Getting on GoodReads

I've been a member of GoodReads for a couple of years now, but I haven't been really active there. I decided that I wanted to be MORE active so I created a discussion group. I already have a few members, but I wanted all of YOU to know about the group too. So please, if you're on GoodReads stop by to join my group.

Francesca Hawley - Romance with Dangerous Curves
8 members This group was created to discuss the erotic romance written by Francesca Hawley, author of Roman...

Books we've read

Leader of the Pack
by Francesca Hawley

Alpha vs. Alpha
by Francesca Hawley

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Reading as a Writer - A Christmas Carol

Okay, I just had the weirdest experience. I LOVE the Charles Dicken's tale, A Christmas Carol.

To elucidate.... I'm one of those really geeky people who can do comparative analysis about the movie versions based on who starred as Scrooge. There's the Reginald Owen version (1938), the Albert Finney musical version (Scrooge -1970), the definitive Alastair Sims version (1951), etc.

Every so often I return to the book to READ it. This time, I received a visitation from the Ghost of Critique Writers. The ghost who is normally invisible except when you pick up an old favorite to read and he whispers in your ear about how someone could have written something better. Now this is Charles Dickens I'm reading. Right? Widely famed in song and story.

So I curl up to enjoy a good book but as I'm reading through chapter one, I think, "Damn Chuck, what voice is this?" I think it was third person omniscient, but I'm not completely sure. Took me right out of the story. Well, crap.

I push past the Ghost (who is giggling by the way) and keep reading. Well, Dickens digresses maundering about in Scrooge's mind. Okay, keep going. Then I get to a couple of beautifully written paragraphs about the London fog. Though they help to set the tone, these paragraphs in no way advance the story. What are they doing there? Dickens wrote for Londoners. They already knew what the fog was like....

I stopped reading. The Ghost was laughing maniacally by now. I am cursed. Doomed to forever read Dickens like a modern writer. Sigh. I guess I'll just stick to the movies from now on...

Merry Christmas, gov'nor. Merry Christmas!

Why don’t men read romances?

In the deep dark corners of the night I ponder weird things. This is one of them. Why don’t men read romances? It isn’t that they don’t like happy endings. After all, every mystery, thriller, adventure, etc has a happy ending appropriate to its genre, and genre fiction by its very nature is formulaic.

The hero faces down evil, has many adventures (sometimes boffing a hot chick in the process), and triumphs over all. He nails the bad guy and status quo is returned. Happy ending….
So it isn’t that. Maybe if men KNEW that many modern romances don’t end with just a kiss, we could convince them to give romance a shot. I mean, I write some explicit stuff and I know many other authors who do too. Hmmmm.

If men just realized that picking up AND READING every discarded romance their wife, girlfriend or significant other read would reveal the incomprehensible to their minds - Women - they might give it a go. What do you think? Men find us mysterious and hard to fathom, but we aren’t any deeper than they are, not really.

GUYS! Romances are women’s sexual fantasies. Get a clue here. If you read what she’s reading, you’d know what turns her on.

Okay, yeah, I don’t want to REALLY get bitten by a vampire, but that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t like playing vampire and the reluctant virgin sometimes.

Actually, more often than just sometimes. ;-)