sarea | I'd give this entry a 6, mostly for effort.

Have seen The Life of David Gale. I appear to be one of two people on God's green Earth who can say that I enjoyed it. Was it a bit manipulative? Sure. Was it sorta predictable? A bit. Was it Kate Winslet's best work? Not by a long shot. Kevin Spacey's? Ditto. And god, Kate had the worst lines. And the story could definitely have been told better. Yet it was powerful for me all the same, and I have no complaints whatsoever about paying full price to see it. I keep thinking about it, and the more I think about it the better it is in retrospect. It's all so seamless and cool! Rating: 7/8

OMG but speaking of ratings -- Jade has gone utterly mad. That ratings system at Portkey is extremely debilitating. It would be such a blow to get a low score. Now she's asking me why so-and-so gave her a 9 instead of a 10, as if I would know. "But if they liked it enough to give it a 9, what held them back from a 10? What's WRONG WITH THE STORY??" I am about to slap her silly. (I've started to rate her on her conversation; a witty comment is given a 10 -- if she gets anything lower I offer suggestions for improvement.)

After having been rec'ed Laura Kinsale by several different sources, I am ready to give her a try. The problem is that all -- or nearly all -- of her books are now out of print, it seems. I did manage to find a few of them today, and Jade found a few near her as well. We're both still in our Outlander phase, though, so am not sure when we'll be able to read these ... we're still reading Dragonfly in Amber.

On the non-romance novel front, I just finished my review of Dragon (Smallville novel), which was a pleasant surprise after the bored-out-of-my-skullness of Arrival. Now I just have one more book to review and my duties are done! Well, at least until they send us more. Le sigh. However, I can't say no. The networks are usually such assholes about working with fans that any olive branch is gladly accepted. The Smallville folks have been amazingly decent to us. (Why us, we still haven't figured out.) Also, last night read Mates, Dates, and Inflatable Bras by Cathy Hopkins, as I cannot resist those British teen novels. It's like a sickness. It was cute, but not nearly as good as Louise Rennison's series.

AND, am still trying to finish The Red Tent by Anita Diamante and A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers, both of which have been v. good, so why can't I just finish them already?! Maybe it's because I get distracted by Laura Kinsale et al. I am a sad, unmotivated person.

BTW the Writing Rule has been broken for days now. Must get back on track.