Part of the problem with writing about the opposite sex is
fantasizing what you think the opposite sex is, when in truth
you haven't a clue in the world. I watched the most recent
PBS Mystery series featuring Elizabeth George's cozies,
figuring watching one of her stories on TV would spare me
from reading an ARC of one of her books. Her main character
Thomas Lynley was such "a sensitive male," I puked. He was
more sensitive than any woman in the story, especially the 18
yr old murderer who used an axe to behead her father. (The
only good part of the story. I perked up for that.) A
sensitive male is what you buy for a postmodern woman who has
everything. George has no idea what goes on inside a man's
head, but her audience can identify with her cloying nonsense
because their fantasy of what a sensitive male is corresponds
to her fantasy. So she's a big name cozy writer. On the other
hand I have four fingers and thumb. Ahhh, what I really mean
is: how many hard-boiled male writers are only capable of
writing "Beautiful Girls in Underpants with Machine Guns,"
which is no less a clueless manufactured fantasy. The diff
between the cozies & the hard-boiled fantasies is women
buy books, so cozies rule. The more cozies there are, the
less reason men have to read. So men read less. Which means
more cozies get published. Which means --
I'm such a sensitive male, my wife sent me to the video store
to rent Hard Eight. She saw it by accident on Bravo, then
said it's my kind of story. I missed it when it came out.
Never knew it existed. Had a wonderful time with it. I tried
checking the rara-avis archives to see what the list has said
in the past about it, but my Apple 2E isn't awake yet.
Happy Labor Day. Don't go to work.
Frederick
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