The Works of Anne Rice

[chiqui]

Oh God. Blood Canticle was atrocious. Mona becomes a vamp...ghosts...sex...that boob hook.

I don't remember a boob hook. Then, I didn't really read it -- just skimmed, because it was so bad.

[Deleted]

I think the boob hook might actually be in Blackwood Farm, if it is what I think it is. And speaking of that book, the way she wrote about "quadroon" housekeeper Jasmine and the "colored" yardworkers struck me as pretty racist. Is there somewhere where it's still acceptable to call someone a quadroon and I'm just not aware of it? Because she does it more than once and every time I cringed. I also cringed at "be my chocolate candy." Blech.

Even boob-hook-less, Blood Canticle was really bad. It reads like fanfiction - bad prose, characters acting like parodies of themselves, actions and events not proceeding logically from other actions and events. My favorite fanfic moment was the totally random fight Lestat and Mona have because she won't change her dress. Because Mona is so totally hot in this sequined dress borrowed from a ninety-year-old woman that Lestat simply cannot concentrate. So he tells her to change. She won't! She's a liberated woman! And to prove it she namechecks Claudia, and Lestat is so hurt and outraged that she would even dare to go there and everyone runs away. Or something equally convincing. And then they don't speak until Mona apologizes for being insensitive about the power of her hotness, and for not worshiping Lestat like we're all supposed to.

I'm not even going to get into how pathetic her attempts to write contemporary dialogue, settings and situations were. Yo, dude, the slang police!

[joysurrender]

Oh, good. I was afraid the boob hook might have made a return.

And yeah, the 'milk chocolate' and 'cafe au lait' stuff came off as both racist and sleazy.

I was enjoying Blackwood Farm much more until the point where Mona showed up. She annoys. Why do all the characters have to be so over the top speshul and perfect and irresistible?

[Deleted]

Blood Canticle...? Is she still writing about Lestat? I would have assumed that character had been retired long ago.

I can understand an author getting somewhat attached to the characters they create, but she seems to take it to a whole different level where it's just plain weird. Disturbingly weird. Remember how she was foaming at the mouth about Tom Cruise playing Lestat? I mean, she was carrying on publicly about it, as if her book was a national treasure being desecrated.

And anyone who can conjure up such a dizzying array of spanking scenarios (the Beauty series) obviously has a serious fetish.

[thecupcakekid]

Sorry, I must have gotten the boob hook confused! It's been so long and that just stood out.

[Ripley]

Bumping for Icy.

[Deleted]

Everyone here has been able describe the problems with AR's writing so well!

The 1980's were a heady time in some ways, and I will always remember the Vampire novels as being an important part of those years. She was right to dispute Tom Cruise's casting for IWAV because the character was so important, but then she recanted and her brown-nosing put me off. Money. It had to have been what was behind the public eating of her own words. Yech. How can you call yourself an artist and do that? Has she forgotten? When I look back at her output, that one act destroyed a lot of credibility. She sold out man!

Any writer who avoids editing is asking for trouble! It can be an assault on the ego, but in the main an editor is a hidden creative force. I think a lot of us are frustrated with Rice's attitude towards editing because we sense how much better her books would have been; "Art" would be served, and not mangled!

I lasted until Violin. Then...that was it. The book went down and I couldn't bring myself to purchase any more of her novels. My best friend had been warning me for years that the writing was getting worse but I soldiered on.

I might be the only person who liked The Mummy and waited anxiously for its sequel (I'm a sucker for Egyptian themes and obviously warped in some way, because the "batter down the virgin door" seemed quaint).

[LurkerNan]

I floved The Mummy. Are they making a sequel? I'm so there.

And yes, I'm burnt out on Anne Rice's vampires too. I bought Violin but couldn't bring myself to crack it open. Now that there is a whole slew of writers of vampire/supernatural books I find her to be ... not so great.

[Deleted]

My mom recently borrowed The Witching Hour from me, and I remembered thinking that the books in that series got progressively worse, so I reread Lasher to refresh my memory of it and decide if I should give it to my mom or just tell her what happens. I gave it to her, but purely in the spirit of telling someone "here, you have to taste this" after you've eaten something awful.

I either didn't pay attention to or had forgotten how wonked the science is, with all the "Rowan has to sneak into a fully equipped medical lab to uh...run tests. I don't know what kind. With all the highly specialized medical equipment. I don't know what kind. To figure out uh...I don't know. But she has to keep studying him! She keeps taking his measurements! She has a very scientific mind!" And when one of the Mayfair women dies from a hemorrhage they're like, "Well, the husband wouldn't authorize an autopsy. But wait! We have her bloodstained clothing. We can test that and find out what triggered the hemorrhage." Uh...O RLY? And don't get me started on not only the 13-year-old that has awesome, orgasmic fulfulling sex (with other teens and with old men) but the THREE-YEAR-OLD who's "erotically mad" and has orgasms complete with ejaculation (or in Rice's words, "baby juice"). In between reading the works of Plato and Aristotle and having metaphysical coversations with his grandma. Give me a fucking break.

Also, I was surprised at how much of the book just didn't need to be there. There are several chapters devoted to Julian's retelling of events we've already heard detailed, sometimes more than once, in the previous book. (Not even well; Rice has him claim to have fathered Stella's child, when the previous book makes clear that she was maybe ten when he died.) There didn't seem to be any point in it other than to do a Vampire Lestat-style retcon where Rice's crush Julian gets to explain why everything he did that looked bad in the previous book was just a misunderstanding or didn't really happen. And we had the whole life story, which did not matter, of Yuri the gypsy, who did not matter and does not matter in the future.

And why is she so fond of male characters who are rebellious and fey and randomly burst into uncontrollable laughter? Is it supposed to be wild and charming? It sounds like mental illness. I know the people who think Lestat and Julian (Lestat 2.0) are "mad!" are supposed to be stuffy mundanes, but...the stuffy mundanes are right. Get them some meds. And Lasher too, with his stupid Jesus beard and "baby skin"...gross. The fucking laughing and dancing and clapping whenever someone says a rhyme makes him seem like he's mentally retarded. Combine that with him constantly nursing on Rowan and then having sex with her, and...gross. Not even sexy in a wrong way, just gross.

I checked out her website to see if she was still on her Jesus kick, and there are Bible verses and links to Catholic websites all over it. You're such a one-note poseur, Anne. I'm sure we'll be enlightened as to how Lestat was actually a Christ figure any day now.

[Ripley]

Also, I was surprised at how much of the book just didn't need to be there.

Marching Penguin, surely you're not suggesting that somebody edit her works! Because Anne Rice knows what her fans want! She self-edits! If you don't appreciate that, then ur jus a jellus haterzz!!11!!1