[LMB] Two Reviews

[Lois McMaster Bujold]

Lois McMaster Bujold wrote:

>/ I could find more samples to illustrate the trend, but the trend is 
/>/ found at many levels; I find it quite striking and interestingly 
/>/ consistent over many samples.  Many romance readers (those who do not 
/>/ cross over a lot to F&SF) seem remarkably tone-deaf to world-building, 
/>/ even as some skiffy reviewers seem at least equally tone-deaf to 
/>/ relationship-building.


Agnes added:
/
http://www.smartbitchestrashybooks.com/index.php/weblog/the_sharing_knife_volume_1_beguilement_by_lois_mcmaster_bujold/
would be a better control from the romance POV, although it only covers 
Beguilement.

And it fits the pattern to a T: 90% of the review covers the 
relationship between Dag and Fawn, but even though one of the reviewers 
seems to read SF the only mention of world-building is in terms of "not 
negatives", ie. it gets good mark for being unobtrusive and not impeding 
the story [1].


Agnes



*** To add to the samples, here are some dissenting voices from the 
skiffy side, clearly tone-deaf to the romance.  The latter two are more 
generalized objections, of the "This wasn't the book I wanted to read" 
sort, but the first has enough detail to guess at how the book is being 
read.  For a larger sample, Amazon suffices.

Here's one that mainly responds to the world-building, seeing the 
personal stuff as Unimportant:

http://www.3greenfish.net/2007/09/05/book-review-the-sharing-knife-volume-1-beguilement-by-lois-mcmaster-bujold/

For a word from the I-don't-get-romance-at-all side, there's

http://publius1.livejournal.com/323718.html

For the short version, we have:

http://entertainingnick.blogspot.com/2007/09/book-sharing-knife-legacy-by-lois.html


Does anyone remember that thing going around the Internet a few years 
back, about the two students forced to write a story together, which I 
short-handed as "Blasters vs. Chamomile Tea"?

Ta, L.