And in closing, as I think the drama is about to die down a bit--probably for another two or three months--I am very sorry if I hurt anyone's feelings, or allowed someone else to hurt someone else's feelings. It's not right and it's not okay to have someone else make you feel ashamed. Ever.
Unless you're doing it to me. Because God knows, I probably deserve it. No sarcasm. I'm a fuck up in a not-fun way. I accept that. I'm not sure I can change that because I think to effect positive change you have to, you know, not be a fuck up to start with. All I can promise is that I'll try.
All I can say is I'm sorry, and if I fucked up in your direction and you want to chew me out, please do so I know what I need to apologize for. Just don't call anybody else names. Don't involve your fellow blog-readers in a shit-storm. If you need to bitch at somebody, bitch at me. Not each other.
You are not allowed to gang up on each other, kids. That's not why we're here.
This chapter. Uh...right.
...actually I think the shitstorm has been much more fun. Can we go back to discussing my failings as a human being? Please? Please?
I'm going to summerize really fast because I am burnt out, I think everybody here is burnt out, and then I'm going to find kittens or something to talk about at the end of this.
Asher is dying. Belle Morte has drained Asher of all his energy because she's pissed that she can't manipulate JC anymore. Anita tells her to stop, and demands that Belle save Asher, or she'll kill Musette.
Belle says "you can't kill Musette"
Anita says "Can too."
Belle says "Can not."
It repeats itself for several pages.
Finally Valentina says "Uh...he might die while you're talking and then she'll kill Musette and I'd rather not have that happen, so, duh..." and Belle decides to save Asher.
Meanwhile, Anita and Jean Claude are snuggling physically, and Anita and Richard are snuggling mentally, albiet in an "I hate you don't leave me" kind of way.
End of chapter. Next chapter. Belle starts doing vampire psychic stuff to Asher, only Asher freaks out and Anita realizes somehow that Belle is trying to bind Asher back to her. Anita freaks out. Richard asks her what the fuck is wrong with her and Anita gives him a pretty good summery, and then compares Belle Morte to Rania, the psychotic sexual sadist who had basically run the pack before Richard was in charge. Richard almost freaks out.
Belle says the options are, Asher can spend the rest of his life as her slave, or the rest of his life as a piece of jerky.
Anita says "No, he just needs more power" and I start getting a BAD feeling in the pit of my stomach, because that means we're about to have a sex scene involving Anita and a piece of jerky, and this will probably involve enough food and beast metaphores to sustain a zoo.
It turns out that Asher has gained the ability to feed psychically. It is implied that this is the ardeur, and then it is implied that this is due to his feeding on Anita earlier, which Richard reacts to by chewing on a couple pieces of furniture. And of course this is all about how Richard doesn't understand the powers of LOVE and not, you know, about the several kinds of fucked up rolling around on the floor.
The chapter ends with Jean Claude and Anita kneeling on the ground in front of Asher, ready to plump him back up and let him sink fang.
Was there a plot in all this? Murders? International Aryan terrorists? Are we just going to stick with "bad guy does horrible thing, Anita sexes it back to life" for the rest of the book?
We are. Aren't we?
You have to respect yourself, too, or the respect you have for others isn't as full and rich as it might otherwise be. Don't give people permission to attack you. Thank you for another entry, by the way. What would I do without you providing me with quality LKH sporkings? :)
ReplyDeleteI truly appreciate that you own your talent, your failings, your abilities and your thoughts. They belong to you and if you feel that you fucked up - you own it. That is pretty rare.
ReplyDeleteI have a knee jerk reaction to reach out to you and say no, no, not right. But then I realize this is part of who you are and why I enjoy your insights and thoughts while sporking the LKH series.
What doesn't kill us makes us bitter, right? (read that somewhere.....)
Before I forget... If you want a blog that examines speculative fiction from a social justice angle, I highly recommend Ana Mardoll's Ramblings.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.anamardoll.com/?m=0
If you haven't read it yet, go on over and have a look.
"Was there a plot in all this? Murders? International Aryan terrorists? Are we just going to stick with "bad guy does horrible thing, Anita sexes it back to life" for the rest of the book?"
ReplyDeleteYes...that's the LKH formula after all. Because she just can't write a book that's purely sex, even though she basically does that, she has to try and convince people that yes, Anita still does things besides sexxing. Like...stopping these bad guys that popped up for the sole purpose of adding something, beyond sex, in the book and will be dispatched as quickly as they appeared. They will never be mentioned again, like other baddies, and the next book will simply repeat the formula with new baddies introduced. It's like Mad Libs.
Anita Blake is the top vampire executioner for the country, but that "REFERENCE ANITA'S COMPLICATED PERSONAL LIFE". Now a series of "SOME SORT OF CRIMINAL ACTIVITY" threatens the city. While "NEW BOOK VILLAIN" threatens those closest to her. Anita might have to "POINTLESS TALK OF SACRIFICE THAT WILL NEVER HAPPEN." And "REFERENCE MOTHER OF ALL DARKNESS FOR THE BILLIONETH TIME." This might be the hardest fight that Anita has had to face yet, and it "VAGUE ATTEMPT AT SUSPENSE FOR A BOOK THAT WILL BE NOTHING BUT SEX."
I think the sad thing is...I would read a book about Anita's Complicated Personal Life if anything ever happened in Anita's life.
DeleteI was SO happy at the end of book-before-Obsidian-Butterfly because something got resolved. Anita, JC and Richard were forming a threesome. Not a happily ever after, but it was DONE. It was over. There would be no more aingsting and there would be romantic subplot that didn't suck and there would be crime explody whatsis everywhere.
And we undid that in the first thirty pages of Narcissus in Chains and as far as I can tell, haven't moved one inch since.
Anita still loves Richard. Anita still hates Richard. Anita still can't take care of her personal needs and keep herself from hurting people around them.
And screw the audience (...THAT WASN'T A REQUEST, ANITA. God.) I don't see how an author can be entertained. All the fun in writing, IMHO, is locking six or seven personalities into a room together and throwing the occasional man eating gerbil into the room whenever things get boring. This is not that. This is watching six or seven virgins try to have an orgy and one of them is a sociopath sadist with "Baby's first knife kit".
I don't even ask for an incredible plot. I've read the last four Honor Harrington, and beyond "We are being manipulated by racists" and "We are all friends now" there hasn't been a plot there in a WHILE. But I'm reading because I get to watch Queen Elizabeth and President Prichard make nice while Thomas Theisman and Honor go off and be badasses all over the racist's toy spaceships.
I can think of a lot of ways to make plot with these people. An awesome plot would have been Valentina deciding to go off with Anita and kill Gregory and Stephen's father for a while (Anita is a necromancer. They could do it more than once) run into Dolph, who is investigating the same thing, bond over making child-murderers go away--Either Gregory or Stephen would get to go along--thus proving that vampires aren't all bad and he can go make nice with his son now--and then have everybody counting the cops come back to fix JC's little problem with Belle Morte. Having every were-whatever in St. Louie plus the cops band together with JC's vamps and say "Fuck the old methods, it's the new millinum, get out of our city" would be the final scene.
But we're not going to do that.
Because LKH would rather stop the plot dead every few pages and let Anita roll on the floor with a random guy.
I HATE this book.