have the excuse of being 13.

ETA: God, this site just keeps getting better and better. Check this out. Do one of the puzzles. Seriously.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I remember looking at FORCED MATE and reading an excerpt online when it first came out because hey, what's not to love about intergalactic royal chess sex slaves, but I hadn't realized the full extent of the problems with the execution... And I have mixed feelings about LoveSpell/Dorchester because their willingness to publish books like this one means that sometimes they end up with things that other houses won't publish (because they need too much editing or are just pushing the envelope and breaking the usual romance genre rules in some way) which turn out to be really interesting, although the downside is you often end up with stuff like this series.

I don't know anything else by the publisher, so I can't tell if this is typical. There's definitely a place for small publishers in niche markets, but I don't understand why something like this ever needs to see the light of day. (Though I sort of want a copy now... You think I should write the author and compliment her on her witty satire of the romance genre?)

I actually looked up the numbers for FORCED MATE and it sold a whole lot better than I would have expected. Guess there's a market for intergalactic royal chess sex slaves after all.

Also -- hey! You still exist!

LoveSpell is kind of like... I want to stay the last stop in print publishing before you go to small press/POD/Ellora's Cave, but I feel like that sounds negative in a way I don't entirely intend--and these books do sell! I mean, I would actually pay to read a GOOD book about intergalactic royal chess sex slaves (and why hasn't that been a flashfic challenge yet?) but that could just be me.

And I know I have been a major flake for the past two months, but I am around and boss-less until after Labor Day so we should finally have lunch!

(no subject)

"Survival isn't just a matter of making out"

Re: "Survival isn't just a matter of making out"

Re: "Survival isn't just a matter of making out"