My Recent Comments

Thanks! Michelle, that's horrible!  Aunt Cheryl, I agree about the protective bubble! Glenn is getting better and the pink around his ankle is getting less colorful. He is scheduled to see our family doctor on Wednesday for a follow up. I think we have been burning the candle at both ends lately. Accidents etc. can happen any time but I think we are going to make a concerted effort to slow down our daily life...and cook with shoes!

Sparkle, Urgent Care is a walk-in clinic but many of them also have regular appointments and patients too, but they have longer and weekend hours and rotating doctors. Some are better than others. We had one where we used to live that had an awesome doctor. This one near our new home just seems to not be as good. The main difference between Urgent Care and the ER here is $$$$ for less complicated things that do not need specialized medical equipment and often the Urgent Care can do triage to determine if something can be done without hospitalization. Urgent Care is the same as primary care doctor in cost give or take depending on the rates your insurance company contracts with them. An ER visit can cost up to 10 times as much for the same thing. The insurance we have now is fairly lousy and everything comes out of our pocket with no co-pays to lessen anything. Until we reach thousands of dollars, the insurance covers nothing except a lower negotiated rate than for non-insured. But we are lucky to have any insurance much less for the whole family because more and more small companies here are dumping insurance benefits. Almost every year his company has to change insurance because the rates just keep climbing astronomically. But, I am glad he went to the ER because waiting to get antibiotics was not an option and the IV to start I am sure helped a lot. This time the wait was fairly short at the ER.

That's neat what you do. I am way too squeamish to work in medicine (yet I love the Medical romances!) but I must say there is nothing better than some of the medical people I have encountered.

I have almost done that myself to a couple of friends and sometimes!  Well, sometimes I do say I love you to me friends so that isn't the bad part...it's the "sweetie" that comes afterwards!

I just got another huge book that I am dying to read ---950+ pages!  I do love the author so I can't not read it but maybe I will count some short novellas as books to compensate in tems of numbers.

I would hope ratings are optional and do not hurt a certain book if someone chooses not to rate a book. I hate giving book ratings. I hate looking at ratings on Amazon and RT and other places. One thing I like about the current format is that it let bloggers choose. If someone wants to do ratings, great, but if someone doesn't, there is also room for that style too. One of the things that I absolutely detest about Amazon as a review site is this battle of ratings and I think it encourages a sort of atmosphere that makes that site unpleasant while this site is more pleasant quite frankly. Yes, one difference is the different group of people here. I much prefer a one sentence comment than a rating which is VERY highly subjective. I do not necessarily want to follow someone else's rating system.

Yes, tweak to encourage new people but do not tweak over the good things that makes this site uniqe and special in some attempt to make it easier--when it was not a problem in the first place. We already have a group of dedicated bloggers who are here for whom these changing formats are making it less appealing, not more. Don't throw out the baby with the bath water as they say. Yes, encourage new people to come aboard but please don't alienate those of us who are here either. It's not that I think there is some hidden plan but in this call for more, more, more bloggers, I do think maybe some of the beauty of what we already have is getting overshadowed and people are rushing in with tweaks to make other people write blogs in a certain pre-defined way now that would make us all adhere to some format that is their choosing, not the individual's. Penn was saying people could write short reviews---great, let them but now I am hearing ratings and stars and how to organize the blog into sections etc. Suddenly dedicated bloggers who do not fit the profile of what some people want  are being sort of asked to fit someone else's idea of what they should be doing. I think both groups deserve respect and consideration. I don't ask people to write reviews like I do and I like the variety and flexibility here. I think one of the best things about last year's Challenge was how it said that our blogs were as individual as we are. That in itself was one of the most inspiring messages for women and for me. I was new to the community and that was what snagged me in ---I really believed that no one would try to force me into some predetermined idea of what reading should be. If you want to rate, great but don't make people. If you want to write short reviews great. But don't presume everyone wants a form that encourages what you want.  A change now in midstream should also accommodate current bloggers. Can't we have mutual respect and a flexible form for everyone? I do review elsewhere and I am swamped with books I need and want to read and I just do not have time to change my writing style again to fit a new form and slow down my reading pace even more.

Yes, it doesn't make sense to read tons of plot summaries attached to books but when reading blogs , I like reading plot summaries first if they are  there. 

I think I am getting hit on all sides with review format changes.  One place I review suddenly wants me to rewrite 200+ old reviews to make them "different" than any other place.  Not likely I am going to do that and give up reading.  At least here I had the option of writing more off the cuff and varying the format according to my mood/fatigue level, or the individual book.

I do not like the idea of pre-fab reviews one little bit. People should review what they want and how they want as long as they are respectiful of one another. I think I would quit if we are all mass marketed into some standard review formula. Get more people involved, but please..I really do not like the implication (unintended I am sure since I know Penn) here one little bit. Personally I think there needs to be a combined effort to get more bloggers..and make people's blogs more accessible in a list. I don't even know who the new bloggers are sometimes to welcome them and encourage them. People here are very helpful in terms of helping new people get aboard and working things out and Lorie and Jayne have helped too. Please...this standard format seems like an extreme remedy when that is not the problem. Individuality is what makes this Challenge so much fun!

Nancy, I had this open to comment and then distactions came.  I am glad you joined this year.  I have very much enjoyed reading your reviews and thoughts.  Your presence has made this year very nice. 

Debiw said some time last year that a good rule of thumb is not to reveal more than what is past page 50. Even though I write long reviews, I try not to tell the storyline after page 50 or what is already in the blurb (which sometimes give away too much, esp. in mysteries). I do write about other things in more detail but I do try to avoid giving away the story...except of course everyone knows romance has a HEA and somehow the H/h get together so I feel that saying that without details is not giving away anything. There is a lot to talk about besides the story...the hero and the heroine, the setting, etc.

As for me as a reader and book buyer, spoilers do not influence me one way or another. I am the kind of person who has reread certain books a lot. Spoilers are worse for mysteries---I do not want to know who did it.

I tend to like spoilers less when it's negative review than a positive one but really, I think reviews here, long and short are more thoughtful than the general kind of customer review I read elsewhere. I do not like RT reviews --- RT reviews are too short, they focus on one tiny area of a book that I do not. Often they rate books low when I find an author has really done something special so their numbers are unreliable for me as a reader, especially for authors that do not have major backlists.

If I tried to write really short reviews I would be miserable and quit because it would not be fun. It doesn't mean anyone else has to blog like me or even read my blogs...and it doesn't stop me from reading and loving short blogs either.  Even light pleasure reads awe me with the beauty of the writing.

Everyone can see new things in a book. For me that is the beauty of a book! Today people are still reading books that have been read and talked about for thousands of years...and still seeing new things in them! There is no magically correct interpretation of any book.  For me at least, that is totally exciting and invigorating and joyous. But for some reason, I do see that expansiveness happening more with positive reviews than negative ones.

I would not want to see some prefab kind of review here on the Challenge where we all look alike. That would really bore me to death so I am very happy for the variety of blogs and I hope everyone does what feels most natural to them. Otherwise no one will have fun. Personally spoilers do not bother me but I guess I would prefer not to have them ...but love them in private emails or places where Ican make the choice to read them or not.

 

I do not understand your inflections either but the word wry is not in everyday vocabulary but it is an elegant word nevertheless. Using terms like lazy and noncreative seemed to me as you attacking an author. And then Romance 101 too. It is hard not to read condescension into the choice of your vocabulary. It doesn't matter to me personally if you like wry or not but it is the inflammatory choice of words that prevents me from having a meaningful, stimulating discussion about the often interesting issues you sometimes choose. Showing versus telling is a great topic but I can't go there because your choice of words already comes loaded with connotations. Maybe you did not mean it that way but words like lazy and your response to FF closes down what could be an interesting discussion. I prefer to just discuss the topics and not have it so personally directed.

VInce, I was offended by your reply to FF as well.  It feels like you are attacking those or condescending to those who disagree by using such terms as Romance Writing 101.  

Also, I would just like to say that education in and of itself does not give anyone a reason to condescend to others.  If anything, a high educastion is humbling and shows a person how much they do not know and the wisdom to realize that there are many, many people smarter than them in all walks and shapes of life.  Whether a romance reader has some advanced degree or is not, romance readers are not dumb nor are romance authors.  Nor are women.