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[ellenel13.livejournal.com]

Hello, everyone. I'm very glad I found a community where I get to express how disappointed I've become with the Anita Blak series without being called an elitist bitch, a prude, or mean, or all the other colorful names I'm sure most of you have been called at some point or other.

I first found two used copies of Guilty Pleasures and Narcissus in Chains in a giveaway in my local library, so I'd figure I'd give the series a try. I actually began reading Narciassus in Chains first because I found the title more interesting. I stopped reading by the time that Anita got it on with Jean-Claude and Richard in the club, not because it bothered me or anything, but because I didn't know what the hell was going on. For some reason, I decided to give the series a chance and stopped reading Narcissus in Chains to read Guilty Pleasures first in hopes of understanding the series a a bit more. Imagine my suprise when Guilty Pleasures had and actual plot, instead of rushed sex scenes that didn't seem to have anything to do with whatever the hell was supposed to be going on in the actual the story.

1) Guilty Pleasures

I never really liked Anita, not even in Guilty Pleasures. She always came off as condescending, and full of herself. Nervertheless, LKH actually managed to create a compelling, dark, universe with an interesting cast of characters. There were subplots going on, (the vampire junkie guy, the dreams with JC, the church of eternal life, and Anita actually described what was happening in the world aside from SEX, SEX, SEX) and the villain was actually entertaining despite being a complete rip off of Anne Rice's concept with Claudia. And Nikolaos was never afraid of Anita at all; it was actually the other way around. After reading some of the later books, I find it shocking that there were only two sex scenes in Guilty Pleasures and neither of them included wetness, tightness, writhing, trapped pulses, screaming orgasms, or "metaphysical" bullshit. The first person narration was a turn off because we only got Anita's point of view on things, so in my opinion, it's hard to get a complete feel of the characters who aren't Anita herself. Regardless, it was a legible book with its share of flaws but entertaining enough that I decided to give Narcissus in Chains another try.  

2) Narcissus in Chains 

Let me start by saying that I didn't absolutely hate Narcissus in Chains. I had to skip some of the sex scenes (the book actually gets shorter if you do that) because they were so repetitive and Micah made me want to stab my eyes with a pencil so I wouldn't have to read about him, but the stuuf about the Chimera was interesting. Now that i think about it, Chimera is probably the last villain in the series to be an actual villain instead of another boogeyman for Anita to pwn like she's a comic book heroine drawn by an amateur artist. Narcissus in Chains was much worst than Guilty Pleasures, but I wasn't invested with the characters and had  no real knowledge of the books in between these two, so I dismissed the series as slightly spoiling candy for the brain and left it a that.

I will say that I began actively hating Anita when she started bitching about Richard not allowing her to feed the ardeur (ardor?, ardur?, LHK doesn't seem to have decided how to spell this word yet) when she herself has the same rule with Jean-Claude. LHK goes on and on for pages, no--whole chapters about how MEAN Richard is being for not helping her with the lust thing, when she has practucally castrated Jean-Claude and wont let him feed of her and objects to him feeding from other people. It's probably the most hypocratical thing the bitch has done. And the she gets the nerve to have her feelings hurt when Richard dumps her because she has slept with four other men. All of which is still self-contradicting; she demands her lovers to be be monogamous to her but she has a harem. I don't know what the opposite of chauvinism is, but LHK is suffering from it; her female characters (oh, who the hel am I kidding--Anita) gets to be exempted from all the rules while the men are treated like dildoes with names.

3) Cerulean Sins, or Anita is the queen of the universe and the fountain of wisdom

If I start enumerating the many ways in which this book sucked, I would never finish so let me stick to the bigger points.

First, the "villain" that LHK spent about 200 pages building up to be the scariest thing that Anita ever faced turned out to be a stupid vampire cheerleader, french girl who was pwned by Anita's modern ways. Seriously, JC, Asher, and every other "strong" male character in the series were quaking in their boots at the mere mention of Mussete and the Anita shows up and completely destroys her the power of a knife. That moment topped all moments of Anita-sueism that I've read so far, and I'm counting the ardor (ardeur?, ardur? oh fuck it, if the author doesn't care how it's spelles, why should I?).

Second, the sex scenes were just awful. But that's rwally a given so let's move on to Anita's butting in JC and Asher's relationship. On any other situation, I would not be too angry about Anita not wanting her man to be with another man. I don't mind that Anita seems to be a little homophobic (God knows the woman needs flaws) but she doesn't get to bitch about her boyfriend's trouble with his other boyfriend when she spent hundreds of pages bitching about her other boyfriend.  How can Anita seriously demand that JC not sleep around when she herself has fucked 95% of the men in the series (which is 965 of the cast anyway).

Third, Anita accusing her human "friends" of not understanding her and judging her when she is the one who aliniates them. For example, Anita's self-righteous behaivior when it comes to Dolph calling her a whore, to which I think "Anita, honey, you are a whore." How can she really blame them for thinking that sex with every supernatural man in her town is a bad thing? It all goes back to Anita's LHK's screwy views on sex: Anita is wise and brave enough to screw anything with a penis (it's forced on her, just like ebol JC dragged her into the world of monsters against her will) and everyone else is only allowed to have sex with Anita, because she can take care of them.

Fourth, forget the emotional or moral repecursions of having twenty sex partners, wouldn't that be physically impossible? I mean, the average human has sex three-four times a week (at least according to that sex-ed book I read a few years back), but Anita can . . . er, accomodate about five diferent sexual encouters with five different men in a few hours (or at least two chapters). So, my question is, why hasn't LHK mentioned anything about Anita needing medicinal creme and having trouble walking? Or are we supposed to believe that Anita has a super vagina? 

I apologize for lenght, but I just needed to get this off my chest.

Comments

[dwg.livejournal.com]

I'm with you on nearly everything - the big not is Chimera being the last "villain" of the series. In my mind, the last decent villain was Seraphina back in Bloody Bones because she really fucked with Anita's head and nearly made her into the one thing she feared the most.

To me, Chimera kinda went around with the whole, "OOH LOOK AT ME! SEE HOW EVIL I AM??? I AM BEING EVIL! LA LA LA!" thing rather than actually having a motive to be evil and do nasty things. I mean, c'mon, really? Sexual sadism is enough to get someone labelled as "evil" in Anita's world, building on that and hurting Her Men just gets you dead faster.

Also, I'm annoyed at how the multiple personalities are portrayed - sure, I'm not a shrink, but I've had my share of psych classes and drama shows to understand a bit of what it means, and what LKH wrote still don't make any kinda sense.

But oh, lordy. I give you cookies and gold shiny things for trying to start the series on NiC. I really, really do. You're a brave soul.

[ellenel13.livejournal.com]

I never read "Bloody Bones," so when I say that Chimera was the last good villain, I mean compared to Mussete, or Belle Morte. At least that dude stood to Anita. Sort of.

[dwg.livejournal.com]

Oh dude, totally. Specially in reguard to Musette. I was so pissed off with her. Everyone's shakin' in their kinky boots and I was all, "THAT'S IT??? WTF? BRING ON THE BADASS?!?!?" but all she turned out to be was a lame device to help justify Anita to attempt a three way with JC and Asher.

And Belle? I maintain that she's stupider than a ball of hair. For a chick that's meant to be two thousand years old - and while I can buy that she's absorbed with her own hype - she ought to have half a brain. I mean, she had it enough in her to rule pretty much most of Europe, she's got to have some kinda savvy about her. *stabs something* I'd offer to ghostwrite for LKH, but...eh, effort and pain.

[ellenel13.livejournal.com]

Belle Morte pissed me off the most. Nikolaos would have bitchslapped her. I mean, I was expecting a wise, evil, threatening villain who would create some plot. What do I get, another Mary Sue to make Anita seem that much more badass. Pathetic.

[dwg.livejournal.com]

Making Team Evil stupid to make the hero seem more awesome is one of my biggest pet peeves. I need my heroes to work hard for their victory for me to respect them. Dumbing down the other team is cheating.

[nightangel486.livejournal.com]

I think that in order to become a lycanthrope or vamp in the Anitaverse, you have to pass some test of perfect physique and unusual/cool/ridiculous name. A tleast if you want to be a major character. Seriously, where are all the ordinary looking supernatural folks with normal names? I wanna see a badass 2000 year old vamp with the name Bob, or something.

[catskin.livejournal.com]

"Sexual sadism is enough to get someone labelled as "evil" in Anita's world."

If only I could convince myself that LKH knows anything about sexual sadism, BDSM, bondage, S&M or any other type of sex.

For all Anita's hottightwetnessomghebroughtmescreaming sex, pretty much all she seems to do is lay on her back and shriek in the guy's face. Sexy? Not much.

[dwg.livejournal.com]

No shit. With all those screaming, writhing orgasms, it's a small wonder that someone hasn't dialled 911 thinking that she's having some kind of seizure.

[catskin.livejournal.com]

Look at the scene in ID where she and Nathanial go for a quickie on her desk: if one of my workmates was locked in their office with a man I'd never seen before screaming her lungs out, I'd call someone. Police, ambulance, animal control. Anyone!

Then again, maybe someone did. I stopped reading after that chapter.

[dwg.livejournal.com]

No, everyone in the office throught the fight continued. Only Mary, the savvy day secretary, caught onto what had really gone on and why Anita had ripped out all her fingernails. But Mary, being a fangirl of Anita's ways, wisely said nothing to tip off Bert.

...you'd think someone would notice the wet patch on the carpet, or the smell, or something?

[ladymina.livejournal.com]

you know that is one of the points where I really don't think how to explain LKH's lack of common sense knowledge about sexuality and sexual reactions, etc ... or the human body anyway ...
and let's not get started on her idea of BDSM , looks like the calendar research is an old problem of hers but even then ... where did she get those godawfull stupid calendars?

[dwg.livejournal.com]

*eye twitch* I know if I get into it, I will never get to bed and I'll turn myself into a zombie. *falls down*

But srsly, dude, google is a beautiful thing.

[dwg.livejournal.com]

AHH HA HA HA! The idea of Anita getting tranqued is too damned funny.

"She's still kicking!"
"Shoot her again!"
"But this is enough tranquiliser to kill an elephant!"
"DO IT! SHE'S TAKING OFF HER PANTIES!!!"
*screaming and shooting*

[acostilow.livejournal.com]

You know, I was introduced to AB:VH by my best friend at the time. She was all like, "OMG YOU HAVE TO READ THIS SEX SCENE IT'S THE HOTTEST EVER." So I did, and was like, "Eh. I've read (hell, I've written) better." But I gave the books a chance. And I agree with you. Anita bored me, but I loved the other characters.

And I agree with dwg. Cookies and shiny things. Yesh. :D

[ladymina.livejournal.com]

I think on the villian side we need olaf to make things scary again, that guy was really scary, the one true sociopath in the series, being a trigger happy whore doesn't qualify for real sociopath and Edward is a bit too rational for the title too
I mean even in OB with an enemy with truly horrid ways of killing and using his victims the guy itself was a little puppy who was distracted from his evil plot by just about everything more like a 5 year old than some villian (hell Kevin out of those horrid movies was more scary in his evil plottings when his enemy was infront of him)

NIC was just bad, I don't know how I got trough it and I read them in order and loved the first few books...


Oh and LKH is suffering from her dreamworld where all guys are oh teh evil and she is making a statement with her behaviour (Laurellita's behaviour) in everyone else's universe it is just whoring, for Laurell it is feminism at his best - show those horrid males how you really fuck things up *rolleyes

[ellenel13.livejournal.com]

I disliked Anita from day 1. i found the guys more interesting (whatever happened to the guys who leads the Church of Eternal Life?) but then they all became Anita's pussies. Except for Richard, who was painted as the idiotic satan for not supporting Anita in her descicion to become the whore of Babylon.

[ladymina.livejournal.com]

I did like the Anita of the first books for her smart ass remarks, for the real problems and injuries she got fighting the bad guys, because in the first books she nearly loses a lot, and she still gets hurt enough to be shook and she still loses people (apart from the people that are running away from her adeurereur- or are just jealous of the number of guys she can fuck without getting a STD great life of anita and her guys)
My absolute favourite character in the books is Edward followed by Jason, Asher and Verne.
I especially dislike Anita with uber powers and adeur, JC (though sometimes I pity him), Richard, and Micah who says yes and amen to about everything Anita does, wants or fucks.
The degrading of Richard started before the whoring started for real and has - in my opinion more to do with the fact that LKH's ex-husband is the base for him, while her now husband is the base of Micah) than with the fact that he was against her whoring.
But oh yeah most of the guys in the books desperately need to grow some balls (to go with the cocks of doom) and put Anita into place.

[ellenel13.livejournal.com]

Thing is I've only read "Guilty Pleasures," "Circus of the Danmed," "Narcissus in Chains," and ""Ceruleans Sins" so my knowledge is not that detailed. But you should try reading the first Anita book then one of the lasts and you'll be astounded at just how much the quality deteriorated.

[ladymina.livejournal.com]

I know that the quality detorates really badly, especially with NIC and everything after that
But I do have to say I loved Obsidian Butterfly, but Edward was in that book.
Most of her old readers did notice the detoriating of her talent, quality and unnessecary things like plots , but one has the stupid hope that the next book might be better, or bring Edward back into the picture or another beloved character from the early books.

[ladymina.livejournal.com]

And Malcom (I think that was the name of the leader of the church of eternal life,) is mentioned in ID - in the small part of the book that is about solving a crime.

[hippie-lover.livejournal.com]

I bet when she brings back Olaf, Anita ends up screwing him too, somehow taming the big, bad serial rapist. Oh yeah.

*headdesk*

[ladymina.livejournal.com]

I had actually hoped that he would kill her, maybe Edward would help when he sees Anita fucking her guts out in her natural habitat.
One can only hope ...

[hippie-lover.livejournal.com]

Hah. If that ever happens I hope it's accompanied by an open invitation for other people to write about what happens next. Otherwise those poor pussy-whipped males will be forever stuck moping and crying over loosing that amazing sex *rolls eyes* What would they do without her constant care? My god. They might actually remember a time where they had personality - and characters were introduced with more then a name and a dick size.

[ladymina.livejournal.com]

you know, it is all that I can do NOT TO post a rant about the schlongs of death dick size of her guys and her sex habits compared to the real world ...

[ladymina.livejournal.com]

Ah well you have a point, I am at least a grown up 23 year old ...
btw if I do, can you give me the guy count for ID and maybe Danse macabre, I haven't tried to read that one, and I just can't remember the number of guys in ID for real ... apart from a lot ...

[ellenel13.livejournal.com]

"characters were introduced with more then a name and a dick size."

The really sad thing is that in this fandom, that has a completely literal meaning.

[ladymina.livejournal.com]

yeah it has ...
and I so didn't need the mental pictures of some of the guys size (especially Bernardo and Micah)

[witchwillow.livejournal.com]

Name.
Rank.
Dicksize.

That's the image you put into my head. And I can't stop giggling.

[catskin.livejournal.com]

Welcome aboard :) I don't know whether to admire or pity you for starting with NiC, but it's always nice to meet another anti-fan.

[snickersd.livejournal.com]

I feel your pain, NiC was the second AB book I read. Had to stop half-way through because Micah irritated the hell out of me.
One thing about NiC that I wondered about, was what ever happened to that triumvirate thing that existed between Anita, Richard, and JC. They made a big deal over it in Blue Moon (the first book I read) and seemed to forget about it afterwards. After all that hype, I have a hard time believing it got beat out by Anita's magical vagina.

[ellenel13.livejournal.com]

That plotline was left to hang when LKH decided to replace Richar with fucking Micah.

[ladymina.livejournal.com]

see that is what I missed in the last few books, the plotline that the first books still had
(and can someone please show LKH why it is a bad idea to use your current lover as the base of one of the main supporting characters

[ellenel13.livejournal.com]

The fact that a professional, publish author bases her characters solely on people in her real life makes me want to die a little inside. There's nothing wrong with using what you know when you write, but when it becomes so bad that your real life dictates what happens in your book, it's time to stop.

[ladymina.livejournal.com]

Actually yeah it is sad.
But well I don't think they are based solely on her guys cause I don't think the dick size is real the looks and that don't fit
and while most writers do use people they know as a common base for characters they stay far far away from doing carbon copies - or god forbid using a significant other or family member for a book /book series

[ladymina.livejournal.com]

her smart ass remarks and attitude made her intersting for me add in her height and it was real fun, because I am quite prone to saying a lot of things, and just barely stopping myself from saying more and I am quite small, too.
and I don't have the excusion of young age, cause I was 21 or 22 when I started reading the books. Damn

[klmorgan.livejournal.com]

I admit that I thought LKH was deliberately building a flawed character. That eventually all her double standards and too-quick assumptions would come back to bite her ass in the end, and it would make the character grow. I was really psyched, man.

I was also fucking naive.

[keepsake]

You know, if someone calls me elitist for expecting a plot from the book I'm reading, yeah, I'll take it.

[dinsedaledarby.livejournal.com]

first of all, much icon love.
second, it is rather strange that Anita can just fuck anyone that comes down the street while her so called boyfriends are kicked to the curb if they even look at another women.
Also, every other page some vampire is mentioning to Jean-Claude "why are you still with her, you could be so much more powerful, blaah blaah blaah,"
seriously. If i were jean-claude i would be all fuck this shit. I'm leaving.
and if he had done that she wouldn't have had the frickin' ardeur and she could be out solving crimes and killing things like she should be doing because that's her job
apparently she can make money by not showing up to work. Have LKH even mentioned Animators, Inc. in passing in the last few books?

[ellenel13.livejournal.com]

In the later books I've read, this is how it goes:

1) Anita is in her office at the beginning of the book, where some "dangerous" clients want her to raise a zombie illegally.
2) They try to intimidate her.
3) She shows them the look she gets when she's about to kill. "She goes to a cold, dark place." She literally scares them with her eyes like a good Mary Sue.
4) Anita forgets about that for the 500+ pages she spends fucking all the male characters.
5) At the end of the book, when LHK remembers that there was supposed to be plot, they reapear to be quickly disposed of with the cold, dark eyes. And a gun, if we're lucky.

[ellenel13.livejournal.com]

I know, it's the creepiest thing ever. Some sort of mysogeny (sp?) directed at men. I'm beginning to think that she's some sort of psychopath who can't deal with real men so she creates this docile, fantasy ones.

[mariakatarina.livejournal.com]

First: Welcome to the club!

Second: You hit on one of Anita's/LKH's issues that I totally cannot stand her for doing in the later books. Anita is a blatant fucking hypocrite. Little miss "I can sleep around with whomever I want/need/is convenient/whoever the fuck is there, but it's all for the ardeur. But if you so much as look at another person but me with sex on your mind and I will rip your heart out with a wooden cooking spoon."

It's just UNFAIR. What the hell woman, you can't handle them being polyamorous and/or bi (let alone just some of the guys not liking (your) vagina all that much on general principle)? Ugh. I'm so tired of Anita rounding up all these male characters in a harem but not allowing them to even enjoy each other. It's okay for HER, high queen of the crotch, to have sex (what she considers relationships) with multiple men, but it's not okay for them to seek out attention or a relationship from someone else? It's not okay for them to be monstrous in anyway, to act in any way she does not deem fit for them, but it's okay for her to treat them like shit on occasion and use them to feed off of?

Ugh. Just ugh. Her self-righteousness and her persecuted tones in the beginning were annoying, but at least the books had good plots and interesting character building. Now it's just self-righteous sueism.

[adam-adonai.livejournal.com]

Jean-Claude needs to produce a female opposite to Anita. He has an ardeur to feed too, after all. Let her be faced with his "food supply" and let's see how she copes. :)

[ladyvy.livejournal.com]

I don't know what the opposite of chauvinism is, but LHK is suffering from it; her female characters (oh, who the hell am I kidding--Anita) gets to be exempted from all the rules while the men are treated like dildoes with names.

Actually chauvinism is a non gender term. That's why they put the word male in front of it when they are speaking about chauvinism. But people tend to treat this term like it's only used for men. And I totally agree with you 100%.