Monday, 5 July 2010

"There are other places to kiss..."

Public Mistress, Private Affair has a title that could easily be switched and retain its meaning. Public Affair, Private Mistress. See? Still meaningless. Maggie Cox writes Mills & Boon novels. Her previous attempts include The Millionaire Boss's Baby, The Spanish Billionaire's Christmas Bride (Themed! Eep) and The Spaniard's Marriage Demand. They all sound awful, don't they? Then again, Bewildered Heart has no predilections for wealthy Spaniards. Give us a homeless Belgian any day. This effort involves a PR guru named Nash. He hides a dark secret behind his smouldering good looks, tanned, fit body and silky, sexy voice. He is, in fact, from the mean streets of Stockholm. Nash must keep this potentially devastating personal embarrassment under wraps, in order to maintain his reputation as a brilliant PR guru who didn't grow up on the mean streets of Stockholm. 

Thankfully work proves a distraction as now he has been hired to reinvent an actress, Freya Carpenter, who is frayed, proving her name is as apt as Nash's. Since Freya's notorious divorce from a bastard named James Frazier, she has seen her name dragged through the mud, with charges of drug-taking, drink-drinking and general bitch-being. Why journalists accept James' word when it is apparent no one accepts James' word never gets clarified by the narrative. Freya has been left loveless, penniless, with her career in tatters. More worryingly though, her divorce has left her incapable of trusting a man or falling in love again. Despite these setbacks and her two years in the wilderness and semi-reclusion, she remains incredibly attractive with piercing eyes, ivory skin and lips that make you forget every thought you've ever had. It's difficult to believe such a vivacious actress could be so broken by threats and lies. Well, Nash, start believing it! 

The instantly enchanted pair jet off to Nash's secret hide-away in the South of France. There Freya can catch the sun, forget her history and let the media machine do its work, restoring her honour in the eyes of her audience and those scrupulous Hollywood casting agents. Most importantly, as this is a romance novel, is for Freya to finally begin to believe the public relations man of her dreams is Nash and he stands in front of her, wearing revealing swimming trunks and eating grapes he soaked in olive oil his-very-self. So debonair and classy! Once she confronts her feelings about him, perhaps she can marry him in a hastily-arranged marriage that is in no way a ploy to refute those slanderous accusations of her being a shameless hussy with no acting talent. When Nash smiles dimples appear in his cheeks. He's so gorgeous, with his mysterious Scandinavian looks. Yet Freya is not ready to fall in love even though she's already fallen in love. Cripes! Can these two somehow manage to work things out without ruining their best laid PR plans that aren't dramatically connected to their burgeoning love. 

It is important to raise stakes in story-telling. If it all comes down to a college dissertation or an easily contradicted and inconsequential lie the emotional melodrama that Mills & Boon demands lacks credibility and weight. All the hand-wringing and will-they-won't-they tension is lost when there's nothing stopping them from not. The emotional hang-ups of the characters, from bad divorces or tough childhoods in the ghettos of Stockholm, are never properly fleshed out to be believable enough to warrant one hundred and eighty pages of 'We can't do this... yet.' If it's supposed to keep the passion alighted so when they finally get together it is all the more poignant and fulfilling the structure is not matched by the author's emotional pacing. Nothing is keeping them apart besides a writer struggling with a formula. 

Invariably, the plot ends with the two leads (often the only two characters in the entire story) admitting they have always loved each other. Fine, everyone enjoys a happy ending. Before that, however, at least one sex scene must be shoe-horned in and that sex scene must be between the two romantic leads. Their mutual passion for each other's exquisite beauty needs sating with that experience then leading them to realise they are destined for one another. However, the sex is rarely tied into the journey of the characters, therefore trivialising the sex. In MacKenzie's Promise and Learning Curves the female lead is a virgin, saving herself for the right man. Both sleep with their perfect man, but long before they are in acknowledged love. Freya hasn't spoken to anyone besides family members since her divorce, so sleeping with Nash appears to be a huge step forward for her and a meaningful gesture towards Nash. It doesn't feel that way to the reader, it feels like a contractual obligation of the author. 

The couple have usually broken up by the morning. Someone has said something idiotic and unbelievable. Otherwise someone has said something bland and non-committal and the other party has reacted in an idiotic and unbelievable manner. The time apart is spent wishing they weren't apart and pretty soon they have reconciled, locked in an embrace that will last them a lifetime, until they're clawed apart so they can be buried separately. Claire Somerville, Mills & Boon's marketing director, has said, 'Pretty much anything goes (sexually), but all in the context of the enduring emotional relationship. There has to be a connection between the hero and the heroine. They've got to like each other, otherwise it doesn't work.' Really, Mills & Boon? Your stories are unashamedly old-fashioned, corny and unrealistic, but this contrived and flippant attitude towards sex doesn't add up.

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