These few days, I went both on binge eating and binge reading. Both affected my mental and physical health in no-good way. I'll exclusively talk about the latter in this post.
I indulged myself with romance novels, mainly Harlequin. I selected them based on how interesting are their premises from the synopsis in Goodreads and the comments by their readers. Here are some of them.
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| My book selections. Judge away, I bow my head in shame. |
I can hear what you're thinking just from seeing the titles and covers. A loud WHAT and DIRTY BOOKS! and TACKY! Well, this is why they are called guilty pleasure. I know too much of them are bad and too early when you first exposed to this genre is bad too. I feel ashamed to have read these books, but some days when I need something light, happy-ever-after guaranteed, and can make me roll my eyes in 1. disbelief, 2. disgust, 3. mockery, I'll read them. The aftertaste is 1. sated after fulfilling my binge, 2. ASHAMED, and 3. guilty. But enough of that.
I am seeing a disturbing theme serving as universal backbone to some of these books... The Stockholm syndrome, where a dominant male swept into the female protagonist life, both forcefully and unwanted, did nasty things to her, and got her love and devotion forever after. Ouch. These books set women emancipation movement far backward into Victorian era. Let's review some of them by the level of godawfulness.
3. The Highest Stakes of All
In The Highest Stakes of All, we are presented with a dangerously irresponsible father, his beautiful young adult daughter (who is afraid to defy her father unhealthy policies with her far sounder opinions) as heroine, and the hero with perfect physical description and of course an old baggage burdened upon him by some woman from his past. This book is highly disturbing. First, the father is practically peddled his daughter as 'attention diverter' in his globetrotting poker games. I'm speechless. How can a father allow, even ask his daughter wearing revealing clothes? If I wore clothes like she wore in the book, my father will lock me. Then, the grandest bad fatherly act ever... Betting his daughter against five hundred thousand pounds (if I recall the currency correctly).
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| Wikimedia Commons |
Like this, but instead of chips, a living, breathing human being.
And of course, he lost. Being both a gentleman and coward, he surrendered his bet - the daughter.
The 19 year old daughter is bestowed with every winning features a mortal can have. Killer physique and inherently nice heart, almost a Snow White-like character. So sweet. But there is something wrong in her brain circuit. She whines about how she hates her current state of life as accessory in her father's dealings, but she doesn't do a thing. It's not like she doesn't have any other choice. She can easily contact her aunt and uncle in UK and ask them to bring her home, closer to college life she badly wants. Instead, she chooses to follow her father, bows to his dangerous schemes. It only takes ONE call, but she doesn't make it. She trusts her father will protect her from any sticky situation because he has extracted her from one. One good deed against a long tallies of godawful deeds? One good deed wins. And at the gambling table? No better. No better. It just takes a NO and a scream like, "NO, NO I AM TOTALLY NOT THIS CREEP'S TROPHY GIRLFRIEND. Worse than that, I'm his daughter." But she doesn't do that. Oh, no. Unfortunately, her tongue is tied at that moment. And so she is whisked against her will by her father's opponent to the millionaire's private island.
Being a Harlequin, the opponent is a handsome, perfectly sculpted Greek (I don't know why Harlequin authors are so crazy with Greek, Spanish, and Italian heroes) millionaire, age not mentioned. In the midst of Greece economic crisis, it's difficult to believe that there still is Greek millionaire left. The millionaire has painstakingly tracked the father-daughter duo for revenge. In his admirable tracking, he neglects to ascertain two vital things, namely 1. the real relationship between the femme fatale he deems responsible for the crime he avenges and the elderly gentleman who is the real criminal and 2. the age of the femme fatale. 1 and 2 will be vital to the storyline and overall icky factor. He eagerly executes his revenge (before checking the daughter's ID - I don't know why he can be and stay a millionaire with mind like that) with the threat of kidnapping and rape charge looms high for him. Then he realizes his horrible mistake. Essentially, the first sex the millionaire has with the daughter is rape, because she's unwilling. It feels creepy because he seems far older than the daughter. After the rape, does the daughter threaten to sue or ask him to return her to her stable relatives? Nah. She longs for the millionaire, she has no will whatsoever to escape. Especially after she found a helpless cute girl (later in storyline we'll learn that she's the millionaire's daughter but he doubts her legitimacy) and acts nanny to her. When the chance to leave the millionaire comes, she refuses to go because it means jumping from the frying pan into the fire or whatsoever (in this thing, I completely agree with her decision, seeing how awful her stepmother is). This is the rare occasion when her brain works as it should be. She and the millionaire admits their love to one another, with plans for marriage seriously considered.
What I learn: you can fall in love with your rapist, and it's totally OK. But only if he is loaded, handsome, perfectly sculpted, and all that blah. Your rapist too, can fall in love with you until he cannot wait to make your commitment more permanent. You should not try to escape with any method, although you totally deserve your freedom.
2. The Greek's Forced Bride
If you are a normal human being, the title should make you wince. Nobody likes to force-marry someone. To lay the bare outline, our heroine, Natasha, catches her fiance in the midst of the act with her sister. The other witness is her soon-to-be brother-in-law, Leo (another Greek millionaire - in the midst of Greece economic crisis they seem to be a thriving breed), who almost precedes her in barraging Natasha's fiance office to kick his ass for siphoning company cash. Natasha runs away and loses her self-control and cool logic. Leo catches up with her. What happens next is the classic semi-abduction (I don't wanna go with him, but I can't see another solution, besides, he's so persuasive...). Leo has lusted after Natasha since the engagement between Natasha and his stepbrother is still well and good. Natasha reluctantly reciprocated after being kissed, fondled, and everything that can be counted as sexual assault. Then of course the stepbrother and sister strike back, leaves Natasha with gold digger mark and no choice beside marrying Leo.
Sigh. Fortunately, this book isn't so rampant with Stockholm syndrome, at least not as awful as the previous book. Although whisked you away forcefully when you are a damsel in considerable distress and unstable condition is a nasty thing to do. What if the whisker is insane/ deranged/ dangerous criminal hidden behind the perfect smooth facade as a millionaire? After all, Natasha barely knows Leo. She is just being engaged for several months and only communicates with Leo in soon-to-be-in-law capacity before that.
What I learn: again, Greek millionaire isn't a dying breed. It doesn't count as sexual assault if your body respond well and the one doing the assault is one sexy hot-blooded Greek millionaire.
1. Savage Surrender
Our heroine, Sophie, is adorable in the beginning. She is quick-witted and sharp-tongued. Clever and cool-headed, too. She literally stumbles into fortune one rainy day. She gets a position boost, from a lowly employee to private secretary to the Greece-based mother of the company owner. I usually dislike sheer luck, but this time, I'll forgive it. Then comes her son into the picture. Alex is a womanizer who apparently doesn't understand the meaning of word no and so confident of himself that he unable to comprehend that, yeah, not every heterosexual/ bisexual woman can be charmed by you, asshole. So he keeps on trying to get Sophie. With charm. When charm fails, he tries harassment, which elicits firmer rejection. But he keeps on trying. And when Sophie flirts lightly with his friend, he roars with illogical jealousy. Sophie, of course, fights back. And he keeps silent for awhile.
But then a minor earthquake rocks the island. Sophie's employer decides they should go to England and tells Sophie it will be okay if she sees her family. She agrees, albeit reluctantly. The thought of comes back home revives old memories. Then Alex tries to seduce her again in a very inopportune time. The bane of Harlequin heroines, BODY RESPONSE, befalls her because of the desire for her lover she has locked away for 5 years starts to trickle back. Alex goes away smugly, believes that he wins Sophie.
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| From http://sunflowerfieldsawards.com/ |
Yep, won like a trophy.
Sophie goes home, becomes a nervous wreck, anticipates to see her old flame (which becomes her old flame while he's still married - hello adultery!). Alex follows her and of course successfully finds her and wiggles to be her companion to a party that is hosted by her old flame and his completely nasty, without-redeeming-inner-beauty-whatsoever bitch of wife. Sophie kisses her old flame passionately in the hidden place. Only it isn't too hidden because Mrs. Old Flame sees them and Alex too. Alex gets worked out and declares that he will marry Sophie. Sophie refuses. Alex forces her. Sophie, afraid to be outed as 'the other woman', agrees very reluctantly (although Mrs. Old Flame is very promiscuous it is highly unlikely that people will blame Mr. Old Flame if he commits adultery, although the adultery is first committed when Sophie was 18 and Mr. Old Flame... 33. Barely legal). Sophie becomes very passive and apparently loses her wits. I became fed up and skipped. And found, surprise, surprise, Alex slaps Sophie. During honeymoon, no less. Sweet. And yes, Alex gets what he wants, sex with Sophie, with Sophie acts totally passive because she still doesn't want him, which makes it non-consensual, which makes it rape. And during the act Sophie is presented with the 'triumph glittering in Alex's eyes'. Sophie's passiveness is zombie-like, which indicates that she is very probable depressed. In this point, I felt my stomach lurched with disgust. But then, comes the BODY RESPONSE. And Alex acts real attentive when she is sick. Sophie then realizes she loves Alex. I almost vomited. Then Sophie receives a news that makes her to go home in hurry while Alex is away on business trip. She goes home, meets the old flame, old flame tries to kiss her and accidentally witnessed by Alex, who must be 1. eagle-eyed or 2. voyeuristic if it is about Sophie. Another misunderstanding. Then love declaration and big happy ending.
This book is a rapist apology, to quote one comment at Goodreads. I cannot support Sophie and Alex to be united because 1. Alex is a bastard who tries to make Sophie jealous by seducing his friend's sister (completely fails, of course), the seduction isn't only comprised by kiss and adoring words, which makes him a heartless bastard; and 2. Alex harasses Sophie sexually and finally rapes her. By supporting their relationship, it means that the reader justifies the rape and harassment, which no sane woman will support. This book is a very clear example of Stockholm syndrome because Alex rapes and is very nasty toward Sophie, yet Sophie falls for him.
What I learn: the same with the previous two books.
Will somebody writes a good Harlequin with empowering moral lesson? As for those books and their comrades with similar storyline...
