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A while back I mentioned the Harlequin line which inspired a poll on Equal Opportunities Exoticized Ethnicities Romance. The Rachel & Oyce Presents line featured titles like The Infernal Indian's Insatiable Innamorata, The Vietnamese Vampire's Voluptuous Virgin, and The Nimble Nigerian's Nubile Nubian's Nibbled Nipples. The actual Harlequin line featured Latin Lovers, Brazilian Billionaires, Greek Tycoons, Parisian Playboys, and Sensual Sheikhs.
I finally got around to attempting to read one of them. It is in the "Latin Lover" line, and that phrase is emblazoned on a chili pepper on the spine of the book. This is the inside cover:
VIVA LA VIDA DE AMOR!
LATIN LOVERS (on a chili pepper)
They speak the language of passion.
I have read lots and lots of bad books, in many genres. You might call me a conoisseur of horrid prose. I have read many books that are more obviously risible, not to mention unpublished manuscripts like "The Eye of Argon" ("a lithe opaque nose") and Madmen Always Win, a play that contained the immortal line, spoken by a coroner, "He died-- of broken capillaries and stuff."
And yet In the Spaniard's Bed, while not falling to such depths, strikes me as something rather special in the annals of horrible books. It was published, for one thing. And while many awful books get published, especially by throw-away series paperback lines, its consistency of dreadfulness is impressive.
The thing about In the Spaniard's Bed isn't that it is full of hilariously bad prose. It's that virtually every single sentence has something wrong with it: incorrect grammar, a word that sounds similar to one which would make sense instead of one that actually makes sense, bathos, anti-climax, expository lumps, over-use of adjectives, non-sequitors, cliche, unintentional innuendo, sentence fragments, inappropriate shifts in tone and style, a general image used when a specific one would be better, and so forth. It seems to have been written in an all-nighter, or perhaps dictated, by someone on poor terms with the muse of language.
For even a potboiler about blackmailing billionaire sexy Spaniards can be a good one of its kind, or a bad one.
I reproduce some random sentences below. Perhaps in studying what is wrong with them, we will gain some insight into how to write a good sentence, or how not to write one quite that bad. I invite you take a crack at them.
The ice-pink gown moulded her slender curves, its spaghetti straps showing silky skin to an advantage, and the diagonal ruffled split to mid-thigh showcased beautifully proportioned legs. A gossamer wrap in matching ice-pink completed the outfit, and her jewelry was understated.
Sassy, he mused, and mad. It made a change from simpering companions who held a diploma in superficial artificiality.
She fired him a look that quelled him into silence.
It was a beautiful night, the air crisp and cool indicative of spring.
He didn't move, but she had the impression he had shifted stance. How did he do that? Go from apparent relaxation mode to menacing alert?
Cassandra registered his words, and felt her stomach contract in tangible pain.
On reflection it was a restful day.
Choosing what to wear didn't pose a problem, for she led a reasonably active social life and possessed the wardrobe to support it.
A long black scarf wound loosely at her neck was a stunning complement, and she wore minimum jewelry, diamond ear-studs and a diamond tennis bracelet.
Bedroom duties. The thought should have filled her with antipathy, but instead there was a sense of anticipation at a raw primitive level to experience again the magical, mesmeric excitement he was able to evoke.
He was the most impossible man she'd ever had the misfortune to meet. Dictatorial, indomitable, omnipotent.
Diego gave a husky laugh, and uttered something incomprehensible to her in Spanish.
I finally got around to attempting to read one of them. It is in the "Latin Lover" line, and that phrase is emblazoned on a chili pepper on the spine of the book. This is the inside cover:
VIVA LA VIDA DE AMOR!
LATIN LOVERS (on a chili pepper)
They speak the language of passion.
I have read lots and lots of bad books, in many genres. You might call me a conoisseur of horrid prose. I have read many books that are more obviously risible, not to mention unpublished manuscripts like "The Eye of Argon" ("a lithe opaque nose") and Madmen Always Win, a play that contained the immortal line, spoken by a coroner, "He died-- of broken capillaries and stuff."
And yet In the Spaniard's Bed, while not falling to such depths, strikes me as something rather special in the annals of horrible books. It was published, for one thing. And while many awful books get published, especially by throw-away series paperback lines, its consistency of dreadfulness is impressive.
The thing about In the Spaniard's Bed isn't that it is full of hilariously bad prose. It's that virtually every single sentence has something wrong with it: incorrect grammar, a word that sounds similar to one which would make sense instead of one that actually makes sense, bathos, anti-climax, expository lumps, over-use of adjectives, non-sequitors, cliche, unintentional innuendo, sentence fragments, inappropriate shifts in tone and style, a general image used when a specific one would be better, and so forth. It seems to have been written in an all-nighter, or perhaps dictated, by someone on poor terms with the muse of language.
For even a potboiler about blackmailing billionaire sexy Spaniards can be a good one of its kind, or a bad one.
I reproduce some random sentences below. Perhaps in studying what is wrong with them, we will gain some insight into how to write a good sentence, or how not to write one quite that bad. I invite you take a crack at them.
The ice-pink gown moulded her slender curves, its spaghetti straps showing silky skin to an advantage, and the diagonal ruffled split to mid-thigh showcased beautifully proportioned legs. A gossamer wrap in matching ice-pink completed the outfit, and her jewelry was understated.
Sassy, he mused, and mad. It made a change from simpering companions who held a diploma in superficial artificiality.
She fired him a look that quelled him into silence.
It was a beautiful night, the air crisp and cool indicative of spring.
He didn't move, but she had the impression he had shifted stance. How did he do that? Go from apparent relaxation mode to menacing alert?
Cassandra registered his words, and felt her stomach contract in tangible pain.
On reflection it was a restful day.
Choosing what to wear didn't pose a problem, for she led a reasonably active social life and possessed the wardrobe to support it.
A long black scarf wound loosely at her neck was a stunning complement, and she wore minimum jewelry, diamond ear-studs and a diamond tennis bracelet.
Bedroom duties. The thought should have filled her with antipathy, but instead there was a sense of anticipation at a raw primitive level to experience again the magical, mesmeric excitement he was able to evoke.
He was the most impossible man she'd ever had the misfortune to meet. Dictatorial, indomitable, omnipotent.
Diego gave a husky laugh, and uttered something incomprehensible to her in Spanish.