The Lennie Ross Interview

As you know, I refer to the dating scene as the dating marketplace.  Why?  Because ultimately, everyone is hoping the perfect someone will love their “brand” and become a life-long brand loyalist.  After reading Lennie Ross’s intriguing new novel Blow Me, I’m convinced Los Angeles has the most superficial dating marketplace in the United States!  New York and Miami, LA has you beat…

I recently had the pleasure of speaking to Lennie Ross about her new novel:

What inspired you to write Blow Me?  What do you want readers to takeaway from this novel?

I read a lot of women’s contemporary fiction and I find most of it is situated in New York, and most of the women have rather glamorous lives. I wanted to write a bit of a grittier novel where it’s still a lot of fun for the reader, but I wanted to show that most women’s lives aren’t perfect and aren’t that glamorous. As well, I wanted to represent Los Angeles, and give a look into the lives of women on the West Coast, as it’s a very different world.

You titled your new book, Blow Me. Aside from the double entendre of the title, do you think women need to act more masculine?

The title is just an expression one of the protagonists uses frequently, particularly when she’s pissed off with a man. However, it is in no way intended to have any kind of masculine connotation. After all, saying f— you is not taken literally that one is intended to f— themselves, and neither is blow me intended to be literal. It’s simply a common slang expression meaning more or less the same thing as f— you.  If anything I think women need to remember that they are women, and would be better off embracing their feminism and dropping the “tough guy” routine. We’re women. There’s nothing wrong with that! Relax and enjoy it, ladies.

You paint a vivid picture of the Los Angeles dating scene.  Do you believe the dating marketplace in LA is that superficial?  If yes, what are the reasons?  

Not only do I believe it, I have experienced it first hand and have witnessed my friends and acquaintances go through similar experiences to the ones I write about in my novel. I also have friends in New York and Miami who feel it is very similar there.  I could write an entire book about the reasons for this superficiality, but simply said, it’s a different era, and a different world. People have different values. Not necessarily good values, but values nonetheless. I think there is a phenomenon in larger cities like LA and NY where it’s expensive to live and where one is witness to a lot of (perceived) wealth, there are certain pressures that perhaps aren’t there if you live in a small Midwest town. Here in Los Angeles, women sadly really are trying to keep up with the Kardashians… and don’t get me started on them! Ugh. It’s not just the women, however. The men are just as bad. If you read the earlier stories in my blog, many of them are stories of actual dates I had, and the behavior of the men is just wretched. The men in Los Angeles tend to treat women like whores, and so if the women are then perceived as whores, it becomes a bit of a chicken & the egg scenario… which came first. (No pun intended… well, maybe a little!)

Your novel is set around the lives of three women in Los Angeles.  Women can be each other’s best friends or worst enemies.  What do you think accounts for these extremes?

I portray the three women in my book as being both friends and to a degree enemies…though that’s really too harsh a word… how about competitors?  This is a direct result of the pressures society puts on women and the pressures men put on women. I coined something I call the Wonder Woman Complex: today’s woman is expected to earn a 6 figure salary (we all know how hard that is), be a wife, mother, lover, sex kitten, dog walker, maid, and fill a myriad of other roles all with a smile on her face. The pressure on women these days are so extreme. The pressure to find a man in a society where men don’t want to get married, because divorce laws are so extreme and divorce attorney fees have no ceiling, leads women to compete with each other and it’s very stressful. You might say, well, women don’t NEED to get married anymore… that’s not entirely true as men still make on average 30% more than women and there are still many jobs that women have a hard time obtaining… specifically those high-salaried CEO jobs. While we may find happiness without men, financial security is still a concern, and companionship and sharing life with someone is also important. There is a certain humiliation factor when a woman is still single at a certain age. It’s been rumored that (ugh.. back the Kardasians) that Kim Kardashian’s marriage was arranged so that she would not reach 30 having not been married. That says a lot about society’s view of single women.

One of your main characters has an interesting quid pro quo with a man.  He takes her shopping at Barneys, and as a “thank you”, she gives him sex.  What advice would you give your friend if she told you she “thanked” a man for high end merchandise with sex?

My character suffers from low self-esteem and doesn’t feel she is deserving of being treated well. She has experienced a pattern in life of men using her for sex and then buying her things… Perhaps their way of easing their own guilt. She has been sexually assaulted and harassed her entire life and assumes all men want sex with her. Skye barely knows the man she thanks with sex. So, it would greatly depend on my friend, how long she knew the man buying her things, her personality and her track record with men. I would likely wonder about her self-esteem, and I would ask her why she didn’t just say thank you, rather than judge her and criticize her immediately if her actions are different than mine. It could be that she was super horny and really wanted to have sex with him, that she knew she wasn’t obligated. Regardless, I would want to make sure my friend knows that quid pro quo is not necessary, because there is nothing more painful for me to witness than a woman with low self-esteem.

There are direct and indirect references to Pretty Woman in your novel.  Do you think women are looking for Prince Charming and a fairytale romance?

There are both references to Pretty Woman and to Prince Charming in my novel. I do think that many women are looking for their Prince Charming and there are plenty of statistics out there to support my belief, as well as a massive industry in Harlequin Romance style novels with sexy, strong heroes. You might want to ask Danielle Steele what she thinks about this. She’s had a career spanning over 20 years as a best selling author writing novels that always have fairytale endings. You might want to review this article about gender equality and what women find attractive in men: http://bit.ly/tqfkZb It explains why women are attracted to financially successful men. It has less to do with the actual money than you would think.

I can definitely see Blow Me being adapted into a movie.  What Hollywood actresses would you like to see play the roles of Skye, Dawn, and Chloe?

Thank you, unfortunately Hollywood doesn’t agree. Despite a lack of decent romantic comedies lately, evidently the market in Hollywood is saturated with Sex and the City style material and the studios aren’t buying it. It seems men in Los Angeles aren’t the only ones not interested in women nearing or in their 40s. Tragic. Everyone who has read my novel says it would make a great movie…maybe someday, despite the cards being stacked against the genre. I have been asked this question before, and it’s difficult to answer. I would see Dawn as being someone like Sandra Bullock or Julia Roberts, Skye as being someone like Pamela Anderson, and Cameron Diaz or Jennifer Aniston as Chloe.

Do you think the Feminist movement has helped or hindered women in the dating marketplace?

I think in many ways the feminist movement has hindered women. While it has done some positive things for women, it has done more to harm women and confuse society. I definitely think it has hindered women in the dating marketplace. Women don’t know how to behave like women anymore. They think that courtship should be equal. They think they should go ‘Dutch’ on a date. They are denying men their primal desire to pursue and win over a woman. Again, refer to that article in Psychology Today for more on how gender equality has hindered women in the work place and in the bedroom. Having your car door opened or your meal paid for does not mean you are a lesser human. It means the man is being a gentleman—a quality a woman should be seeking in a mate—so don’t emasculate him by doing everything yourself. He will feel useless and unappreciated and will move on to someone who does appreciate him. We are designed to be different, we are not designed to be equal or we’d all have the same body parts and we’d be able to procreate on our own… like spiders. So, yeah, in a nutshell, I think feminism has greatly hindered women in the dating marketplace… funny you call it a marketplace… sounds a bit like a barter, trade or sale situation.