I've been following the brouhaha on AAR's At the Back Fence board, over various issues concering virgin widows, widows who are not virgins, virgins who are not widows, and sundry other things, including politics, feminism and at some point, Herman Melville. Granted, some of my perception of this may be influenced by Sudafed, and I have not read Adele Ashworth's Duke of Sin, to which some comments are addressed. What mental acuity I have these days is devoted to working on one of my WIPs and making sure that one of my elder Sims from Sims2 gets to platinum aspiration level in time for his date with the grim reaper. (That and the fact that I must make a light-haired, light-eyed family for my custom neighborhood to toss some variety into the genetics pool. Yes I spend way too much time on my Sims when I feel poopy, but call me on it and I will sneeze on you.)

But back to the discussions. There's also the one on the Connie Brockway interview. I am saddened at another writer leaving the historical fold for the contemporary venue (contemp readers, you have a good one coming your way; treat her right) and riled at the factors she cited for doing so. Not at her, at the factors. I do think that the historical romance genre has undergone some shrinkage, and as the dh is fond of saying "for the love of creamed corn" it doesn't have to be that way.

I'm going to give myself a little more time to get my thoughts together before I publicly opine on such things, but one effect this has had on me is to see if I can write a virgin widow book. Hey, people would talk about it, and any publicity is good publicity. :) There would have to be a good reason for it, not just because. Though I've got enough stuff on my plate (but hmm, haven't chosen anything for the anthology yet...something to think about) If I did, it would have to make sense, and not just for the virgin angle. It would have to affect more of the story than that.