still.

I wonder if I should go buy the new Entertainment Weekly after all? I mean, I'm still not over the Oliver Wood ("fucking hot" as an off blog convo put it)/Cedric Diggory mixup and I've never read any of Stephani Meyer's books (quite possibly a bit too emo, even for me) but vampires. And, perhaps, they'll recap the series so I won't have to go find/read any of the books after all.

In other vampire/vampiric news, Fanny sent me this a while back and I meant to share it with the rest of yous.

The things they do for television these days...

Vampires, ahoy!

Following on from Fanny's previous post, when she first mentioned that the actor who played Cedric Diggory was to play a vampire, my thoughts were on this chap.

Actually, until about 5 minutes ago when I read Fanny's post, I was still imagining that chap as a vampire. And loving it.

Now that I've sorted out Cedric Diggory (and not lovely Scottish-accented Oliver Wood) in my head, I'm not half as keen.

Fangs.

I was never a huge fan of Cedric Diggory. In the book or the movie.

I mean, he's, like, okay and all. He's an archetype, a placeholder, the smart, talented, sensitive, handsome, kind jock you wish to meet (or I wish to meet. Though I would probably get annoyed with how perfect and good he is and then call him a pansy).

And I was kind of indifferent to the actor playing him in the movie. Except I didn't think he was that hot.

And now he's playing a vampire.

And I am weirdly, bizarrely intrigued (despite the really bad pastiness the vampires have going on. Really, really bad).

It may be a case of two wrongs equalling a right. As so:

A = Robert Pattinson, who I'm largely indifferent to and don't find that good looking
B = The Stephenie Meyer Twilight series that I am also largely indifferent to, given my distaste for angst-y vampires and the women who love them (Bum). Though the books have pretty covers.

Therefore: Indifference A + Indifference B = Embarrassing Interest C

Though this is all moderated by (Love for Kristin Stewart)X.

Another paranormal.

So I'm currently reading this:

I've generally been entertained by the series. Even if they are vampires. So far I'm a few chapters into it.

This latest one has the MainWoman as Chinese. Taiwanese, if you want to get technical. And one part of me goes squueeeeee...There my bitches at! The other part of me goes uh-oh, uh-oh, uh-oh. Danger, danger, danger. Because while I agree with Bum in her argument about the convolutions romance writers go through to place Americans in stories where other peoples would work (probably better, more interestingly {is that a word? Is that word that should be used?}), I always have this dual reaction when there are Asian characters.

So it was rather providential when I read this from Karen from Karen Knows Best:

See, I have realized that I tend to avoid books wherein any of the main characters are Latino, particularly Mexican. Ninety nine times out of a hundred, I can’t buy the cultural makeup the writer is laying down for those characters. More than once I’ve been overheard saying, “Cojones, dammit, not cajones!!!” or “hispanos are human beings, not a different species!”

Which is funny, because what I sometimes take to be stereotypical representation may in reality come from the author’s life expereince. Case in point: Karen Templeton’s character Félix in Baby I’m Yours. I had trouble with him because I thought he was a stereotypical Latino man based on things like George López or what have you. Turns out Ms Templeton based Félix on a number of actual people she knows in New Mexico where she lives.

Whodathunkit?

So am I being racist in reverse? Am I actually assuming—with all the attendant asshattery—that no one can properly write Mexican or Latino characters that I can relate to?

Which is maybe...perhaps...how I feel about non-Asians writing about Asians. Like I think that we're a mystical people who others just can't get, rather than...well, mostly like everyone else and one doesn't need to belong to the club to write about the members.

I don't know.

I want to see more Asians, more minorities in romance (where they are not the mystical or quirky or whatever sidekick, and really just a big offensive cardboard cutout of stereotypes. I'm looking at you, Iris Johanson, Melanie George and others I will remember later). However, I will fall into the trap of looking for errors, how the author gets it wrong.

Contrary? You betcha.

best(est) thing ever

aka "Vampires are made of win"

So much so that a famous professorial type has noticed the trend in vampire-ish books and has blogged about it.

Of course, most of the commenters seem like pretentious wankers (FYI, people, vampires have been around forever. Hee. See? vampires! forever!!) and slag off vampire-ish books as though there were no variety among them.

I do like these comments though:

Comment 1: "I live in Portland, Oregon and recently overheard two Powell's employees discussing this phenomenon. One was explaining to his new-hire charge that "Supernatural Romance" is the largest growing, hottest selling category in fiction right now, a subgenre he described as "women committing every imaginable act of lust and perversion with vampires, werewolves, demons, Lovecraftian tentacled rape gods, basically anything you can imagine as long as it's not a normal human man."

(another person responds):"So, kind of like anime, then?"

Yay person no. 2! I like how science-y types seem to reckon anime and suchlike (comics, graphic novels) are oh-so-cool while, at the same time, being pretentious twats about this...the point being, you can find dreadfully-written books in any shape/style/genre.

Languid-handed vampires ahoy!

Went over to Border's to pick up the book Fanny talked about earlier. Ended up buying this and this instead.

Just finished reading the first one (see pic). Plenty of vampires and a rather unbelievable tale of how two people who love each other keep their hands off each other for over 600 years. I don't want much in my vampire books but, really? That's taking abstinence much too far.

ETA: Since I was half-asleep when I wrote this, I forgot to add this book comes very close to violating one of my taboos in life. Most things, I'm fine with--I figure if some of us fancy diaper-wearing and weeing on each other while performing tantric sex, then good on them. But, Evermore has one of the few things that make me icked out. Or could have, if the author hadn't magicked it away towards the end.
I want Fanny to read this to see what she reckons.