Karen Hawkins posted this on Aug 15th 2010 under Goddess Eye Candy
Anyone seen the hit show, THE MENTALIST which stars sexy Australian Simon Baker?
If not, take a peek:
He looks good in a suit, too.
And there is something about his smile . . .
Or maybe it’s his eyes . . .
And to think Hugh Jackman and Simon Baker are BOTH from Australia. They sure know how to grow ‘em down under, don’t they? Meantime, Happy FROS!
Karen Hawkins posted this on Aug 1st 2010 under Goddess Eye Candy
Goddess Suzanne Enoch mentioned that many of our sexiest movie heroes were once comic book heroes. I hadn’t thought of it, but she’s right!
Like Hugh Jackman as Wolverine:
Gerard Butler as King Leonidas from 300:
And Chris Evans coming soon as Captain America:
Rumor has it that Chris Hemsworth will be coming soon as Thor:
And, finally, soon to be in Iron Man 3, the lovely Robert Downey, Jr.:
Here’s to Super Heroes and Super FROS!
Suzanne Enoch posted this on May 8th 2010 under My Life As A Plebe, Suzanne Enoch
I have a confession to make. Well, several of them.
While I do like the “pretty” men, the classically handsome Hugh Jackmans (or is that Jackmen?) of the world, I have a…a thing for some men who perhaps don’t have those angled jawlines or look awesome in a tuxedo. There’s a certain something about them that just attracts me.
For instance, I’ve loved William H. Macy for years. Even when he played kind of weaselly characters like the one in Fargo. And he was awesome in Airforce One. He just seems like a nice guy. And boy, can he act.
Bill Murray is another man whose work I adore.
Okay, I didn’t like Lost in Translation, but I LOVED him in The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou. And Groundhog Day. And Ghostbusters. And Larger than Life (with an elephant and a young Matthew McConaghey as a crazy truck driver). The man is not classically handsome, but I just adore watching him act.
And then there’s Steve Buscemi. I can’t think of a single role where I didn’t just 
love seeing him on screen. From Armageddon to Fargo to Desperado, he keeps my attention and my interest. I don’t know why, but he does.
Is it just me? Who’s your favorite unconventional leading man?
Sabrina Jeffries posted this on Feb 14th 2010 under On Writing!, Sabrina Jeffries, When Goddesses Fall To Earth
On a recent episode of The Big Bang Theory, uber-geek physicist Sheldon said this immortal line about Valentine’s Day: “Given that St. Valentine was a 3rd century Roman Priest who was stoned and beheaded, wouldn’t a more appropriate celebration of the evening be taking one’s steady gal to witness a brutal murder?”
He had a point. If you delve deeper into Valentine’s Day, you learn that the priest thing might have only been an excuse for the Roman church to get rid of a persistent pagan holiday–Lupercalia, a fertility festival falling between February 13th and 15th. Two lucky bachelors participated in the sacrifice of two goats and a dog, made whips out of the flesh, dipped them in sacrificial blood, and whipped the bystanders with them. Women LINED UP for miles to get a bloody lash to enhance their fertility. Because nothing says fertility like the blood of a dead animal whipped onto your bare flesh by a drunk Roman guy.
Whose idea was this? Did some Roman frat boy sitting around at the orgy with his friends say, “Hey guys, you know what would be really fun? We get this goat, see, and then we line up a bunch of women …” Because no WOMAN would come up with that custom.
The other custom from Lupercalia was a lottery in which the bachelors drew the names of the single women to determine who was their “love” for a year. The English were still using that one during the Regency. I even used it in The Truth about Lord Stoneville. Of course, Stoneville never leaves anything to chance, so he fixes the draw in order to get the heroine. (P.S. The eye candy today, for those of you missing FROS, is Andres Velencoso, my inspiration for Stoneville.)
Stoneville also tries to manipulate one other long-standing English Valentine’s Day superstition–that the first man a maiden sees on Valentine’s Day will be her sweetheart. He shows up at the heroine’s door in the wee hours of the morning to be the first man she sees. This was a genuine superstition–some women even went around covering their eyes until they encountered the man they really wanted, so they wouldn’t be stuck with, say, the chimney sweep they ran into while polishing the silver first thing in the morning. Oh, if only it were that easy. How many women would cover their eyes until they could show up at Hugh Jackman’s door on Valentine’s Day ?
Thankfully, we now celebrate in less peculiar ways–flowers, cards, chocolate (the pic on the right is the gorgeous bouquet hubby bought me for Valentine’s Day). But it’s hard not to notice that red is the color of choice that day, and a heart … well, that’s just one beat away from being the blood of a sacrifice, right?
So maybe Sheldon is right. Next year, we should all take in a slasher film in honor of Valentine’s Day, and leave the flowers and cards and chocolate to the faint of heart.
Do you have any unique Valentine’s Day traditions between you and your loved one? Is there a standard tradition you hate? Do you like getting flowers or would you rather skip that and go straight to the chocolate? And have you ever seen a slasher film on Valentine’s Day?
Remember, today is your last chance to post a comment that will be included in the drawing for a Sony e-reader! The winner will be chosen at random at midnight from all the comments that were made this week. So get in there and post, people!
Madeline Hunter posted this on Nov 4th 2009 under Madeline Hunter, When Goddesses Fall To Earth
My very first experience with romance novels was a bust. I did not “get it”, even though I found the historical setting fascinating. I did not find the hero compelling. Frankly, he scared me.
He was an older man to me. I was about twenty and the hero was about thirty-five, and this was old-school historical romance. All that alpha, domineering, overtly sexual stuff alarmed me. He was too much like my last bad date. I was at a real disadvantage with him.
My tastes changed as I got older. A lot. And while I love the young guys in our Sunday FROS posts, I would never want a relationship with one. Nor do I find romance novels where the hero is older than the heroine, even by ten years or so, alarming and unappealing. I don’t have a stake in those dynamics anymore. Actually, I like romances in which the man is an “older man”, whatever that might mean. I like the interplay of the innocent who thinks she is more worldly than she is, and the man who really is more worldly, and is protective as a result.
We have had a lot of pictures of Hugh Jackman on this blog. I must say that when a picture of him when he was young went up, it startled me. Oh, he was gorgeous, but I must admit that I like Hugh the way he is now, a little lined and more mature. I felt that way about Clint Eastwood. He peaked, visually speaking, in his 40s for me. Actors younger than 30 or 35 appear too smooth and untried, too slick, to me now. An older man’s face has character to it.
Do you appreciate the older man? Do you like them in romance novels? Did your taste on this change as you got older, the way mine did?
Any famous older men whom you particularly appreciate? 
Claudia Dain posted this on Sep 7th 2009 under Claudia Dain, Goddess Eye Candy
When I was a newlywed, I met another woman who was a newlywed. We became friends. As these things go, the more friendly we became, the more we wanted our husbands to meet, nervous and eager that our husbands get along, that we each like each others husband, that her husband like me and my husband like her…it’s one of the complications of being married. You can really like a woman, but if you hate her husband, you’re not going to be ‘couple friends.’
Anyway, I digress. Sort of.
This woman, let’s call her Mary, spent a lot of time talking about how handsome her husband was. Mary would literally blush, her pupils dilate, her breathing get shaky and her voice giggly when she spoke about Don (not his real name). He was so handsome. She told me how they met, how the attraction for her was instantaneous, but she couldn’t believe that any guy this handsome would ever look at her twice. Just for the record, Mary was an attractive woman. Not gorgeous, not beautiful, but generally nice-looking. Mary spent a lot of time gushing about Don’s Adonis-worthy looks.
After a while, it dawned on me that she was sort of warning me off him. A little shot across my bow not to fall in love with her man. Knowing Mary as I did, this wasn’t about me being a slimy, cheating whore; it was about Don being irresistible and so handsome that women couldn’t help but fall at his feet, helpless. Giggling and dilating.
Can you see where this is going?
We arranged for our husbands to meet, dinner at their apartment. I had told Big D everything, naturally. How Don was supposed to be this total hunk, that Mary was a little nervous about me meeting him and falling for him. Big D thought that was pretty funny.
I have to admit to being curious and very interested to meet this devastatingly handsome man, this man who could fell a room full of women simply by walking into it. Well.
I’m not sure my poker face was at full capacity when I walked into that apartment and met Don, Dream Man. I hope it was, for Mary’s sake.
Don, to my eyes, was a perfectly average looking guy. He had a nice build, but he was too short for my taste. I didn’t like the shape of his nose, his wispy eyebrows, or his tiny teeth. I didn’t like his hair. It can’t be any surprise that Big D looked nothing like Don. My husband is my Dream Man. His particular arrangement of body parts is the arrangement that gets me giggly and dilated.
A Dream Man ideal is not a universal template, one size fits all women.
My template is tall, dark, sinewy, strong eyebrows, great teeth, great feet. (Don had really hairy toes.) I make no claim that my template is universal, but it is consistently mine. During my youth, I pined for Joel McCrea, nearly a dead ringer for Big D. I also sighed heavily over Gary Cooper. Hugh Jackman is my current Dream Man type. You can see the resemblance between these guys, right? Not only physically, but they have a soft-spoken way about them that zings me. When I met Big D, there he was, Dream Man. My template, in the flesh.
I think our template comes to us. I don’t think we create it. You either find a man handsome or you don’t. You either dilate or you don’t.
In my latest book (buy! buy! buy! —subtle marketing at its best), the heroine is very confused about her template. I think this makes for some very funny situations; not that she’d think so.
What’s your template for a Dream Man? Has it been consistent? Has it evolved? Does it involve Hugh Jackman?
Suzanne Enoch posted this on May 7th 2009 under Goddess Eye Candy, Suzanne Enoch
Okay, Karen Hawkins is doing a FROS world tour, but my eye is closer to home. Everybody’s talking about Wolverine this week. And I’ve seen the movie twice. But as many of you know, and however much I admire Hugh Jackman in all his shirtless glory, I’m a Gambit gal. I love that Cajun master thief and mutant, and today I am generously sharing him with you.
He appeals to the writer in me because a) he’s handsome, b) he has a mysterious and troubled past, c) he has cool powers, d) he’s very good at what he does, and e) he has a cool accent.
Yes, in reality Taylor Kitsch was born in Canada, but this is fantasy!!
Have you seen X-Men Origins: Wolverine? Did you enjoy seeing ole Remy LeBeau? Which summer movie are you most looking forward to?
