A Knight for the Doctor

A Knight for the Doctor

(Knight Moves 1)

Lance & Elaine 

In New Britain, where the different are persecuted, the curvier-than-regulation Elaine is a medical student who has learned the truth of the new draconian “health measures” and is trying to help the swelling underground resistance.

But the underground isn’t the only organization to take notice of Britain’s plight, and Camelot sends out its greatest champion, Sir Lancelot, to investigate. Lance is jumped almost as soon as he sets foot in Scotland.

Will Elaine be able to save him, and will she escape the retribution of the New Britain government? And in this chaos, is there any chance for love for the knight or his doctor?

Amazon

Evernight

AllRomance

Bookstrand

PucaTrade Giveaway

(This has nothing to do with our books.)

We've broken into the Top10 on the all-time traders list on PucaTrade, so to celebrate, we're doing a giveaway! Make sure you're following us on Twitter. Okay? Now, tweet what your favorite Magic card is and why. (It doesn't have to be one of the ones below.) If you do those two things, you'll be entered into the drawing, which will be held on September 11 at 8:46 AM JST.

Prizes are as follows...

1st Place

2nd Place

3rd Place

4th Place

5th Place

6th Place

7th Place

8th Place

9th Place

10th Place

International Women's Day

I have not yet met any woman who objects to this “holiday”, but I certainly do. Holidays were originally “holy days”, celebrating days important to the religion of the area. They took on political significance over time, celebrating days important to the state. In both cases, the event or person celebrated was of some great social significance. This is why holidays such as Christmas or Independence Day exist.

International Women’s Day, however, implies that women are socially significant for—what? For being women? Either that is mind-bogglingly arrogant or unspeakably patronizing.

Do you like us arrogant or patronizing? We can do both!

So women are so arrogant that they consider their mere existence a favor to society, that being born a woman is something that society needs to acknowledge as a great achievement? Or else are women being patronized as though they were children so young as not to understand the concept of achievement, as when two-year-olds are given a prize merely for showing up at the “competition”?

I'm a woman! Give me a day merely for that fact!

Neither of those things, neither the arrogance nor the patronization, is exactly worth celebrating.

--the Mrs.

Lunar Eclipse

We had a full lunar eclipse in Tokyo, and the sky stayed clear long enough for me to photograph it. I took over one hundred photos, but I thought I'd share just five highlights.

I'm still working on learning how to photograph the moon, so don't flame me. :)

(mr)

This was the exact minute of the full eclipse. 

Wall Art Pt.1

We like our house, but the walls have gotten rather dirty right around little kid height, if you know what I mean. I'm kind of a clean freak, but I've learned to live with a certain level of mess, because there's just no way to have a perfectly tidy house with six kids (half of them being teenagers, half being little).

People are more important than stuff.

So my wife and I thought we'd just wait a few more years until the little ones were old enough to not run around smearing their grubby paws across the white walls, and then we'd repaint the walls. But a friend of ours, who just happens to be an artist, decided to do something different. He decided to take those crayon and pen scribbles on the walls and turn them into wall art! There was one particular section of wall that had a long zig-zag scribble on it. Our friend looked at it and said to the girls, "You know what that is? That's a dragon's tail."

The girls were hooked. They just sat and watched him transform a dirty, scribbled wall, into a work of art. Check out the transformation!

Whaaa! What's up with that head?

Look at the door! Yeah, our kids are wild.

I'll update here when the castle is finished!

Until next time, live...and love!

(mr)

Summer Reset

Something happened to our blog and all the images got deleted or something. I think it was when I got my new phone, which was, because it's an Android, automatically linked to my Google account. Somehow I messed things up here, so I've decided to stick to a simpler design. This'll do.

Why are you taking over my life?!

We've had an amazing summer here! Sure, we had our hot days, but overall, it was cooler than most summers, which just thrilled us. And now we're almost in October, and the weather is perfect every day.

The Mrs. is 27 weeks pregnant, and we're expecting our seventh child (a boy!) around Christmastime. After six daughters -- to finally have a son? Yeah. Surreal. Everyone in the family is excited and can't wait to spoil the little prince absolutely rotten.

Isn't she lovely?

The Mrs. and I spent most of the summer alone, which is unusual, since we usually hang out with friends a lot. But this summer we just needed time alone -- and that's what we got! A perfect summer of love, sharing, and happiness. As Jane Eyre says, "as gay as in company, as free as in solitude". That is the idyllic life I share with my darling.

Until next time, live ... and love!

(mr)

Sumida River Walkabout

EDIT: Sorry so many of the photos got deleted.

The other day, because the weather was so fine and we wanted to spend the day together out and about, my darling wife and I took a walk through Tokyo, starting in the bay and working our way up one of the cities major rivers into the heart of what was once the old fishing villages of Edo. On the advice of my photographer friend, I recently got a 50mm lens for my Canon EOS 20D. I love taking pictures, but it's strictly a casual hobby, so I'm not claiming to be the best or even good at this or anything. Anyway, here are some moments I caught. (Some of these images have been cropped to fit what I wanted.)

Lovely even on a 10-mile walk

The spring flowers in Tokyo are amazing

On an artificial beach in the middle of Tokyo Bay

In the bay -- built by the Shogun to stop foreign ships

The gun batteries on the island

This bridge has a long, technical, boring name -- we call it Rainbow Bridge

More blossoms, of a different variety

We walked across Rainbow Bridge

One of many old noble gardens converted into national parks

Along the Sumida River

He flew right over my head

We stopped for sushi in the old fish market

Me

Not common for modern Japan -- even the natives were surprised

The end of our journey - the Thunder Gate of Sensouji (Asakusa Temple)

What is domination?

Domination. 

It is a word that I see more and more often in the romance genre, but rarely do I see it actually illustrated or taken to its logical end.

Do not mistake me. I am not objecting to the concept. I fully understand the appeal. The ultra-masculine “alpha” qualities possessed by “Dom” heroes are attractive ones, from the supreme confidence to the protectiveness to the possessiveness, and due to the growing popularity of the BDSM sub-genre, it is clear that I am not the only one to find the domination appealing.

But they always pull their punches.

This is not to say that there are not graphic depictions of all sorts and levels of Dom/sub relationships, but I have never read any that actually portrays the final step, the ultimate in domination. There are all sorts of stories about collaring, about sadomasochism, about spanking, even about Total Power Exchange (which is where the Dom assumes all authority over the sub). But never the ultimate.

And what is that? Impregnation.

Those artists and their fanciful renditions!

Oh, there are stories where the heroine gets pregnant, even stories where she gets pregnant accidentally, it not having been planned but by the failure/forgetting of some sort of birth prevention. But I have never read any story wherein the hero simply chose to impregnate the heroine and did so, without asking and/or begging her first.

How manly...where can I get one?

But “her body, her choice”! But “feminism”! But – but nothing. The whole point of the Dom/sub relationship is that the sub's body belongs to the Dom. He is the one who chooses what sorts of pleasure she receives and when. Often the Dom will even forbid the sub to wear clothing (in private) because he wants to see that body, which is his. 

So why does this boundary not get crossed, not even in a sub-genre devoted to pushing and crossing boundaries?

It is ingrained now in the modern psyche that the decision to have a child is entirely the woman's, with the man having no say. This is due both to the ubiquity of contraception, both male and female, and to the existence of legalized abortion. Even if a man managed to impregnate a woman, despite her contraceptive use, she could simply abort the child. Pregnancy is the woman's decision to make, and even a Dom, it seems, cannot get past that. A Dom can call his sub “pet”, can put a collar around her neck and call her his property, can choose what clothing she wears – or even if she wears any at all. He can physically discipline her. But he cannot impregnate her?

Yeah, good luck finding that picture.

Well. 

I do not have a Dom/sub relationship with my husband. It's too much trouble, and I'm not into pain. But, to be honest, he is a dominating sort of man. And in my world, the world of a devout Catholic, neither abortion nor contraception shows up. At all.

What can I say? He got me pregnant – again. He has taken that step of ultimate domination, has shown his authority over my body by forcing me to bear his seed. So Baby #7 is on the way! And, by the way, I am delighted. I enjoy my husband's masculinity, his authority, his power, and the fact that he has these things does not in any way diminish me. I rejoice in his Kingship, and it makes me a Queen.

Can I please read a Dom/sub story wherein the hero shows this ultimate dominion? I would love to read one.

(mrs)

Gods above and below...please don't let me be weak!!

I am a woman. I do not usually like to draw attention to this fact on my blog, as it rarely seems pertinent to what I am discussing. This time, however, though it oughtn't to make a difference, it does.

I am beginning to wonder if many women now are … stupid. Why would I write something like this? And why would my own sex matter?

To answer the second question first, my sex matters because if I were a male, my words would be dismissed as those of a misogynist – and that without taking into consideration if I might have a point. Were I a man, my words would be dismissed unheard because of my sex. Ironic?

You have facial hair. Your argument is invalid.

As for why I would write this, it is because after one “maverick” heroine too many, I burst out in this diatribe. The heroines I see in fiction today are what make me suspect the stupidity of women. Not because the heroines themselves are stupid – they never are – but because of the attitudes held not only by the characters but presumably also by the readers who continue to purchase the books.

These heroines are always supposedly both “strong” and “independent”, needing no one's approval and doing exactly as they please. This is, also supposedly, what makes them “strong”. However, there is always one thing that the heroines seem to dread above all others: being perceived as weak. Surely that is all right, though?

Not exactly. Fearing being thought weak is … weak. If I care whether or not I am thought “weak”, if I adjust my behavior to avoid being thought weak by others, then I am weak, altering my actions to take account of others' opinions.

You're welcome.

This is without taking account of the definition of “strong” as “doing what I please”. Really? It's strong to do what I feel like doing? To seek my own desire ahead of anything else? Is that not the default of humans? Being selfish is not the same as being strong, and oftentimes the more difficult action, the one that would require more strength, is the sacrificial one, the one that places another ahead of oneself. But because selflessness has been accounted, rightly or wrongly, a feminine quality, it is now equally dismissed as “weak”. (This opens another whole issue, that of why feminine=weak in the minds of women, but that is a blog for another day.)

I cannot get away from the fact that fearing others' opinions, even if the opinion one fears is that of being considered weak, is weak. How is that the women reading these stories do not see this? What quality in their minds prevents them from seeing what is otherwise so evident?

However, in fairness, I must acknowledge that I don't know if men notice this, either. I dread the conclusions I must draw if no one can actually see an inherent contradiction.

“Just as one generation could prevent the very existence of the next generation, by all entering a monastery or jumping into the sea, so one set of thinkers can in some degree prevent further thinking by teaching the next generation that there is no validity in any human thought.” – G.K. Chesterton

Have we gone so far as this?

(mrs)