Hello again, my friends…
I think I’m going to just talk to you… like an article but more personal than that. And, I’m going to share through an event that is more recent. One which is in my head, and will be there for a while. It is care giving for my mother. She recently passed away. That’s pretty heavy… so let’s back up. Pre-death.
It was about 9 months into her moving in with my husband and me. She was reluctant to come live with us because she thought she was going to be in the way. After a time, she became much more comfortable… this is largely because my husband made it clear that he loved her and wanted her with us. I was thrilled to see her relax and make herself at home. I pictured bonding with my mother after all these years. Not so. It was my husband and my mother who bonded in a way I didn’t understand. They could carry on a conversation without really talking… much like my brother and I use to do!
It was fair. My husband put up with my brother and me doing this so the least I could do is get over myself and find other interests while they were doing their bonding thing.
What to do! A friend recommended that I read romance novels… something that was just for me. Hmmm… I had never read one before! My reading had always been much different. But when free reading material presented itself at the local postal center, I decided to give it a whirl.
I left the postal center with no less than three books (Have you ever read one of these? Holy Cats!) And, when I was home, chores done, I climbed into a corner of the sofa and began…
And again I say, “Have you ever read one of these?” I wasn’t two pages into the first one and fraternal twins had been sent off by their father to marry guys that they didn’t love, and to live in places that are basically terrible and only a snake would love… And I mean that sincerely, because one woman married a man lower than the ground and he did every terrible thing known to the devil (perhaps the writer of the book!) and the other woman went to Brazil to a coffee plantation, and had more encounters with snakes than Indiana Jones! And, these are really BIG FAT muscular snakes! The guy who owned the plantation even had one for a PET! These women went through more trauma trying to get to the lap of their real true loves than Romeo and Juliet! By the time this first novel was over, I was looking for snakes every time it got dark and was too chicken to take a walk in the yard! Snakes! Yuck!
The second novel: A horse rancher who is of course a hunk and half, who raises Arabian horses… A stud farm run by a stud! Of course. Why not? If he isn’t lying down in some position that would make a new bride blush he’s on that horse of his. Lincoln McKenzie… But we call him “Linc”… “Ah Linc, hold me!” Holy Cats! Get a room! Anyway, he’s been hot and bothered for his next door neighbor since he was 17 and she was 9 (this begs the question if that’s even legal!) and she of course thinks he’s hot stuff too… (Hmmm…. some girls just mature faster, yes?) He kisses her on her 16th birthday and that’s the ballgame folks, he can’t wait until she’s legal and she can’t wait to be anything but a virgin just for him.
But no! His parents (his father and his beautiful not-so-faithful step-mother) hit the 16 year old Holly North’s parents’ in a head on car crash and the step-mother dies (halleluia the bad lady is gone) and along with both of Holly’s parents (boo-hoo the good parents with one daughter) die as well.
Linc (ah, Linc, kiss me and hold me again) holds Holly to comfort her that fateful night and they bond yet again.
Oh man! I had to take a break! Mush, mush and I don’t mean ye huskies!
Next day Linc showed up looking for his true love, but Holly’s aunt had whisked her away to the big bad city of New York. There, Holly (whose middle name is Shannon) becomes in only 6 years the TOP of all TOP super models for every thing… Clothes, make-up, hair products… You name it, she’s the girl for the modeling gig. But she still remembers, of course, how to rope a cow, ride a horse, build a camp fire and cook on it… Heck she’s better than Dale Evans!
So! Holly decided she wanted a photo shoot on her parents old ranch and she convinces her boss (who would also like to bed the lovely Holly/Shannon but she wants to just be friends… yeah that’s real!) to go there. So of course they head back to the old homestead.
Now. I’ll try to make this part short and painless. Linc hates models because he believe they can’t love according to him… Really love a man. In addition, he believes they’re basically sex objects who pander clothes among other things… And, we’ll just leave it at that! Holly aka Shannon the super model still is a virgin and has fought off every beautiful man on the planet but Linc her true love…. What! Is she saving herself for him? Who knows. She just wants to have someone who “does it for her.” You get the drift? So…
I take you to a place up in the mountains that is special to our little cowgirl-starlet… She sets up a camp that would put Tex Ritter to shame and then it begins to rain… But then a full moon also comes out in the rain.. How is that possible? Ah well, she looks out of her tent just as lightning flashes and who does she see on his Arabian Stallion that is rearing in the moonlit rainy night? Hunky beautiful Lincoln McKenzie. He happens to fall off his horse when the horse stumbles coming down the mountain in the rain… Linc hits his head! Oh no! Save him, Holly… And… SHE DOES! Of course she has to take off her blouse to take care of his horse and she has to help Hunky Linc to her tent to nurse him; and she has to take his clothes off that are wet and put him in the one-person sleeping bag… And you got it! … She has to put her virgin body into that one-person sleeping bag to protect her own health. He wakes up and you can imagine what goes from there! Kissy-kissy shoo-shoo bop and a whole lot more!
And then that’s the entire rest of the book… He’s in pain wanting her but willing to drive himself to the edge of insanity making it with her BUT not taking her because she’s a virgin and she’s oh-so-willing to learn but blast… he wont’ take her because she’s a virgin!
300 pages of this! Holy Cats. Did I say Holy Cats? Geeze Louise, get a room you two!
I’ve decide after reading this book that I have no sex life! I mean these are the horniest two people on the planet! But of course he doesn’t want to hurt her so he just drives himself crazy instead.
If I had read this stuff when I was a virgin my life would have been very different I fear. I’m not sure HOW but holy cow, these people are really horny! I kept thinking, “When do they work?” Do they EAT? They must be the thinnest people on the planet since they’re living on love alone! But no, they aren’t because enter a sub-plot to this book which is that Linc thinks that if Holly is a model she doesn’t really love a man, she just has physical relations.
Yes, he does finally take her, but even THAT has torment and pain it it. When Link does, his angry-at-all-models attitude starts getting in the way as he recounts a scene in his mind of the lovely Holly aka Shannon cuddling up to some male model in a shoot (entirely professional but in Linc’s mind it’s cheap thrills in action) and then he doesn’t believe she’s a virgin so… But surprise! She IS! Linc you idiot! He hates himself anew and there’s more pain and sub-plot. And of course, we have the whole trust issue to deal with now because he violated her in anger and she’s feeling wounded as well she should. But geeze! How complicated can this get? Here it is:
I counted a total of 8 sub-plots in this book all centered around unrequited love! And yes… Holy cats! SOMEbody take a dang shower! When this thing finally ended I was so tired you’d have thought I’d just done a romantic cruise with hubby and we never left the cabin! Holy cats!
I can’t say that I would ever read one of these books again… not that it wasn’t an experience. It took care of the time on my hands… so I didn’t worry about my mother, so that I didn’t plan too far into the next day of care giving, so that I could get away from my responsibilities.
It was good for me. Was it good for you?
Carolyn Thomas Temple