Oh how she chips away at my foundation

[witchwillow.livejournal.com]

Oh for the love of all that's holy!



LKH: Italics
Me: Regular
My Emphasis: Bold

In A LICK OF FROST what I made notes for was, names of characters and physical descriptions, especially of eyes. When I first created my version of the sidhe, the high court of faerie, I had this neat idea. I read one account of a man who had met one of the sidhe. He described her as beautiful, then said she had three eyes. Now I'd read all sorts of true accounts of people that had interacted with the fey. I studied reports of people from the 1700s and before, and after, that said they'd been abducted not by aliens, but by fairies. They do not describe anyone as beautiful that has three eyes, or any extra bits. That is like considered a sign of being 'evil'. So, how to reconcile beauty with three eyes?

I walked around for a day or so, trying to decide what it meant. I passed a news stand and saw a cat magazine. It had a gorgeous cat on the cover with a closeup showing it's eyes. Eyes that had three distinct rings of color in it's iris. I knew what I thought the man had meant when he said the beautiful woman had three eyes.

So I gave most of the sidhe multi-colored irises. Great idea, very visual. Problem, it's sometimes hard enough to remember who has gray eyes, or brown, or blue, but then also to remember who has three rings of different shades of blue, and who has grey rings, or which of them has eyes that are just green. It makes a small problem that most writers have with a large cast of characters even harder. Yes, yes, if I would just keep that running list of physically characteristics on file, I wouldn't have to worry about it. I've been meaning to do that for years. I just never quite do it.

There's more to this blog. So much more. Stuff about dyslexia and her two degrees blah blah wankcakes blah beer blah. But this is what makes me scream:

ARRRRRRRRRRRGHHHHH

The following rant will be quite rambly and may be somewhat incoherent.

Do we need reminders that vampires drink blood? No.

Do we need reminders that weres shift shape? No.

Do we need reminders that the fey use magic? No.

Why then, if she's properly introduced the concept of tri-ringed irises does she feel the need to continually remind people, over and over again with description after description that she can't even keep straight?

If it's not important enough for her to remember, if in fact she finds the concept confusing, how can she not think that the readers aren't confused. If her own characters don't impress themselves into her memory, how can she not understand why some readers don't really give a damn?!

I know I could well be missing something, much in the same way I read the first Merry book and I don't remember the tri-ringed irises at all. But this whole thing strikes me akin to the long haired men in the Anita Blake books. People can't keep the men straight (no pun intended) because they're all beautiful and long haired and pony-tail wearing.

And now having seen her solution is to write NOTE CHARACTER B _ INSERT HAIR COLOR / EYE COLOR; I 'm all no wonder men in both her books come across as empty shells.

I'm not going to get into the couch pop-psychology about why LKH can't hold onto the characterization of a male character; his personality, what makes him tick, etc. Because I think she can't hold onto any characterization. And this is why it's so much easier for her to have all other women as bitches, all major character women defined by the crown on their head, or their physical appearance and all the men just walking dicks with long multi-coloured hair and eye colour.

When I was a little girl, I think I wanted to meet a mer-man with sea-foam green hair and green eyes. I've now been on livejournal for going on almost six years now and my participation in fandom has helped me place that childish longing in it's place. It was the infantile longing for the exotic that's created to be tamed. It was my first fantasizing about a magical universe. I don't really remember much about my little mer-man, but I knew we were going to save the world together from a great evil (Blame Tolkien).

I have been actively straining to learn all I can about writing and characters and world building and various nuances of writing for the past six years. I've written fan-fiction and done rpgs and called it all my Outside The Classroom College Writing Experience.

I've seen myself grow.

How the hell is LKH managing to move backwards? She started off with characters who've stayed in my mind precise and clean for years ( Edward, Rafael, Ronnie, Olaf, Jason). Now, however, everytime I read reviews I have no idea who's being talked about. People go 'The one with the hair and the eyes' but it all gets jumbled for me because they all have 'special hair and special eyes and special penii'.

My personal memory can suck, for a shitload of reasons (stuff I can safely say would make LKH run screaming). But as books were always my comfort, I could and can remember storylines from books I read when I was 5, 6 and 7. I can almost always remember the characters involved and what they were supposed to look like and more importantly what they felt like.

LKH's 'progress' in writing, terrifies me now. Because I can't remember the characters, the people she's writing about anymore. Which means I can't remember what I was doing at the time I read the books. Which means I can't remember parts of my life, because her work has no hook.

I'm sure that's not the way it feels for everyone else. I know I have a unique mental take on things. But surely I'm not the only one thinking that her characters have become soulless. It's more than they're now pod!people. They seem empty inside. And the knowledge that she just sticks in 'HIS EYE COLOR IS WHAT?' just makes things creepier to me.

http://blog.laurellkhamilton.org/2007/05/taking-my-own-advice.html

Comments

[lyo.livejournal.com]

Yo, LKH:

Is this why Nicca was PURPLE in the firstbook and BROWN in the second?



>_> That's been irking me for a while. I just needed to get it off my chest.

[witchwillow.livejournal.com]

Now that I know about the fate of Rafael I don't have the energy/strength to wish up an AU any longer where things suddenly turn right. Wishing for the Wild Hunt in the books won't fix things. Wishing for the Wild Hunt to come tap on her window and say hello....

That's another story.

[dwg.livejournal.com]

At the very least, the Erlkoenig could breeze in from Chicago and pwn everything in sight.

But on the other hand, I really dread what she'd do to the Hunt and Erlkoenig if she put them in the MG books. She already pansied up the Sluagh, we need to keep her mitts off the Hunt. *swats at LKH*

[witchwillow.livejournal.com]

Slightly off-topic here, but I remember my first experience with the concept of the hunt was via Susan Cooper. It came across as fearsome, awesome, beautiful and freaky as shite.

Now I kind of want to do a post of: "Other Books - As Written By LKH"

In Jurassic Park - would the dinosaurs be sexier and prettier?

As much as the Elves in M. Lackey's Serrated Edge series piss me off by their continual one on one saving of small abused children - Can you imagine those stories as written by LKH? Would anyone have time for the children?

Maybe we should take comfort that she stuck to prettifying the Unseelie and smexifying St. Louis.

[brandiweed.livejournal.com]

And here I was thinking she'd had a garbled recollection of the description of Cu Chulainn:

"His hair was black at the roots, blood red in the middle, and gold at the ends, and said to either be very smooth or sticking up in the front. Seven pupils of seven colors were in each of his eyes, with the light of seven diamonds in each pupil. Each hand had seven fingers and each foot seven toes, with the grasp of a hawk in each."

(Strangely, most artists depict him as quite human.)

[nightangel486.livejournal.com]

Bedlam's Bard was the first urban fantasy I ever read and is still one of my favorites--and it came out before AB:VH

[melaniedavidson.livejournal.com]

Ooohhhh. That actually sounds pretty likely.

[dwg.livejournal.com]

I could argue that the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park are already kinda sexy (...I'm a raptor fangirl) -- but oh dude, you have no idea how scared I was when I came up with some sort of LKH crossover into Supernatural. Just...no, she's not allowed anywhere near that. Nuh-uh. Sure, it's already got pretty boys, but they've at least still go their balls and each other. *feels grimy*

And I'd hate to see her take a crack at House.

So yes, I agree...it's nice to see that she's neatly contained in her own little bubble of universe. But if only she'd stop spawning all these wannabe knock-offs, I'd be content.

[amamelina.livejournal.com]

Ok, I am the first person to admit that Dyslexia can be a problem, but I think she's laying into it too hard. Personally, I think that she would try harder. I know that I try harder, and I'm not as bad as she is. I rely heavily on my spell-check (and it hates me for it) and I have friends who read my stuff. Difference between us is that if my friends find something they don't like or understand, I listen to them.

[slayra.livejournal.com]

Sure, they had potential (except Anita. Always too much of a supposed feminist for my taste) as characters.

Jean-Claude could have been pretty complex if Hamilton ever decided to explore his character... you have his past, his love/hate relationship with Asher, how he came to be in St Louis with Nikolaos, heck how he was made a vampire! Not to mention his ambitions and the thoughts behind his 'political moves' in the vampire scene. When Asher appeared it would have been sweet if LKH had explored the feelings of JC, who obviously loved Asher very much in the past. How did he feel then, did he love Anita and Asher at the same time?

Richard had a lot of potential as well. A brief mention of his past, how he became a werewolf, why can't he kill and why is he strong. It would all be far more interesting if we could read about his inner-thoughts. Instead he comes off as bitchy and stubborn and deluded... because it's Anita's point of view.

Edward would help the series if he appeared more and was more than a two-dimensional supporting character. We saw his present life in OB, but (again), what of his past? Why did he become a sociopath? Trauma or simply a way to survive in his profession?

I could go on... about Jason, Asher (I know Asher is a recent-ish character but he adds to the plot, because of his connection with JC) and a few others of the first books. I'd cut the cast before Nathaniel, Micah, Damien and all the other were animals and vampires came into the picture. Because these last characters are so poorly developed they don't even have interesting pasts, much less personalities. We know next to nothing about Micah, he kind of landed in the books. Same with Nathaniel, all we know is that he is a 'submissive' and a 'victim'.

The books lost a lot with the ridiculous ardUer but in terms of characterization they were never good to begin with. All the potential is lost because we only hear about the other characters through Anita's perception. So the chances of us ever seeing the other characters as truly complex individuals was already slim; with the ardUer they are now non-existent, because there are so many characters that the author can never develop a few of them properly. To write them all, she has to merely give shallow descriptions of them. And also, because in Anita's perception now every woman is a bitch (pardon), every person who doesn't understand a racist and 'not-liberated' and judgmental and every male is 'food'. It's sad, really.

Sorry for the rant, but it's infuriating to see so much potential ruined. In the hands of another writer it would be great. I truly dislike books with a lot of characters. ^___^;;

[dwg.livejournal.com]

Srsly, if you're going to have a large ensemble cast...it kinda helps if you delve into their stories and what drives them instead of everything from one person's POV. As much as I teeter on disliking Lost, it's got a massive main cast and manages to give them some air time (y'know, when it's not about Jack or Kate for five whole minutes), Heroes is doing a fantastic job with multiple protagonists. And then there's the Pratchett novels which don't always focus around the same. people. in. every. book. People go off and have adventures on their own, and come back either better or worse.

So in the hands of another writer, all this potential could be used to the max and we'd have ourselves a series that honestly could go on for some 20 books without boring/frustrating/terrorising the readers to death. IMHO, LKH shoulda ended AB:VH at 12, simply because it's asking wayyy too much of her readership to stick with it for another 10 books.

[cicipsychobunny.livejournal.com]

Erlkoenig for the win!

[saucyirishlass.livejournal.com]

And even brain dead, you'd probably still be more coherent and display less complete lunacy than LKH does.

[vmisery.livejournal.com]

Remember how she talked about how she and Jon were "looking for a third?"


...I had not heard that. Suddenly, a whole bunch of things are explained...

[vmisery.livejournal.com]

No kidding, I went through the books looking for the descriptions just to straighten it out in my head because I thought I was mis-remembering something. I couldn't believe such a glaring inconsistency got by.

[brandiweed.livejournal.com]

Good thing she didn't have a garbled recollection of the riastrad (battle-frenzy) and think it was orgasm:

"... a spasm in which every inch of him convulsed, his joints turned backwards, one eye bulged and the other retracted into his skull, his mouth opened wide emitting flame and showed his engorged lungs which emitted a scream that paralysed or killed from fear, a jet of dark blood as high as a ship’s mast shot from his forehead, every hair stood up like a spike that could impale an apple, and the 'hero’s moon' shone about him."

[witchwillow.livejournal.com]

I am tired.

'hero’s moon' in quotes made me think of glowing white stuff. I then started cackling about glow in the dark jism and how LKH would have it making tribal animal shapes on people's skin.

And now I think I'm gonna try to breathe slowly.

[clover-elf-kin.livejournal.com]

I've actually never heard the term "series bible"--found a few links, though, and it certainly sounds like a good thing for an author to have on hand. Can someone rec a few pages on such? ^^

[alex-lebeau.livejournal.com]

Huh. I kinda have that problem with left and right, or used to: if someone just asks me where left is, or right is, I can answer. But if I have to think about it, I get muddled, though not nearly so much anymore. I also don't drive much, if ever; when I started to seriously do so to work on getting my license, I mostly solved the problem, because I just never needed to worry about such directionals otherwise.

I do tend to flip numbers around at work (like telling someone they have $10.40 instead of $10.04, or telling them their paid amount instead of their change), but I still usually give them the correct money. But I'm also horrible at math, so there you go.

[dwg.livejournal.com]

Me and my dad are the same sort of way with numbers as you are -- it makes for remembering PIN and phone numbers all kinds of fun. The irony is, I went on to do pure math in high school (okay, so it's all agerbra, very little numbers) and was still horrible about it, but I'm great at working out money in my head while at the check out.

[alex-lebeau.livejournal.com]

Me and my dad are the same sort of way with numbers as you are -- it makes for remembering PIN and phone numbers all kinds of fun. The irony is, I went on to do pure math in high school (okay, so it's all agerbra, very little numbers) and was still horrible about it, but I'm great at working out money in my head while at the check out.

But see, that's odd; I can remember PINs and phone numbers just fine. It's money at work I'll eff up, and I can't work out change very well at all unless it's an easy number.

[tsubaki-ny.livejournal.com]

You know, it would be kind of phenomenal should Hamilton choose to write one of these from a viewpoint character other than Anita. I never thought of that before your post (I'm just a casual LHK reader. Heh -- I almost typed "fan").

Oh, how I wish there could be tie-in novels a la Star Trek, contracted out to different authors. But... er.. you can't have tie-ins for a book series, can you? Darn.

[tsubaki-ny.livejournal.com]

Gael Baudino needs more press. She's definitive, for me. But she was under the umbrella of fantasy, before "paranormal romance" became the industry term for the subcategory. (Which, I think, made her and her contemporaries try harder -- having to compete with the entire category instead of a comfortable sub.)

(Gossamer Axe is out of print!! *weeps*)

[tsubaki-ny.livejournal.com]

The bit that annoys me is that the more she says it, the more she will be believed!!

[witchwillow.livejournal.com]

(Gossamer Axe is out of print!! *weeps*)

Somewhere in one of the boxes in my bedroom is my copy of Gossamer Axe. If I don't find it when I finish moving - I really will weep too.