AAR

[Gail K.]

I was at Target today and was blown away by the utter ridiculousness of category romance titles...I swear, they get worse every year (which is about the frequency with which I check out that aisle in the book section).

From the Harlequin Presents Line:

Virgin for the Billionaire's Taking
Italian Boss, Ruthless Revenge
The Sicilian's Innocent Mistress
At the Sheikh's Bidding

The old Harlequin titles were much more evocative, not this paint-by-numbers crap.

Anyhoo, in light of this week's enormous collapses on Wall Street, I better be seeing a decrease in the number of tycoons and the like in category romance. Women like men with JOB SECURITY, ya know.

[NoirFemme]

LOL Gail. Apparently, based on what I've heard from H/S editors and authors, those titles are like brand names for readers. Even though they sound fussy and overblown, and may not match the plot exactly, the reader can grab a handful, knowing what to expect based on the title. It's weird, but it's lucrative.

As for the downturn in the economy, I think it will make more readers flock to tycoons and billionaires--it's the little people and the six-figure companies that are hurting right now; Warren Buffet and Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, etc are still super wealthy.

[Manda]

Yeah, somehow I don't think The Unemployed Junk Bondsman's Secret Baby is going to draw in the readers. Though I see your point, Gail--it's kind of hard to stomach all those gazillionaires when most people are hurting financially.

But I suspect it's true that these books will be more popular than ever now that the economy is so bad. Similar to the way movies about champagne sipping rich people were popular during the Great Depression. People want escape--especially during hard times.

[Mingqi]

LOL! This post made my day!

[Yulie]

[cheri]

Gail, hilarious post thanks for doing it. Yulie, so you really are looking over the Medaterian Ocean(sorry I killed the spelling of that.) I lived overseas as a child and loved swimming in the ocean there. It was literally turquoise in color and so warm. I've never forgotten how beautiful it was. Even though I saw a lot of things that weren't very pretty, that ocean wasn't one of them. cheri

[Yulie]

Hi Cheri,

Yes, I have a view of the sea from my living room window. At work I have to stretch a bit to see it, but it's still there . Beautiful, and much warmer water than other places I've visited (I'm still traumatized by my first encounter with the ocean on the Oregon Coast, pretty as it was). Where did you live?

BTW, I have to use the spell-checker to get it right myself. Good thing the Hebrew name is simpler.

[cheri]

I am SO JEALOUS! I think any time you can see the ocean or hold a baby is a miracle. I would love to have the ocean within driving distance let alone look out my window. that is where when it is all said and done I will be. I've already told every member of my family to dump me in the ocean when I'm gone. How morbid is that! LOL! I lived in Algeria for close to 3 yrs when I was a child. We lived in a small city named Sidi Bel Abes (I think I spelled the Abes wrong) right outside of Oran. We also spent some vacation time in Morocco among other places. I've been to the state's oceans and the Caribean and nothing compares in color to the M. Really, it is magnificent. Are you originally from there? you mentioned Oregon? cheri

[Yuri]

[Gail K.]

Happy Friday from www.eharlequin.com!

From the Silhouette Desire Line:

The Prince of Midtown (not)
The M.D.'s Mistress
His Expectant Ex


From the Silhouette Special Edition Line:

Millions to Spare (not)
Hitched to the Horseman
The Daddy Verdict


From the Harlequin Romance Line:

Abby and the Playboy Prince (who has to get a job!)
Texas Ranger Takes a Bride
Crazy About Her Spanish Boss


*Parenthetical Comments Mine, snicker.

Harlequin Marketing Dept: quit insulting our collective intelligence! You suck.

[Gail K.]

[MaryK]

[Kass]

Billionaires are doing great. It's the rest of us who are getting shafted.
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[MarianneM]

The headline of this thread mentions "recessionary times"... Not to throw cold water around, but by definition a recession is two quarters of negative economic growth. Two quarters equals 6 months.

At this point, although there are fireworks and cries of "we'll all be killed/die/be beggared" in the halls of power, we haven't yet had one quarter of negative economic growth, much less two. Of course, Washington and Congress are predicting the end of the world as we know it if we don't pass a huge bailout bill for those folks who have a small yearly income, like $30,000 a year, and felt that they should be able to buy a $400,000 house and keep it. Because they wanted it. Now. And we must also bail out the so-called smart banks who issued these "subprime" loans to these cluelessly optimistic people.

And they're going to do this with our tax money. Well, we had to bail out the Savings and Loans in the 1990s with our tax money, even though many prudent people, like myself and my husband, and I'm sure many of you, had previously decided that a savings and loan was an iffy place to store their money. So we didn't. Too bad. We still had to pay for it with our taxes.

Our society has decided that no one should have to suffer the consequences of their bad judgment. That's also too bad. Because the only way to achieve seasoned good judgment is to have suffered the consequences of your own bad judgment.

At any rate, we won't know if we have had one quarter of negative economic growth til the end of this month. Then, if the last quarter of this year is also a period of negative economic growth, we can say we are in a recession. Nice Christmas present, isn't it?

Marianne [who is cranky because she has just been through 11 days of no electricity in a hot Houston summer after IKe.]

[MaryK]