Series books that shouldn't be

Let me just put this out there in the universe:

It really is OKAY to have a one-off book. Not every single book out there needs to have a sequel. No, really, it doesn't. Granted, there are plenty of authors whom I am quite pleased, nay, ecstatic, to have multiple volumes. Ilona Andrews, G.A. Aiken/Laurentston, etc. But they are in the minority for the most part, and they seem to have started their series with the idea that a story should be finished within its pages, then a larger arc residing in the background which the reader can decide if they want to become a part of. Many authors, who really shouldn't be giving up their  day jobs, are writing 3 book stories and just taking that leap that assumes we want to slog through their first one. Well gee. We just don't.

Highland Shift by Laura Harner is one such book. It's not that the writing is so very bad, because as far as putting sentences together, she seems relatively able to do that. But her heroine? Oy Vey. I would slap her silly, but she's already there. Once again, we are subjected to the "virgin heroine" syndrome, in which a 20-30 something gorgeous woman has "just never had time" for sex. Buh? Do these people actually exist? I'm not saying it's a bad thing, but apparently in genre romance land, the trees are ripe with them. Anyway, within 24 hours of meeting the godlike Scot who has deemed himself her protector and has moved himself into her home, miss never-had-time-for-it has decided he has to be her first. And that it's going to be meaningless sex. So she sets her hat for Mr. Scot, attemtping to seduce him. Within the next 24 hours she has decided, within the same sentence and in this order, that 1) she wants a one-night-stand, and 2) he has made her fall madly in love with him! Oh noes! In one sentence! Freak.  And it's not, he's so aweomse I fell in love with him, it's YOU made me fall in love with you. Like it's his fault she's freaking bi-polar. And crazy.

I didn't go any further with this one. I just couldn't after that. I can put up with a lot of stupid, but when the "heroine" blames others for her own shortcomings right off the bat, and practically date-rapes him, well it's just more than I can deal with. This is one of those books that shouldn't have a sequel, and yet, inexplicably, does. Desktop publishing has brought us some wonderful authors over the past few years, but its also brought us garbage like this.

Let's hope it swings back the other direction sometime soon.