Did she die yet? A book about Queen Victoria's assassination attempts

New York Times' bestseller list can be a mixed bag, and Shooting Victoria mostly fell into that category. It paints an amazingly detailed picture of the context and circumstances surrounding several assassination "attempts" on Queen Victoria. This was either a carefully researched book or an artistically embellished one. The first shot on the young queen's life was by a disillusioned young man who designed a whole scheme surrounding his assassination attempt. [SPOILER ALERT] He went to some pains to completely fabricate a group that conspired to kill the queen, whereas it was really just he, and he alone, who shot in an overacted dramatic scene with two (likely unloaded) dueling pistols.

Shooting Victoria contained a great deal of interesting historical tidbits, and painted a rather clear picture of life for the royals as well as the paupers during the aptly named era. The story did drag on for quite a bit, considering you know she doesn't die in these attempts.

50 Shades vs. Sookie Stackhouse

Well I sure have been trying my darndest to resist reading 50 Shades of Grey, yet somehow I'm okay with myself for reading the Sookie Stackhouse books, on which the TrueBlood series is based. While it's not like every other page contains a detailed description of yet another raunchy erotic S&M scene (so I've heard, based on reviews), the vampire series does dedicate its fair share to detail how sex/feeding might look like between a vampire and a human.

So, if I've already indulged myself in reading this vacuous stuff, then maybe it wouldn't be so bad to get on the Grey train? No, no, I must resist. I mean, I'll give it to you ladies for being so assertive and outspoken about the fact that you like erotica based on a woman diving right into a man's fantasy of power and submission. But seriously, it might as well be an issue of Playgirl, it's so sex-filled. I find it kind of hysterical that there's a huge uproar about men using library computers to look at porn, yet when you look at libraries' electronic books, ALL of the most popular books are these generic romance novels. Folks, this is like women porn. OK, they might not have pictures of penises as centerfolds, but they do have them dripping from the pages in like every other scene.