Libraries, sex and soft porn

Neil Gaiman has defended libraries this week - http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/oct/15/neil-gaiman-future-libraries-reading-daydreaming#start-of-comments

-as if they needed defending. I am posting the link here because it’s worth reading. One thing I learned – he’s English. There I was, always thinking he was American – not that I’d ever bothered to check. I haven’t ever read anything of his. Strange how these ideas float around. Perhaps I’d better find something of his and read it!

I am about halfway through JKR’s book and surprised to find I am enjoying it. Strange how reviews, verbal or writtten, even a chance remark, can influence one’s enjoyment of a book. Helen didn’t say a lot, but gave me the impression she was not impressed. She didn’t rate the ending, certainly. I won’t say any more until I finish the book. 

I returned a book to the library today with mixed feelings. It was a historical romance, and the blurb claimed the author was a best selling author, had been on the New York best seller lists. It opened most pleasantly, with a well written heroine called Temperance,* but about half-way turned into what I would call soft porn. Maybe the boundaries have changed these days, but really, what's wrong with a little discretion? I don't want to find crude words - the kind often seen scrawled on walls - in a Victorian romance. I don't want items of genitalia detailed, or long descriptions of sex - I have imagination, I have had experience and I can fill in the gaps quite well without such blunt details. I think Piatkus should check their buying policy - or at least how they market the books they import from the US.

OTOH - one woman's soft porn is probably another's exciting read though I think the readers who want soft porn would find the story itself trite. Oh, to be a publisher these days. What one must do to make money.

*PS her sister was called Silence. I should have known......