Moose gets traumatized, Katie Herzog becomes a climate criminal, Jesse Singal becomes gay, Susan Meachen dies, and Carla Rossi has a lot of explaining to do
Whenever an uncommon kink comes up on B&R I always think about the time my mother-in-law posted pony play to her facebook (think of puppy play but rather than puppies its people as horses). She sent this video in our family thread too and immediately one of my sister's-in-law called her and explained that this was a sexual kink and to take it down. She just thought people were having fun pretending to be ponies :D (which is very in line with her)
When my brother and his gf recently visited Cologne, they saw a woman sitting in a tiny carriage being drawn by her human pony - in broad daylight, in the middle of the city. She also had a little whip, of course.
(But it's Cologne, so the whole thing is probably not that surprising.)
As much as I enjoy witnessing the downfall of La Dottoressa Rossi, I feel really bad for her PhD students - their careers are basically over before they started. (Kidd even mentioned in one of his posts that he was contacted by one of her PhD candidates who asked him for permission to use one of his images, so there is at least one honest person in the whole RECEPTIOsphere.)
Who I don't feel bad for are all the tenured professors who are defending Rossi even though it's so obvious that she's a plagiarist and fraud.
The case reminds me of a very pithy observation by one of my colleagues when I was still a PhD student: "Much of modern academia is a mix of kindergarten and Game of Thrones.")
When I was a graduate student, I was finishing my master's degree and considering whether to continue pursuing a PhD (in a liberal arts field). I was good at school, and I figured academia would be a good place for my skills and interests. But I'd spent a year abroad before that program, and that gave me some vision of a different path - I wasn't dedicated enough to want to spend 5-6 years earning another degree. So I finished the MA and went off to my first full-time job that fall. At the time, I remember feeling pretty conflicted about it. But in the last few years here, as everything has gotten completely out of hand, I thank God every day I'm not stuck inside the academy. Even though I really liked the people I knew in my program, I just can't imagine weathering the climate now.
Okay so I can't believe I'm writing this, but there is actually a huge difference between the TRADPUB romance writers world and the indiepub romance writers world.
I would say that most tradpub romance writers (outside of those who became popular/famous before ~10 years ago) are very similar to the type of person who writes for Slate or Jezebel. Similar politically, similar in their Twitter usage, similar in that they're (for the most part) mediocre writers who take their jobs/identities VERY seriously.
The indiepub romance writing world is . . . insane. For one thing, it's totally capitalist and basically without limits, which means that some of the stuff that gets popular is VERY not PC and weird. (and just some throat clearing, I do read some indie romance, so I'm not saying this is BAD per se.) Like, there is a LOT of MFM, "monster" romance (some of these are REALLY weird), "dark" romance, and the tangentially-related "bully romance" which was mentioned in the episode. A bully romance is basically a romance where the male main character is a bully who's usually very wealthy and "powerful" and treats everyone around him like garbage. It makes him very angry that the female main character, who is sweet and kind and innocent, has such a hold on him (usually for no discernible reason). So he treats her even MORE like garbage, but she likes him anyway . . . ? There's usually no character growth. And all of these books are usually extremely explicit. Most, almost all, writers of this type of thing use pseudonyms and don't register a copyright so that they can write anonymously. Some of them do do the woke politics thing, but a lot of them don't. Writing these books can actually be pretty profitable, if you become popular in a niche and publish often.
From what I can see of her amazon page, what Susan was writing was mostly extremely tame, comparatively. Most of them were pretty short (around 100 pages), but priced accordingly. She does have a solid amount of positive reviews. I'm guessing she was probably making most of her money through Kindle Unlimited, which is a subscription service where readers pay per month and then get access to the entire KU library. Authors get paid per page read of their books.
At first I thought she was probably lying about having a daughter, but I can see that one of her old bios says "I’m from a tiny town in the Southern part of Tennessee, it’s not huge, but it’s home. I started writing last year, but I’ve always loved to read. I have been married to my husband for twenty-two years, we have two grown children, and one we sort of adopted, who has given us our first set of grandkids. You can generally find me curled up with my laptop and my baby girl a six foot long Ball Python working on my next book." (The bio of "Special Delivery.") So I'm left wondering if she was impersonating her daughter or if her daughter really did take over her fb. I'm kind of disturbed by the idea that her daughter would even know she writes these books, let alone read them or get one FOR A WEDDING PRESENT. It's NOT like Chandler's mom from Friends. Usually these types of books feature the author's interests in this department HEAVILY.
Either way, it's not uncommon for indie writers to be socially awkward, deal with mental health stuff, etc. It's a job where the biggest requirement is that you produce a lot of content in a niche genre. It's true that most writers who do REALLY well are able to understand other things like marketing, design, basic grammar, etc, and have proffesional relationships with designers and editors, but honestly, a lot of writers are doing just fine (via KU) by just being prolific and dependable. Which, as you can imagine, doesn't attract the most mentally stable people.
Anyway, this is embarrassing. Hope everyone is having a good week.
When I was a fresh-faced college grad, I really wanted to be a book editor and responded to an ad to work at a romance ebook start up, which was clearly attempting to capitalize on the recent success of 50 Shades of Gray. I didn’t have any background knowledge of the industry nor did I read those types of books (I read Venus in Furs to prepare, which … why did I think that would be helpful?), and the interview was incredibly awkward—it also took place in a sort of empty warehouse that was in the process of being converted into office space, which freaked me out a bit since the genre that I was there to discuss involved light bondage. Your explanation here underlines some of the details I was missing at the time. I was proto-woke and so was giving feedback on my editing test like, this character seems too drunk to consent. Not getting that job was probably all for the best.
I like Vampire stuff so I get genre stuff on my social media scroll. I'm always surprised when there are the morality and consent discussions in the comments. It's like they don't understand the genre they all love so much at all. They're talking about ethics in a genre devoted to, admittedly pretty, immortal predators. It's like, "So, the 400 years of nightly killing is fine but glamouring that girl for food & sex was the bridge too far? Dude has literally eaten babies but here's where you draw the line?".
When I worked in a call center the women there would leave their romance books on a shared table for everyone. Out of curiosity I started reading some.
That was the end of me believing that women were less horny than men.
This is a great summary! I read a lot of romance but mostly stay with the sweet/vanilla genre - KJ Charles is about as racy as it gets - so it's fascinating to learn what else is out there. I suppose just as porn has got more kinky, so has romance - but a lot of it does seem to have Chuck Tingle vibes. I feel like there's probably a massive crossover from fanfic as well...
I think you're absolutely right about fanfic. Even 10-15 years ago you could see the beginnings of the current popular trends in indie romance. Which Harry Potter fics were popular? Harry/Draco--thus predicting the extreme obsession that some straight women have for gay male romance. Hermione/Snape--age gaps and bully romance. Harry/Ginny surprise baby. And *barf* Ron/Ginny.
The monster stuff I think sort of started with Twilight, though vampire stuff has always been popular. Definitely was enhanced by the insane popularity of omegaverse, which is sort of fanfictionish itself IMO.
I'm not really into the darker stuff myself but I have a general interest in the business end of indie publishing (and also I watch a lot of booktube, and those girls love the dark stuff lol).
I think a lot of people are making *some* money. More, obviously, than they were making when they were writing fanfic. I don't think it's really hard to make a couple hundred dollars, but making a living is definitely more rare.
And Sterek (Stiles/Derek) from Teenwolf! Which also pairs together soft/goofy and brooding/jerk, but in order to soften the latter and add more human dimensions (ironic, since it is technically the first step in the direction towards the monster fucker corner of furrydom)
No, but it was A) incredibly popular and B) written during a time when fanfic was also incredibly popular. I'd say a large portion of the indie paranormal smut market owes its life to Twilight fanfic
It targeted a much younger audience too, I believe.
Though I will admit that when it comes to sheer, unadulterated terror the idea of being immortal and repeating small town high school over and over and over again for eternity can't be bested.
The idea of the romance lit world being the emotional kink counterpart of pornographically displayed kink is WILD and I sort of love it, and it totally tracks: it's a singular theme spiraling in on itself endlessly and creating weirder and weirder branchings that nonetheless fall under the overarching theme!
Deviant Subcultures are fascinating. I guess it makes sense that interconnectivity has caused an explosion of these.
I mean, just by the numbers, if 1 in 20,000 people are really into alien mollusk abduction porn....then prior to the internet there might only be 1 or 2 people in your whole town that would be into it and they'll never say it out loud.
But with the internet, that's 400,000 potential customers world wide. Which could be the foundation of one hell of a sole proprietorship with a $5/mth subscription.
One of the wonders of capitalism is exactly that phenomenon. I'm sure that anti-capitalists and capitalism cheerleaders both will cite that example in their cases.
The weird thing is that this should be true, and perhaps used to be, but I'm finding mostly that the Internet is increasingly going the opposite way, with most products (and even porn).
It's got something to do with Google and a few other companies controlling everything, and algorithms, but for example I tried to buy a classic tiered Mexican skirt a few years ago of a sort that I know isn't uncommon, or didn't used to be, but it was impossible to find on Google shopping, Amazon, Etsy, Ebay, or anywhere else. I kept seeing the same six skirts which were modern and only Mexican-adjacent because I don't know, that's what the powers that be wanted to sell me.
Turns up not precisely what I was envisioning, but something much closer and a reasonable substitute, thanks. It isn't actually too late--I was going to craft a thing for Halloween/Day of the Dead. I might still do it.
Check out the Neeva search engine and/or browser. It's privacy focused and does not use any tracking profiles to serve you search results.
Sometimes you get the same results. But often, you get surprisingly different results from google/bing/etc.
I find the difference to be particularly stark when searching within my domain of interest...where the other browsers have such a hard core profile on what they _think_ I want vs. what is, most likely, the most correct result for the search.
I will! I doubt it does much for shopping, because I think that problem is at the level of the readily available products. But I have been looking for a better search engine in general. Duck Duck Go and those others commonly recommended just haven't indexed enough stuff in my experience.
I have a logical mind and high research skills, so the google fuzzy algorithm crap annoys me to no end (and they keep removing or changing the functionality that allows you to do override that). First, there are already a million results for what I type in. Why expand out my keywords so that I get two million? Second, there can be a world of difference between things like staple, Staples, stapler, etc. I know what im doing, stop giving me variations. Third, i really do want the random ass sixies folk song with the extra two words in it, not the Lizzo song from last year that you get when you remove words from my search string. Stop trying to read my mind!
I tried the search recommended below. First few hits were Etsy, but I also got some boutique shops out of CA that clearly specialize in traditional Mexican folk clothing.
Google gave me similar results, but the folk shops were a bit buried in amazon, Pinterest, eBay, etc. links.
I've always found the Amazon product links in Google hits fairly useless (and suspect)......I mean, yeah. Ok. Yeah, I know what Amazon is. And I know they have everything. So, uh, if I were looking to buy something from Amazon I'd go to Amazon.com...kay? (which I do...more than I should probably)
I knew someone whose mother wrote traditional religious romance novels. She would have her kids read them and give her suggestions. She'd also give copies of her books as wedding presents when friends and family members got married. I always thought that a christian romance novel was a strange wedding gift and it would be very awkward coming from someone who was related to me.
okay but also we need to know what is the plot of a traditional religious romance novel?? The readership needs answers! Cause Song of Solomon gets real scandalous ("I will climb the tree, I will taste the fruit") and we just neeeever talked about it in church.
So if most indie romance books are basically angst + smut, most traditionally published romance novels today are actually not "bodice rippers." When done well they should be steamy, but also feature an engaging plot with actual conflict about the relationship (that's realistic and understandable) and opportunities for both characters to grow. Most of them also feature a chicklit side-plot where the MC overcomes something in her life and becomes a better version of herself OUTSIDE of the relationship. Now, a LOT of authors miss the mark, and many of these are not done well. But that's the basic idea. And a Christian romance is this minus the smut. It might have the usual romance tropes--best friend's brother, fake dating, forced proximity, enemies to lovers, whatever. But the relationship is less "animal magnetism + real personality depth" and more "emotional connection."
Now, to someone like me this might seem very boring. But some women find the on-page explicit nature of other romance novels to be really off-putting and uncomfortable, so there's definitely a market here. And I have read books that, while not Christian romance, aren't super explicit that were EXCELLENT (thinking of you, Twice Shy). So I think there's a butt for ever seat.
True, it does overflow with scandal, but of the "sinful" variety, so I imagine the books written for that audience would wants something less "Man commits adultery and murders cuckolded husband only for God to strike down the baby".
Also I have every intention of weaving "bodice-ripper" into my everyday vocabulary, it's the new "cool", as in "man that really ripped my bodice", and "have you tried the new cheesy potatoes? they're a real bodice ripper"
That is a very good question. I think there are a couple of possible plots but I was always afraid to ask. I do know that (fortunately) they were not Amish romance novels.
Oh but an Amish romance novel seems like it would have all the makings of an incredible, tension filled romance novel! Bigwig from the city's breaks down outside Amish, who should happen by? But the beautiful and exceedingly capable Amish widow whose husband died tragically in a butter churn and has never seen fit to remarry but welcomes this man (not into her home, propriety after all) but into her town and slowly wins him over to the technologic refuge of a non-modern world.
That is true. If my aunt gave me a copy of her Christian romance novel as a wedding present that would be a lot less awkward than a bodice ripper she'd written. Though I would probably have a nagging suspicion that she was sending me a message that I should've waited to have sex before getting married.
A romance novel is a weird wedding gift and getting one from the author makes you wonder if she knew that hand-made gifts were best and decided this would count or if she had copies to give away and was just trying to save money.
Hmm okay so like I said above, dark is not my main wheelhouse, but I'll try my best!
A lot of times dark means a toxic relationship, so a lot of them do have some pretty strong patriarchal vibes (sometimes literally!).
Books that a lot of people like that I haven't read that I think would fit the bill:
1) Morning Glory Milking Farm--a paranormal romance that's pretty weird (you can read the summary on Amazon) and sounds dark to me, but reviewers said it was sweet.
2) Hate by Tate James is a very popular reverse harem book that, again, I can't say I've read.
Books I *have* read that might fall into this category--I do think some of the CoHo books are a little darker, especially something like Ugly Love or November 9. I think you might like Naomi Novik, who's a traditionally published writer who writes pretty dark (but, IMO, extremely well written) versions of Eastern European folk tales, some of which have a romantic plot/subplot. Spinning Silver and Uprooted come to mind. Neither is particularly smutty, though, if you're going for that.
What’s the one where it’s about Taylor Swift, basically, and she ties up the secret billionaire owner of the AirBnB she’s staying at and gives him a bj? Also, the guy describes his cock as twitching all the time (I know that doesn’t narrow it down)
Yes. My wife was listening it with me on a car trip and turned it off because I couldn’t stop laughing (so we never got to Taylor Swift even finding out the handyman she was blowing was a secret billionaire or stopped him from being manipulated into a bad marriage with an evil slut) and she got too mad to tell me the title.
Jesse reminded me of Grandpa Simpson: "I used to be with "it"! Then they changed what "it" was. Now what I'm with isn't "it" and what is "it" is weird and strange!"
I learned the "key" pronunciation, too, either because some American Southern dialects still preserve Britishisms or because my family is full of Anglophiles.
Although she later went on to say she acknowledges her nose blindness, has asked others to check her stench, and admitted to receiving messages from friends about her BO.
That's more than once a week, which is a reasonable frequency (it's about how often my husband showers). The idea that one needs to bathe or shower more often than that is a fairly modern notion, and it's a luxury that's still out of reach for many people. No one should get dragged on Twitter for conserving resources, even if she was trying to save her own skin rather than the planet.
Yeah, I spent a fair amount of time in my youth bathing in a pond because we didn’t have enough water in the well. I’m not part of the luxury class. And if bathing were an out of reach luxury for her for socioeconomic reasons she probably wouldn’t be on Twitter much.
Man. Jude Doyle REALLY does not like Jesse. Is Jude a trans guu now or nonbinary? Also. Jude really does seem unhinged or maybe just online unhinged.
ETA: I really do not get what white bisexual women have to do with Andrew Sullivan or Glenn Greenwald. Gay men are into women since...when? And the "white" thing, is the idea that there is some white supremacist thing going on,?
Because the other thing is that Jude Doyle seems to hold a LOT of contempt for white women.
Everyone knows that the person who gets to rank the queers is the person who has a vagina and is married to a man. Honestly, if that be-vagina’ed person also happened to be white, they would definitely be a Karen.
The tweet is confusingly worded, but the upshot is that there is a (fake) competition between bi women and gay men to be the most problematic, and surprisingly, the bi women won.
Well. Katie talking abou a former feminist writer who is now trans - kinda gave it away. If this were a fully public forum, I would feel uncomfortable writing Jude's name since I think Jesse would get pilloried over that. But otherwise? They stated things that happened. It isn't speculation. But also Truly. I think Jude Doyle is a contemptible person.
I was thinking Daniel Lavery at first, but it wasn't cutesy enough. Sad that this is basically a genre, "women who transition but who still gossip/snark on social media like it's the jezebel comment section circa 2007"
OMG. I totally was on jezebel then. HA hahaha. Ha.
But I mean. Daniel Lavery married to a man? I think that might be the transphobiest statement ever. Also. No kids. Also. Not sure Daniel cares about Jesse - Grace is the one who cares.
Ooof, you're right -- Grace, like Mallory, write so much with the voice of their "assigned at birth" sexes that I have difficulty remembering that Grace transitioned because I care so little about Grace that I forget her name.
Isn't this a public forum, as in visible to all who care to read it? I thought that was the deal with the free episodes. So Jesse has until it's released to the public (on Monday?) before he's pilloried. ETA: Thanks for Sherlocking this!
Nothing to do with this episode, but I wanted to post a public thank you to my wife for getting me an "It's complicated" T-shirt for Christmas. :) I know, we're not supporting the BARpod merch store, but she figured I could wear it more places than "pervert for nuance".
“Where the Real Gays Go” ~a new banned children’s book from Jesse Singal
Update: between this and Mike Solana’s substack I feel like I know a bunch of gay secrets that straight people are not supposed to know. For any Patrice O’Neal fans, he used to say that Fight Club and the song “Creep” were white secrets. I feel like blood play is a lesbian secret.
Rejected title: "Death of the Death of the Author"
Whenever an uncommon kink comes up on B&R I always think about the time my mother-in-law posted pony play to her facebook (think of puppy play but rather than puppies its people as horses). She sent this video in our family thread too and immediately one of my sister's-in-law called her and explained that this was a sexual kink and to take it down. She just thought people were having fun pretending to be ponies :D (which is very in line with her)
That's both hilarious and wholeseome :D
When my brother and his gf recently visited Cologne, they saw a woman sitting in a tiny carriage being drawn by her human pony - in broad daylight, in the middle of the city. She also had a little whip, of course.
(But it's Cologne, so the whole thing is probably not that surprising.)
I wonder who will be the contemporary Nietzsche driven mad at the sight of someone senselessly beating their human pony.
As much as I enjoy witnessing the downfall of La Dottoressa Rossi, I feel really bad for her PhD students - their careers are basically over before they started. (Kidd even mentioned in one of his posts that he was contacted by one of her PhD candidates who asked him for permission to use one of his images, so there is at least one honest person in the whole RECEPTIOsphere.)
Who I don't feel bad for are all the tenured professors who are defending Rossi even though it's so obvious that she's a plagiarist and fraud.
The case reminds me of a very pithy observation by one of my colleagues when I was still a PhD student: "Much of modern academia is a mix of kindergarten and Game of Thrones.")
When I was a graduate student, I was finishing my master's degree and considering whether to continue pursuing a PhD (in a liberal arts field). I was good at school, and I figured academia would be a good place for my skills and interests. But I'd spent a year abroad before that program, and that gave me some vision of a different path - I wasn't dedicated enough to want to spend 5-6 years earning another degree. So I finished the MA and went off to my first full-time job that fall. At the time, I remember feeling pretty conflicted about it. But in the last few years here, as everything has gotten completely out of hand, I thank God every day I'm not stuck inside the academy. Even though I really liked the people I knew in my program, I just can't imagine weathering the climate now.
Mme la duchesse, I've enjoyed your writing so far. How long until more gossip on Byron?
Thanks so much for the encouragement! This gave me the motivation to finally put the finishing touches on a post I had been planning a long time :D
Okay so I can't believe I'm writing this, but there is actually a huge difference between the TRADPUB romance writers world and the indiepub romance writers world.
I would say that most tradpub romance writers (outside of those who became popular/famous before ~10 years ago) are very similar to the type of person who writes for Slate or Jezebel. Similar politically, similar in their Twitter usage, similar in that they're (for the most part) mediocre writers who take their jobs/identities VERY seriously.
The indiepub romance writing world is . . . insane. For one thing, it's totally capitalist and basically without limits, which means that some of the stuff that gets popular is VERY not PC and weird. (and just some throat clearing, I do read some indie romance, so I'm not saying this is BAD per se.) Like, there is a LOT of MFM, "monster" romance (some of these are REALLY weird), "dark" romance, and the tangentially-related "bully romance" which was mentioned in the episode. A bully romance is basically a romance where the male main character is a bully who's usually very wealthy and "powerful" and treats everyone around him like garbage. It makes him very angry that the female main character, who is sweet and kind and innocent, has such a hold on him (usually for no discernible reason). So he treats her even MORE like garbage, but she likes him anyway . . . ? There's usually no character growth. And all of these books are usually extremely explicit. Most, almost all, writers of this type of thing use pseudonyms and don't register a copyright so that they can write anonymously. Some of them do do the woke politics thing, but a lot of them don't. Writing these books can actually be pretty profitable, if you become popular in a niche and publish often.
From what I can see of her amazon page, what Susan was writing was mostly extremely tame, comparatively. Most of them were pretty short (around 100 pages), but priced accordingly. She does have a solid amount of positive reviews. I'm guessing she was probably making most of her money through Kindle Unlimited, which is a subscription service where readers pay per month and then get access to the entire KU library. Authors get paid per page read of their books.
At first I thought she was probably lying about having a daughter, but I can see that one of her old bios says "I’m from a tiny town in the Southern part of Tennessee, it’s not huge, but it’s home. I started writing last year, but I’ve always loved to read. I have been married to my husband for twenty-two years, we have two grown children, and one we sort of adopted, who has given us our first set of grandkids. You can generally find me curled up with my laptop and my baby girl a six foot long Ball Python working on my next book." (The bio of "Special Delivery.") So I'm left wondering if she was impersonating her daughter or if her daughter really did take over her fb. I'm kind of disturbed by the idea that her daughter would even know she writes these books, let alone read them or get one FOR A WEDDING PRESENT. It's NOT like Chandler's mom from Friends. Usually these types of books feature the author's interests in this department HEAVILY.
Either way, it's not uncommon for indie writers to be socially awkward, deal with mental health stuff, etc. It's a job where the biggest requirement is that you produce a lot of content in a niche genre. It's true that most writers who do REALLY well are able to understand other things like marketing, design, basic grammar, etc, and have proffesional relationships with designers and editors, but honestly, a lot of writers are doing just fine (via KU) by just being prolific and dependable. Which, as you can imagine, doesn't attract the most mentally stable people.
Anyway, this is embarrassing. Hope everyone is having a good week.
When I was a fresh-faced college grad, I really wanted to be a book editor and responded to an ad to work at a romance ebook start up, which was clearly attempting to capitalize on the recent success of 50 Shades of Gray. I didn’t have any background knowledge of the industry nor did I read those types of books (I read Venus in Furs to prepare, which … why did I think that would be helpful?), and the interview was incredibly awkward—it also took place in a sort of empty warehouse that was in the process of being converted into office space, which freaked me out a bit since the genre that I was there to discuss involved light bondage. Your explanation here underlines some of the details I was missing at the time. I was proto-woke and so was giving feedback on my editing test like, this character seems too drunk to consent. Not getting that job was probably all for the best.
I like Vampire stuff so I get genre stuff on my social media scroll. I'm always surprised when there are the morality and consent discussions in the comments. It's like they don't understand the genre they all love so much at all. They're talking about ethics in a genre devoted to, admittedly pretty, immortal predators. It's like, "So, the 400 years of nightly killing is fine but glamouring that girl for food & sex was the bridge too far? Dude has literally eaten babies but here's where you draw the line?".
I like a a TRADPUB myself...darts, pork scratchings, mugs with handles.
When I worked in a call center the women there would leave their romance books on a shared table for everyone. Out of curiosity I started reading some.
That was the end of me believing that women were less horny than men.
This is a great summary! I read a lot of romance but mostly stay with the sweet/vanilla genre - KJ Charles is about as racy as it gets - so it's fascinating to learn what else is out there. I suppose just as porn has got more kinky, so has romance - but a lot of it does seem to have Chuck Tingle vibes. I feel like there's probably a massive crossover from fanfic as well...
I think you're absolutely right about fanfic. Even 10-15 years ago you could see the beginnings of the current popular trends in indie romance. Which Harry Potter fics were popular? Harry/Draco--thus predicting the extreme obsession that some straight women have for gay male romance. Hermione/Snape--age gaps and bully romance. Harry/Ginny surprise baby. And *barf* Ron/Ginny.
The monster stuff I think sort of started with Twilight, though vampire stuff has always been popular. Definitely was enhanced by the insane popularity of omegaverse, which is sort of fanfictionish itself IMO.
I'm not really into the darker stuff myself but I have a general interest in the business end of indie publishing (and also I watch a lot of booktube, and those girls love the dark stuff lol).
Thats amazing, I'd never even heard of omegaverse. There is so much writing going on out there and so few are getting paid, i just don't get it.
I think a lot of people are making *some* money. More, obviously, than they were making when they were writing fanfic. I don't think it's really hard to make a couple hundred dollars, but making a living is definitely more rare.
And Sterek (Stiles/Derek) from Teenwolf! Which also pairs together soft/goofy and brooding/jerk, but in order to soften the latter and add more human dimensions (ironic, since it is technically the first step in the direction towards the monster fucker corner of furrydom)
Did Twilight do anything that Anne Rice didn't write about decades before?
Sparkly day-walking abominations.
Ok. Fair. Anne Rice vampires were not glitter bombed.
No, but it was A) incredibly popular and B) written during a time when fanfic was also incredibly popular. I'd say a large portion of the indie paranormal smut market owes its life to Twilight fanfic
It targeted a much younger audience too, I believe.
Though I will admit that when it comes to sheer, unadulterated terror the idea of being immortal and repeating small town high school over and over and over again for eternity can't be bested.
The idea of the romance lit world being the emotional kink counterpart of pornographically displayed kink is WILD and I sort of love it, and it totally tracks: it's a singular theme spiraling in on itself endlessly and creating weirder and weirder branchings that nonetheless fall under the overarching theme!
As someone who does like indie romance, emotional kink is 💯 percent the vibe in the space and honestly I love it.
So long as authors arent being cancelled for their mafia heroes being ableist.
(Mafia romance is generally a little too real for my taste--I will read crazy fantasy or scifi but I usually can’t suspend my disbelief for mobsters.)
Deviant Subcultures are fascinating. I guess it makes sense that interconnectivity has caused an explosion of these.
I mean, just by the numbers, if 1 in 20,000 people are really into alien mollusk abduction porn....then prior to the internet there might only be 1 or 2 people in your whole town that would be into it and they'll never say it out loud.
But with the internet, that's 400,000 potential customers world wide. Which could be the foundation of one hell of a sole proprietorship with a $5/mth subscription.
One of the wonders of capitalism is exactly that phenomenon. I'm sure that anti-capitalists and capitalism cheerleaders both will cite that example in their cases.
The weird thing is that this should be true, and perhaps used to be, but I'm finding mostly that the Internet is increasingly going the opposite way, with most products (and even porn).
It's got something to do with Google and a few other companies controlling everything, and algorithms, but for example I tried to buy a classic tiered Mexican skirt a few years ago of a sort that I know isn't uncommon, or didn't used to be, but it was impossible to find on Google shopping, Amazon, Etsy, Ebay, or anywhere else. I kept seeing the same six skirts which were modern and only Mexican-adjacent because I don't know, that's what the powers that be wanted to sell me.
Try searching for "baile folklorico" skirt/falda. Probably too late, but I'm curious if that search turns you up any results.
Turns up not precisely what I was envisioning, but something much closer and a reasonable substitute, thanks. It isn't actually too late--I was going to craft a thing for Halloween/Day of the Dead. I might still do it.
Check out the Neeva search engine and/or browser. It's privacy focused and does not use any tracking profiles to serve you search results.
Sometimes you get the same results. But often, you get surprisingly different results from google/bing/etc.
I find the difference to be particularly stark when searching within my domain of interest...where the other browsers have such a hard core profile on what they _think_ I want vs. what is, most likely, the most correct result for the search.
I will! I doubt it does much for shopping, because I think that problem is at the level of the readily available products. But I have been looking for a better search engine in general. Duck Duck Go and those others commonly recommended just haven't indexed enough stuff in my experience.
I have a logical mind and high research skills, so the google fuzzy algorithm crap annoys me to no end (and they keep removing or changing the functionality that allows you to do override that). First, there are already a million results for what I type in. Why expand out my keywords so that I get two million? Second, there can be a world of difference between things like staple, Staples, stapler, etc. I know what im doing, stop giving me variations. Third, i really do want the random ass sixies folk song with the extra two words in it, not the Lizzo song from last year that you get when you remove words from my search string. Stop trying to read my mind!
I tried the search recommended below. First few hits were Etsy, but I also got some boutique shops out of CA that clearly specialize in traditional Mexican folk clothing.
Google gave me similar results, but the folk shops were a bit buried in amazon, Pinterest, eBay, etc. links.
I've always found the Amazon product links in Google hits fairly useless (and suspect)......I mean, yeah. Ok. Yeah, I know what Amazon is. And I know they have everything. So, uh, if I were looking to buy something from Amazon I'd go to Amazon.com...kay? (which I do...more than I should probably)
Re: Last couple statements. Can identify.
Thanks for the tips.
It's amazing how specific the internet has allowed the romance genre to become. It's come a long way from the old school bodice ripper.
I knew someone whose mother wrote traditional religious romance novels. She would have her kids read them and give her suggestions. She'd also give copies of her books as wedding presents when friends and family members got married. I always thought that a christian romance novel was a strange wedding gift and it would be very awkward coming from someone who was related to me.
okay but also we need to know what is the plot of a traditional religious romance novel?? The readership needs answers! Cause Song of Solomon gets real scandalous ("I will climb the tree, I will taste the fruit") and we just neeeever talked about it in church.
Lol well a lot of the Bible is scandalous.
So if most indie romance books are basically angst + smut, most traditionally published romance novels today are actually not "bodice rippers." When done well they should be steamy, but also feature an engaging plot with actual conflict about the relationship (that's realistic and understandable) and opportunities for both characters to grow. Most of them also feature a chicklit side-plot where the MC overcomes something in her life and becomes a better version of herself OUTSIDE of the relationship. Now, a LOT of authors miss the mark, and many of these are not done well. But that's the basic idea. And a Christian romance is this minus the smut. It might have the usual romance tropes--best friend's brother, fake dating, forced proximity, enemies to lovers, whatever. But the relationship is less "animal magnetism + real personality depth" and more "emotional connection."
Now, to someone like me this might seem very boring. But some women find the on-page explicit nature of other romance novels to be really off-putting and uncomfortable, so there's definitely a market here. And I have read books that, while not Christian romance, aren't super explicit that were EXCELLENT (thinking of you, Twice Shy). So I think there's a butt for ever seat.
True, it does overflow with scandal, but of the "sinful" variety, so I imagine the books written for that audience would wants something less "Man commits adultery and murders cuckolded husband only for God to strike down the baby".
Also I have every intention of weaving "bodice-ripper" into my everyday vocabulary, it's the new "cool", as in "man that really ripped my bodice", and "have you tried the new cheesy potatoes? they're a real bodice ripper"
That is a very good question. I think there are a couple of possible plots but I was always afraid to ask. I do know that (fortunately) they were not Amish romance novels.
Oh but an Amish romance novel seems like it would have all the makings of an incredible, tension filled romance novel! Bigwig from the city's breaks down outside Amish, who should happen by? But the beautiful and exceedingly capable Amish widow whose husband died tragically in a butter churn and has never seen fit to remarry but welcomes this man (not into her home, propriety after all) but into her town and slowly wins him over to the technologic refuge of a non-modern world.
Ruth & Boaz-type story would be my guess.
To be fair, Christian romance novels *usually* only feature a kiss at the end, if that. There's not a lot of smut there.
But yeah, I would still probably find it weird!
That is true. If my aunt gave me a copy of her Christian romance novel as a wedding present that would be a lot less awkward than a bodice ripper she'd written. Though I would probably have a nagging suspicion that she was sending me a message that I should've waited to have sex before getting married.
A romance novel is a weird wedding gift and getting one from the author makes you wonder if she knew that hand-made gifts were best and decided this would count or if she had copies to give away and was just trying to save money.
Hm.
I’d hoped they’d be more like an Aella anniversary party followed by a Clive Barker style holly reckoning.
I feared it’d be incest porn with boats and tents and a lot of rain.
Now I kind of want to read a romance novel, which I'm pretty sure I have never had the urge to do before
Colleen Hoover “Verity” if you want something fucked up.
Do I seem like a weirdo who likes fucked up stuff!? I'll check it out right away, thanks.
I always find it so interesting which CoHo book people recommend to start with.
Lol! If you tell me some of the other books you like I can try to make a recommendation
Maybe this would be a good career for me. Librarian, but just for romance.
Um? I'm intrigued by "dark" and "weird." Not bully, though. Not too flatly or solely patriarchal.
I have "Story of the Eye" by Georges Bataille, so.
Hmm okay so like I said above, dark is not my main wheelhouse, but I'll try my best!
A lot of times dark means a toxic relationship, so a lot of them do have some pretty strong patriarchal vibes (sometimes literally!).
Books that a lot of people like that I haven't read that I think would fit the bill:
1) Morning Glory Milking Farm--a paranormal romance that's pretty weird (you can read the summary on Amazon) and sounds dark to me, but reviewers said it was sweet.
2) Hate by Tate James is a very popular reverse harem book that, again, I can't say I've read.
Books I *have* read that might fall into this category--I do think some of the CoHo books are a little darker, especially something like Ugly Love or November 9. I think you might like Naomi Novik, who's a traditionally published writer who writes pretty dark (but, IMO, extremely well written) versions of Eastern European folk tales, some of which have a romantic plot/subplot. Spinning Silver and Uprooted come to mind. Neither is particularly smutty, though, if you're going for that.
What’s the one where it’s about Taylor Swift, basically, and she ties up the secret billionaire owner of the AirBnB she’s staying at and gives him a bj? Also, the guy describes his cock as twitching all the time (I know that doesn’t narrow it down)
...is this a real book lol?
Yes. My wife was listening it with me on a car trip and turned it off because I couldn’t stop laughing (so we never got to Taylor Swift even finding out the handyman she was blowing was a secret billionaire or stopped him from being manipulated into a bad marriage with an evil slut) and she got too mad to tell me the title.
Haha can't say I've read it. As a fellow romance reader, it's your wife's own fault for listening to it in the car!
Where's the laugh react when you need it
I like the classics....like D.H. Lawrence.
Jesse reminded me of Grandpa Simpson: "I used to be with "it"! Then they changed what "it" was. Now what I'm with isn't "it" and what is "it" is weird and strange!"
Katie's scoffing reply to Jesse saying he used to think he was hip ("You did?!") alone was worth the listen.
LOL, yes!
It's a causeway, Jesse! You have to go over the causeway to get to the nude beach (where, not fun fact, I once got a whole-body sunburn).
Also, a "quay" is pronounced like "key."
I thought he was talking about groynes... which is much more apposite :)
Along Lake Michigan we've always called it a breakwater. But WTF??? Key is the pronunciation? My mind is blown.
Apparently "key" is the UK pronunciation that I somehow adopted without realizing it? I guess "kay" is the way that most Americans pronounce it.
I learned the "key" pronunciation, too, either because some American Southern dialects still preserve Britishisms or because my family is full of Anglophiles.
Ugh I guess I'm wrong. It's a revetment. I always called it a breakwater, but breakwaters are offshore. The City of Chicago website has a helpful resource! https://www.chicago.gov/city/en/depts/cdot/supp_info/glossary_of_terms.html
They got the Aella controversy totally wrong. She was getting dragged on Twitter for saying she only showered like 60 times last year.
37
What on earth for? Saving water is my only guess… ewwww. Forget dragging her on Twitter, someone drag her into a bath!
She said it messes up her skin if she showers too frequently, and did clarify that she spot-cleans the pits and cracks much more frequently.
There was a time before I knew any of this. It was a happy time.
Although she later went on to say she acknowledges her nose blindness, has asked others to check her stench, and admitted to receiving messages from friends about her BO.
What an interesting feature to have for someone who insists sex is just another task that can be sold to anyone who pops by.
After all, what are friends for?
EVEN SO.
That and she said she only pooped like 140 times last year. Get that girl some fiber!
Excuse me. She only pooped on 140 DAYS many of those days she pooped multiple times.
If that’s not the sign of a totally healthy diet, I don’t know what is.
Also, I just commented about the pooping habits of a complete stranger so clearly I am the sick one.
That's more than once a week, which is a reasonable frequency (it's about how often my husband showers). The idea that one needs to bathe or shower more often than that is a fairly modern notion, and it's a luxury that's still out of reach for many people. No one should get dragged on Twitter for conserving resources, even if she was trying to save her own skin rather than the planet.
Yeah, I spent a fair amount of time in my youth bathing in a pond because we didn’t have enough water in the well. I’m not part of the luxury class. And if bathing were an out of reach luxury for her for socioeconomic reasons she probably wouldn’t be on Twitter much.
She’s not even that hot
Shame on the ABDL community for fetishizing and appropriating a marginalized identity (baby.) Their culture is not a costume!
BARPOD is supposed to be an inclusive, loving safe space, not a place for trans-age-phobic scum.
Repeat after me: Adult. Babies. Are. Babies.
In fact, BAABs (babies assigned at birth) are much inferior to adult babies.
A BAAB can't be your designated driver, nor can it stand security for your next loan.
Really hope you educate yourself on this pressing human rights issue and do better next time.
Shame on me for posting a reply when you had already made the same joke but better.
OTOH, many ABDLs were ABAB (assigned baby at birth) so is it really appropriation or are they just detransitioners???
Freshly subscribed. Long time listener. Here for Katie's coverage of the lesbian and Jewish angle, and Jesse's horse related content.
I love your user name.
Man. Jude Doyle REALLY does not like Jesse. Is Jude a trans guu now or nonbinary? Also. Jude really does seem unhinged or maybe just online unhinged.
ETA: I really do not get what white bisexual women have to do with Andrew Sullivan or Glenn Greenwald. Gay men are into women since...when? And the "white" thing, is the idea that there is some white supremacist thing going on,?
Because the other thing is that Jude Doyle seems to hold a LOT of contempt for white women.
Everyone knows that the person who gets to rank the queers is the person who has a vagina and is married to a man. Honestly, if that be-vagina’ed person also happened to be white, they would definitely be a Karen.
Straight “queers” were not the future I was promised growing up on Queer as Folk and The L Word. I want a refund.
That’s what happens when “straight = boring & problematic.” Even the straights aren’t straight anymore, but it’s problematic to point that out.
Haha. Which I guess makes Jude Doyle the Karenest of Karens
The tweet is confusingly worded, but the upshot is that there is a (fake) competition between bi women and gay men to be the most problematic, and surprisingly, the bi women won.
Not sure how I feel about you naming him, but you didn't need to be Sherlock Holmes to figure out who it was.
Well. Katie talking abou a former feminist writer who is now trans - kinda gave it away. If this were a fully public forum, I would feel uncomfortable writing Jude's name since I think Jesse would get pilloried over that. But otherwise? They stated things that happened. It isn't speculation. But also Truly. I think Jude Doyle is a contemptible person.
I was thinking Daniel Lavery at first, but it wasn't cutesy enough. Sad that this is basically a genre, "women who transition but who still gossip/snark on social media like it's the jezebel comment section circa 2007"
OMG. I totally was on jezebel then. HA hahaha. Ha.
But I mean. Daniel Lavery married to a man? I think that might be the transphobiest statement ever. Also. No kids. Also. Not sure Daniel cares about Jesse - Grace is the one who cares.
I have given this way too much thought. Sorry
Ooof, you're right -- Grace, like Mallory, write so much with the voice of their "assigned at birth" sexes that I have difficulty remembering that Grace transitioned because I care so little about Grace that I forget her name.
To be honest, I just wanted an excuse to make the Sherlock Holmes joke.
Isn't this a public forum, as in visible to all who care to read it? I thought that was the deal with the free episodes. So Jesse has until it's released to the public (on Monday?) before he's pilloried. ETA: Thanks for Sherlocking this!
I didn’t know that. Oh well, marching into the flames.
Hey, Jude!
Oh Fuck. Yeah. You are right. Now anyone can read the public episode comments.
No I think you’re right. I forgot about it being released too.
Nothing to do with this episode, but I wanted to post a public thank you to my wife for getting me an "It's complicated" T-shirt for Christmas. :) I know, we're not supporting the BARpod merch store, but she figured I could wear it more places than "pervert for nuance".
“Where the Real Gays Go” ~a new banned children’s book from Jesse Singal
Update: between this and Mike Solana’s substack I feel like I know a bunch of gay secrets that straight people are not supposed to know. For any Patrice O’Neal fans, he used to say that Fight Club and the song “Creep” were white secrets. I feel like blood play is a lesbian secret.
Jesse: Don’t say the tweeter’s name
Katie: ok. This is a person who is unhinged; who is a trans dude; who is married to a man; who’s name is not Dude Joyle.
"Leather daddy diaper baby" is the most disturbing tongue-twister
It also can be sing to the Ninja Turtles theme! Try it!
Leather diaper just makes me think of Zardoz
I'm the same way whenever a mouth disgorges a bunch of rifles.
I think
Leather
Diaper
Baby
Daddy
would look good on a shirt, hat and mug.
Or a onesie.
Ooh, tres Balenciaga! I dig!
As soon as Katie said ABDL, I knew a classic Jesse “nooooo” was coming. Well done on the 10,000 primos!
What I learned on B&R today: there’s actually only like 6 people on the Internet.
And one very busy ChatGPT