squicky metaphors/hyperbole of the Game Changers books (Fannish Fifty #16)

[verushka70]

So prior to seeing the TV series, I hadn't read any of the Game Changer novels on which the Heated Rivalry series is based. I began to read them after I watched S1. And I have a question:

Am I the only person who finds all the screaming orgasms, toe-curling, and eyes rolling back in people's heads during sex to be, well, just kind of ridiculously over the top?

Not to mention the weird metaphors. At one point in Common Goal (the book I'm finished with now, book #4 in the series), the author describes Eric (Bennett) pursuing Kyle's cock with Eric "naked and stretching forward for Kyle’s cock like a baby bird."

JFC. WTF? To me that is a squicky buzzkill - who juxtaposes sucking hard cock with a baby bird? and ffs, WHY? - and it totally killed the heat in what had been a pretty hot sex scene, up to that point. What the fuck even is that?

Not to mention describing Eric's cock feeling to him like "a kettlebell".  Just... What is wrong with describing it as hanging down, feeling heavily engorged?

And that's only in one book! There are other similarly awful metaphors in the Game Changer and Heated Rivalry novels (and I presume in the third book, which I haven't read yet) t, though maybe not quite as bad as that baby bird one.

Maybe I should keep a running list for shits and giggles. But that would require me to re-read and so far the only novel I would be remotely interested in re-reading is the first one, Game Changer, focusing on Scott Hunter and Kip Grady. So far, maybe not coincidentally, it also seems to be the best book out of the three I've read now.

Look, I know Rachel Reid started out writing fanfic. I get that. And I'm not saying these novels completely suck and have no redeeming value (if that were the case, I'd never have bothered with the second book in the series). To be very clear: that is not the case.

But I thought that actual published books would have an editor that, you know, edited that kind of writing, to make it more polished and professional, less hyperbolic and cliché and... bizarre. Did the editor(s) read these novels and think they're fine? Did they suggest changes that Rachel Reid refused? Did the editor just not read all the way through the manuscripts...? (Are these novels not profic published, but published via a vanity press?)

Don't get me wrong: this kind of thing - bad metaphors, over the top clichés - irritates the hell out of me in fanfic, too. But it irritates me 1,000% more in published profic because then 1) it doesn't even read like profic, and 2) it reads like mediocre fanfic. There is - or there should be - a higher standard for published books! If I'd paid for these books, I'd be pissed. Luckily I took them out of the library, but, still: I'm a cross between disappointed and shocked.

I suppose I shouldn't be surprised, what with the success of Fifty Shades and the Twilight novels. Apparently people (young people especially) just eat mediocre stuff up.

(I barely got through the latter, it was such insanely bad writing - loaded with passive constructions and verbiage, not to mention actions like simply crossing the room taking two full fucking pages to describe. I literally skimmed the last 2/3 of Twilight just to fucking finish the damn book, and didn't even bother with any of the other novels in the series.

I skimmed Fifty Shades in a book store, too, when it came out and thought, "People PAY for this? When you can get fanfic just as bad - and so much more fanfic that is WAY BETTER than this - completely FREE on the Internet?") I guess, after all the hype, I'm underwhelmed by the Game Changers novels. I'll probably finish them all, but at this point it's just to complete them for completeness' sake and to follow the Scott/Kip story, since they're the focus of book one and in the circle of teammates and friends of the characters in books two through six/seven in the series. But I'm not eagerly awaiting the next novel. Not because it's Shane/Ilya (although that's part of it; I prefer the Scott/Kip pairing), but because the books just... aren't that great, and are not as good (imo) as Jacob Tierney's TV adaptation.

On the plus side, the TV series elevates the source. So there is that.

Sorry not sorry: I'm just a cranky old fan who grew up reading sci-fi and fantasy by Bradbury, Leguin, etc. My standards for published books are higher than other people's, I guess. And I was never a romance novel reader - unless Margaret Mitchell's Gone With The Wind counts, which I'm pretty sure it doesn't.

Comments

[ride_4ever]

TL;DR while at work, but I'm making a note to return to this later.

[verushka70]

No worries. I think you'll see what I mean once you get the to the top of the "Hold"s for the HR library/inter-library loan books.