My sister sent this – which was taken from a fan fiction community where someone has a little issue with a story – and I’m still laughing.
Okay, picture this:
Your dearest friend in the world has disappeared, and you go to find them. You search for two nights, and when you finally discover them, they’re weak, tired, a large rock has crushed their leg, their skin is scraped up and torn, there’s a large, deep cut on their side, and they’re having trouble staying conscious.
Do you:
A. Call for help?
B. Try to carry your friend back home?
C. Try to heal them yourself?
D. Confess your love for them and have sex with them right there?If you picked D, I hope you don’t find me horribly injured and needing medical attention.
The sad thing about this is, I recognise this sort from some romance novels.
I remember how I laughed my head off a few times when I read this erotic romantic suspense novel.
The 31-year-old hero is a world-famous bodyguard — with a CV that’s riddled with all sorts of military awards and had had a few tours in Falklands/Afghan/Gulf War/etc — who’s been assigned by a F.B.I. pal to protect the heroine, a 6ft world-famous supermodel. (FYI, the hero is 6ft 6in.)
He believes he’s assigned to protect her from a stalker, but oh no, it’s much more than that. The hero doesn’t know what she knows: an “inscrutable and evil” leader of the Triad wants her as His Woman. He lusts after her golden blonde hair, ice blue eyes, and pearl-white skin. Oh, and he reckons she would make a great addition to his list of gifts he offers to his important and equally evil guests.
Not only that, the heroine carries a secret, bestowed by her Pulitzer-winning physicist father who’s been murdered. Her job as a supermodel enables her to travel around the world, passing information to certain important government agents. And the evil triad leader wants to get his paws on that secret. The heroine doesn’t tell any of this to the hero because she doesn’t want to endanger his life. Never mind the fact he’s a highly decorated war veteran and a trained bodyguard.
Anyroad, there’s a strong attraction between them, but he’s resisting. She doesn’t understand why and decides that he’s too good for her. Through her thoughts we get a massive infodump about how her mother died young, how her father was frequently absent, which gave her a sad, lonely childhood. Still, as her bottom lip quivers, it’s her destiny to save the world (e.g. U.S.A.) from the baddies.
After getting shot at, the hero finally twigs that a trigger-happy stalker isn’t a typical stalker, the hero babies the heroine into telling him the truth. After she does, he basically says “Hell, no! Not my woman!” and takes the heroine underground. Meanwhile, the heroine fusses about whether he loves her.
They somehow decide to stay at a very posh hotel and he suggests they go to its five-star restaurant. In spite of her ‘breaking heart’ after learning that the hero’s former wife is a bitch from Hell, the heroine bravely agrees. After she has a luxurious bath in a luxurious “Greek-style” bath, she wears an expensive glittery long dress the hero bought from the hotel’s shop where he purchased with his – which he mentions ever so casually – “Centurion“.
They dine and dance to a piano song before wandering out to a beautifully landscaped garden. They finally kiss, and so passionately. Naturally they are spotted by the triad leader’s men, which causes the bullets to fly.
As they dash from the hotel garden, the hero makes a quiet grunt, which puzzles the heroine. Still, he takes the heroine into a maze of city alleys. As they wait in an unlit alley, the heroine somehow notes the crimson blood soaking his black silk shirt. omg! He’s been shot in the shoulder! omg! The heroine then realises she really does love him and he really does love her and so, she tells him this.
As soon as they find a refuge in a run-down hotel, he picks the heroine up “with ease” and has a wild monkey shag with her against a wall. This with a bullet still in his shoulder. At this point I was laughing so hard that I couldn’t finish this romantic suspense novel. And after five years, the memory of this novel still burns.
I don’t know whatthere was to laugh about. Everyone knows that romance heroes have rock-like chests and steely strength (though one very important part of their steely/rock-like bodies are carefully covered in velvet), so although they bleed, that’s just to help someone locate the entry hole of the bullet/sword. It doesn’t really harm them much more than a bullet/sword entering a reinforced steel door, or a stone wall.
You’re such a long-time reader of the genre I’m surprised I even have to explain that to you!
;-P
Bwahaha!
I’d LOVE to know who came up with the velvet thing. It makes me think of Elvis in a velvet painting. Bizarre, but hey. Hm, heroines have silken hair and silk skin, don’t they?
I wonder what type of skin does a villain have. Sandpaper?
I think you’re right that the heroines are silky, but the heroes’ rock hardness seems to metamorphose certain parts of the heroines into pebbles.
Don’t villains tend to have pockmarks (or possibly acne)? Heroes have a monopoly on the kind of scars that make a man look devilishly attractive.
If you want to enhance your reading experience in regard to bullet-proof heroes I advise you to read “Angel in a read dress” by Judith Ivory. You’ll have a field day with that, I guarantee. But the example you have given isn’t bad either. BTW: The whole plot sounds wonderfully campy.
@Laura
lol!
A trend of giving villains pockmarks drive me nuts. I think giving villains deformed faces, scars or similar is the laziest way of dehumanising them. It doesn’t do real-life people with similar physical “imprefections” any favour as well.
@Kerstin
I avoid Judith Ivory’s books as a rule, but the way you put it, I’m seriously tempted to give AIARD a try. I think I will.
It really was campy. The author didn’t intend it to be as the story tone was right up the so-serious-that-no-one-dares-smile alley, which made it even more hilarious.
“It doesn’t do real-life people with similar physical “imprefections” any favour as well.”
Very true. We haven’t got a TV, but have you seen “James Partridge, who is chief executive of Changing Faces, [who] suffered severe burns in a car accident aged 18 [...] front[ing] the Five News lunchtime bulletin”? Apparently he was going to be on every day for a week.
In the BBC news item I saw it said that:
The charity’s head of campaigns, Winnie Coutinho, said: “We believe that television can play a big role in changing attitudes and breaking down prejudices.
“Changing Faces is keen to learn whether the public would really accept someone with a disfigurement in this role once they see James Partridge reading the news next week.”
I wonder how the experiment went.