H-I-A-T or That Man Again

OK so here's a day when I expect my blog hits counter to spike wonderfully. A day like the Pink Heart Society Hugh Jackman Tour day. A day when women of taste all over the world come to visit my blog - and my friends' - because of the legend that is

HUGH IN A TOWEL

Over on the PHS blog, Anne McAllister has written a post about the Legend of Hugh in A Towel, recalling the days when she and I used underhand means to win the largest possible audiences for our talks at the Australian and New Zealand Romance Writers' Conferences.

Our secret weapon was Hugh-in-a-towel projected life-size - on occasions more than lifesize (some of the audience are still recovering) on a screen at the front of the room. Since then the legend of H-I-A-T has grown and is now known worldwide, for reasons Anne has explained brilliantly.

There were other pics of Mr Jackman on display, at least at the RW NZ conference where I was talking about Alpha Heroes. I needed illustrations for the Alpha (guess who - or should that be Guess Hugh?) but I also needed, for comparison, the Beta Hero - ->

And I needed an example of the Gamma Hero

<--

But H-I-A-T was the one that everyone talked about afterwards.

Well, perhaps not everyone. I do remember one lady coming to me after my talk (I think this was the one on the 12 Point Guide to Writing Romance - see, H-I-A-T is adaptable, he can be used to illustrate any point and I believe he was - all 12 of them. Well, maybe not the Heroine one . . .) Anyway, this lady came up to me afterwards and gave me a little note. It read 'I don't like your round-shouldered hero. He looks as if he has psychological problems'

Ah well, you can't please everyone - even with H-I-A-T.

On her blog, Anne remembers the Journalist from Christchurch (the one who, for the record, described me as having a barmaid's bosom! I have given it back to the barmaid since then). This man was so sure he had unearthed a cynical conspiracy to brainwash and delude poor gullible women (barmaid's bosoms - gullible women - can you see the level at which this guy saw the female sex?) Why was he so sure that we intelligent - he allowed that we were intelligent - cynical types were out to delude these women out of their money?

Because we told them the terrible lie that tall, dark, gorgeous men were devastatin

gly attractive - and we put up pics of H-I-A-T to prove it.

Shocking! You really needed to be brainwashed before you could think that - didn't you?

You poor, gullible women who enjoy category romance.

Well, deluded or not, gullible and brain-washed or whatever, the legend of H-I-A-T has grown so much that now, whenever I give a talk or a workshop - or any sort of an event - no one believes that it is a Kate Walker event without the guest appearance of H-I-A-T.

So much so that the writers' weekend at which I celebrated my 50th title had to have H-I-A-T right there too. I have illustrated this point with a photo of H-I-A-T with the lovely Julie Cohen because the truth is that I owe the original inspiration for H-I-A-T to Julie who found him as a special treat for me during her Writing The Sexy Bits talk at the RNA Conference in 2004 after which I took him off on his world tour to Australia and New Zealand.

And if you think that H-I-A-T at Auckland or Sydney was wonderful - just imagine H-I-A-T together with Julie's other aids of chocolate and strawberries.

Chocolate, strawberries - H-I-A-T. . .

And people keep asking what do women want?