Does Cupid Aim to Please? Or Is He One Sharp Cookie?

Love Is Blind, Deaf, and Dumbed-Down

Chubs draws back his bow, shoots his ♥-tipped arrow, and pierces the heart of our love interest. Aww. Happy Valentine’s Day.

This picture, this Hallmark moment, is the stuff of fairy tales.

Rewind some centuries, though—before these fluffy stories made us go all gooey; before February 14 was known as Valentine’s Day—and a different picture emerges.

Cupid didn’t have a weight problem. And he was no angel!

Cupid Blindsides

He is a god. Is. Not was. An immortal, his MO has not changed over time to suit shifting ideologies, pop culture, Internet dating. Cupid—Eros to the Greeks—is Love personified: Good and bad. And everything else in between (the ears).

The whole story has it that this mischievous Bastard—with a capital B in deference to his divine status—launched blunt, lead-tipped arrows as well as his sharp, gold-tipped ones. The gold kindled love and passion; the lead instilled the opposite. Gold, lead—whatev. Cupid shoots us through the heart. And then …

He shoots us in the arse!

Cupid is a Crack Shot

This penetrative god—who calls the shots—has 20/20 vision; mortals have hindsight.

Like seismic activity, Cupid’s shot in the gluteus maximus ripples upwards and causes cracks. Most notably, in our rose-coloured glasses.

Ruth (Roth) Gold, smart-mouth protagonist in the romantic comedy Cupid F*cks Up, does not wear rose-coloured glasses. She sees life through an unfiltered lens—schmutz ’n’ all. She doesn’t ‘do’ the modern-day incarnation of Cupid. Ruth thinks fairy tales are bollocks.

She could never identify with the stereotypical maiden, the milquetoast ingénue who evolved from her baby-boomer girlhood, and was fashioned as pink and meek and froufrou. Ruth does not have a Cinderella or Sleeping Beauty complex.

Independent and aware, she’s more aligned with the ballsy characters of the original Cupid’s habitat—the ancient no-holds-barred stories.

Still, she’s not immune to Cupid’s ways. She’s also not prepared for them.

When she ends up in a romance that’s branded taboo within a fairy-tale culture (but would be meh in an ancient one), with slings and arrows directed at her by those around her, she’s assailed front and rear. Ruth is torn between here and there.

What to do?

Stories Hold Answers, but …

Life and love are a mystery. Fairy tales and fairy-tale love are not a mystery. They’re linear and formulaic:

Hapless, narrow-waisted maiden (victim of evil character) + Studly hero prince (slayer of evil character and saviour of hapless, narrow-waisted maiden) = Happily ever after.

Truth: The prince lives in a castle in the air and the fairy tale is scaffolding.

It’s not a foundation.

The Whole Ruth and Nothing but the Ruth

Ruth knows the prince—this godlike fabrication—can’t save her from the evil character in her head. Being asleep won’t make it go away, and waiting for the other shoe to drop is counter-productive.

No. Ruth (Roth) Gold knows the key to change lies beneath the fairy tale—in the twists and turns of the deep, dark corners. She dives and plumbs until the answer finds her. And it is …?

Ah. It’s a mystery!

To unravel it, click here: http://mybook.to/CupidFcksUp