Written by Falconempress. Posted on Mar 21, 08:39 PM.

"You Slay Me" Spork: Intro and Chapter 1

The Empress Muses About the Paranormal Romance Genre

I never really understood the sudden burst of the “paranormal romance“ genre that became so popular with the unholy mess that is Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight. Suddenly, it is everywhere! I recently got a newsletter from one of the online bookstores I am a member of telling me about all the wonderful paranormal romance novels they have in store, just for me! Just out of twisted curiosity, I skimmed through the email, to better understand just what the hell this paranormal romance thing is supposed to be and what kinds of books are written in the genre.

Or, I should rather have said, what kinds of books are written in the genre.

About 98% of them are the same book! The same basic plot— if I can even call it that—the same characters, the same angst and nonsense. It’s horrible! Here it is, all of the cursed sub-genre, in a single sentence:

A young, plain, uninteresting young girl (preferably still in high school) meets a tall, dark, handsome as fuck and brooding, dark and tortured young man who broods and is dark. And tortured. Like, a lot. The two fall in love and the girl soon finds out that he is a (insert a vampire/angel/werewolf/undead abomination/any other supernatural creature that can be possibly anthropomorphized and therefore can have a dick here). So they brood together about their dark, forbidden and tortured love and they get into a whole lot of trouble for proclaiming undying love for each other. Did I mention the male lead in question and everything connected to him is dark? And tortured? Good.

Why do people read this crap? More importantly, why does rubbish like this even get published? Who in the unholy name of Cthulhu thinks this is a good idea? What is wrong with all those people?

But I swallowed my furious rage and forgot about the whole nonsense. But then an entry lccorp2 posted in his journal brought up these long-repressed memories and I remembered something I saw on Amazon a while ago— You Slay Me, the first novel in the Aisling Gray, Guardian series by Katie MacAlister. Basically, it’s a paranormal romance story with dragons. Now, if pulled off in a sensible manner, I would not have too big a problem with it. Not that big, in any case. But this—this—this—THING is just one huge trainwreck. Just read the blurb:

The first book in a sexy, humorous paranormal thriller series featuring Aisling Grey, an apprentice Guardian, and her sometimes boyfriend, sometimes foe Drake Vireo, wyvern (leader) of one of the four dragon septs. Aisling finds her true calling when she travels to Paris to deliver a medieval object that is part of a set sought after for the power it wields.

There she meets the handsome Drake, a man who is not at all what he seems. Implicated in the circumstances of two murders, Aisling, the demon she summons for help (and subsequently can’t get rid of) named Jim, and Drake find themselves caught up in a web of lies and confusion that could well result in the demon lords of hell ruling the mortal world.

Ouch.

By the way, Katie MacAlister is also an author of such classics as Fire Me Up, Light My Fire, Holy Smokes, sequels to You Slay Me; Playing With Fire, Up In Smoke, books from the Silver Dragons series, and let us not forget My Big Fat Supernatural Honeymoon, the title of which speaks for itself and Love in the Time of Dragons which infuriates me to no end, because if you absolutely have to rephrase Love in the Time of Cholera, it better be in something bloody good. And where would any self-respecting paranormal romance writer be without a book about vampires? MacAlister is responsible for such literary gems as Even Vampires Get the Blues and Crouching Vampire Hidden Fang.

Double ouch.

Is it just me or do paranormal romance writers have absolutely no talent for coming up with titles that are not all cringe – worthy wordplays on the paranormal creature love interest in question? Holy Smokes? Are you serious? This is almost as bad as Dead as a Doornail or Dead in Dallas and Dead Until Dusk by Charlaine Harris from the Southern Vampires series which is also a gigantic piece of fail and nothing will ever convince me otherwise. If you’ve never read it, don’t. If you see it in a store, walk the other way.

But since it is New Year’s Eve, a day during which we Slovakians make fun of everything and laugh at everything, including ourselves, and things that inspire fits of murderous rage or would otherwise make us mad, I decided to laugh as well. And I decided to spork the shit out of Katie MacAlister’s unholy mess. So here is the first chapter of the first book in the Aisling Gray, Guardian series, You Slay Me.

Chapter 1

We open on the Orly airport in France where our main character Aisling is going through customs. We spend the first few minutes learning what her name is and how to pronounce it. Apparently it is pronounced “Ash-ling“ because it’s Irish. But before we get there, some hilarity ensues since the French customs officer gets it right on about seventh try, and not even then is it the actual thing, but Aisling thinks it’s “close enough“ and leaves it at that.

The customs officer, who is called Antoine, as we learn, is also an idiot because not only he is unable to pronounce the name correctly, but when Aisling says it’s Irish, he narrows his eyes and points out that Aisling’s passport says she’s American. You see, it’s funny because he’s French people are stupid, haha haha hahaha oh God just kill me now.

Antoine the customs guy then flips through her passport and reads her description out loud for all of us to know what she looks like:

You are five feet and nine inches tall, have grey eyes, are thirty-one years of age, unmarried, and you live in Seattle, state of Washington, America. This is all correct, yes?

This is one of the worst descriptions I ever read. Ever. This is right up there along with describing the character as they are looking in the mirror. It feels forced, stupid and contrived. But speaking of stupid, there is much more than that, oh yes. We haven’t even started yet.

Yes, except I think of my eyes as being a bit more hazel than grey, but the passport guy said to put grey down. Hazel sounds more exotic, don’t you think?

No. I don’t. And Antoine doesn’t either. If he is like any other man I met in my life, he is probably wondering what the hell kind of color “hazel“ is supposed to be (no offense guys, just speaking from experience). Why would you talk to a customs officer like that? For reasons other than looking like a complete airhead. I wonder how the passport guy reacted when she tried to get him to put “hazel“ under “eye color“. Probably the same way as Antoine, who has the correct reaction, rising a bemused eyebrow at her oh-so-adorable talk.

Oooh, I know what this is. This is the author trying to endear the character to the reader.

I hate Aisling already.

Also, I may not have mentioned this before, but the whole thing is written in the first person. I read a lot and so far I only read three books who pulled off the first person in a way that did not make me want to throw the book across the room and then set it on fire after I stomped on it. This is where my utter dislike for first person comes from. I am sorry if by writing this I am somehow offending you, as that really is not my point, but so far, I have had mostly bad experiences with the first person narrative.

Okay, where were we. Right. Customs.

We then learn Aisling is a courier in a firm belonging to her uncle Damian and she is supposed to bring something called an “aquamanile”. She gets nervous because the thing, whatever it is, is worth a lot of money and goes through the instructions her uncle gave her in her head:

Security is your personal responsibility; your security is not the responsibility of the police, or of the government, or any officials—your first and last line of security is yourself. Be alert and aware of your surroundings. Radiate confidence. Never do anything to indicate you are prey.

Damn. Way to over-dramatize things, Uncle Damian. I wonder what the meetings at the company look like.

“We have to adjust our prices so that we will crush our enemies under the soles of the boots of our overwhelming success and then, we will dominate the market within the limitations of anti – monopoly laws, where we will be second to almost none! We have to be the predator our prey will run away from! MAHAHAHA!!!!”

Anyway.

Remembering uncle’s absurdly ominous warnings, Aisling gets nervous and glances around to see whether anybody is looking at her or the case she carries. Yes. Because along with the stress and nervewracking anxiety over the harassment at customs after a transatlantic flight, everybody will be curious about a chick with a fancy case.

We then learn that an aquamanile is a small golden statue of a dragon. Why couldn’t we get that explanation instead of “aquamanile” is beyond me.

But we do not remain in the dark for long! We soon get an explanation for calling a perfectly easily describable object something I am not even sure how to pronounce! Aisling is here to save the day!

An aquamanile is a form of ewer, usually made of metal, used for the ritual washing of hands by a priest or other liturgical person. They were very common in medieval times.

Antoine’s eyes widened as he stared at the black case. “It is a religious artifact you have?”

I gave him a crooked smile. “Not really. Rumor has it that aquamaniles were sometimes used in, er, dark practices.”

He stared. “Dark practices?”

I took in his raised eyebrows and smiled sympathetically. “Demons,” I said succinctly. “Aquamaniles such as this are said to have been used by powerful mages to raise the demon princes.”

Why would you tell a customs officer this? Can anybody give me a reason? Couldn’t you just say “Oh, it’s just a fancy name for this golden dragon statue thing“. No. You have to reiterate the entire history of the bloody thing to him. The audience needs to know what EXACTLY that thing does, so Antoine the customs officer needs to know as well.

By the way, aren’t there other people waiting to be checked in? Isn’t she wasting their time and Antoine by telling him this stuff? You know what a line to customs look like after a transatlantic flight? Especially at a large airport like Orly? I do. And much better than I would ever have wished. Because I spent TWO HOURS standing in it, with the line moving the entire time. That’s how many people get off these flights. The officer checked my papers, asked the purpose of my visit, checked my fingerprints, scanned my handbag and sent me on my merry way. But even so, with the amount of passengers it takes so long to get through. I think there is a very long line of people behind Aisling, all tired, sore and wanting to punch her face in.

But Antoine again proves that he is an idiot because at a mention of “demon princes“ he shits bricks and his eyes nearly pop out of his sockets. Really, That’s what it says in the book. That his eyes nearly popped out. Aisling continues to explain the difference between a common demon and a demon lord, while Antoine hangs on her every word. She then proceeds to explain to him in great detail that even though demons are a personal hobby of hers all of this is bullshit anyway since demons are not real:

“Yeah, I know. I think it’s a bit out there, too, but you’d be surprised what people believe. Even so, it’s a fascinating subject. I’ve made quite a study of demons—not that I believe they really exist outside of man&‘s imagination—and found there are whole cults revolving around the idea of demons and the power they wield over mortals. I heard there’s a group in San Francisco that is trying to get a demon elected into public office. Ha ha, like anyone would notice?”

Ha. Ha. It’s funny because it’s San Francisco. And, as we all know, San Francisco is all about libertarians and hippies and Arnold. Ha.

Yes. This is really what passes as humor in this book.

Despite being a complete tool, Antoine has enough common sense in his body to recognize the attempted joke this tragically unfunny and stares at her blankly. Aisling is getting really nervous because she only has under two hours to deliver the dragon statue and tries to speed things up. How? By telling the customs officer the story of her life, of course.

“This is my first job as a courier, you see, and my uncle—he’s my boss—told me that if I screw up this delivery, I’m off the payroll, and since a very stupid judge in California ordered me to pay my ex-husband alimony just because Alan, my ex, is a lazy slob who likes to hang around the beach and ogle the fake-boobed girls rather than get off his surfer ass and work for a living like the rest of us, it’s kind of important that I keep this job, and to keep it means that I have to get the aquamanile to the woman who bought it from Uncle Damian.”

This has got to be some of the worst excuse for exposition I ever came across.

Antoine is completely stunned by the word vomit that just ensued, so Aisling nudges him with her papers to get his attention. She could have done that in the first place instead of complaining to a complete stranger while a long, long line of people behind her tap their feet impatiently, but then we would have been denied this delicious exposition and we can’t have that, now, can we?

Antoine demands she opens the case so that he can examine the statue and she complies. Shockingly enough, this time without informing him about her childhood trauma or the dark practices of old. She reveals your standard coiled golden dragon statue with emerald eyes. To Aisling this is one of the very few depictions of a dragon without wings she has ever seen, which further proves MacAlister has no idea what she is writing about. I am no dragonology savant, but hello, Eastern dragons, like the Chinese ones? Even in western lore there just as many wingless dragons as there are winged. Research what you are writing about, dammit!

The papers are in order, but as Aisling turns to leave, Antoine stops her:

“One moment,” he said, stopping me with an upraised hand. I held my breath, worried he was going to insist on something that would keep me from making my appointment with Mme. Deauxville. It would be just my luck that Antoine would decide I needed a full body search.

I tried to look innocent and friendly and not in the least like someone who would smuggle something into the country in a convenient body cavity. “Hmm?”

Oh gods. I wish she didn’t mention “convenient body cavities“. What the hell.

He glanced around quickly, then stepped closer to me, his voice dropping. “You are an expert in demons but you do not believe in them?”

I shook my head, not wishing to get into a philosophical conversation while the clock was ticking. “I’m not really an expert—I’ve just studied a few medieval texts about them.”

Yes, because studying untranslated medieval texts on demonology is a common pastime of your average American woman with a ridiculous-sounding name. And all of a sudden “the clock is ticking”. Funny, you had more than enough time back when you engaged in a lengthy conversation about different kinds of demons.

“Demons are very bad.”

No shit, Sherlock.

I shrugged and edged sideways. “Not really. According to the texts I’ve read, they’re actually rather stupid. I think people fear the thought of them because they don’t know how to control them.”

That’s exactly the problem that couple from Paranormal Activity had—they just didn’t know how to control the hellspawn haunting one of them and ravaging their home without any sensible purpose or motive!

He leaned closer, the stale odor of cigarette smoke clinging to him, making my nose wrinkle. “And you don’t fear them?”

Because he’s French, you see. And all French people smoke cigarettes. Speaking of which, I want one so bad right now.

I shook my head again, edging even farther away.

In a surprising turn of events, Aisling reacts correctly when a man leans towards her, whispering “Are you afraid of demons?”

His dark eyes lit for a moment with a deep red light, making him suddenly look a whole lot more ominous than a simple customs inspector. “You should,” he said, and then turned away, gesturing the next person in line to his table.

“Hoo, I guess there’re weirdos all over the world,” I mumbled to myself as I pushed my way through the crowd toward the exit, careful to keep both hands on the handle of the black case. My clothing and personal items I could afford to lose, but this job was my chance—my only chance of getting ahead since the company I worked for went belly up. If I messed this up, I’d be jobless again. With no unemployment benefits left, and a beach bum to support, I had to have work, something that would allow me to live while paying Alan the huge wad of money the court decided I owed him.

Men. Bah!

Wait, what? The guys eyes light up red with the infernal heat of the hellfire and she just shrugs this off with “there’re all sorts of weirdos in the world“ and proceeds to bitch internally about how badly she needs to do this job right and what a douchebag her ex is? WHAT IS WRONG WITH THIS WOMAN?! I think Aisling may be certifiably retarded. She just encountered hellspawn and all she can think about is “Jeez, Alan is such an asshole and if I don’t do this well, I may have to look for another job“. What would she do if her plane crashes? “Oh no, my favorite shoes now have all of this gross viscera all over them. But at least we landed quickly and now I can do the job I was sent here to do. I hope it goes well.“ No wonder Alan packed his bags and ran.

And why didn’t the next person in line kick her in the kneecaps for stalling so damn much?!

After that display of inhuman idiocy Aisling decides to get herself a cab. With her heinous French, she tries to talk to a cab driver who quickly becomes a favorite of mine as he leaves her struggling with the language he can speak, amusing himself at her expense. You can hardly blame him—the woman came to the country to work and she does not speak a word of the language, not even the most basic phrases. His name is Rene and he is awesome. He agrees to drive her to “Rue Sang des Innocents“ (I swear I did not make this up) for thirty six euros and trust me, in Paris, that is almost for free. Before the delivery she still has some time (all of a sudden, wasn’t she in a terrible hurry not too long ago?) so she runs into the hotel to fix her hair. Then they arrive at the place. Aisling observes her surroundings:

“Wow,” I breathed as I leaned out the window to peer up at the house. “What a gorgeous building. It looks so French!”

Buildings in the center of Paris sometimes tend to look like that, honey. God, Aisling is such a dipshit.

Rene explains that it’s an exclusive neighborhood and together they go through the three sentences/reactions Rene taught her in their way there:

“If someone annoys me, I say, Voulez-vous cesser de me cracker dessus pendant que vous parlez.”

“Will you stop spitting on me while you are speaking,” Rene translated with a nod.

“And if I need help with anything, I say,”J’ai une grenouille dans mon bidet.“

“I have a frog in my bidet. Yes, very good. And the last one?”

“The last I should reserve for any guy who hits on me when I don’t want him to: Tu as une tite afaire muter les plaques des egouts.“

“You have a face that would blow off the cover of a manhole. Oui, tris bon. You will do. And for your meeting with the important lady, bonne chance, eh?”

Truly, knowing how to brush off men who come hitting on you since you are so hot and all is so much more important than knowing how to, let’s say, call help if something happens. Or ask where the restroom is. But that is just me being my impractical self.

Rene leaves, giving her his card in case she needs a chauffeur and Aisling rings the bell. And talks to herself about how she is a confident Professional. Nobody answers, though. She gets nervous because the whole street is quiet—too quiet, actually. Gee, I wonder if anything sinister may be going on on a street called “Rue de Sang des Innocents”.

Since it was a pleasant June evening, I expected people to be arriving home, bustling around doing their evening shopping, strolling down the street, gazing upon the Seine, and so forth, but there was no movement at all in the house.

Because in Paris, everybody frolics on the boardwalk after they come back from their frustrating middle-class job after their boss yelled at them for nearly an hour because they did not arrange the envelopes correctly. I am starting to think this woman only knows Paris from postcards and old movies.

She notices the main door is open and enters the empty hall where she does the usual “Hello?” routine most minor characters in horror movies do before getting murdered in a horrible fashion. Since Aisling is our main character with a special name, I am not getting my hopes up.

She goes up to the apartment with the overwhelming feeling of dread and wrongness settling over her and muses how the hall looks like a tomb. She finds the apartment and tries to knock but—surprise!—the door swings open just as she touches it. I never really understood why murderers and burglars always leave the front door open. Wouldn’t they want to close it so that nobody could disturb them when they work or so that the noisy neighbour or accidental passerby wouldn’t find an open door strange and call the police? But I forgot that Aisling is too good to call the police, since she can take care of herself. Silly me.

Despite what common sense would be telling her if she had any, she enters the ominous, quiet apartment with open the door. She remarks on the furniture, that it is all pretty and Paris-y. Until she notices the body, that is.

Suspended from a chandelier, a woman’s body was doubled over, hanging from her hands tied behind her back, her body swinging slightly above a black circle of ash that had been drawn on the lovely red carpet, a circle inscribed with twelve symbols.

If you tied somebody’s hands behind their back and then hung that person by their hands, would their body remain doubled over? Wouldn’t the weight of the body pull the arms out of their sockets at the shoulders? Just asking.

Aisling then swears there is a frog in her bidet and wishes that worst of her problems were frogs and that, rather smartly, actually, ends the first chapter. Thankfully.

Thank you for reading,

Falconempress

Tagged as Aisling Gray, Falconempress, Paranormal Romance, Spork.

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