Ep. 294 - Dark Lover by JR Ward

Hey HBssssssssssss! Surprise! This episode is tardy because we decided to thoroughly enjoy our Labor Day weekend over at HBHQ and wow did school start right after! Very exciting changes. This week, Sabrina joins Mel to recap Dark Lover by JR Ward, the first book in the Black Dagger Brotherhood series! If you love a hate episode, this just might be for you because... let's just say this was a rough first time read in 2023. Luckily, Sabrina is here with her wrap-around-mid-2000's-nostalgia-glasses, so there's some balance!

We've got Wrath and Beth and lessers and Tohrment and Phury and doggens and Rhage and casual police brutality and Zsadist and pimp juice and Vishous and Escalades and shellans and war horniness. Welcome to a brand new world!

Bonus Content: Mel read this book to the tune of constant and unstructured 4 year old whistling *eye twitches*, Mel goes on a rant about white supremacy, misogyny, fatphobia, police brutality apologists, toxic sexuality, strict binaries, gender essentialism, etc etc (you know, NORMAL STUFF), Darius the accountant, #justiceforMarissa, and so much more!

Lady Loves: GET YOUR GREENS!

Sabrina - make healthy routines that you can stick to when your mental health takes a dive. It's ok to set up shortcuts in advance!

Mel - hide your greens in a chocolate protein smoothie! Trick yourself like a toddler as a grown-ass-person!

Notes and Resources from Mel:

• Sarah Wendell's excellent review of Lover Revealed which is an imagining of the actors who play these characters in the movie.
• Top BDB scenes from Saucy Wenches Book Club.
• A bonus recap series of Dark Lover by DocTurtle on Smart Bitches, Trashy Books.
• Re: white supremacist themes. I've sat with this for a while after recording this episode and I can understand how it might have been hard to spot or parse these themes when this book came out because everyone in the two warring factions (to my knowledge) are white. Hell, the lessers get fairer and fairer as they age to a point that seems to mimic albinism. I still hate it, but I can see how readers in 2005 and beyond might have whimsied on past without further interrogation.
• Re: queerbaiting. The panel I referenced was at the 2012 Romantic Times conference (apparently the same event that launched #peegate). A summary of what was discussed can be found here. While I completely stand by everything I said in the episode, I can acknowledge some complicating factors that may have influenced the trajectory of BDB. This series is traditionally published and it's well-known that representation like queer relationships, let alone HEAs, were much harder to get approved by trad publishing houses of the time because "readers don't want that" was the status quo within that machine. Ward was a newer author at that point and may not have had the power to push for an MM HEA, even if she wanted to. HOWEVER, other than what is on the page, my main issue is the camp-straddling that is exhibited when you pair series canon with Ward's unofficial statements to readers. Here's the pertinent excerpt from that write up:

Q: We haven't seen much of Butch and V lately--

JR: interrupts They've been seeing plenty of each other!

Q: -- will we ever see any of that on the page?

JR: No.. [paraphrased]... I will give hints about it and talk about it verbally, but it won't be on the page... because too many people would hate it. sotto voce Butch is getting it regularly.

In my opinion, making statements like the above to hopeful readers, essentially creating her own fanfic to pander to queer folks and allies, while officially siding with people who would be offended by the very existence of a queer relationship by never putting it on the page, is cowardly and underhanded. Regardless of the motivation or intention, by doing this, it appears that Ward is presenting as an ally to profit from queer folks and allies while still maintaining enough deniability to avoid risking general sales. Now, saying "people would hate it" could be a subtle way of saying that her publishing company is ultimately behind that decision, but that doesn't go far in changing my view. Either stand up for what you believe by putting it on the page or stand by the words you put on that page.

Make sure to check out Mel's new podcast Bonkers Romance!

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