S06.45: Our Favorite Episodes, Tropes we Love, and Books that Take the Finger
Jen and Sarah are together at last (again), and we’re taking your questions! Listen as we revisit some of our favorite past episodes of the podcast, as we discuss our favorite books with our least favorite tropes, and recommend a bunch of books that take the finger. We’re also talking about historical romance, and why it remains an absolute bop.
We're coming up on the end of Season 6 (what?! how!?), which means a deep dive of one of Sarah's books, even though she doesn't have a new one this year! We're talking Wicked & the Wallflower, the first of her Bareknuckle Bastards series. Get it at: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Apple Books, Kobo, or wherever you get your books.
Show Notes
Jen went to go see Illinoise when she was in New York, and the Fated Mates team ate at Claro in Brooklyn.
Some of our favorite episodes of the podcast: the Derek Craven episode with Kate, the first category romance interstitial, and trailblazers Vincent Virga, Elda Minger, and Nora Roberts.
Our walk up songs are Too Funky by George Michael for Sarah, and Every Day I Write the Book or Town Crier by Elvis Costello.
The Comstock Laws were bad and they are still on the books, which is gonna turn out to be a bad thing.
Alexa Riley also writes as AR Taboo, for the truly dirty stuff. Check your content warnings.
Books Mentioned this Episode
The Sponsors
Blue Box Press, publishers of Audrey Carlan's The Marriage Auction, Season 2, available in print or ebook from Amazon.
Lucy Score, author of The Body in the Backyard: A Riley Thorn Novel, available in print, ebook or audiobook, from Amazon.
Jess K. Hardy, author of Lips Like Sugar, available in print or ebook from Amazon.
Liana De la Rosa, author of Isabel and the Rogue, available in print, ebook or audiobook from Amazon, Apple Books, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, or wherever you get your books.
S06.35: All About Dukes (in Romance)
This one is for our historical lovers! We’re talking about everyone’s favorite title — Dukes! We get to the bottom of many duke questions, including: Why so many? Why are they always dukes? What’s wrong with princes? How do these guys make their money anyway? What’s with all the normies inheriting dukedoms? What about duchesses? And more! Please remember that everything we are about to say is romance fact. Don’t @ us with real life fact. We don’t want it.
Happy anniversary to our founding Patreon members — it’s one year of our Patreon and our Discord today! We love you a whole lot. Learn more about the Patreon and go join those cool people who love romance as much as we do at patreon.com/fatedmates.
Show Notes
The tree thing about pollen and allergens is called botanical sexism (god it’s everywhere) and this claim, like all things, is complicated.
Defining the title of duke. What are the corn laws or the laws about chimney sweeps? You don’t really care—it’s just fossils.
The Reformed Rakes podcast had a recent episode about pregnancy.
The Unites States Congress is comprised of incredibly wealthy people.
In 2009, Tatler got 10 of the 24 living non-royal dukes to sit down for lunch. There’s a photo. It’s exactly what you would expect. This 2021 article from Tatler lists the 4 living single dudes that either are or will be a duke. Shoot your shot, ladies.
Question: has Sarah really written more dukes than fewer?
A Duke: Eleven Scandals to Start to Win a Duke’s Heart, No Good Duke Goes Unpunished, The Rogue Not Taken, A Scot in the Dark, The Day of the Duchess, Daring and the Duke, Heartbreaker, The Duke of Christmas Present, and A Duke Worth Falling For (9)
Not a Duke: Nine Rules to Break When Romancing a Rake, Ten Ways to be Adored When Landing a Lord, A Rogue by Any Other Name, One Good Earl Deserves a Lover, Never Judge a Lady by Her Cover, Wicked and the Wallflower, Brazen and the Beast, Bombshell, and Knockout (9)
Books Mentioned this Episode
Sponsors
Louisa Darling, author of
The Matrimony Trap available in ebook from
Amazon, Apple, Barnes & Noble & Kobo
Faye Delacour, author of The Lady He Lost,
available in print or ebook from
Amazon, Apple, Barnes & Noble & Kobo
or wherever you get your audiobooks.
Beth Gelman, author of Always Falling Behind,
available in print or ebook, or with
your monthly subscription to Kindle Unlimited
and
Stephanie Rose, author of Second Time’s the Charm
available in print or ebook, or with
your monthly subscription to Kindle Unlimited
S05.36: The Best Kisses in Romance
We’re talking kissing today! So simple and so powerful, there’s no doubt that that first kiss in romance is always an important one. This episode was inspired by our recent readalong of Her Best Worst Mistake, but we talk about some other great books (most of which we’ve talked about before) with truly excellent kisses. Enjoy…and tell us about your favorite kisses in books, movies, tv shows…wherever you get your superior smooching.
We have a Patreon now, and it comes with an extremely busy and fun Discord community! Join other magnificent firebirds to hang out, talk romance, and be cool together in a private group full of excellent people. Learn more at patreon.com.
Show Notes
Kissing is the best, and we are obsessed with the first kisses from the following movies and TV shows: Maddie and David from Moonlighting, lots of Angel and Buffy kissing, jump in the wayback machine for Sam and Diane from Cheers, and more recently Jim and Pam from The Office.
The first gay kiss on network TV was on LA Law back in 1991.
In the 80s and 90s, we imprinted hard on movies with great kissing scenes: The primordial kiss that was Han Solo and Princess Leia in The Empire Strikes Back, the “No Kissing on the Mouth” from Pretty Woman and Jen forgot to mention another 90s classic, Poetic Justice with Tupac and Janet Jackson. Hello to that last scene from Never Been Kissed with Drew Barrymore. People have made entire YouTube videos of great movie kisses.
Why did people use a metaphor about [“Rounding the bases”][11] to discuss sex back in the day? Who knows!
Most of today's links are YouTube videos, but here are PDFs of the things that are text-based links. [11]: https://www.glamour.com/story/lets-settle-this-baseball-and
Books Mentioned This Episode
Sponsors
Meghan Quinn, author of Royally in Trouble,
available from Amazon, or with a monthly subscription to Kindle Unlimited.
and
Megan Frampton, author of His Study in Scandal,
available now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Apple Books, Kobo
and your local independent bookseller.
and
Lumi Labs, creators of Microdose Gummies
Visit microdose.com and use the code FATEDMATES
for 30% off and free shipping on your order
