Saturday, May 12, 2012

Round Two: The Best Man

Our results from the Latin Gigolos Face-Off  was a little surprising:
Val "I'll be your wingman, anytime" Kilmer would make a great Best Man at a loveless wedding and muddy the waters considerably when Sarah Araminta Daisy Darling Comely is found weeping on his jacket...

Nanny By Chance beat The Fateful Bargain
Discovering Daisy beat The Chain of Destiny
A Good Wife beat The Convenient Wife (as it would, I suppose)
and
Roses Have Thorns carried off the title in the three-way grudge match between that and Making Sure of Sarah (which I love!  Didn't get one vote.  (sniff)) and The Final Touch

All but Roses Have Thorns came later in the canon than the one's they beat out.  I shall start calling that era 'When Betty Got Her Grove Back'...
Kevin has a large Dutch castle, rather too much mahogany furniture, a sad romantic past and a heart full of love...

Now on to voting between the last sections of Round Two.  (Next time I'll be asking for Wildcard nominations!) These are drawn from sections 2 and 12:

Saturday's Child vs. Marrying Mary
Uncertain Summer vs. Only By Chance
Cassandra By Chance vs. The Vicar's Daughter
Stars Through the Mist vs. The Mistletoe Kiss
and
Enchanting Samantha vs. The Fortunes of Francesca

Can't wait to seen how this shakes out!  After the Wildcard Picks are agreed upon, I'll spend a week in seclusion, hammering out a bracket and cursing under my breath--in a lady-like manner, Bettys, I assure you!


Kunal is happily married to Rose Francesca Tait fford and offers nothing but platonic advice.  But you'll take it.

24 comments:

  1. Saturday’s Child One of my favourites. Bollinger – not the champagne.
    Uncertain Summer One of my favourites. Dear Gijs. Lies, wicked lies.
    Cassandra by Chance Ogre’s Relish.
    Stars through the Mist Another favourite.
    Enchanting Samantha I thought she was enchanting.
    This round was one of the easiest, yet.
    Betty Anonymous

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  2. Betty Barbara here--

    Well Betty Keira, the results for this round probably won't be as uniform as for the previous one.

    Here's my 2 cents worth---
    Saturday's Child
    Only by Chance--love Henrietta and I had some major problems with Serena in Uncertain Summer (which I shall no doubt spout off about when we do the reprise next week).
    Cassandra by Chance--a classic! Tho' I enjoyed Vicar's Daughter--just not as much.
    Mistletoe Kiss--in my Betty Top Ten, but Stars Through the Mist is in my top 20. Oh woe! (Adds another Post-It to the growing stack.....)
    And the final pairing is so bleh as to be worthless. I don't like Samantha at all(sorry, Betty Anonymous)and I barely tolerate Francesca--so I'm abstaining on this one.
    And I will not rant and throw a hissy fit like I did the last time you matched up two fantastic books against each other and left two lesser books to duke it out, when you so easily could have done different match-ups. I'm beginning to see a pattern here, Betty Keira........

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  3. Yoikes. Not results I'm thrilled with. Hmmm, wild cards maybe?

    Saturday's Child. Nothing against Marrying Mary, but this is classic.
    Uncertain Summer
    Cassandra by Chance
    Stars Through the Mist, a favorite of mine.
    The Fortunes of Francesca, not because I love it so much, but I really don't like Samantha. Not enchanting at all.

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  4. Saturday's Child
    Only by Chance
    Cassandra by Chance
    Mistletoe Kiss
    The Fortunes of Francesca

    Betty von Susie

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  6. Mistletoe Kiss
    It's one of my favorites as well, Betty Barbara!

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    Replies
    1. Hardcover. Last night, I went to get Uncertain Summer from my Neels bookshelf and at the same time checked to see what other hardcover copy I possessed - other than Year's Happy Ending. I knew there was a Christmas story but thought it was grey. Well, it isn't. It's a lovely pink, lovelier than in the image and not a library copy(?)and it's Mistletoe Kiss.
      Betty Anonymous

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  7. OK, ladies, here's a true Dutchman. Not an doctor but a contender on tomorrow's Bachelorette premier (which I won't be watching, by the way). Is he RDD material? He's 30 so maybe just an RDD's younger brother?

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    Replies
    1. Younger brother material, I'd say. - Driving on a suspended license and driving without a valid registration? And he a race car driver. Tut tut. - So, younger brother, yes. RDD, no.
      He is better looking than in that picture. (Awful hairdo.)
      Betty Anonymous

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  8. Totally off the subject, as I usually am, I hope all of the mommys reading this blog have a wonderful day tomorrow, be your babies two-legged, four-legged, finned or feathered, they are lucky to have such cool and funny moms.

    Happy Mothers Day.

    Betty von Susie

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  9. Saturday's Child
    Only by Chance - love it so!!!
    Cassandra by Chance
    Mistletoe Kiss - love it but also love Stars through the Mist
    Enchanting Samantha

    Betty AnoninTX in Utah who keeps getting strange looks as I pose paperback books for photos

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  10. My choices are
    Saturday's Child (one of my favourites)
    Uncertain Summer
    Cassandra by Chance
    Stars through the Mist
    The Fortunes of Francesca

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  11. Lots of favorites going head to head!

    Saturday's Child (a top tenner for me...Marrying Mary is slightly farther down the totem pole)
    Uncertain Summer...by a nose.
    Cassandra by Chance (another top tenner...The Vicar's Daughter is just slightly lower...but only slightly)
    Mistletoe Kiss (one of the first BN I ever read - I didn't love it the first time around because I didn't speak the Betty Language yet, but upon re-reading, I thoroughly enjoyed it)
    The Fortunes of Francesca (I don't find Samantha quite as enchanting)

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  12. Saturday's Child
    Only By Chance
    Cassandra By Chance
    The Mistletoe Kiss
    (or, as I call it, The Telephonist)
    The Fortunes of Francesca

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  13. In anticipation of a few wrongs being righted via wild cards, I have girded up my ... uh ... something ... to participate in the voting one more time:

    Saturday's C
    Only by C
    Cassandra by C
    Mistletoe K
    Enchanting C-mantha (really dislike Francesca's 'disarming forthrightness,' which I characterize as unforgiveable rudeness to everyone she meets)

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  14. Saturday's Child
    Only By Chance
    The Vicar's Daughter (That's only because I haven't read Cassandra by Chance)
    The Mistletoe Kiss
    The Fortunes of Francesca

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    Replies
    1. Betty Shilpa, you gotta read CbyC--very unusual yet satisfying

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  15. Saturday's Child (just read while on my cruise; unusual, I thought)
    Cassandra By Chance (I like TVD, but Cass by C is in a class by itself)
    The Mistletoe Kiss (one of my new favorites!!!!)

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  16. Riddle:
    The Mistletoe Kiss - It is New Year's Eve. In the Netherlands.
    "...Someone had tuned into the BBC, and Cokker was going round filling glasses with champagne. The maids and the gardener had joined them by now, and there was a ripple of excitement as Big Ben struck the first stroke. There were cries of Gelukkige Niewe Jaar! and the children screamed with delight as the first of the fireworks outside the drawing-room windows were set off. Everyone was darting to and fro, kissing and shaking hands and wishing each other good luck and happiness. Emmy was kissed and greeted too, standing a little to one side with the smallest child ...

    What's wrong?
    Betty Anonymous

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    Replies
    1. IS it the wrong time zone or does it only signify the hour after Big Ben has gonged all the times...?

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    2. Amsterdam and Den Haag are both an hour ahead of London, and Den Haag is about as far west as the Neth go, so it seems a fair bet that all of the Neth are an hour ahead of Big Ben. I've wondered about that miss of Betty's a few times -- and speculate that maybe there's a special BBC broadcast that goes out at 11pm GMT for listeners in western Europe...

      but it seems unlikely.

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    3. Bingo. Different time zone.

      Today, quite by chance, I found a review of the German version of The Mistletoe Kiss. It's a crime, I'm telling you. No, not the review. They renamed the protagonists. Now, I ask myself, if the Great Betty springs all these strange Dutch names on her English readers who often have no hope of getting the pronunciation right, why would anybody publishing these books in a different language bother changing the names? Besides, it's a crime against Neelsism.
      Ermentrude Foster became Lilian Foster and
      Ruerd ter Mennolt became Joost van de Loo.
      Why?
      Betty Anonymous

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    4. Can't answer the why (although I like Lilian better!), but the foreign versions of Essie Summers books have renamed protagonists as well. Sometimes names don't translate well, or may be culturally offensive or inappropriate. The ford Nova was renamed in Mexico, because "no va" could mean, "doesn't go."

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  17. Opramum - er - Betty Laurel(?),
    I guess Ermentrude sounds old-fashioned in German, but then I dare say it's the same in English. And did they think Joost van de Loo sounds more Dutch?
    Anyway, there is a real Joost van de Loo who studied in England and the Netherlands (MA, City University London, MSci, Delft University of Technology Hageveld), very Betty, but he is in "Marketing and Advertising".
    Betty Anonymous

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