MOVED!!

We have officially moved ourselves to the new home..

We likes it!

check us out at http://www.divineway.net/blog

Thanks for coming!

Moving the Romance...

Whew it's been a few days.. The blog is moving to a brand new shiny home over at my server. I'm on the ultimate countdown to Harry Potter which will probably take me away from my romantic notions for a bit, but all is not lost...

Right now, I'm merely trying to get through Suzanne Brockman's Over The Edge. It's hella good. I also bought Catherine Mann's On Target. Let's face it. The cover is smokin hot. Goodness!



I've also a notebook full of theories, fan mixes and casting calls for the BDB which have yet to see the light of day. As soon as everything's moved, Harry is finished, there'll just be tons to read.

Okay, I gotta get moving.. see you on the other side...

Lesser-cast

It's been a few days and I'm back from Harry Potter land momentarily.

More casting choices..

Neal McDonough, Natural Born Lesser.. He's sexy in an odd sorta way..

With brown hair he could be O.


With white hair, he's so X.


I've not decided which one yet...

More Thoughts from Dark Lover..

Before moving on to my MMS for Lover Eternal, I thought I'd post a few of my lingering notes from Dark Lover. Perhaps after I've done a total re-read, some of these thoughts will have answers.

1. In the beginning of DL, Wrath was surprised to know Darius had a half human daughter. Later on Wrath says. "...He watched over you. All your life he was never far away." DL 139 How did Wrath know Darius was watching over Beth? Wrath seemed to know a great deal about Darius's distant relationship with his daughter.



2. Mr X's childhood story is compelling.( DL p 49) I'm glad I did not miss it. In the margins of my notebook is a little casting note. Dolph Lundgren as X?



3. Mr X is to Billy Riddle as Tohr is to JM in LE and LA. There's something to that I haven't quite put my finger on. The lesser/warrior similarities are still being worked out in my head.



4. On my second read of DL, I paused while Beth looked at her mother's photo. She was once an orphan but not any longer. I thought that was a really nice moment.



5. I wrote this in my notebook. It's sappy but I thought it was a great moment early on between Beth and Wrath. He says. "You make me realize how cold I am." This is something that will show up time and again in the series. The Warriors have denied their hearts because of hurts, guilt, anger etc.Throughout the series, each of them will eventually thaw out. Yes, I realize it is the redemption through the woman thing, but I'd like to think of it as men embracing their true natures. The biggest, toughest bastards have the gentlest hearts, ergo, our 6 said examples, the Warrior Heroes.

Okay, I think that's it for this book. As Diane would say, the list gets longer as the books progressively get better. I know my theories get longer and more convoluted as the books build upon one another. We shall see..

The Princess..

Marissa *is* Paris Hilton.

Make Me Smile: Dark Lover

I thought I'd do a few of my favorite moments from each of the books. It's not always the smut that catches my eye....

Here are the Make Me Smiles (MMS) from Dark Lover.

• Wrath getting jealous of Butch and almost kills him. Wrath tells Beth she's his and that's that. Period. No messing about.
• Fritz fanboys out upon meeting Beth. It's the squee heard throughout the doggen world.
• Beth taking care of Rhage while Wrath watches with total love.
• Beth and Tohr hanging out, watching movies. How absolutely cool is that?
• The formal dinner date otherwise known as the "I've not taken you properly" moment. Wrath cleans up nicely. Fritz just keeps bringing the food. I dunno about you, but I'm breathless!
• Butch meets the Brothers and proceeds to pick a fight with Rhage. A few pages later, V wants to kill B, but the Red Sox bring out love. They get drunk instead. Tohr provides the scotch.
• Wrath takes cheap shot at Tohr regarding Darius. Cummon Wrath, that sorta hate is uncalled for, yo.
• Any time Zsadist makes an appearance. *heart*
• The brothers asking Butch to come along to Screamers after the bonding ceremony. Yes, Sally Fields, they might want to kill you, but like you. Butch calls shotgun. He wants to sit in front with V. *love*
• The Brothers crashed out in the hospital after Wrath gets shot. Z on guard duty. *heart*
• Butch and V waking up from drunken stupors in "separate" beds. It's the only time they do, thus far in the series. Wrath's only comment upon seeing them is "Isn't this cozy." *snicker*

Bonus moment:

Upon seeing Marissa for the first time, Butch thinks she's is a high class whore.

"No wonder the house was so well tricked out." DL pg 274

Bwhahahahaha!!

Cool Rider...

Why is Phury celibate? He's got a hot love jones for the Scribe Virgin. Who better than Michelle Pfeiffer to get that motor running! Lover Enshrined, indeed.

No Matter Where You Go...

I will find you...

I blame trolling Anna Campbell's website for this post. Seriously, did she hafta mention Daniel Day-Lewis from Last of the Mohicans? Did she? Like he was the absolute hotness in that film. But I don't need to watch that film to get swept up in it's heart swelling goodness.

I can just throw on the soundtrack, which just takes me to that scene in the cave under the waterfall..

You know the one..

Nathaniel looks Cora in the eye, deadly serious and tells her to "Stay alive! I will find you!" He leaves her for capture, then hunts her ass down while Clannad's haunting "I Will Find You" provides the musical accompaniment. That's awesome. Cinematic magic from James Fenimore Cooper's less than romantic book.

Nathaniel and Cora..*sigh*

Everytime I see it, I'm slain. Ded.

Hope is your survival
A captive path I lead

No matter where you go
I will find you
If it takes a long long time
No matter where you go
I will find you
If it takes a thousand years

Claiming the Courtesan...

WTF? I dunno even know what to say about it.

The last 160 pages or so woulda been okay had I not read the first 160.

There you have it.

Next!

Signatures..

I figured I needed to make some sigs for the BDB board. Yes, I am in over my head. First I have the blog. Now I'm thinking up sigs. What's next? I dunno. If I start writing posts like this, smack me.

Last night I was hanging out in the Pent. Vishous and I had a nice chat about our favorite kinks over wine (Merlot?!) and red smokes (good stuff! Thx Phury!!) before settling in for an enjoyable evening of games. Butch happeend to drop by and upon hearing all the ruckus (mostly Vishous!) and decided to join us. Much fun was had by all.

*blink*

I can't even go there. It's too weird.

But I digress..

The Signatures

Out of this World: Tohrment


I used that awesome photo of the Rock below and added some Bush lyrics. There is such longing in those words, in the entire song. Of course when applied to Tohrment, they are heartbreaking.

When we die
We go into the arms of those who remember us

We are home now
Out of our heads
Out of our minds
Out of this world
Out of this time

Are you drowning or waving?
I just want you to save me
Should we try to get along?
Just try to get along

Riace Bronze



Bless God some guy found the Riace Bronzes hanging out in the ocean. They are the warriors. It represents the Warrior heart of the Brotherhood.

Tohraddiction

I'm feeling like I need to see my casting choice for Tohrment in action, so I've been watching movie trailers featuring the Rock. Okay, lets be truthful, I just needed to drool.

I'm giggling my way through the Game Plan trailer and swooning over Walking Tall. That's so my Tohr..






*drool*

An Omega Jihad..

I posted a question to the WARDen this evening.

I don't know if this has been asked before, but here goes:

I'm trying to wrap my head around the origins of the war between the lessors and the vampires. So afrer rereading parts of Iliad where disputes between the gods gets played out on the battlefield, I remembered Omega had beef with the Scribe Virgin. At one point perhaps they were friendly, but being like the gods, fell out. I was just curious to know what happened between them to make Omega go all 'jihad' on the SV's darlings, the vampires?

Thanks!

I'm sure I'll have some brilliant theory in a few days..LOL


EDIT: The WARDen answered my post..yippeee...

Vishous In The Box

I'm the man in the box
Buried in my shit
Won't you come and save me, save me

Feed my eyes, can you sew them shut?
Jesus Christ, deny your maker
He who tries, will be wasted
Feed my eyes now you've sewn them shut
-Man in the Box, Alice in Chains


This is turning into the Vishous blog, for real. Maybe it's his alternative lifestyle, his taste for G-Unit, the fact he has visions, or just cos. Maybe he reminds me a little of Lestat and Nicolas immediately after they became vampires, traipsing around Paris. I dunno.

Today's Vishous post is brought to you by the letter S, for Spartan. My whole BDSM thoughts have turned on their heel after reading the threads about V's father and the warrior camp. Don't worry, these aren't really spoilers for anything since the damn posts date over a year ago.

The quick version is that V's father, Bloodletter (how Concrete Blonde!), was a member of the BDB and ran a very twisted version of warrior boot camp. Ward compares Bloodletter's warrior boot camp to as Spartan military training held in the Waldorf Astoria. *blink* Bloodletter is quite the nasty sadistic bastard, who treats his son with cruelty and disdain.

Of course everyone hates Bloodletter on the board. "We hates him! He hurts the V."

First off, givin her comments to Spartan practices on the board, Ward hasn't much of a clue about the Spartan military outside of basic knowledge. They were all about war. The Spartans were rough on their males. They were rough on their females. In Sparta if you were male, you were a soldier. If you didn't have the chops to be a solider, you didn't live. They tossed your ass off a cliff. If you were a baby and cried when you were presented, they'd toss your ass off a cliff. If you lived, you had the right stuff and the crying was a one off thing. Those folks didn't mess. Loads of people got thrown off that cliff, yo.

And if scrounging around for food, enduring the intense physical and psychological training is a day trip to the Waldorf, I can't help ya. Spartans were tough for a reason. While their practices are foreign and strange to us today, they lasted. I'm not an authority on Spartan society. All I'm saying is know what you are talking about before you call it the Waldorf. /end rant.

This brings me to Warrior camp. If you can't take the heat, get out of the kitchen. I am not trying to justify the horrors of warrior camp, not by any means. Bloodletter went off and did his own thang 'cos he felt the warriors needed a firmer hand in their training. My opinion is that warriors (especially these guys) are made by discipline and punishment. These boys are being trained to kill, not stitch and bitch. By nature it's not a nice politically correct place.

Yeah, Bloodletter was psycho.

I suppose the Spartan Waldorf included visits to the spa and nights of disco lights. Bloodletter's was dark, dangerous. The training probably never stopped despite V's ass being sore and leaking, belly empty and tears stinging his eyes fresh from the latest round of being used as a humiliation stick by your father! Oh and to add insult to injury, V came out of his transition, naked and bruised outside the camp. The Spartan theory of 'the boy's not warrior material toss him off the cliff' at work.

Ward says V's BDSM is 100% fueled by his experiences in the camp; therefore, I'm gonna go with V having authority issues, a fear of losing control after being helpless, and the whole pain is pleasure issue. His body betrayed him as he was forcibly taken over and over. It's a wonder he doesn't have MORE problems.

Overall I got the impression that warrior camp/training should be nice. And V would be a much kinder, gentler killer if his dad, his dad's subordinates and fellow mates would stop riding his ass. Goodness, taking the harshenss out of boot camp totally emasculates V. Yeah, that he had it rough, but damn, let him get his own back. let him be a full charcter, not a wimpy one.

I bet, V had one friend in camp, someone who took care of him when he hurt, another male. Something happened to take that friend away, or else V went away and the only warmth he had was replaced by cold. It isn't until Butch that he starts to warm up again. There's another male whom he can bond with, who understands him. Who loves him as this other person did long ago.

But I'm talking out of my romantic boy lovin ass..I'm just makin it up as I go along.

So, I'm going to default back to it's a romance novel. He falls in love with a woman and all the hurts are gone. He's drug kicking and screaming back to normal. All that nasty stuff is just a part of the past long gone.

I have a feeling that's how it's gonna end up.

I need a new topic. This one's jumped the shark for me..

Twinks Are The Rhage!

Tonight I thought I'd browse the Rhage threads. Nothing disappoints on the WARDen Boards. Rhage is described in the books as really beautiful, devastatingly so to the point where it's almost painful to look at him. Gorgeous does not cover it. Since I have a sick twisted fascination as to what other people think these guys look like, I hopped on the "Could this be Rhage" post.

ZOMG..First, male models factor high. Second, some of them are twinks. Again, I have to return to the default position of I'm in the romance genre. I'm all out of sorts. I posted as much. For me what makes a man traffic stopping drop dead gorgeous is so far off the mark from the posters, it's on it's own planet.

I never saw Rhage as a twink or gay for that matter but to each her own really.

Moving away from the West Hollywood set..

One of my squicks is just pregnancy talk. I used to think it was just male preg, MPREG, but I realized tonight it carries over into all levels of discussion. I don't wanna know about characters fertility issues or the nuances of breastfeeding. I really makes me squick. I dunno why. I just dislike it. I'm not maternal in that way at all surprisingly enough given my personal background.

Finally..

I love the edits by the admin. Did I mention that? I love when the edited text shows up as a QUOTE in someone else's post. When Rhage turns into the Beast he eats lessors. So someone asked, quite innocently, if Rhage burped or farted baby powder, the calling card of a lessor, as a result. It got edited out, but someone else quoted it. The question is hilarious and I didn't take offense. Quite the opposite.

No wonder Rhage is so sick after he transforms back. He's got lesser indigestion. It's from hell! It'd be hard to distinguish an enemy in the compound from Rhage's flatulence until the lessors had passed. heh!

On that note, I need sleep.

Enter the Dragon

This has to be the coolest tat, yet and its so spot on for Rhage.



Click above for larger image.

Just awesome..

More Vishous Talk

I know I said I'd not pick up another romance book, but Claiming the Courtesean by Anna Campbell is quite controversial in terms of it's sexual policitcal correctness. Seems if a man asserts himself on his slave by physically communicating a message of dominance, it's akin to rape and really bad in the romance genre where light and love rule. Of course I had to read it. Trust I'll have comments about it, scathing ones if I dislike it.

But speaking of domination..


Once again, I'm posting about V and BDSM on the BDB board. In the middle of my post which I'll include here, I realized that all the Brothers were Doms to a degree and nearly all of their initial encounters with their women were violent in some way. I don't think people reading romance novels have a problem with the sexual encounters being a bit rough because they eventually know in the end, the characters wind up together.

When talking about Vishous having a taste for heavy BDSM games, it seems a bit silly to exclusively think that since he's getting his happy ending, the sex will be sweet and gentle. No one is having sweet and gentle sex, not even Marissa.

On the flip side tho, i was chatting with Diane about the comparison people were making between Z's experience and V's pleasures. One seems to cancel out the other in terms of signifigant character development. What was a tramatic experience to one is just fun and games to another. It's a fairly surprising and poor choice on Wards part if indeed she does go there with V in his book.

I thought I'd post my thoughts on the board. I will probably get edited in some capacity if not entirely.I don't know where the line of distaste falls. I guess I'll find out.

Here's my post:

quote="Skadi_Sax"
I tend to go along with the Z analogies. I have a feeling V's unconventional ways are just his way of adjusting to early traumatic events.

Dude, I love your post. I was thinking about the V & Z analogies earlier. Here are my thoughts. I'm fully aware I might be talking out my a**. :lol:

If V's habits are his way of working out some traumatic incident in his pretrans life, doesn't that sort of invalidate and diminish Z's horrible, yet really delicious, experience as a blood slave? Z did not have a choice in the matter where as V is fully aware of what he's doing in the penthouse.

Then again, does V know what happened to Zsadist during his unfortunate captivity? I presume Phury has to know all the details but even that eludes me. I'm not saying that the boys have played my scars are bigger than yours but it strikes me as odd that V would even 'play' so far off the chain knowing about Z.

If that is the case (and I'm seriously theorizing) V figuratively takes the role of Z's mistress thereby making a mockery of Z's pain, suffering and (unchecked) hate. It makes me wonder if there isn't some sub textual riff between V and Z as a result of V's tastes. When Butch asks Phury if he's gay *snort*, Phury responds with a go ask your roommate. The reaction is almost disapproval, almost humor, but no neutrality.

I think a more relevant comparison could be made with JM and Vishous. JM's a hot twink on the street, no family, no friends, alone...crap happens. Maybe V's experienced a similar situation by someone he loved and trusted. As a result he becomes this emotionally stilted person who doesn't let anyone in and only allows himself to feel in spurts. Like Z and JM, administering or receiving pain is a good way to work those emotions out.

quote="Witchie Poo"
I get the impression that so far V has only been dominant. I'm sure that Jane will want to make love in other more tender and emotionally connected ways. A situation in which V was always playing the dominant would not be sexually or emotionally healthy for V and Jane as a couple.


The Brothers are very aggressive and dominate with their women. Each of them are Doms in their own right. Are any of their relationships emotionally healthy and tender in a conventional sense? IMO, no, but it doesn't make them any less valid or satisfying. I'd be surprised if Jane's first intimate encounter with V didn't involve some level of 'violence.' It's not like there isn't precedence:

Wrath breaks into Beth's house the night after she's almost raped and scares her. Since the postman always rings twice, he goes back the next night. This time he forcibly lays waste to her common sense. Good thing he's hot in addition to being scary!!

Rhage slams Mary against a wall-by her throat no less, and demands she speak while getting deep into her space. Mary books a flight to Stockholm. Bella never mentioned they'd be going to Sweden.

In the gym Zsadist tells Bella to get on her hands and knees (whoot!) at their first encounter while juggling his dagger. I mean how dare she interrupt Mr. Ultraviolence during his workout. Bella's terrified but quite down with Z's program until Phury interruptus. She pays him back splendidly during her needing. heh!

Butch...well he's all ready to throw down when threatened by V until the Red Sox makes them BFF, best friends forever.

What I'm saying is..dominate males aren't such a bad thing. Even after their initial scary yet titillating starts, none of the ladies are complaining. Why would they? Every brother is fantabulous despite their issues. I love V as a dominant male and a Dom. He's able to take care of what's his, what he loves :coughButchCough:. I don't believe it will be puppies and kittens between V and Jane.

I’m gonna slide back into my default wait and see position. We’ll know soon enough, right?

I'm really enjoying this thread and hope my sense of humor doesn't offend anyone. :)

That's all for now..