Saturday, October 11, 2008

A week in the city...

I’ve spent the past week back in Townsville and it’s been a busy week. Apart from diving into Book #2 of my duet, which is humming along OK, I’ve given a talk to a reading book club and another to a Year Eleven English class and I’ve been to the hairdressers, the movies… coffee with a friend making the most of a week in town.

One of the readers at the book club reminded me that it’s nice for "older" (35 +) women to read romance. Her big regret about settling down into a long lasting relationship was that she wouldn’t be able to keep “falling in love”, but she’s realised that romance novels allow her to relive that experience over and over. Yay! A possible convert! ?

At the hairdresser’s, I picked up news of a new book craze (or perhaps not so new to many) sweeping through teenage girls like a pleasurable disease and gripping young women. This was verified when I went to the high school. So what’s the good oil?




The Twilight series by Stephenie Meyer.

I’ve started Book one and I can certainly see why these stories have created such a buzz. This is another high school girl and vampire scenario – no doubt inspired by Buffy, but the setting is interesting in a tiny, rainy town in Washington state, the characters are fabulous and the sexual tension is really well sustained – over hundreds of pages…

I guess vampires are the ultimate bad boy heroes, but their superpowers make them great saviours as well – and if they’re good vampires and they’re extraordinarily beautiful and they won’t harm you, even though they’re desperate to have you… what can a girl do, but fall in love?







Meanwhile, on a completely different note, I’m writing about a country wedding in a dear little white country church like this one we photographed in the Outback town of Chillagoe a couple of months ago. Ain’t she sweet?

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I like YA fiction but I usually stick to people like Tamora Pierce, McCaffrey etc. I think there are so many similarities to BtVS!!!
Gorgeous church, my friend's son was married in one just like that and all the guests had tiny bottles of bubble mixture and we blew a bazillion bubbles as they left the church. It was glorious and environmentally friendly!!

Romance, Rumours and Rogues said...

Barb,
did you hear Stephanie Meyers has abandoned finishing the 3rd book in the series because someone leaked the first chapter onto the internet?
Horrible!

Barbara Hannay said...

There are already three books out, Nic. My hairdresser read them all in one week!!!! Maybe this is a different one??
I know the movie Twilight has been slotted in where the next Harry Potter was scheduled, but it didn't bump HP out of the way. Even so, Stephenie's had hate mail about that, which is ridiculous.
I've loved Twilight. Am really looking forward to the next books.

Barbara Hannay said...

Should have said... the hate mail is awful, horrible, as well as ridiculous.
Crazy the things some authors have to put up with! No wonder Stephen King wrote "Misery".