“And the trope, it’s just … that’s it? It’s really just men who are vaguely sexy and slightly awful, but not to the point of being completely toxic?”
“Ideally, yes. But sometimes, they are very, very toxic. Heathcliffe. Mr. Darcy. Christian Grey.”
“Romeo?”
“Oh my god, Romeo! Yes! Walking red flag. Like, the original love-bomber. Complete disaster. Ten out of ten, though.”
— Tropesick, by Lauren Okie, p. 26
Author: Jennifer Mugrage
I'm a wife, mother, Christian, closet Luddite, Neanderthal advocate, incurable book hound.
I'm also the author of The Scattering Trilogy, which is set in 10,000 B.C. Buy, read, pass it on!
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Fat Bear of the Year
I have a very important announcement.
“Backpack” has been voted Fat Bear of the year.
I would have voted for Walker, but I got there too late. Maybe next year.
Made Sick by Tropesick? A Book Review
During the month of October, I like to post about scary things. I guess this book qualifies.
Through a comical series of events, I found myself drafting a contemporary romance novel. I don’t read much in the genre, but I thought it might be a smart idea to try. And where better to start than here, a romance that features a pair of young writers, working on a romance novel together, and every time they write a trope into their novel, it happens in their lives?
I mean, that’s kind of clever.
Also, like a suspiciously large number of contemporary novels out there, this one offers an inside glimpse of the publishing industry. That’s a double-edged sword, of course. I can’t help but be interested in what the industry is like (at least in Okie’s experience), just as I can’t help but be intimidated and repelled by it when I find out.
Anyway.
Tropes, in case you didn’t know, are also known as cliches, things that frequently happen in any given genre. There are so many tropes that, if you have written any fiction at all, I guarantee you have used a few, with or without meaning to. This is not a bad thing. Some tropes, like “not enough beds,” are super contrived, but others have become tropes because they represent common and powerful human experiences. For example, the fact that Absent Father is a trope doesn’t make the experience any less painful for the person experiencing it.
The strength of this book is that the premise allows the author to use a great many common tropes without flinching.
My feelings about this book are deeply mixed, and I’m going to express them in the manner of Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof: “On the one hand … but on the other hand …” There will be some spoilers here.
A pro is that the book takes place in and around New York City.
A con is that this means both the main characters are New Yorkers.
A pro is that both MCs are sweet, likeable people.
A con is that they are both hoes.
A pro is that the story is truly emotional.
A con is that several of the emotional turning points are expressed in pages-long sex scenes.
Another con is that these scenes take place before the characters are truly in love.
Con: not to mention married.
A pro is that the tragic backstory is revealed, little by little, in flashbacks.
A con is that, after a ton of foreshadowing and minimal revelation, there are a bunch of this-changes-everything twists packed into the last few pages. (Wait … is that a trope, too?)
(Spoiler): a pro is the truly unexpected appearance of the Meddlesome Ghost trope right near the end.
Con: (at least, it’s a con to me): Though in retrospect, there were clues about the ghost thing, the atmosphere of the story in no way prepared me for it. I feel this was a missed opportunity to get some chills out of this story. But perhaps this is how ghosts are handled in romances.
I must rant a little bit more about the hoe problem. Katie, the heroine, is presented as sweet, someone who “loves big” even when she has been hurt. She is “bright,” in the sense that her virtue causes a glow that is perceptible to the senses. (She also wears face and body glitter.) She has suffered, but she is not hardened and bitter. And yet, when we first meet her, she is sleeping with a guy she does not even consider her boyfriend, simply because she is a young, successful writer living in NYC and she wants to “have a fun summer.” I’m sorry, but this is really clunky psychology. If you are sleeping around just for fun, you are doing serious mental damage to yourself and to everyone around you.
In fact, both the main characters are presented like this. They are Broken in Some Way (as per the trope), but their brokenness is neither the cause of, nor exacerbated by, their promiscuous behavior. This seems to be a blind spot on the author’s part. It’s not true to life, and it throws off the emotional tone of the book. Rant over.
Appalachian Magic
“Just a little old simple wish,” she said one time more. She reached into a pocket of her patchwork skirt and out came her hand with a pinch of purple-looking dust in the fingers. She flung it onto the fire, which sent up new flames that same shade of purple, with pale, greasy smoke.
“I made my wish before this,” she said, with the words spaced out like as if she was a-reading them out of a book. “I make it now. There was no day when I have not seen my wish fulfilled.”
I’d heard those same words spoken before, long years back. They were what a witch person says to do you harm.
The purple fire cracked and popped as it grabbed the twigs. I had an ugly sense of a crowd gathered close round us–a crowd, maybe not of people, but a crowd. Close in, close enough to see if I looked over my shoulder. I didn’t look. I knew words I’d better say my own self, another set of words, and say them quick.
“Hazel Techeray,” I said, a-remembering the thing as I repeated it over. “I forbid you this house and premises. I forbid you the sheds and stables. I forbid you each bed, that you may not breathe upon them. Breathe elsewhere, until you have climbed air hill, until you have counted air fence post, until you have crossed air water. And thus dear day may come again into this house, in the name of the three holy ones of power.”
Right as I finished, the fire blinked out, like as if somebody had doused water on it. And that sense of the crowd all drawn up behind and round us, it went, too, and I well knew that she and I stood there alone.
–After Dark, by Manly Wade Wellman, pp. 87 – 88
Seen While Out and About
Here in Idaho, everyone enjoys riding in pickup trucks.
Name Archaeology
I have what might be good news for prospective parents looking to name their child. There are fewer total names in the world than you might think.
For example, here is an incomplete list of names that mean “John”:
- John
- Ian
- Evan
- Shane
- Sean or Shawn
- Jan or Yan
- Johan or Johann or Yohann
- Giovanni or Yovanny
- Ivan
- Juan
- Jean (male French name)
- Jane
- Jan
- Janet
- Janice
- Janelle
- Jeanne (female French name)
- Juana
- Jana
- Seana or Shawna
- Joanne or Joanna? Needs some looking into.
- Eva
- Evelyn or Evalynn?
And then there are the last names, everything from Johnson to Ivanova.
Here are some derivations of Mary:
- Mary
- Mara
- Maria
- Anne-Marie
- Marianne
- Marion
- Polly (a British nickname for Mary, apparently derived from a young child’s attempt to say it)
Margaret:
- Margaret
- Maggie
- Greta
- Gretchen (-chen is a German diminutive)
- Gretel
Elizabeth:
“Elizabeth, Betty, Betsey and Bess/all went together to seek a bird’s nest./They found one, with five eggs in it,/all took one, and left four in it.”
And that’s not counting Liz, Lizzie, Lisa, Liza, Elspeth, etc.
Derivations of Augustus, a Latin word meaning “great”:
-
- Augustus
- Gus (or, in the Bertie Wooster books, “Gussie.” For a man. I know.
- August
- Agus (an Indonesian name — via Holland?)
All that to say, to my delight I recently discovered the origin of another popular name, Louis.
Apparently, Louis, a traditional name for kings of France, is derived from Clovis, a Frankish king in the 400s – 500s, who converted to Christianity and expanded his territory so greatly that he may be properly said to be the first king of France.
So, we have derivations of Clovis:
-
- Louise
- Lewis
- Lou
- Louie-Louie!
- Louise
- Louisa
- Luanne?
- Lula? Tallula?
Imagine finding out that your name goes all the way back to the 400s. Or the first century (John). Or the beginning of the race (Adam).
Or better yet, just don’t mess with Hecate
“Slit the throat of a sheep at the pit’s edge and let the blood drain into the darkness. Place its body on a pyre, right there next to the pit. Burn it whole. Then pour honey into the pit and beg the goddess for her sweet favour. And then you must walk away. You may hear footsteps close behind you; you may hear dogs bark. You must not turn around. Do you understand?”
–Madea, instructing Jason about how to entreat Hecate, in No Friend to This House by Natalie Haynes, p. 180
Rag-Bag Beanie
This is a simple rib-knit beanie. The only fancy thing about it, is that the yarn is made from twisting together scraps from my stash to create a “bag of rags” look. This is called a “Russian yarn ball.” And yes, they do frequently come apart as we are unwinding the Russian yarn ball, and have to be put back together again.
You could create a Russian yarn ball that was more Court Jester and less Bag of Rags, but I like this darker, duller look. I have a bonnet made this way, and I love it, but it turns out there are more opportunities to wear a beanie.
The beanie pattern is one a I photocopied from a library book years ago, and the idea for the Russian yarn ball is out of another knitting book from the library.
Beta-Read this Wild Book
Want to read the story behind this image?
I’m looking for beta readers for the draft of my latest novel, The Bright World. If you’re interested, let me know through the Contact page, and I’ll e-mail you a copy of the draft. I’m looking for what is confusing, unsatisfying, or what you would like to see developed more.
Here’s a map of the world it takes place in:
Still My Favorite Kid Quote
C’mon, Spidey, let’s go up to the Celestial City!
–one of my kids to the other, years ago
That’s when I knew I was doing it right.
