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The high-concept/tropetastic hook: After her boyfriend-since-college unceremoniously dumps her, thirty-six year old biracial (or "dual heritage") Nice Girl Laurie Watkinson tries to make him jealous by dating the playboy at the Manchester (England) law firm where all three work.
The far more nuanced details:
I'm not usually all that drawn by high-concept romances, but I found If I Never Met You a real pleasure. McFarlane doesn't just play the trope for easy laughs; she digs deep into the feelings of Laurie and her boyfriend/ex Dan, and shows how a good relationship can gradually slip away without you even recognizing it (and how the relationship you thought was so great really had its downsides, downsides that because you were in the midst of it, you had trouble even seeing). She also shows, rather than just tells, why white playboy Jamie feels the way he does about romantic attachments (Chapter 13, where Jamie talks about why "I'm kind of a communist when it comes to relationships" is especially amusing), and why he urges Laurie to buy into his plan for them to fake date (the law firm wants him to "show my conventional settledness" before they give him a promotion).
What was most striking to me, though, was Laurie's gradual understanding of the gendered dynamics at work at her law firm, dynamics that shape both how she and Jamie are perceived by their co-workers. Jamie, a self-confident overachiever, refuses to conform to what his male colleagues want of him, and so he is turned into the office villain and ostracized ("Laurie saw how the trick was worked: the alleged villainy was entirely subjective, a matter of taste not substance: waltzing and swaggering. She increasingly suspected Jamie's offense was his refusal to play the popularity game"). But Laurie is valued by her male colleagues more for who she is dating than for the quality of her own work, even by the men who insist they are her friends, are looking out for her interests in warning her away from Jamie. As Laurie recognizes, "she had always been aware Salter & Rowson was a toxically sexist environment." But "she had been protected" as long as she was dating Dan. Now, though, "as a single woman, she was fair game for the rough-and-tumble of such politics. She was—apparently—daring to have carnal relations with a male the testosterone club didn't like, and that had to be punished."
Laurie also gradually realizes that Jamie's reputation as a heartless playboy is who he is ("You're an actual womanizer, snaring the unwary by doing a comic parody of a womanizer"), but it is only one side of a far more complicated, and more interesting, person than she, or anyone else at the law firm, ever thought.
McFarlane is a strong writer on all fronts: character, plot, theme, and voice. I especially enjoyed the cast of interesting secondary characters (especially both characters' parents, and Laurie's friend Nadia, an odd duck but a damned articulate feminist), and McFarlane's way with words.
A few favorite lines:
"Her mother and father were opposite poles, Laurie realized; her dad said the right things and didn't mean them, and her mum might feel them, but she never said so."
"No one is going to think Hermione Granger here is having it off, big style, with Draco Malfoy"
"in the very unlikely event she found herself in love with anyone again, she'd assert herself. She'd say what she wanted, not endlessly accommodate his needs. If that made her a bitch at any point, so be it. There were no rewards for being a walkover."
"I'm sick of this perception of me as the greatest man slag of the northwest," he said.
"Then be less man slag. Bee the unslaggy man you want to see in the world."
McFarlane is a new-to-me author (perhaps I haven't heard of her because she's a Brit, and I'm in the States?), but I'll definitely be checking out her other books.
If I Never Met You
Willam Morrow/HarperCollins, 2020
Posted by Jackie C. Horne at 9:00 AM 5 comments: Links to this post
Pride and Prejudice 3 Ways: Soniah Kamal's UNMARRIAGEABLE, Uzma Jalaluddin's AYESHA AT LAST, and Sonali Dev's PRIDE, PREJUDICE, AND OTHER FLAVORS
In A Natural History of the Romance Novel, literary critic Pamela Regis describes Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice as "probably the best-known canonical romance novel" (27-28). It is certainly a touchstone work in the English-language romance genre. Which makes it fascinating to read retellings of Elizabeth and Darcy's rocky road to romance written by authors from cultures which were once colonized by the English. How do South Asian writers reimagine this quintessentially English story?
Soniah Kamal chooses broad comedy and culturally specific feminist critique in Unmarriageable, a modern-day P&P retelling set in current-day Pakistan. Plotwise, Kamal's is the closest of the three books discussed here to Austen's original story, with both characters and events closely mirroring those of P&P. Thirty-year-old Alysba Binat, the second of five daughters of a formerly wealthy landowner, teaches English at a girl's secondary school in the fictional Dilipabad to support her family, as does her elder sister Jena. Alys struggles not only to instill in her students a love of English literature, but also to show them an alternative to the "Tao of good girls in Pakistan," which is to marry early, start a family without delay, and have grandchildren before you know it" (6). But many of her students are far more interested in when Alys will be married herself than in following her example of pursuing a college education and holding out for a spouse who "believed in sharing the housework, kids, and meal preparations without thinking he was doing a great and benevolent favor" (27).
Valentine Darsee, the nephew of the owner of the school where Alys teaches, hardly seems to embody such a man. At the most coveted event of the Dilipabad season, the Nadir-Fiede wedding, Darsee, who has recently returned from completing his MBA in America, belittles both Alys's looks and her intelligence to his friend "Bungles" Bingla ("Please, stop foisting stupid, average-looking women on me" [68]). Yet Bungles' pursuit of Jena keeps throwing them into each other's paths, and the two argue with intelligence and heat over literature, film, and how to create a Pakistani identity inclusive of an English-speaking tongue. Before he knows it, Valentine is proposing—quite badly, of course—to a less-than-receptive Alys. Valentine's interference in Jena and Bungles' romance, not to mention his role in disinheriting his cousin, Jeorgeullah Wickhaam, from inheriting a share in the British School Group owned by his family.
Yet there's far more to Valentine Darsee than Alys's first impression suggests. And as he reveals his own family's vulnerability, helps Alys' through the scandal of her youngest sister's elopement, and straightens out weak-willed Bungles' love life, Alys has to reconsider.
As a cultural outsider, I sometimes found it difficult to navigate the book's humor. Am I really meant to admire, rather than ridicule, a character named "Bungles"? Are the sisters with rhyming names (Sammy and Hammy Bingla; Beena and Deena Khala) meant to be funny, or are such sibling names common in Pakistani culture? But Alys's frequent critiques of Pakistani patriarchy, as well as her arguments with Darsee about how to square a love of a colonizer's culture with the damages that colonizers' actions have done to one's own, are as accessible as are Austen's own critiques of English patriarchy and her far less radical ones of English social class.
The Binat family in Kamal's novel is Muslim, as are the characters in Uzma Jalaluddin's Ayesha at Last. But while religion served as more of a cultural marker in Unmarriageable, it is central in Ayesha. And its more intriguing character is the male, rather than the female, half of P&P's romantic duo. Khalid Mirza may have been born in Canada, not in India as were his parents, but Khalid is as observant a Muslim as anyone back in Hyderabad. But not everyone in the new neighborhood to which Khalid and his mother have recently moved, a neighborhood in which "the brown and black faces reflected his own," are as committed to Muslim pieties as is Khalid. Which causes some friction when Khalid's mother begins the process of finding her only son a suitable wife. For his part, Khalid is happy to have his marriage arranged: "A partner carefully chosen for him, just as his parents had been chosen for each other and their parents before them, seemed like a tidy practice. He liked the idea of being part of an unbroken chain that honored tradition and ensured family peace and stability" (3). He's actually looking forward to having a wife, hoping that it will help alleviate the loneliness he's felt since his older sister Zareena was sent back to India to attempt to curb her rebellious streak. At least, until he begins planning a youth conference at the local mosque with Hafsa, the daughter of a wealthy local family, and finds himself increasingly attracted to her.
What Khalid doesn't know is that "Hafsa" is really Ayesha, his across-the-street neighbor, who has been pulled into the masquerade to help cover for her irresponsible younger cousin. A recent college graduate, Ayesha is spending the year as a substitute teacher at a local high school, hoping that her temp gig will turn into a permanent one. Her first meeting with Khalid is hardly auspicious—hearing him declare that he "stays away from the type of Muslim who frequents bars" when her friend tries to set her up with him leads Ayesha to grab the mic at the Open Mic Poetry Slam where they were supposed to meet:
You fail to see
The dignified persona
Of a woman wrapped in maturity.
The scarf on my head
Does not cover my brain.
I think, I speak, but still you refrain
From accepting my ideas, my type of dress,
You refuse to believe
That I am not oppressed.
So the question remains:
What do I see when I think of you?
I see another human being
Who doesn't have a clue.
Ayesha had written her poem with "veil-chasers" (men who think women in hijab are an exotic challenge) in mind, but is convinced that it applies equally well to the "judgmental, sexist jerk" that she sees in Khalid. But since Jalaluddin gives us a dual point of view narrative, readers know that Ayesha has far more in common with Khalid than she, or he, initially believes.
Jalaluddin's humor is not as broad as Kamal's, although her story contains many laugh-out-loud lines:
"When an unmarried man and woman are alone together, a third person is present: Satan."... Khalid found this reminder helpful, especially when paired with cold showers. There wasn't much more that a twenty-six-year-old virgin-by-choice could do really" (12).
And it contains equally thoughtful discussions of cultural identity, although identity here is not that of a post-colonial, but of an immigrant. To avoid racism and prejudice, should Khalid follow his colleague Amir's example? "This political shit is everywhere. The least you can do is stay under the radar. Adopt some camouflage. That's when I did when I moved here. I learned to blend in" (55). Or should he act the one way his mother has taught him to be a good Muslim? Or can Ayesha show him a third way?
I wasn't that fond of the way that the two most powerful women in the story (Khalid's mother, and his female boss) are painted with broad bad-woman strokes, nor with the way that each is humiliated at story's end, while the story's Wickham character is looked upon with sympathy, if not empathy. And the backstory of Khalid's sister's banishment, and her ultimate happiness with it, undermines the novel's questioning of Khalid's mother's single-minded adherence to her own brand of Muslim piety. Yet reading a Muslim romantic comedy is a rare enough treat that I temporarily put aside these misgivings to enjoy the myriad pleasures Jalaluddin's unusual romance offers.
My favorite of the three P&P retellings is Sonali Dev's Pride, Prejudice, and Other Flavors. Not because it is set in the United States, rather than in another country, or because it features the characters most assimilated to Western culture, but because Dev is the deftest at sketching character and crafting memorable prose. And because her retelling shifts the story in a surprising direction, placing an emotionally clueless female surgeon in the role of stiff, arrogant Mr. Darcy, and a sensual male chef in that of witty but judgmental Elizabeth Bennet.
Unlike Khalid and Ayesha, whose families maintain much of their Indian heritage after immigrating to another country, thirty-two year old Trisha Raje and her siblings have focused the majority of their energy on assimilation. Despite the fact that back in India, her father is His Royal Highness the twenty-third maharaja of the princely state of Sripore, HRH, as his children only half-jokingly call him, insists that fitting in in his new country is essential. And fit in his children have done, helped along by their family's immense economic privilege. Eldest brother Yash is a rising political star in California, elder sister Nisha a successful wife, and Trisha one of the country's top brain surgeons.
Her medical mentor has tried over the years to impart to Trisha the importance of a charming bedside manner, but "Trisha had never understood the big brouhaha over doctors' manners.... A soft touch hadn't gotten her where she was" (Kindle Loc 190, 224). Instead, Trisha appreciates another lesson: to keep your emotions out of your job, something that comes far easier to her than to most other doctors. Trisha's brusque, direct manner and general obliviousness to others' feelings disrupts traditional gender norms more than do her surgical skills. That Trisha inadvertently insults the caterer hired to cook for one of her brother's political events is hardly surprising for a woman whom "everyone [knows has] absolutely no emotional intelligence" (2023).
What is surprising is that said caterer, British born Anglo-African-Indian Darcy James Caine, turns out to be the brother of Emma, one of Trisha's new patients. Every other surgeon has given up Emma's case as hopeless, but Trisha, using a newly developed surgical technique, knows that she can excise the brain tumor pressing on Emma's optic nerve. The only downside: Emma will lose her sight. And as Emma is a visual artist (her "Penile Dysfunction" series one of the more popular of the works she's created), she's refusing to let Trisha operate. And judgmental Trisha is blaming DJ for not convincing his sister otherwise, even as she finds herself growing more and more attracted to his cooking—and to him. (Favorite line: "What was wrong with her? It was like having another person inside her. A person she had no control over. This having-feelings-for-someone business was like being infected by a tapeworm" [3813])
Both DJ and Trisha have rich backstories that help explain their current prejudices and points of pride (Dev's reimagining of Wickham, and the effects of Wickham's betrayal on Trisha, are particularly thought-provoking). And Dev constructs differences in class, privilege, and racial appearance that make her protagonists' constant clashes understandable and sympathetic to the reader, if not, at first, to one another. What makes those clashes so compelling is that neither Trisha nor DJ is completely wrong—or completely right. Having pride in her work isn't Trisha's problem; thinking others' work is not as important as hers is. And while indulging in prejudice in a world where people are judged and misjudged based on the color of their skin is clearly wrong, learning to discern between people who will do whatever it takes to help others and those who manipulate you into thinking they care when they're only out for themselves is a vital skill.
In her concluding "About the Book," Dev notes "The fact that I can relate so viscerally to Austen's heroines is bizarre, even ironic, given that her heroines lived in a time when her country had enslaved mine while proliferating the theme of 'East is East and West is West and never the twain shall meet.' But then that's the genius of Austen, isn't it?" (5975). As it is the genius of three writers, who all take Austen's characters and themes and use them to comment upon postcolonial, immigrant, and racial identities to such pointed, insightful, and above all, entertaining, effect.
Posted by Jackie C. Horne at 11:09 AM 7 comments: Links to this post
Labels: book review, immigrant, immigration, multicultural, postcolonial, Pride and Prejudice, retellings
Learning to Grieve: Linda Holmes' EVVIE DRAKE STARTS OVER
How many times have you looked at a happily married couple and thought, "wow, how perfect are those two for one another?"
And how many times has that image of perfection been at all close to the truth?
To everyone in her small (very white) Maine hometown, Evvie Drake seems to be living a perfect fairy tale. She and her high school sweetheart, Tim, attended college together, maintained a long-distance relationship during his medical residency, then married and moved back to Calcasset, even though they could have run off to the big city as so many other young Down Easters had done. Tim was "effortlessly charming" to everyone he met, and served his small community with pride and care, and the house he bought for his wife was far more luxurious than the small cottage in which she grew up. Even Evvie's hardworking lobsterman father thinks "my Eveleth is so lucky, that Tim wants to be her husband" (Kindle Loc 1152). For ordinary Evvie to have caught good doctor Tim seems luckier than hauling in the season's largest catch of lobsters.
Which is why when Tim dies in a car crash, everyone in town understands Evvie's debilitating grief.
Everyone, that is, except Evie.
Because nobody besides Evvie knows that when she got the call from the hospital a year earlier, telling her that her husband had been in an accident, she'd been just about to leave: leave Calcasset, leave her marriage, and above all, leave her too perfect to be real husband. The third person narrator doesn't tell the reader why Evvie was poised for flight; everyone else in town, including Evvie's own family, thinks Tim was the perfect doctor, the perfect husband, the perfect small town guy. This disconnect between her own far less rosy memories of her marriage and those of everyone else around her, and her need to keep her aborted flight from town a secret so she won't be accused of heartlessness toward the dead and departed Tim, has Evvie just as stuck—in Calcasset, in the house that she hates—as if she had really been grieving for a beloved spouse. As the narrator explains at the start of the story,
It had been almost a year since Tim died, and she still couldn't do anything at all sometimes, because she was so consumed by not missing him. She could fill up whole rooms with how it felt to be the only person who knew that she barely loved him when she'd listened to him snoring lightly on the last night he was alive. Monster, monster, she thought. Monster, monster. (Kindle Loc 137)
Her best friend, Andy, worried that Evvie is spending too much time by herself ("You know...it's not good to be alone too much. It'll make you weird" [232]) persuades her to rent out the small apartment attached to her house to his old college buddy, Dean, who wants to get away for a few months from his life of notoriety in New York City. A former World Series-winning pitcher for the Yankees, Dean's case of the "yips" (an inexplicable loss of fine motor skills in a mature athlete; in baseball, the ability to accurately throw the ball) has become so disastrously embarrassing that he's been voted "First Athlete We'd Throw into an Active Volcano" by the fans on a popular sports website. Tired of the taunts and interviews and endless analysis, Dean decides to officially retire, and needs a quiet place where he can take it easy for a while while he figures out what to do with the rest of his life. Since Andy presumes that Evvie is doing the same, he guesses that they'll have a lot in common.
At first, Evvie is reluctant, but she changes her mind when it turns out that Dean is as wary of talking about baseball as Evvie is about talking of her widowhood:
"I do think we should have a deal." She looked at him expectantly. "You don't ask me aboput baseball," he said, "and I don't ask you about your husband."
She blinked. "I didn't ask you about baseball."
"I know. I didn't ask you about your husband."
"But you want to have an official arrangement."
He rubbed his eyes. "I don't know how much you know about it, Evvie, but I have had a shitty year. A shitty couple of years. And I have talked about it a lot. And I think maybe you're in the same position. If you're okay with this, you'd be doing me a favor, and you'd be doing me an even bigger favor if it can just be normal. I'll say hi, and you can say hi, and we won't do, you know, the whole thing with the mysterious sad lady and the exiled... fuckup." (454)
After Dean moves in, he and Evvie keep things pleasant, chatting amiably about books and television and small towns versus big cities, light, funny conversations that steer well clear of baseball and grief. But Evvie watches as Dean as he throws pine cones in the pitch-dark of the Maine evenings, and wonders if he has truly given up his dream of throwing again in the majors. And Dean listens when Evie "punch[es] a little hole in the rowboat in which they'd decided to float" by telling him about the memorial service she's attended for her husband, and perceptively asks why she doesn't include herself in the list of people for whom the "memorial thing" was great (745). And hears the confession that tumbles out of Evvie's mouth:
"I felt bad," she said, "because they all loved him so much, and I didn't. I mean, I loved him originally, a lot, but I didn't when he died. He wasn't nice to me. He didn't hit me or anything, but he was sometimes pretty nasty. And then he died, and now when I'm around people who miss him, I don't know what to do. Sometimes I can't sleep because I don't miss him so much, which sounds crazy. But...that. (755)
After a few more rounds of punching holes in the rowboat of their non-discussion agreement, Dean proposes that they call the agreement off, and choose to be friends instead. And after that, attraction begins to leak through the gaping rowboat hole. But when Evvie's penchant for making everybody happy all the time runs smack into Dean's tiny but still not entirely extinguished desire to pitch again, will nurturing hopes once set aside lead to a new start? Or only to a dead end?
Evvie's struggles are all behind the scenes, hidden from her family and fellow townspeople, and often even from herself. Dean's, in contrast, are everything public, appallingly visible to millions who shiver with the horrified glee of schadenfreude at the once elite athlete who now throws even worse than they do. But both are struggling with how to grieve: for a dead husband Evvie no longer loves; for a career Dean still does; and most importantly, for the selves each worked so hard to construct in each of those roles: cheerful, uncomplaining wife; dominating never-fail star pitcher. Even if those constructions did and continue to do each of them more harm than good.
With its slowly-developing romance, and its focus on the many ways that both Evvie and Dean need to learn to "start over," Holmes' story is closer to women's fiction than it is to full-blown romance. And its storylines do not all end in the easy triumph common to genre romance. But with its sensitively-constructed characters, amusing and clever dialogue, and all too believable depiction of one woman's gradual understanding and acceptance of how she was once gaslighted and emotionally abused, Evvie Drake Starts Over might just be the most quietly charming work of feminist romantic fiction I've read this year.
Breaking the Yips cycle: Peak Performance Sports
Linda Holmes
Evvie Drake Starts Over
Ballantine Books, 2019
Labels: baseball, book review, contemporary romance, domestic abuse, emotional abuse, grief
Romancing Outrage: Aya de Léon's SIDE CHICK NATION
Side chick, n:
The other woman; also known as the mistress; a female that is neither a male's wife or girlfriend who has relations with the male while he is in another relationship (Urban Dictionary)
(African American Vernacular, slang) A mistress; a woman one dates in addition to one's girlfriend or wife, usually in secret (Wiktionary)
Dulce García knows exactly what it means to be a side chick. Wooed by a far older man when she was only fourteen, Dulce thought she'd won the role of princess in a Disney movie, a girl destined to live happily after with a man who promised to take care of her. Instead, her prince turned out to be a pimp, asking her to sleep with others as a favor, and then as an expectation, and finally, not asking at all. Dulce's eighteen before a group of activist former and current sex workers helps her flee from the violent man (see previous books in the Justice Hustlers series).
But the patterns Dulce learned during her years with her pimp are hard to escape. Her next long-term boyfriend hooks her with the line "Would you do me the honor of letting me pay your bills?" This boyfriend doesn't ask her to sleep with anyone else, but before long he stops taking her out and lavishing money on her, even interrupting their time together to read and answer texts from some other woman. Dulce knows she's about to be demoted from side chick to nonentity, and steals her boyfriend's drug dealing stash so she can flee to the Dominican Republic where she has family.
But small-town life in the DR is too slow for Dulce, and she's soon picking up wealthy men in hotels on different Caribbean islands, staying with her sugar-daddies for days or weeks at a time, entertaining them while their wives and girlfriends wait for them back in the States. Even while on date with Xavier, a Puerto Rican reporter now living in the U. S., a man who actually seems to like her for herself, Dulce instinctively answers the call from a past sugar daddy looking to hook up again. And lies to Xavier about the man who's picking her up in the middle of their dinner.
But then Hurricane Irma slows the flow of sugar daddies visiting the Caribbean to a trickle. And Dulce finds herself sleeping in a storage room in San Juan, waiting for the next hurricane to hit.
Hurricane María...
If you are looking for a narrative of personal redemption, a story in which an unworthy heroine is punished and made humble by the elements and by the suffering of herself and others, and is thus made worthy of love and respect, Side Chick Nation is not the book for you. All the anger in de León's narrative is for those take advantage of vulnerable people like Dulce: abusive husbands, boyfriends, and pimps; privileged reporters complaining about the tough conditions they have to live with in order to report on the conditions in Puerto Rico post-hurricane; relief workers and rescuers more eager to dish out verbal abuse than material aid; and above all, the United States, the colonizer that continues to bleed its territory dry. Though she writes with tension and suspense of Dulce's physical trials during and after María hits the island, de León is far more interested in the ways that the natural disaster, and the United States' lackluster response to it, demonstrates a longer term pattern, a pattern illuminated by her book's title. Puerto Rico, like Dulce herself, is no more than a side chick to the powerful, alluring, but ultimately exploitative country that "won" her more than a hundred years ago.
But is every man, and every American, on the market for a side chick? In the aftermath of the hurricane, Xavier is back in Puerto Rico, worried about Dulce and hard in pursuit of the real stories behind the devastating natural disaster. Savvy Dulce, knowing that Xavier might just be her ticket out of the devastated country, finds her way to the hotel where he and the other American reporters are being housed. But as Xavier invites her to work with him covering the story, Dulce's joy in writing, a joy she had almost forgotten after being lured into a life of prostitution, reemerges. But will her past as a sex worker stand in the way of her new dreams? And can she trust any man, even one as seemingly kind as Xavier, is not ultimately out to exploit her?
In her Author's Note, de León explains that she was developing a different storyline for this fourth book in her Justice Hustlers series when María hit Puerto Rico. Writing within the confines of the genre conventions of the series makes for an uneven narrative; heists in which the previous members of the Hustlers ladies, but not Dulce, participate, are important to "the larger story [de Léon is] hoping to tell about colonization, climate change, and the need for women of color to be leaders in transforming both," but don't feel integral to Dulce's personal or romantic arcs (Kindle Loc 4976). Nor do the side stories of New Yorker Marisol, the protagonist of The Boss, and her cousins back on the island. But as De León argues in the conclusion to her Author's Note, "heist fiction has proven a fitting genre for this story: as these characters have had to battle law and custom to find small pockets of justice and reparation, similarly, the extended family of Puerto Rico will have to keep battling laws, customs, history, and entrenched power structures to get the justice and the reparations that the island deserves" (4976). No woman—and no territory—deserves to be anyone's side chick.
"Somewhere there's a guy..." Urban Dictionary
"Ten thousand miles...": "American Propaganda: Controlling Public Opinion in Puerto Rico."
Aya de León
Side Chick Nation
A Justice Hustlers novel
Kensington/Dafina, 2019
Labels: book review, colonialism, contemporary romance, heist romance, Puerto Rico, social justice, suspense
Two approaches to romancing the curvy girl: Kilby Blades' THE SECRET INGREDIENT and Sierra Simone's MISADVENTURES OF A CURVY GIRL
While attending the conference of the New England Chapter of RWA last month, I overheard a writer complaining about the rise of "curvy girl" romances. Oh, this writer had no problem with romances that feature girls whose bodies do not fit the rail thin catwalk model profile; rather, she was sick of such romances that spent pages and pages focusing on the female protagonist's issues, problems, and phobias about her body size. "There are lots of women out there who are curvy and proud of it; why can't we see more of them in romance?"
I was thinking about this comment while I read two recent novels self-labeled "curvy girl" romances: Sierra Simone's Misadventures of a Curvy Girl and Kilby Blades' The Secret Ingredient (with the marketing-savvy subtitle A Curvy Girl Small Town Culinary Romance). Both novels feature heterosexual women who do not fit into the size 4-6 clothing made for a typical runway model. One book acknowledges that and then moves on without further comment; the other puts its protagonist's struggles to embrace body positivity in the face of a past history of fat policing and shaming front and center.
These two romances may take the exact opposite approach to depicting the curvy girl, but each does so for distinctly feminist reasons.
In Kilby Blades' The Secret Ingredient, celebrity chef Marcella Dawes has fled the hustle and bustle of Los Angeles for the east coast, renting a cottage on the North Carolina shore to work on her latest cookbook between seasons of taping her television show, "Cooking with Marcella." Her neighbor Max Picarelli is even more peripatetic; as a plastic surgeon, he travels the world on the dime of a nonprofit, doing reconstructive surgery for children with cosmetic birth defects. But in his downtime, Max, who has Italian roots just like his new neighbor, loves to cook, and is a secret fan of everything Marcella, whom he thinks of as "chef extraordinaire and goddess of the kitchen" (Kindle Loc 80). As Max describes her, "Marcella was everything a woman should be: all confidence and curves, and a true classic beauty to boot. He had often admired her generous proportions and everything that perfected them—those vibrant eyes, that gentle voice, and her mane of thick, dark hair" (73).
Marcella is a "curvy girl" only if one defines "curvy" as the norm, a point Blades is clear to make early in the story. As Cella thinks when comparing Max to the typical LA man, "Half the men Cella had dated had skin that was softer than hers. They were usually prettier and skinnier, too. At a size twelve, Cella was an average American women. LA was running as short on those was it was on strapping American men" (206). Advertising and media might make women believe that their curves are abnormal, too much, but Cella knows perfectly well that her size is nothing out of the ordinary. (In fact, Cella may be below the current U.S. norm: see this 2016 study).
Cella has no issues with her weight, with her body image, or with feeling desire for, or feeling desirable to, another person. The conflicts her stem from job satisfaction, or dissatisfaction, for both Cella and Max, not from any issues Cella has with her size or weight. Despite the novel's subtitle, the slow-build romance that builds between Max and Cella has nothing to do with Cella's "curviness." The subtitle is a bait-and-switch in the most positive sense, serving up a story of a woman with absolutely no problem with her size to readers using the search term "curvy girl" to find a romance.
Unlike Blades' Cella, Sierra Simone's Ireland Mills, who is white, has struggled with how to think, and feel, about her body for most of her life. Ireland isn't as skinny as a model; nor is she an "average" size twelve. Ireland's 5' 2", and wears a size 18 (Kindle Loc 102). But at the start of Misadventures of a Curvy Girl, Ireland has determined to break free from the negative thoughts about weight that her sister and her ex-boyfriend have spent years instilling in her (A girl of your size really should have shorter hair. Don't you think that's more of a "goal" outfit? But those dance classes aren't designed for people to lose weight... [65]). Fat-shaming framed as benevolence, Ireland has finally realized, is still fat shaming. And Ireland is so over it: "I was over the diets that didn't work. I was over the grueling gym schedule that left no time for fun. I was over hiding behind my friends whenever we took pictures. I was over shopping for print tunics at Blouse Barn" (Loc 81). Ireland's going to dress the way she wants, have fun the way she wants, and eat the way she wants, other people's judgments be damned. And if that means not having a boyfriend, then so be it: "I'd rather be alone than be with someone who will only love me if I'm skinny" (94).
Simone rewards her protagonist for taking this major step towards body positivity with not just one, but two handsome men who find her curves just to their liking. At a photography shoot on a Kansas farm (Ireland prefers to be behind, rather than in front of, the camera), Ireland meets hunky farmer Caleb, who is immediately smitten: "She better get used to being pampered and taken care of, because I want to make it my life's work. And that's after only an hour together. Christ, I have it bad" (361). But Caleb is a package deal with best friend, bar owner Ben; the two, who have been besties since kindergarten, have discovered they're happiest when they love (and make love with) the same woman, together. Ireland hasn't ever really considered polyamory, but with two such kind, gorgeous, and sexy men, and her own awakened curiosity, she's quickly on board with the kink.
Erotic bliss, however, doesn't preclude emotional difficulties. Especially when Ireland discovers that her commitment to body positivity can't always withstand self-doubts and the voices of shame from her past. It takes some arguing, a break-up or two, and some honest talk by an acquaintance who doesn't buy into the "accept your body and everything will be OK" hype for Ireland to understand that body positivity isn't just about how you feel, but about what you do:
Body positivity doesn't mean you flip a switch and walk around feeling great for the rest of your life. It's not even really about feelings at all. Body positivity is about what you do. It's about daring to live your life as you are—not fifty pounds from now, not six dress sizes from now. And there are going to be days when ever bad feeling comes back for you again. When you feel all the messy, hopeless things you thought you were past feeling. Those are the days you do it anyway" (2456)
Acknowledge a character's "curviness" and move on; highlight a character's curviness and focus on her challenges and triumphs as she works to accept and enjoy her body—both methods work to convey the feminist message that while fat oppression is real, people who understand its methods can challenge the negative biases it demands far too many of us embrace.
Average size comparisons: Into the Wild
Stop negative talk: Safecity
Kilby Blades
Luxe Publishing, 2019
Sierra Simone
Misadventures of a Curvy Girl
Waterhouse Press, 2019
A thought-provoking excerpt from Misadventures of a Curvy Girl:
A couple of years ago, I was watching a movie with a handful of girlfriends as we traded gossip and passed around popcorn and bottles of wine. And we got to the part of the movie where the hero makes his grand gesture, chasing after the heroine and declaring his love for her. Declaring that sh was his.
The room gave a collective groan at this, popcorn flying at the screen, and someone pronounced how utterly backward and chauvinistic is was and how she'd never be caught dead with a man who looked at her and said mine. A man who looked at her like she was a prize in the machine simply waiting to be claimed. I stayed silent. Because I wasn't going to argue that on a structural level men should act proprietary with women, and I never would. But on a personal level, well...
It was hard to look at my friend, who was slender and sleek and would no doubt have men wanting her everywhere she went and not think easy for you to say. Her body was the kind of body that people wanted to claim, wanted to stake some kind of sexual ownership of, and mine was not—never had been, and as years of pointless diet torture had taught me, never would be.
So it was hard not to wish I had the luxury of scoffing at male desire. It was hard to watch those movies and know that, according to them, people like me didn't have heroes chasing after them. People like me are the best friends, the comic relief, maybe even the villain.
And in real life? In real life, the kind of male attention I received was dangerous and demeaning. Aggressive frat boys who told me I should feel "lucky" to have them fuck me and then got belligerent and nasty when I refused them. Mean men at bars who grabbed and groped and assumed I'd be grateful for the assault since clearly nobody else would ever want to touch my body.
Girls like me, we didn't get chased, we didn't get claimed, we didn't get the happily ever after. Not in movies. Not in real life.
And was it such a crime to want those things? (1624)
Labels: book review, contemporary romance, curvy girl, erotic romance, fat acceptance, fat feminism
Imagining the Joys of a Progressive Political Future: Casey McQuiston's RED, WHITE, & ROYAL BLUE
Several of the workshops featured at this past weekend's "Let Your Imagination Take Flight" conference, hosted by my home chapter of Romance Writers of America, focused on "getting unstuck" and fighting writers' block. And I shared many conversations with fellow writers talking about the feeling that something is missing when we sit down to write these days, suggesting that this is an issue for many American romance authors at this particular point in history. Several colleagues pointed not to the prevalence of unpleasant weather currently plaguing America's northeast, but instead to the country's current political situation as the most likely reason why they are experiencing stress, lack of inspiration, and just plain burnout at the thought of writing about happily ever afters. It can be hard to imagine a more progressive future when you feel mired in an ever-expanding swamp of lies, constantly having to justify and defend the values, and the people, you hold dear.
Which was why it was such a joy to sit down post-conference and read Casey McQuiston's joyful but politically pointed romance comedy debut, Red, White, & Royal Blue. McQuiston originally came up with the hook-y premise for this book—the son of the American president falls for the youngest of England's royal princes—in early 2016, before the surprise of that fall's Presidential election. After said election, McQuiston herself felt blocked: "Suddenly what was supposed to be a tongue-in-cheek parallel universe needed to be escapist, trauma-soothing, alternate-but-realistic reality. Not a perfect world—one still believably fucked up, just a little better, a little more optimistic. I wasn't sure I was up to the task" (Acknowledgements).
I for one am amazingly grateful that McQuiston managed not to give up on this story. For rather than reading as a "tongue-in-cheek parallel universe," the love story of presidential son Alex Claremont-Diaz and Prince Henry of Wales served for me as a glorious vision of a more hopeful, progressive, and utterly achievable political future.
What does said future look like? It looks like a country willing to elect not only a female President, but a female amicably divorced from her first husband and happily married to her second. It looks like a country with two biracial first children (Mexican-American senator father, white President mother), who, with the "vaguely bisexual" granddaughter of the Vice President, serve as the country's most talked-about, and admired, twenty-somethings. It looks like a world in which the younger generation, comfortable both working and socializing in a multiracial, international, global world, serves as a model for their more cautious elders.
It also happens to look a lot like a classic enemies-to-lovers romance.
Staffers new to the White House are informed early on of three important things about FSOTUS Alex Claremont-Diaz: he lives at the White House, even though he's still in college (Georgetown is so close!); he often calls for coffee in the middle of the night while working on his college essays or his mother's reelection strategy; and he has a long-standing grudge against the youngest of Britain's royal princes.
A few years older than Alex, Prince Henry has always struck Alex as a dull stick-in-the-mud, undeserving of all the adulation and attention focused on him:
The tabloids—the world—decided to cast Alex as the American equivalent of Prince Henry from day one, since the White House Trio is the closest thing America has to royalty. It has never seemed fair. Alex's image is all charisma and genius and smirking wit, thoughtful interviews and the cover of GQ at eighteen; Henry's is placid smiles and gentle chivalry and generic charity appearances, a perfectly blank Prince Charming canvas. Henry's role, Alex thinks, is much easier to play.
Maybe it is technically a rivalry. Whatever. (Loc 149)
Which is why attending the wedding of Henry's older brother is filling Alex not with delight, but with snark. As he tells elder sister June, "You can't just call him my 'arch nemesis'... 'Arch nemesis' implies he's actually a rival to me on any level and not, you know, a stuck-up product of inbreeding who probably jerks off to photos of himself" (93). And so, to the surprise of no-one, Alex can't restrain himself from taunting his "arch nemesis" during the very proper wedding reception:
The most annoying thing of all is Alex knows Henry hates him too—he must, they're naturally mutual antagonists—but he refuses outright to act like it. Alex is intimately aware politics involves a lot of making nice with people you loathe, but he wishes that once, just once, Henry would act like an actual human and not some polished little wind-up toy sold in a palace gift shop. He's too perfect. Alex wants to poke it. (229)
Poking polite Henry, however, quickly escalates into "Cakegate" (you have to read it to appreciate it), an international breach of etiquette so dire that requires major diplomatic efforts (and major acting) to patch up. As his mother's aide sternly informs Alex,
"Both sides need to come out of this looking good, and the only way to do that is to make it look like your little slap-fight at the wedding was some homoerotic frat bro mishap, okay? So, you can hate the heir to the throne all you want, write mean poems about him in your diary, but the minute you see a camera, you act like the sun shines out of his dick, and you make it convincing" (311).
All Alex is convinced of is that a person who lists his hobbies as "polo" and "competitive yachting" has about as much personality as a cabbage. But with his mother facing a challenger criticizing her for her chilly relationship with her British counterpart, Alex gives in and heads to London for a whirlwind weekend visit with his "close personal friend" Prince Henry.
Alex prides himself on his ability to read others, and is convinced that he knows all he needs to about the stuffy, dull prince before he even gets off the plane. But during their tour through charity events, television interviews, and a false-alarm assassination attempt, "he keeps getting these little glimpses into things he never thought Henry was. A bit of a fighter, for one. Intelligent, interested in other people. It's honestly disconcerting" (623).
Even more disconcerting is the friendship the two develop via text message, and occasional in-person meetings, in the ensuing months. Because while Alex prides himself on his ability to read others, his ability to understand himself could use a bit more work. Especially when it comes to his own latent attraction to a not-quite-so-proper prince.
But can the son of the American president date a British prince in the middle of a re-election campaign? Especially if mom needs to win their home state of Texas in order to guarantee a repeat?
I've quoted so often from Red, White, & Royal Blue in the above review because so much of the pleasure in this rom com comes from McQuiston's distinctive, laugh-out-loud voice, told entirely from the point of view of its hyper intelligent but emotionally clueless main character. Though the story is told in the third person, it's also told in the present tense, which gives the narration both immediacy and a certain wry distance, both of which are perfectly suited to conveying Alex's character and charm. For example, after Alex sees a picture of Henry with a "mysterious blonde," the narrator tells us "Faintly, under it all, it occurs to him: This is all a very not-straight way to react to seeing your male frenemy kissing someone else in a magazine" (1655). Or the scene where Alex is trying to figure out whether he might not be as straight as he's always assumed by calling his former (male) best friend and asking, "This might sound weird. But, um. Back in high school, did we have, like, a thing? Did I miss that?" (5485).
No romance reader will want to miss McQuiston's glorious celebration of snark, sentiment, and the progressive political possibilities of a not quite straight royal romance.
And no writer could find a better cure for political-despair-induced writers' block than McQuiston's sparkling, effervescent romance.
British/US flag pin: Athletic awards
Royal wedding cake: Getty Images
Hate to Love trope sticker: RedBubble
Casey McQuiston
St. Martins, 2019
Labels: bisexuality, book review, contemporary romance, politics, royalty
Short Takes: Spring 2019 Historicals by RNFF favorites
After being in somewhat of a historical romance reading funk for the first few months of 2019, I was thrilled to see that several of my favorite historical romance writers had new books coming out in the spring. Here are my short recs for books by three RNFF favorites:
Courtney Milan's full-length historicals feature traditional male/female romance pairings. But her shorter works tends to star more unconventional couples. The duo in her latest, Mrs. Martin's Incomparable Adventure, might just win the award for most underrepresented characters in Victorian romance. Although they are both white, both of her lovers are female, as well as "seasoned"—one in her sixties, the other in her seventies. Though the eponymous Mrs. Martin suffers from a lack of spirits after the death of her best friend, she hasn't lost any of her outspoken manner ("My husband, God rot his soul, used to bring prostitutes home all the time. After he'd finished with them, I'd serve them tea and double whatever he was paying them.... It was hard work fucking my husband. Trust me, I should know. I certainly didn't want to do it" [Kindle Loc 225]). She's certainly not the meek, retiring gentlewoman recently sacked boarding house manager Miss Violetta Beauchamps was hoping for, a woman whom Violetta could somehow swindle into paying the far-overdue rent for her smarmy nephew. Violetta desperately needs that money in lieu of the pension her employer had promised her, but then chose not to pay her upon unfairly firing her after she'd worked for him for forty-seven years. In fact, Violetta is far closer to the meek mouse she had hoped Mrs. Martin would be than is the formidable Mrs. Martin herself.
But after Violetta shares the truth of her nephew's boorish behavior with his aunt, Bertrice Martin decides to set off on the adventure her doctor prescribed: not for a rest in Bath, but to London with Violetta, to help the unfortunate woman drive out the sponging "Terrible Nephew" from what she mistakenly assumes is Violetta's boarding house. Milan's trademark humor is in fine form here, as is her penchant for pushing her characters into a seemingly inescapable corners then inviting us to watch with unabashed glee as they use unconventional methods to escape the confines society wishes them to inhabit. Violetta's transformation, from traditionally "nice" woman who is happy to fade into the background to one who speaks out on her own behalf as well as Mrs. Martin's, is particularly delicious.
An Unconditional Freedom, the third entry in Alyssa Cole's American Civil War-set series The Loyal League, features a man as disillusioned as is Milan's Violetta, but far less happy to accept his fate with any meekness or humility. Before the war, Daniel Cumberland's greatest trauma was that the woman he loved (the heroine of book 1, An Extraordinary Union) did not love him back. But after the idealistic aspiring lawyer is kidnapped from his Massachusetts town and sold south into slavery, his happy, carefree nature is quickly beaten out of him. We meet Daniel after he is rescued from enslavement, unable to fit back into his old life, to "be strong and forget what happened," as his father recommends. Instead, he's working as a spy for the Loyal League, a spy who prefers to work alone. But when Janeta Sanchez, a new recruit, enters the league, the angry, disdainful Daniel is assigned to be her partner.
Janeta, the daughter of a Cuban planation owner and the black slave woman he later married, has grown up taking slavery for granted, even while recognizing that her golden brown skin makes others treat her not quite the same as they do her obviously Spanish half-sisters. Moving from Cuba to Florida changed little for her—until war broke out, and her father was arrested on suspicion of being a northern sympathizer. Her lover in the Rebel army promises that if she will spy on the Yanquis, he'll make certain her father is freed. And thus Janeta, the daughter of a slave owner, finds her way to the Loyal League, using her skill at hiding behind layers of pleasing behavior to ingratiate herself with all of its members. All, that is, but the wary Daniel.
Cole choice to decenter the whiteness that typically looms so large in northerner vs. southerner Civil War stories is not only a boon for readers of color looking for greater representation of their experiences in historical romance; it also allows white readers to step away their fears of being associated with the villain in the more typical white/black binary portrayal of slavery. Which may allow them to read without debilitating defensiveness about the blind spots that many whose heritage does not include a history of enslavement and racism often have towards those whose does, as well as the ways that good people are indoctrinated into accepting what we today often self-righteously believe we would never accept ourselves. Take this exchange between after Daniel and Janeta, after Daniel reveals the scars on his back:
Janeta thought of the time her family had gone into the city center in Santiago. Her mother had clapped her hand over Janeta's eyes when they'd walked by a man tied to a post with his bloody back exposed.
You don't need to see such things. You are a Sanchez. You don't have to endure such ugliness.
She couldn't look away now, though. Daniel has bared to her this proof of his ill treatment and all she could ask herself was, "Why?"
"That man tried to start an insurrection. They had to make an example of him."
That's what her father had told her later when she'd questioned him about what she had seen. He'd handed her a gift when she'd asked why insurrection was bad, a beautiful porcelain doll with creamy skin, rouged cheeks, and blue eyes, and she'd let the matter drop.
"What did you do?" she asked Daniel, and saw the muscles beneath the scars tense.
"You think I did something to bring this upon myself?" he asked, his voice taut, and Janeta's fear came to the surface then. Not that he would hurt her, but that she'd made yet another misstep.
"No! I—I meant, why did they do this to you?"
He shook his head and pulled his shirt back up over his shoulder, not turning to face her as he did up his buttons.
"I was born a Negro in a country where that is a crime, and I was ignorant enough not to know that I had already been convicted."(Kindle Loc 556)
Both Daniel and Janeta discover their own blind spots as they work together to track Jefferson Davis—and struggle to reconcile the plans of the Loyal League with their own secret goals.
After Elizabeth Kingston's call for "Reclaiming Historical Romance" in the December 2018 issue of RWA's Romance Writers' Report, I was interested to see how she herself would address the problem of white supremacy in her own medieval historical romance writing (you can get a copy of her article free via her online store). The third book in her Welsh Blades series, Desire Lines, features two white protagonists, one an aristocratic the other a servant. But neither protagonist is typical of their class, a major theme of the story. The book also includes a secondary character who is dark-skinned, and a brief subplot depicts a Jewish family persecuted by the English. Such characters, while they do not play major roles, go a long way towards disrupting the "white mythos" of the more traditional medieval historical romance.
Gryff and Nan first meet on the road to Lincoln, when the bandits who have been holding Gryff captive attack the group of travelers of which Nan is a part. It is the servant, Nan, though, not the nobleman Gryff who does the rescuing, letting fly with her deadly knives until all of the robbers are dead. Gryff, fearful for his life from more than just the bandits, doesn't tell his rescuer or any of her fellow travelers his true identity, and neither does the narrative, although brief flashbacks hint at his less than lowly upbringing. Nan, though a servant, has benefitted from the favor of several noblewomen, favor that has not only taught her how to wield a knife, but also to speak Welsh as well as a noblewoman would. During their long journey across England—Nan looking for a long-lost sister, Gryff for his best friend, after which both then travel to Wales—the two exist in a liminal space, outside of traditional societal norms and expectations. Which allows each to see beyond the surface of the other, and of course to fall in love with that person. But when their journey comes to an abrupt end, that liminal space ends, too, and each must decide whether their feelings for one another can survive in a world that expects something far different of a nobleman than it does of a servant. An old-fashioned historical in the best sense—not because it has an all-white cast, but because it glories in real angst, high stakes, and a bucketload of both physical and emotional longing, with personal feelings set against seemingly insurmountable demands of honor and duty.
Not to mention the falcons and hawks...
Labels: book review, diversity, historical romance, short takes, white supremacy
Jackie C. Horne
Writer, scholar, and rabid reader of romance.
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text:
// Copyright 2016 The Chromium Authors
// Use of this source code is governed by a BSD-style license that can be
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/**
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 * {@link android.graphics.Point} and {@link android.graphics.PointF} are both mutable, so this
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public final class ScaleEventParameter {
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


After weeks of trying, and failing, to master the coffee machine, I had turned to my colleague (who's coffee always looked barista quality), and asked for advice. Et voila! A definitely drinkable coffee!
I'm sure I'm not the only one that could have benefited from that advice either (loud screeching coming from the milk steamer will testify to that).
Throughout any organisation there's a plethora of untapped subject matter experts (and I'm not just talking about people who know how to make coffee). Everyone from the CEO, to managers, to team members, have valuable information that, if shared, many people would find helpful.
'If' being the operative word.
Up to 90% of the knowledge in an organisation is locked inside the heads of their employees, which leaves businesses in a pretty precarious position. What if someone leaves? Or what if they don't leave, but keep that knowledge to themselves, instead of helping colleagues to find better ways of doing things.
People love to feel valued and publicly recognised as an expert in their field. So why not ask your process guru, your product expert, your compliance queen (or king), to share their knowledge with others. Get them to jump online, create a quick 5min learning topic, then share it with the people who would benefit.
To get started, send out a quick survey (or just speak) to your employees, team leaders, department heads etc. to discover which topics need addressing. Then find out who your subject matter experts are on each area, and invite them to create some training.
To make it as engaging as possible, encourage them to add in some images, text and a quick guerilla-style video shot on their smartphone (95% people remember info they learn from a video). They can even curate useful YouTube links or news articles they've found helpful in explaining a particular topic, and include them in the learning topic.
By using a mobile learning platform, you can ensure that your people have access to the new training topics the minute they come out, anytime, anywhere, and can dip in to them for refreshers, as and when they need to.
Once you have a few people on board, and several bite-sized training topics out there, you'll be amazed at how quickly people put their hands up to share their own knowledge. After all, there's nothing more motivating than seeing your peer being publicly recognised for their expertise, to make you want to be recognised too.
Quality control is, of course, incredibly important. You can choose to have final edit (until you feel comfortable enough to take a step back) and make sure you're happy with the content before it gets shared out.
Before long you will have developed a culture of sharing best practice, that will see some (if not all) of the 90% of knowledge documented and passed on, which ultimately will strengthen the capability, confidence, and engagement levels, of your workforce.
Don't forget – if someone knows how to make a brilliant coffee, get them to share that knowledge out too – people love to learn new skills, and sometimes they don't have to be work related!


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Six Degrees Of Domhnall Gleeson – The Irish Star's Mega-Connections!
You've probably heard of the Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon – the notion that just about every actor on the planet has a link to the Footloose star. But we're beginning to think that the same applies to our very own super-connected screen star Domhnall Gleeson!
We've tested the hypothesis by journeying through a bunch of our favourite flicks, all tied together by the thread of the Dubliner's career…
Available to rent now on Virgin Movies, from €4.99
A suprising look into the creation of Winnie The Pooh, and the real-life family story that inspired the classic tale, this is an emotional and frequently dark film in which Gleeson excels as author A.A. Milne. The film plunges us into the lives of the Milnes – including his wife, as played by Margot Robbie, who also stars in…
The Australian's breakthrough arrived as the woman unfortunate enough to have married Jordan Belfort in Martin Scorsese's outrageous black comedy. The fast-paced, foul-mouthed romp saw leading man Leonardo DiCaprio flexing his comedy muscles – something he most certainly wasn't allowed to do in…
It might be tough viewing at times, but this startling film is one no self-respecting fan should go without seeing. A brutal and uncompromising story brought to life in truly stunning fashion, it's not just a bear that DiCaprio has for company in the wilderness; there's also the wonderful Tom Hardy, who takes to the skies in…
Now showing on Sky Cinema
Some viewers will be disappointed to know that Hardy spends most of his screen-time with his face almost entirely obscured by a mask – give us what we want, guys! – but he's just one of the stars of this wartime epic. Among those also part of Christopher Nolan's masterpiece is Barry Keoghan, turning heads recently in…
THE KILLING OF A SACRED DEER
Strange and unsettling, this psychological drama is an odd one – and the performance of Keoghan, who is perfectly unhinged as mysterious teenager Martin, is one you won't forget quickly. To make it a thoroughly Irish affair, he's joined in the film's central roles by Colin Farrell, who formed another Dublin one-two punch in…
Before Martin McDonagh was bothering award panels all over the globe with the superb Three Billboards (which is also on Virgin Movies right now!), he was demonstrating his ability to whip together tense drama and cracking dark comedy. Along with Farrell was fellow Dublin actor Brendan Gleeson, who just so happens to be the father of that man Domhnall Gleeson, star of…
We told you – he's everywhere! Not content with his ongoing global domination, Domhnall's also set on conquering a galaxy far, far away as General Hux, a leader of the First Order in a battle for supremacy with Kylo Ren. We're not exactly rooting for him – we're not going to switch to the dark side, after all – but we're still chuffed to see him tearing it up as part of the greatest series in cinema!
Guarantee your film fix by adding Sky Cinema to your Virgin TV package – click here to find out how!
6 Movies all linked together by Domhnall Gleeson

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


The world of Minecraft is, on its own, quite captivating and is enough to keep players hooked for hours upon hours but, after a while, it can get repetitive, and you can't help but turn to mods to make things more interesting. JurassiCraft is a mod that's been designed for the exact purpose of making Minecraft's world more intriguing and enjoyable by adding full-fledged dinosaurs into it. If you're a fan of the Jurassic Park franchise or simply want to add more exciting content into your Minecraft game world, then this mod is something that you'll certainly enjoy using.
As the name suggests, JurassiCraft has been based on the Jurassic Park universe, but it's worth keeping in mind that the content in this mod isn't limited to this particular franchise, so you'll probably see various other things as well. Onto the specifics, the mod will allow you to create actual dinosaurs, but it's important to remember that the actual process of creating dinosaurs is a rather complex one. In order to make a dinosaur, you'll first have to extract DNA from fossils, and then you'll be able to use this DNA to put together a baby dinosaur. The first time might be slightly difficult but once you've made your first dinosaur, making more will become significantly easier.
The JurassiCraft Mod isn't limited to just dinosaurs since it has a variety of other great features such as prehistoric plants that you can use to add a bit of extra visual flare to the world, vehicles through which you can get around quicker and even some fascinating dinosaur themed decorations that you can use to customize your world according to your preferences. Overall, JurassiCraft is a really solid mod that'll make your experience a lot more enjoyable and interesting by adding dinosaur themed content to the game.
How to install JurassiCraft Mod?
Download and install LLibrary for your Minecraft version.
How do u tame tehm?
What is the resource pack is used in the pictures?
i cant load the mod,it says "Jurassiccraft needs additonal mods for it to work" something like that.
Calm down. Just try a different version.
Hey when do you think you could add a small amount of new dinos like Mosasuarus, Pteranodon, Tylosaurus, Umoonasuarus, Spinosaurus, And Dimorphodon This is ALL I ask of you so it would be Abousultly amazing if you added these dinos.
Wait there are diffrent dinos in diffrent versions?
There is version 2.0 Pre-release for minecraft 1.8.8 or 1.8.9. This version contain 20 or 30 dinosaurs, and includes Pteranodon, Tylosaurus, Spinosaurus and Dimorphodon.
there are way more dinos in the video then in the mod! why?
You finally updated the mod! Yes! I've been waiting for so long!
and also could you add things like pachys, dimorphodons and pterosaurs and coelophysis . thatd be cool. SUPER COOL. also plz add the archaeopteryx shown in the pics.
Hi, Do you know if it's possible to use this mod with a Minecraft Server ? Because, currently on my Minecraft Server, I see all items,but I can't use them. Thanks for your reply.
When I break a fossil block with an iron pickaxe nothing drops. Then I went on in creative and placed several hundred fossil blocks and got a fortune 3 diamond pickaxe and I broke all of them in survival and nothing dropped, not once. Please help.


Read this. It's ultimately going to be about you.
I don't do politics. Decency isn't the property of any particular philosophy or movement. It doesn't belong to the left, or the right or the center.
Whatever did or didn't happen to Freddie Gray in Baltimore…to think there is anything to be gained by rioting, looting, destroying businesses and plunging a city into darkness…we know better.
This was an organized, synchronized, social media engineered movement. It wasn't spontaneous. It was by mostly young people with a sense of entitlement far beyond what they've earned.
I don't know what prejudices they've had to encounter, and at the moment I don't care. They had access to technology that planned this.
They didn't go to Freddie Gray's funeral. They didn't know him. They're undoing all the work of Dr. Martin Luther King and every hero that came after him.
This is a gutless, soulless excuse for cowardice. And yes, it's easy for me to say it 300 miles removed from the scene in front of a laptop.
But I have much more respect for someone who uses the processes of justice already in place and who lives in integrity to make themselves better…than an organized descent into hatred that's no different from that of ISIS.
I'm not moving too far off that statement, with a couple of exceptions.
was the looting, the violence, the disregard for one's own community.
Then when I saw the fact that many people in the neighborhoods went and cleaned up the damage, it brought things a bit more into perspective.
My sense is that high school kids (the rioters seem to be mostly in their teens) are of the "respond first and think later" type. I know I was!
And any sense of injustice combined with raging hormones will get people to do things they wouldn't ordinarily do.
So yes, it's terrible what happened. And that many unsupervised kids out on their own is a problem unto itself.
It also so happens that unchecked police power combined with poverty produces a recipe for disaster. If you're curious, Google the Zimbardo prison experiments.
I have to step back and wonder how it would feel to constantly walk around feeling like a suspect, simply because of my skin color.
And like it or not, that is very much the American condition. Maybe it's everywhere.
Yes, there are opportunities for black men and women to break through. We see it everyday.
But it is also an assault on their dignity to have to work harder to prove something.
Some people will give into the sense of powerlessness and rob, steal, pillage and destroy.
The strongest among the community raise the bar. But it takes patience, desire and time.
And yes, it is politics…at its most basic level.
Not liberal or conservative. Not Democrat or Republican.
Politics. The setting of policy and the allocation of resources we all pay into.
I'm not going to listen to people who say the 911 operators don't send police into black neighborhoods. And I won't hear about organized conspiracies to keep African Americans down.
No, you don't have to be ultra-talented.
Just make it bad business for the people with money to ignore you.
If you represent market share, make people earn your business.
If you have value to give, give it. And get better at it all the time.
If "the man" won't let you play, start your own thing.
It worked for Damon John. And Russell Simmons.
Yes, there are continuing injustices. And a media who isn't the least bit shy about covering them.
Use the system. Put the spotlight of shame on the cops and others who play the game dirty.
Same goes for the housewife who's been under her husband's thumb for thirty years.
And for the privileged rich kid who has a dream in his or her heart but hasn't found the courage to stand up to parents who won't listen.
And for a father who's a wage slave to his job…and hasn't figured out how to break out of the box he's in.
Most won't ever break through.
The ones who do pave the way for the next generation.
And have a damn good time doing it.
What say you about Baltimore?
How does it fit into your own life?
Comment below. Like, share and Tweet above. Someone is waiting for your insight and compassion to speak out.
This strikes close to home as Baltimore is a stone's throw from where I live. Well, let's say I can get there in 3O-45 minutes.
On Thursday of last week I accidentally got turned around coming home from a very cool and important appointment. Ended up in Baltimore and figured that I needed to bring some love and light to the city.
I am an immigrant, lilly white with an American accent so no one can tell. There have been many a time since 9/11 that I have counted myself fortunate that I would not be a target of discrimination by most.
Having lived in Asia when I was little I know how conspicuous one can be by virtue of one's skin color. There is no hiding.
My heart goes out to these kids who thought they were expressing power and desecrated their own home. They created a situation much worse than had been originally.
Humanity still has much growth to go through. Our immaturity as a human race relative to how sophisticated we believe ourselves to be has baffled me from a young age.
I like the way you think and appreciate what you express.


Uganda Communications Commission has indefinitely suspended ABS Television's broadcasting license until when the commission is satisfied that the Kawala based station has modified and harmonized its programming content as per the law.
According to the Executive Director UCC, Godfrey Mutabazi, on October 28, 2016, 'Pastor' Augustine Igga's station was fined Shs25 million for constant breaching of minimum broadcasting standards and the station vowed to desist from broadcasting offensive programs.
According to a letter dated September 5, signed by the Mutabazi, ABS TV management has been ordered not to bother UCC over its suspension.


ANN ARBOR, MI--(Marketwire - June 11, 2007) - Pipex Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (OTCBB: PPEX), a specialty pharmaceutical company developing innovative late-stage drug candidates for the treatment of neurologic and fibrotic diseases, announced today that TRIMESTA (oral estriol), its proprietary therapy for multiple sclerosis (MS) has entered a multi-center, Phase II/III clinical trial for the treatment of women with relapsing-remitting MS. This clinical trial has received a $5 million grant from the National Multiple Sclerosis Society (NMSS) in partnership with the National MS Society's Southern California chapter, with support from the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
TRIMESTA (oral estriol) has completed an initial 22 month, single-agent, crossover phase II clinical trial in the U.S. for the treatment of MS in relapsing remitting patients, with highly encouraging results. The results showed the total volume and number of enhancing pathogenic myelin lesions (established neuroimaging measurements of disease activity in MS) decreased during the treatment period as compared to a six-month pretreatment baseline period. The median total enhancing lesion volumes decreased by 79 percent (p=0.02) and the number of lesions decreased by 82 percent (p=0.09) within the first three months of treatment with TRIMESTA.
Following a three month drug holiday during which the patients weren't on any drug therapies, TRIMESTA therapy was reinitiated during a retreatment phase of this clinical trial. The relapsing-remitting MS patients again demonstrated a decrease in enhancing lesion volumes of 88 percent (p=0.008) and a decrease in the number of lesions by 48 percent (p=0.04) compared with original baseline scores (1),(2).
During this phase II clinical trial, a 14 percent improvement in Paced Auditory Serial Addition Test ("PASAT") cognitive testing scores (p=0.04) was observed in these MS patients at six months of therapy. PASAT is a routine cognitive test performed in patients with a wide variety of neuropsychological disorders such as MS. The PASAT scores were expressed as a mean percent change from baseline and were significantly improved in the relapsing-remitting group.
Dr. Rhonda Voskuhl, Professor of Neurology at the University of California, Los Angeles and inventor of TRIMESTA, commented, "Due to its rapid onset of action, oral activity and high response rate seen in relapsing-remitting MS patients in the initial Phase II clinical trial, TRIMESTA may have an important clinical advantage over current injectable MS treatments. As a neurologist, the improvement in cognitive testing scores may also represent a new paradigm in treating MS patients as well as other neurodegenerative diseases with TRIMESTA."
Dr. John R. Richert, Executive Vice President of Research and Clinical Programs at the National MS Society, stated, "We're encouraged that the National MS Society's funding of the original pilot trial of estriol, which emerged from targeted research on gender differences in MS, has led to this new trial. We are pleased that Pipex and Dr. Voskuhl are committed to advancing the development of this novel approach which could potentially lead to an affordable, oral disease-modifying therapy for this debilitating disease."
Dr. Charles Bisgaier, Pipex's President, stated that, "The active ingredient in TRIMESTA has been marketed for over 40 years in Europe and Asia for the treatment of post-menopausal hot flashes. As we enter this Phase II/III clinical trial of TRIMESTA for treatment of MS, the product's known historical efficacy and tolerability coupled with the promising Phase II clinical trial results in MS patients an exciting new approach to treating this devastating disease with a targeted orally active drug candidate."
Dr. Bisgaier went onto say, "The exceptional increase in cognitive function together with the rapid reduction in lesion volumes and numbers positions TRIMESTA to become therapy of choice in the $10 billion global MS market. We are grateful for this $5 million grant and the support of the NMSS/NIH. We are excited about working with the National MS Society, Dr. Voskuhl and her team in furthering this promising new approach."
The clinical study is a double-blind, placebo-controlled trial that will take place at seven sites in the U.S., enrolling up to 150 female MS patients. Investigators will administer TRIMESTA to women between the ages of 18-50 who have been recently diagnosed with relapsing-remitting MS. TRIMESTA will be given in combination with subcutaneously injected Copaxone®, a standard treatment for MS. The team is evaluating effects of the treatment combination on relapse rates using several clinical and magnetic resonance imaging measures of disability progression.
The study sites include the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), Ohio State University (OSU), Rutgers University (UMDNJ), Washington University, St. Louis, University of Chicago, University of Utah and Wayne State University. For further information on this Phase II/III clinical trial, please visit www.clinicaltrials.gov/.
Doctors have known for decades that women often experience a sharp drop in MS disease symptoms during the course of pregnancy, specifically in the third trimester when the levels of estriol is being produced at their highest level by the placenta. The list of autoimmune diseases that improve during pregnancy includes multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis, thyroiditis, uveitis, juvenile rheumatoid arthirits, ankylosing spondylitis with peripheral arthritis and psoriatic arthritis.
A landmark clinical study published in the New England Journal of Medicine, known as the PRIMS study (Pregnancy in Multiple Sclerosis) followed 254 women with MS during 269 pregnancies and for up to one year after delivery. The PRIMS study demonstrated that relapse rates were significantly reduced by 71 percent (p < 0.001) through the third trimester of pregnancy from prebaseline levels and relapse rates then increased by 120 percent (p < 0.001) during the first three months postpartum before returning to prepregnancy rates (3).
TRIMESTA is an orally active, immunomodulatory and anti-inflammatory molecule the has been approved and marketed throughout Europe and Asia for approximately 40 years for the treatment of post-menopausal hot flashes, but has never been introduced in North America. Estriol, the active ingredient in TRIMESTA, is a weak estrogenic-based molecule that is produced in the placenta by women during pregnancy. Estriol is considered to play an important role in the immunologic privilege offered to the fetus during pregnancy and is also thought to be responsible for the spontaneous remission of Th1-mediated autoimmune diseases of women (such as multiple sclerosis and rheumatoid arthritis) during pregnancy, especially during the third trimester. Pipex has an exclusive worldwide license with UCLA (through the Regent of the University of California) to the intellectual property rights surrounding TRIMESTA.
MS is a chronic, usually progressive disease of the central nervous system in which the immune system attacks and destroys the structure, and therefore degrades the function, of nerve cells. Approximately 400,000 Americans have MS, and virtually every hour someone is newly diagnosed. Most are between the ages of 20 and 50, and women are affected two to three times more often than men. Worldwide, MS may affect 2.5 million individuals.
According to the National MS Society, the economic cost of care for MS patients in the United States including medical and non-medical care, production losses, and informal care exceeds $23 billion annually, or more than $57,000 per U.S. patient per year. Complications from MS may make it harder for people to work and may interfere with their ability to perform common, daily activities. During 2006, combined sales estimates of FDA-approved injectable MS therapies, which include Avonex®, Betaseron®, Copaxone®, and Rebif®, totaled approximately $5.0 billion.
For most people with MS, the disease slowly progresses with a series of unpredictable flare-ups, also called relapses or exacerbations. But for some, the progression of the disease is rapid. Relapses often lead to increasing disabilities such as walking impairment, muscle weakness or speech or vision impairments.
The National MS Society is committed to building a movement by and for people with MS that will move us closer to a world free of this disease. The Society funds more MS research, provides more services to people with MS, offers more professional education and furthers more advocacy efforts than any other MS organization in the world. The Society has approximately 500,000 members, including more than 300,000 people with MS, and over 460,000 volunteers who carry out the Society's mission. For further information on the National MS Society, please visit www.nationalmssociety.org.
Pipex Pharmaceuticals Inc. is a specialty pharmaceutical company that is developing proprietary, late-stage drug candidates for the treatment of neurologic and fibrotic diseases. Pipex's strategy is to exclusively in-license proprietary, clinical-stage drug candidates and complete the further clinical testing, manufacturing and regulatory requirements sufficient to seek marketing authorizations via the filing of New Drug Applications (NDAs) with the FDA in the US and Marketing Application Authorizations (MAAs) with the European Medicines Evaluation Agency (EMEA). For further information please visit www.pipexpharma.com.
(1) Sicotte NL, Liva SM, Klutch R, Pfeiffer P, Bouvier S, Odesa S, Wu TC, Voskuhl RR. Treatment of multiple sclerosis with pregnancy hormone estriol. Ann Neurol. 2002 Oct. 52(4):421-8.
(2) Soldan SS, Alvarez Retuerto AI, Sicotte NL, Voskuhl RR. Immune modulation in multiple sclerosis patients treated with pregnancy hormone estriol. J Immunol. 2003 Dec 1:171(11):6267-74.
(3) Confavreux, C., Hutchinson, M., Hours, M.M., Cortinovis-Tourniaire, P., and Moreau, T. Rate of pregnancy-related relapse in multiple sclerosis. 1998. Pregnancy in Multiple Sclerosis Group. N Engl J Med 339:285-291.
Copaxone® is a registered trademark of Teva Pharmaceuticals.
This press release contains forward-looking statements, within the meaning of Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, that reflect Pipex Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (the "Company," "we" or "our" "Pipex") current expectations about its future results, performance, prospects and opportunities, including statements regarding the potential use of TRIMESTA ™ for the treatment of Multiple Sclerosis. Where possible, the Company has tried to identify these forward-looking statements by using words such as "anticipates," "believes," "intends," or similar expressions. These statements are subject to a number of risks, uncertainties and other factors that could cause actual events or results in future periods to differ materially from what is expressed in, or implied by, these statements, including the risks set forth in our most recent filing on Form 10-QSB and Form 10-KSB filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. We cannot assure you that we will be able to successfully develop or commercialize products based on our technologies, including COPREXA™, TRIMESTA™, Anti-CD4 802-2, CORRECTA™, EFFIRMA™ and SOLOVAX™ particularly in light of the significant uncertainty inherent in developing, manufacturing and conducting preclinical and clinical trials of new pharmaceuticals and obtaining regulatory approvals, that our technologies will prove to be safe and effective, that our cash expenditures will not exceed projected levels, that we will be able to obtain future financing or funds when needed, that product development and commercialization efforts will not be reduced or discontinued due to difficulties or delays in clinical trials or due to lack of progress or positive results from research and development efforts, that we will be able to successfully obtain any further grants and awards, maintain our existing grants which are subject to performance, that we will be able to patent, register or protect our technology from challenge and products from competition or maintain or expand our license agreements with our current licensors, or that our business strategy will be successful. All forward-looking statements made in this press release are made as of the date hereof, and the Company assumes no obligation to update the forward-looking statements included in this news release whether as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise.
Steve H. Kanzer, CPA, Esq.


Extensive programming experience; languages include C++, Java, Perl, Haskell, ML, Scheme, Mathematica. Other experience: TCP/IP/sockets, threads/concurrency, assembly, Unix, Linux kernel, Windows, cygwin, CVS/svn/darcs, Eclipse, XML, SQL, OpenGL. Research background includes published work in language design and formal analysis of software.
Contributions to a research program on the application of logical frameworks based on linear logic to the specification of security and access-control policies. My contributions have included working out the theory of the CLF framework on which the project was based; contributing to the design and theory of the LolliMon logic programming language; and presenting the results of my part of the work at the Office of Naval Research, Washington, D.C.
Has been the primary contributor to the development of CLF, a logical framework based on linear logic and aimed at specifying and reasoning about concurrent computation. This work has involved collaborating with colleagues on the initial design of the language; making key technical breakthroughs leading to the first tractable semantics of the language; working out the semantics and theory of the language; and co-authoring numerous conference papers and technical reports describing the work.
Independent research establishing a novel technique for verifying program properties using lazy evaluation. The work resulted in a new formal verification of a combinatorial theorem of J.H. Conway, and was achieved by applying my technique in the Haskell language. The work was presented at a seminar.
Made major contributions to the design and analysis of LolliMon, a linear logic programming language. The work involved collaborating with colleagues on the initial design; developing a mathematical theory to specify the operational semantics of the language; and co-authoring a refereed conference paper describing the language and theory.
Made major contributions to Twelf, a theorem prover and specification checker based on the LF logical framework and the Elf logic programming language. This work included assimilating and comprehending a large existing code base; designing new algorithms and data structures for the key type reconstruction component of the software; implementing my design in the Standard ML language; constructing examples and test cases for the software distribution; walking other contributors through the implementation internals; and tracking and fixing defects.
Contributed to a research program aimed at creating a digital library of formal mathematical knowledge, using an open infrastructure based on logical frameworks to translate between knowledge developed in different theorem proving systems. My contributions included the preliminary design of a module system for LF; and participating in the project kickoff meeting at SRI International, Menlo Park.
With a colleague, designed a new memory management paradigm combining region-based memory management and linear types. My work included assimilating the relevant scientific literature; helping to elaborate the initial idea into the design of a new programming language incorporating the paradigm; developing the mathematical theory needed to specify the semantics of the language; co-authoring a refereed conference paper describing our work; and presenting our work at a conference in Florence, Italy.
Redesigned and extended an implementation of Lolli, a logic programming language akin to Prolog, based on linear logic. This work involved reading and assimilating the scientific literature on linear logic and logic programming; designing novel algorithms and data structures for proof search in linear logic; implementing the algorithms in the Standard ML language; measuring and tuning the implementation for performance; visiting and collaborating with researchers at Kobe University, Japan, on aspects of the theory; and co-authoring a refereed conference paper describing the work.
As part of an Harvey Mudd CS Clinic team collaborating with Optivus Technology, Inc., contributed to the design and implementation of a tool for automatic radiographic image registration. My roles on the team included: researching techniques for image processing; design and implementation of novel de-noising algorithms.
As part of an Harvey Mudd Math Clinic team collaborating with the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, surveyed and evaluated various approaches to formal software verification.
Researched routing algorithms for wormhole routed massively-parallel computers under the direction of my advisor. This work involved designing new routing strategies; writing a large Monte Carlo simulation and visualization package in the C++ language in order to test the performance of the strategies; responding to the direction of the professor advising me and coordinating with his other students working on related projects; and co-authoring two refereed conference papers describing the work.
Served as a teaching assistant and visiting lecturer for two instances of the undergraduate course on type systems and operational semantics of programming languages, taught in the Standard ML and Java languages.
Served as head teaching assistant for the undergraduate course on functional and modular programming in the Standard ML language. The work included coordinating and supervising five undergraduate TAs.
Envisioned and created the first student-run seminar in our research group. Each week the students participating read and discussed an academic paper. The group was managed by myself for the first two years and is still running.
With a friend, designed and constructed custom hardware and software for a web cam installed in the department lounge soda machine, so grad students like myself could watch for leftover food from seminars, etc. as it arrived in the lounge. The system was based on a repurposed "web appliance", IP multicast, and VNC.
A list of publications and presentations is available online.