S02.41: Audiobooks with Voice Actor Justine Eyre
This one’s for you, audio readers! We’re thrilled to have a freewheeling episode this week featuring the fantastically talented Justine Eyre, who has narrated Sarah’s last seven books! Sarah & Justine had never talked until this conversation, when we were able to ask all the questions we’ve always had about how audiobooks work, and what makes them so great. And stay tuned until the end of the episode, when you can hear the first two chapters of the audiobook of Daring & the Duke, available wherever audiobooks are sold, June 30th!
We might not be doing read alongs until August, but that doesn’t mean your TBR won’t still be groaning under the weight of our recommendations — we’ve got a bunch of rec episodes lined up for summer…
Oh, and did you know Sarah has a book out in two weeks? Order Daring & the Duke from Amazon, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, Apple Books, Books-a-Million or from your local indie, or order it signed from her local indie, WORD Bookstore, and get a special edition Fated Mates sticker with your purchase!
As summer approaches, if you are up for leaving a rating or review for the podcast on your podcasting app, we would be very grateful!
Show Notes
Welcome Justine Eyre! Justine has narrated all of Sarah's books since Never Judge a Lady by Her Cover.
Join Sarah's Old School Romance Book Club (OSRBC) on Facebook.
Is Jane Eyre really "our favorite Jane"? Jane Austen would like a word.
Justine talked a lot about how audiobooks are made, but here's another great explainer about the role of narrators and audiobook production.
We recorded this before J. K. Rowling's latest terrible TERF rant, so take Jen's praise of Jim Dale's narrationwith a grain of salt.
Justine mentioned Scott Brick as a mentor, and his site has a guide for those interested in becoming narrators.
S02.40: A Kingdom of Dreams by Judith McNaught: A Romance Reader's Romance
It’s the last read-along of Season Two! We’re reading Judith McNaught’s A Kingdom of Dreams, which is the actual book that blooded Sarah when she was wee. This week we’re talking old-school romance, what McNaught was doing with this book and this hero who is so unlike all the heroes who came before him, and why (book) Jennifer is the perfect namesake for (our) Jennifer.
We might not be doing read alongs until August, but that doesn’t mean your TBR won’t still be groaning under the weight of our recommendations — we’ve got a bunch of rec episodes lined up for summer….oh, and did you know Sarah has a book out in three weeks? Order it from Amazon, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, Apple Books, Books-a-Million or from your local indie, or order it signed from her local indie, WORD Bookstore, and get a special edition Fated Mates sticker with your purchase!
As summer approaches, if you are up for leaving a rating or review for the podcast on your podcasting app, we would be very grateful!
Show Notes
Marty McFly, played by Michael J. Fox, was the main character in an excellent 1985 time-traveling movie called Back to the Future.
Sarah's next book, Daring and the Duke, comes out at the end of the month. Preorder from WORD in Brooklyn and you'll recieve a limited edition yellow Fated Mates sticker.
Whitney, My Love is an early McNaught historical romance that the author changed because in the original text, the hero rapes and horsewhips the heroine. The hero of A Kingdom of Dreams, Royce Westmoreland, is one of Clayton's ancestors, but we think he is McNaught correcting the record on the Alpha hero. In the IAD novella episode, we talked about the changes in Whitney, My Love. Whitney also came up in the Alpha episode that started the season, because it's impossible to talk about the primordial alphas without talking about the early Alpha.
More on the four books that comprise the Westmoreland series.
Who do we talk to get A Kingdom of Dreams on audio? Oh, you can email a request to Audible.
Jen learned about 1497 on Wikipedia. As one does.
Margaret Tudor was Henry VII's eldest daughter, married to James IV of Scotland to bring peace to the border. Fun fact, once James IV died (thanks for nothing, Henry VIII, you were the worst), Margaret acted as Regent until James V of Scotland, but when that didn't work out, she married two other dudes and also staged a coup, so we don't really know why we don't all sing her praise always. Yeah, we do. Patriarchy. Anyway. Sarah didn't learn about Margaret Tudor on Wikipedia, but you can.
All about the bliaut. Sarah would like you to know she looked up bliauts on Wikipedia after we recorded and now she's an expert. High-fives to all Wikipedia editors. Nothing without you.
Tinctures, tonics, and teas is Fated Mates shorthand for historicals where medicine women knew various herbal remedies for preventing or ending pregnancy. Or in this case, causing life-long impotence.
We talked a little bit about the freedom of setting a romance in Medieval times on our Scottish Romance episode, so head over and listen to that if you're interested.
Jen's obsessed with the idea of the Vietnam Hero, but doesn't know where to start. Probably with finishing the Ken Burns Vietnam documentary.
What would Jurgen Klopp say?
While we're talking about Judith McNaught and Wikipedia, do not sleep on her page. Divorce celebrations, Coors Brewing Company tie-ins, the invention of the non-clinch romance cover, moving to Dallas after going there on book tour...it has it all.
Support Black Lives Matter and bail funds in your city or state.
Register to vote. Already registered? Double check.
Ad from the May 1989 issue of Romantic Times. via Rob Imes’s Unofficial ROMANTIC TIMES Index.
S02.39: Childhood Friends to Adult Lovers
One of readers’ very favorite tropes this week…sometimes it’s friends-to-lovers and sometimes it’s friends-to-enemies-to-lovers and sometimes it’s friends-to-attempted-murder-to-lovers….we’re talking childhood friends to adult lovers and we will get to the bottom of it! Get ready for way too much music from The Saint. But first things first….Black Lives Matter.
If you love the music in this or any of our episodes, check out our Spotify playlist, which includes it all!
Show Notes
Looking to donate? Here's why supporting community bail funds is so important. The Minnesota Freedom Fund has raised millions of dollars for protestors who have been arrested, and here is an exhaustive list of other collectives and organizaions spearheaded by Black activists.
Sarah donated to The Brooklyn Bail Fund and Jen to the Chicago Community Bail Fund. Find one in your city or state through the National Bail Fund Network.
Bookshop.Org has a special link if you want to shop and support Black-owned Indie bookstores.
Register to vote. And make sure you're still registered. You can also donate to Stacy Abrams's nonprofit, Fair Fight, which is dedicated to ensure voting access for all Americans..
Jen's friend Susan is putting together a service to help parents keep kids busy this summer, it's called My Camp Box.
Maybe you'd like to find some more unrequited love romances? And, by the way, Requited is an actual word.
Jacob imprinting on a baby in the Twilight series was...a thing. But in the MG (middle grade) graphic novel Fake Blood, a bookish boy has a crush on the coolest girl in school, and she just happens to be a vampire slayer.
Friend of the Pod @Bandherbooks led a read along of Again the Magic a few weeks ago.
Sarah loves The Saint, a Val Kilmer classic. The author of that NYTimes profile, Taffy Brodesser-Akner also wrote a LitFic novel Jen loved called Fleishman is in Trouble.
Next time you need details about the exact details of what's happening in a movie, TV show, video game, or book for your kids, check out Common Sense Media.
Mulan II is a romance. Don't @ Sarah; Alvin and the Chimpunks is a not a romance. Don't @ Jen
Preorder Daring and the Duke from WORD in Brooklyn and score a special edition yellow Fated Matessticker.
Next up, A Kingdom of Dreams.
S02.38: Three Little Mistakes by Nikki Sloane: I Think About Kool Aid A Lot
We’re talking about one of the best writers in erotic romance this week—Join us for a deep dive into Nikki Sloane’s Three Little Mistakes, which is one of Sarah’s favorite romances. We’re talking about kink, kink shaming, how to make sex discussions less awkward with new partners and how erotic romance is doing some of the best work in the genre right now…and we’re also going to talk about fruity drinks.
Also, if you love the music in this or any of our episodes, check out our Spotify playlist, which includes it all!
Notes
Here's Jen Porter on Twitter talking about erotic romance. But just this week, Robin Bradford (winner of the RWA Librarian of the year!) was also talking about why it's a problem that we don't have a clear definition for erotic romance.
Getting RWA to recoginize erotic romance was such a struggle that there was actually a petition! But now we can (hopefully) all move on to bigger and better things with The Vivian.
YA books with queer characters are some of the most challenged books in America.
Sarah also mentioned Sordid, which has non-consensual sex and therefore needs a content warning.
Nikki Sloane used to live in Chicago and now lives in Kentucky. Looks like Jen's friendship plans have just been foiled.
Having sex in a porche sounds excruciating, and so does having sex with a porche (WTF!), but Men's Health Magazine to the rescue with this handy (lol) list of best cars to have sex in.
Maybe when we can go places again, you might want to rent or buy a yurt in Hawaii.
Avoid those sugary drinks for yourself and your kids. If you are in Chicago and looking for a dentist, Jen LOVES her dentist Dr. Deaver and Dr. Casimir at Classic Smiles on South Wabash. And she really buried the lede and forgot to mention that Dr. Deaver is not only an amazing dentist, but he was President Obama's dentist!
Next time: A Kingdom of Dreams.
Preorder Daring and the Duke from WORD in Brooklyn and you'll get a sweet limited edition yellow Fated Mates sticker.
S02.37: Partner in Danger Romance
It’s one of our favorite tropes this week — get your pens out, because we’re talking about about a thousand books that tackle Partner in Danger! You know what we’re talking about: “Oh no! This person I sometimes bone is in danger! WAIT! I am feeling feelings!!!” It’s great. We’re going to talk about why. Sarah would like to apologize in advance, because it was really hot in her house when we recorded, and it scrambled her brain.
We love having you with us! — subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform and like/review the podcast, please!
Also, if you love the music in this or any of our episodes, check out our Spotify playlist, which includes it all!
Show Notes
As of last week, going outside looks like a pretty safe thing to do.
In fact, there is less central A/C in New York City. So watch out for the window units.
Zoom fatigue is real.
You know, there is quite a large assortment of "Dorothy in the Sheets, Blanche in the Sheets" merch on Etsy. In case you need to talk a call from your editor.
We all struggle with the illusion of control.
The trope of the damsel in distress has been around for a long, long time. So let's not fridge more women, mm'kay.
Friend of the pod Adriana Herrera has some words of wisdom about writing trauma in romance. And also Jen and Adriana did a Facebook Live chat on the topic. (link & audio forthcoming).
Pour one out for planes. And cars. And alcohol from mysterious European lands.
In case you missed Blood Blow Jobs: please refer to Fated Mates Season One, Lothaire and Rune.
Jen looked it up a map. In Reborn Yesterday, the heroine is dropped onto the Belt Parkway, not the Long Island Expressway. Still seems bad.
Edward saved Bella from a careening van in the school parking lot. And from a bunch of drunk guys.
The Most Dangerous Game is a pretty great short story, classically used to teach person v. person conflict.
Morality Chain is a great trope. Look for an upcoming interstitial on this topic soon!
In Pretty Woman, she rescues him right back.
Preorder signed copies of Daring and the Duke from WORD bookstore in Brooklyn and you'll get swag from Sarah and this special yellow Fated Mates sticker.
Books referenced this week
S02.36: Bet Me by Jennifer Crusie: I wanna mash their faces together.
It’s a Jen week this week! We’re reading Bet Me this week, the book many people put right on the top of Best Contemporary Romance lists — one of Jen’s favorite books and a book Sarah liked to tell people she loved but has now discovered she’d never actually read. Minerva and Cal are absolutely terrific, as is this book, and we’re having a rollicking conversation about fat rep, about friendships in romance, about food (Sarah’s love language), about shoes, and about why grown people at little league games are a weird thing.
We love having you with us! — subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform and like/review the podcast, please!
Also, if you love the music in this or any of our episodes, check out our Spotify playlist, which includes it all!
Show Notes
We're big fans of Carly Lane-Perry from SyFy Fangirls. We especially like her newsletter, Kissing Books--Jen wrote about grandmothers in romance.
Is it criticism if it's all positive?
Baby Foot is sold out, but there are lots of other terrifying alternatives you can try.
Janet Dailey is famous for plagiarizing Nora Roberts. Before that happened, she wrote the Americana series, with one book set in every state. The one set in Ohio was called The Widow and the Wastrel, and Jen's twitter thread about the book unearthed several early covers for the book.
Sarah asked if Jenny Crusie is from Ohio? She is.
This was Sarah's first time reading Bet Me, just like it was Jen's first time reading Gentle Rogue.
Minerva and Diana probably wish they weren't named after Roman goddesses.
So: you want to be an actuary. You want to learn about chaos theory. You're wondering about the gender essentialsim of a book with a title like Men are from Mars; Women are from Venus. You want to learn more about the band Cake.
Penn and Teller explain the Cup and Ball trick. Oh, and did you hear Sarah mention it's going to appear in Daring and the Duke? Pre-order from WORD in Brooklyn, and you'll recieve a free limited edition yellow Fated Mates sticker.
With these many characters, it might as well be a Robert Atlman movie.
Learn about dyslexia, our understanind of which has dramatically changed over time. Erin McCarthy's Hard and Fast (2009) also has a dyslexic hero.
Another utterly fantastic family dinner gone wrong scene is in Her Naughty Holiday by Tiffany Reisz.
Jeanne Lin knows how to write some really sexy kissing.
The fairy godmother is a hallmark of Cinderella, and Sarah's own magical modiste is Madame Hebert.
There are so many homages to great rom-coms of the 90s. Diana loves the music from Julia Roberts movies. Elvis Costello's She appeared in Notting Hill, the lead up to the big wedding was like Four Weddings and a Funeral, and of course Diana turns into a Runaway Bride. Min's visit to the magical modiste is like one of the greatest makeover sequences in movies, Pretty Woman. The "I love your shoes" was like The American President. All the wolf references, of course reminded us of Moonstruck. Cynthie's sexy clothes at the little league game were reminiscent of this great scene in Bull Durham.
Order buttons from Kelly in Jen's shop, and t-shirts from Jordan Dene.
Next up, we'll be reading Three Little Mistakes from Nikki Sloan.
S02.35: Freewheeling with Sophie Jordan: The "Taking the Finger" Explainer
Sophie Jordan is back again! She’s got a new book out, The Virgin and the Rogue, and she’s back with us to freewheel about old school romances, aphrodisiac plotlines and just what do we mean when we say “taking the finger?” It’s a delightful hour. You won’t regret it.
We love having you with us! Subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform and like/review the podcast, please!
Also, if you love the music in this or any of our episodes, check out our Spotify playlist, which includes it all!
Show Notes
Welcome Sophie Jordan, who was last on the pod talking about The Master. Come on five times and you get a Pink Ladies jacket.
Chewy.com will deliver your cat litter and also massive bags of cat food.
Annika Martin's Dark Mafia Prince inspired Sophie and Sarah to coin the phrase "taking the finger," which Jen has co-opted with glee. Not sure what counts as worthy of "taking the finger"? The Simone Scale TM is here for you.
Jen's "control rods" metaphor is because she's a big old nuclear nerd.
Aphrodesiac books we know of: The Virgin and the Rogue; Robin's Lovett's Planet of Desire series takes place on a planet where the atmosphere is an aphrodesiac; in A Taste of Her Own Medicine by Tasha Harrison, the grandmother whips up a "come to me" potion; Johanna Lindsey's Secret Fire sounds bonkers; Wild Card is one by Lora Leigh that Joanna Shupe recommends. Does the shortbread in How the Dukes Stole Christmas count? What else have you got?
Michael Phillips of the Chicago Tribune taught Jen everything she needed to know about the backbone of good criticism, everything else she's making up as she goes along.
We talked about bodily autonomy in season one.
Sarah talked about watching the trailer for this very terrifying 60s movie The Lady in a Cage.
Order Sophie's signed books from Katy Budget Books and Sarah's from WORD in Brooklyn -- including pre-orders for Daring and the Duke.
Oh, you want to read Sophie's story about a stablemaster and a maid? No horses were harmed, so it's fine.
S02.34: Texas! Chase by Sandra Brown: The Original Sexclamation Point
Sometimes there’s a writer who’s so transformative to your experience as a reader that you forget she even was a part of it until you remember, and then you remember every book she’s written. It’s Sandra Brown week here at Fated Mates, and we have loved so many of her romances that we just didn’t know what to read, so strap in, because both Jen and Sarah read Texas! Chase, and then two roads diverged, only to discover some real deep-rooted kinky stuff. Strap in. This one left Eric shellshocked!
We love having you with us! — subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform and like/review the podcast, please!
Also, if you love the music in this or any of our episodes, check out our Spotify playlist, which includes it all!
Show Notes
Jen's been thinking about how we're going to archive the Quarantine Times and so are historians. Steve Ammidown was kind enough to make some videos about archiving for Jen's TikTok.
Turns out that tweet about the Spanish epidimologist was not true! Blessed be the fact checkers.
Lori Lightfoot is Jen's mayor and her Coronavirus memes are the best.
Everyone knows who Tom Brady is, but not many people seem to like him.
Sandra Brown was in the first class of authors acquired by Vivian Stephens. Her Loveswept #1 was Heaven's Price, and her Harlequin American Romance #1 was Tomorrow's Promise. Steve Ammidown was also kind enough to dig into the archives and pull out some early interviews with Sandra Brown and about the founding of Loveswept.
Benjamin Dreyer definitely wants you to know the difference between the em dash, en dash, and the hypen.
The Rana Look cover has the author and McLean Stevenson from MASH as the cover models. Whoa.
You can still join the Doubleday Book Club. Who knew!
Jeff Wright has a very funny TikTok (which he crossposts to Twitter and Instagram) and a very distinctive way of saying Oh Wow.
Sheikhs & Native Americans in romance are full of racist, harmful stereotypes.
Jennifer Porter took the hit on Texas! Lucky for us.
Oil Futures aren't looking good for the Tyler family; it's not looking great for the rodeo, either.
Sunny Chandler's job as a Mardi Gras costume designer seems pretty sweet. Here's a cool interview with Patricia Halsell-Richardson, a woman who designs Mardi Gras costumes in Mobile.
A quick primer to the waves of feminism and what people thought about working women in the 80s.
Sandra Brown's house was blown up for an episode of Walker, Texas Ranger. A show that is making a comeback, as it turns out.
Ann Richards was pretty great, and so is her daughter Cecile.
GQ has some instructions on how to be a DILF, but our current favorite is by Katee Roberts.
Slow Heat in Heaven has a plot about dogfighting, but Sarah mentioned a romance where the dogs fall in love back when we talked about non-Sandra Brown category romances.
The 80s Primetime Soap Operas were a force to be reckoned with.
Next time, we'll be talking about Bet Me by Jenny Crusie. For some reason, it's cheaper to buy it bundled with Welcome To Temptation. /rolls eyes at eBook pricing on a 20 year old book.
S02.33: Enemies to Lovers with Tasha Harrison
Tasha Harrison is joining us this week to talk about an old reliable trope — enemies to lovers! This is one of those that we return to again and again — and of course, since it’s a Pandemic, we have to ask…if you’re into enemies to lovers and you haven’t read Kresley Cole’s Immortals After Dark, what are you waiting for? Season 1 is here for you! Otherwise, we’re freewheeling with Tasha on everything from the best Chris to the real inspiration for The Wire, so strap in. It’s a ride!
We love having you with us! — subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform and like/review the podcast, please!
Also, if you love the music in this or any of our episodes, check out our Spotify playlist, which includes it all!
Show Notes
Remember that time when Michelle from Destiny's Child felland then got right back up?
Jen wrote about Enemies to Lovers for Kirkus.
Apparently, it's called a Proprietary Eponyms when a brand name becomes a verb or common noun.
The question of whether or not fiction should be "timeless" is one that authors deal with in different ways.
Robert Redford was a snack. Kevin Costner was named The Sexiest Man Alive, but Jen thinks the only time he was truly sexy was in Bull Durham.
Can there ever be a definitive ranking of the Chrises? Jen likes Pine, Sarah likes "the Australian one," and Tasha isn't interested in any of them. Sarah has Chris Evans blindness, but Tasha points out that he's got a little of the wild one in him. Check him checking out this reporter's boots.
We just had Christina Lauren on our show! Beautiful Bastard is better than Fifty Shades in a lot of ways, especially for that elevator scene. Either way, it's a good illustration of the myriad problems with a workplace romance.
Speaking of Lucy Eden, she and Jen had THE STRANGEST thing happen at the 2019 RWA conference.
Babies are complicated in romance and complicated in real life. Maybe what we're really going to see is a boom in "marriage in trouble" romance. Kids are complicated, too, especially if you buy the wrong poop bags.
Tasha's dad inspired the character of Norman Wilson on The Wire! The Baltimore paper The Afro-American can be read online. The real life Baltimore Mayor he worked for was Martin O'Malley.
These Italian Mayors want you to stay inside. If only all the American governors and mayors were the same. Cardi-B is worried about Coronavirus-- so stay home and stay safe!
S02.32: Taking the Heat by Victoria Dahl: Perfect Books are Perfect
We’re back to a more recent book that taught Sarah about contemporary romance, Victoria Dahl’s Taking the Heat. Use headphones for this one, because we’re talking about the best BJs in romance, the power of a great sex scene, and how we want you all to be in a sex pantheon. We’re also talking about flawed characters, true cinnamon rolls, and why Victoria Dahl is a fricken great author.
We love having you with us! — subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform and like/review the podcast, please!
Also, if you love the music in this or any of our episodes, check out our Spotify playlist, which includes it all!
Show Notes
Sure, Sarah's new computer makes her feel like Lightning McQueen, but it's her new version of Scrivener that is the most exciting thing.
Jen isn't the only one who likes Starburst jelly beans.
Sarah has planner envy. We both love Blackwing pencils. If you also love Blackwing pencils, we highly recommend this video by comedian David Rees on Artisinal Pencil Sharpening. There's also a book! We don't quite understand washi tape, but we're happy for those who love it. If you want to talk planners, Nisha Sharma, Kate Clayborn, and Tracey Livesay are your people.
RIP BEA 2020, we look forward to 2021.
Jen is addicted to jigsaw puzzles, just like everyone else in the world.
The city junk problem is actually pretty great.
Victoria Dahl also writes as Victoria Helen Stone. Jen rediscovered contemporary romance with the Tumble Creek series, and also the Fast Track series by Erin McCarthy.
Gabe's job was to introduce eBooks to the library. We've come a long way, baby.
Jackson, Wyoming is the setting of this book, and apparently there's a lot to do there -- like skiing and rock climbing. It's all outdoorsy, so we can't really speak to it.
The big city to small town trope is a cornerstone of romance. It's just not a corner we visit that often.
The advice columnist is experiencing a huge resurgence these days, and in the age of the internet, everyone can give advice.
Some useful resources if someone you know is sharing their thoughts of suicidal ideation.
That Elizabeth Hoyt book with Winter Makepeace is called Thief of Shadows, and it also has a great blow job scene. In case you're into that sort of thing.
Watch the Ending of Crocodile Dundee if you've never had the pleasure.
If you are looking to try a new podcast app, we both love Overcast. Along with being a great listening device, you can use it to find and share any podcast clips online!
Preorder Daring and the Duke! Support your local indie bookstore, Sarah's is WORD in Brooklyn and Jen's is 57th Street Books in Chicago. And everyone's is Love's Sweet Arrow or The Ripped Bodice.
Next time, it's choose your own Sandra Brown adventure. We'll both read Texas! Chase, which believe it or not isn't on Kindle, but it is on audio! We'll also post a thread of some other Sandra Brown favorites. And if straight thriller is your thing, try OutFox, which is the one Sarah's mom enjoyed.