http://easol.livejournal.com/ ([identity profile] easol.livejournal.com) wrote in [community profile] lkh_lashouts2008-01-23 04:25 am

Reality lines are blurring

First, I must complain that LKH is taking ALL the stuff I love and rambling about it. Now it's Fido! WAH!

Anyway, I had to flog this blog because it's just so damn creepy. I don't know if this woman realizes how unspeakably creepy it is that she talks about her Mary Sue as if she were living in her own little world. Which she is, but not in quite thew same way.

http://blog.laurellkhamilton.org/2008/01/some-wounds-never-heal.html




No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader.
Robert Frost


Does it shock anyone that the next line is "No surprise in the writer, no surprise in the reader"?

Frost is one of my favorite American poets. There are poems of his that I reread periodically.

Ye gods! She reads something besides the captions on TV! Now if only we could make her read her OWN stuff.

It's always nice when one of your literary heroes agrees with your own philosophy of writing.

I must have missed the "pomes" where Frost went on about giant penii, subservient girly-men, and the utter joy of serving the Crotch.

Of course, perhaps reading his work when I was in my mid-teens helped shape my own attitude towards writing.

See, people? She's REALLY REALLY, like, deep and stuff! She reads POEMS and things! I bet she like, wears black nail polish and listens to, like, GOTH music!

If you haven't finished the book, this is your last chance to stop reading and save the surprise, no, the shock.

I'm not sure what is shocking about ANY addict ending up badly...

Okay, I have to assume if you're still reading, you know what I'm about to type. Here goes: Seeing Ron Lim's art, with Phillip chained against the wall, so helpless, so hopeless, really hurt me.

Ironic. Sounds more like something Anita would find a major turn-on, be so very shocked and yet titillated by it, and give Phillip healing sex.

It's been over ten years since I wrote GUILTY PLEASURES. Over a decade since I created Phillip,

Yes, folks, a decade is ten years. And by the way, it's more like fifteen years now, but I don't think LKH wants to think about that.

and had to watch him die.

How do you watch someone die if they, you know, exist only in book pages?

And this, folks, is where it starts getting a little odd.

I didn't know he was going to die until about a paragraph before Anita found him dead. I thought, until the last possible moment, we'd save him. But we didn't, we couldn't. It was the first time I cried for one of my characters.

Well, given that this was her first (original) novel, and nobody "good" had died before, that's somehow not very surprising, IMHO.

And it doesn't surprise me that she was running into this at random. Again, I cannot help but wonder if there was some input from her ex, because in a better author's works, this would be a turning point emotionally. And not for Teh Sex Buddies.

I cried for his death. I cried because we couldn't save him. I cried because he'd been trying to get his life together, and making some progress, and now all of his chances were gone.

Okay, two things:
1. Who is "we"?
2. Is LKH aware that Phillip COULD NOT have any more chances, or get his life together, because ultimately he was a collection of words on a page? At best, an idea?
3. Furthermore, is she aware that she COULD have "saved" him had she wanted, especially since she magically "saves" all Anita's penii via ridiculous methods in recent books? And therefore, she is just being all melodramatic again?

Ron's art reminded me that Phillip didn't expect to be saved. He gave up before Anita did, before I did. It was all there in Phillip's eyes

Of course, her opinions may be clouded by the fact that she now KNOWS that he's gonna croak. Moreover, REALITY LINES BLURRED ALERT.

Of all the people we've lost in the books, Phillip's death hurt me and Anita the most. That pain, those shed tears, are probably one of the main reasons we have a cast of dozens but few deaths of main characters. It hurt too much.

That, and since she can't separate reality and fantasy, she made a pwomise to her heroine to never kill off the penii. All others are expendable.

I told them how his art had effected me,

AFFECTED, dammit.

and assured him that I was sane about all the other characters.

Did she mention the part where she talks to them and they talk back, she buys presents for them, makes promises to them, refers to her pain with Anita's, etc?

I guess it was a complement.

ComPLIMent, dammit.

I miss Phillip. I miss him almost like a friend that died young. You think about them every once in awhile.

Oh, here we go again. Aren't there any characters, except those evil jellus bigots, whom she doesn't obsess on?

What would have changed in Anita's life if Phillip had survived that first book? Would we be looking at him as her one and only boyfriend, and would he have taken up too much room for Jean-Claude to invade? Or would it just have been Richard who wouldn't have found enough room to be in her life?

Or would he have become another doe-eyed long-haired walking penis, drifting through the house in the forlorn hope that Anita will boink him today, because he loves her soooooo much, and her LUUUUUUUV saved him from his addictions and traumas and blah blah blah?

Anita still dreams of him, and his death, and her failure.

Okay, creepy.. It's very, very weird that she refers to her character "dreaming" in the present tense as if this person lives in her house. Ye damns.

Because that's how she sees it, as her failure.

And as a lost chance to shag yet another broken, sexually traumatized, long-haired, ginormously-hung stripper.

We killed those that murdered him. We've had all the revenge we can have for Phillip. It didn't bring him back. It never does. More's the pity.

Somehow I can imagine LKH rocking to and fro in her darkened office, grinning maniacally at the screen and muttering, "We did it, precious. We killed them all, killed them, bathed in their blood, precious... we gots our revenge, precious..."

Re: We are confused

[identity profile] ladymuttly1.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 07:19 pm (UTC)(link)
Does Anita help write the books?

[identity profile] wyrdmuse.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 07:20 pm (UTC)(link)
I like to think that Frost would have thrown up a little to know that LKH is using his quotation as a justification to write self-insert porn. The entry just goes into a creepy place I was hoping I wouldn't ever have to see. I've been known to get a little bummed out when one of my characters dies, but then I go back to the beginning of my work and s/he is alive again. It's magic!

[identity profile] kerame.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 07:23 pm (UTC)(link)

"Am I the only one that sees a little dig at Richard/her ex? My thinking on Richard is that if Anita had been dating a vampire-addicted stripper he would never have been interested in the first place. Oh poo. Now *I* wish Phillip hadn't died either. ;)"


I think she's also trying to reassure herself and jon that he'd have been enough for her if he'd "gotten there first". She wouldn't be fantasizing about her ex, or the hundred and one other big-dicked studs who can't seem to fill the howling wasteland between her legs and in her soul.

[identity profile] tenaya-owlcat.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 07:24 pm (UTC)(link)
This kind of speculness frightens me greatly. ;)

[identity profile] kerame.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 07:34 pm (UTC)(link)
Why would she want to deal with reality when she can create her own?

Philip was a dependent, pathetic loser, just the way Laurita likes her men. He's probably the character her second husband identified so strongly with that he created the cyber-shrine to Laurell and devoted himself to worming himself into her life. She created her ideal man, then he walked into her life. The other president of her fan club was Darla, a woman who is both fanatically devoted to her, and too unattractive to be any sexual competition, just the way Laurita likes her women.

Maybe her crotch writing really does have magical, wish-fulfilling properties?

Re: Dating Philip

[identity profile] kerame.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 07:50 pm (UTC)(link)
Philip was a proto-Nathaniel.

He was her ideal man, she just didn't realize it yet, and less than a year after being published, Nathaniel/jon magically appears with a cyber-shrine devoted to his Diety.

Re: We are confused

[identity profile] nimnix.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 08:21 pm (UTC)(link)
No, Anita's the author. LKH is the one helping. She just types it.

Re: We are confused

[identity profile] ladymuttly1.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 08:24 pm (UTC)(link)
Now I understand. I thought Anita was fictional friend, but it turns out that she's real and everything!

I wonder what LKH bought her for Christmas this year?

[identity profile] nimnix.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 08:25 pm (UTC)(link)
"howling wasteland between her legs and in her soul."

That was downright poetic. And too hilarious. *surrenders the cookies*

Re: We are confused

[identity profile] nimnix.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 08:31 pm (UTC)(link)
I know what I'd buy her... a muzzle. Though knowing her she'd just think it was a gift of luuuuuv and get all angsty about not "doing" girls.

LKH is the fictional friend with a physical shell. Who else would live for someone that completely, give up so much control? Only a creation of your own mind could be that devoted to you.

[identity profile] dinsedaledarby.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 09:47 pm (UTC)(link)
She's crazy.
I should say something more profound and thoughtful here... but seriously. She's crazy. Who thinks like that?
If she's like this with her fictional characters, imagine how she'd be if a real person close to her died.
Death is a natural part of life. It would add a level of humanity to her novels that they could certainly use. it would make the reader care more if they knew anything could happen. her books are like bad fan fiction with everything turning out the way she wished it would in real life. That's a healthy way to think all the time.

[identity profile] dinsedaledarby.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 09:49 pm (UTC)(link)
i mean unhealthy way, sorry

[identity profile] voguexcouture.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 10:00 pm (UTC)(link)
I don't remember him being raised then killed, but I could be wrong. *shrugs*

[identity profile] ladymuttly1.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 10:22 pm (UTC)(link)
Me! Me! ME! I'm the bestest friend in the entire world because I not only remember their boyfriend/girlfriend's names I also know why the broke up with the ex. Aren't I specul!

I mean, come on. If LKH's going to wax so poetically about the pain of losing one of her fictional friends, she should remember the information she WROTE about them.

Re: Dating Philip

[identity profile] ladymuttly1.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 10:24 pm (UTC)(link)
Hmn-the chicken or the egg? Jon or the emo author? Which came first?

Re: Dating Philip

[identity profile] kerame.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 10:47 pm (UTC)(link)
I think there was a latent desire to control men from the very beginning. I think that's why she made Anita a zombie raiser. She started with the dead, then moved on to the living.

Constant exposure to, and ass-kissing from the fan-boi just brought out her worst desires, and normalized them.

[identity profile] longtail.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 11:01 pm (UTC)(link)
The fact Phillip DID die was kind of what got me into LKH's writing in the first place. For once, the heroine DOESN'T get to save the day. That was cool. Anita's reaction and pain was cool. It was more realistic.

I think it would have been nice, if Anita still dreams about Phillip, to have brought him up in a later book or have her revisit it in more of a blurb if she was sooooo deeply "effected." No, a book or two later we got Richard, Phillip's replacement. Looks and wangsts like Phillip, only it's new and improved Phillip!

And because LKH can't seperate reality from her own fiction, we get hordes of weak little supernatural bishonen having bad sex with a boring, bitchy woman that doesn't deserve it and doesn't do anything interesting anymore. YUCK.

[identity profile] everstar3.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 11:03 pm (UTC)(link)
I'm so glad other people were like, "Wait, who's Philip?"

(Also, I'm desperately hoping that others among us read the title of her blog post and immediately got "My Immortal" stuck in his or her head. It will make me feel less alooooone.)

I'm trying to decide why it is that when LKH writes about mourning the death of her characters, it seems absurd, but when J. K. Rowling mentions that she cried for certain characters, it doesn't seem silly to me. I suppose it's because JKR does it without the histrionics.

[identity profile] amamelina.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 11:05 pm (UTC)(link)
he was, same book. After Philip died, he was raised as a zombie by the big bad guy and in the end, Anita had to put him back in his grave. It was actually very sad. I only remember it because it was something that stuck out in my mind as "wow, how horrible for her".

[identity profile] the-mome-wrath.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 11:40 pm (UTC)(link)
Am I the only one who thinks that she hams it up for her blogs?

I think she wrote that blog to try and get the worshippers all up in a frenzy. That way she can hear more emotional praises and reaffirm her decision to not kill of anymore main characters.

Re: We are confused

[identity profile] kerame.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 11:53 pm (UTC)(link)
"Who else would live for someone that completely, give up so much control? Only a creation of your own mind could be that devoted to you."


Or a stepford husband, who was the founder of her cyber-shrine, and the 19 year old president of her fan-club when he met his idol.

[identity profile] dreamstrifer.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 11:56 pm (UTC)(link)
I read parts of this flog to my mom. Her reaction (as she's heard me complain about LKH before)?

"Um, I know this is going to sound crazy, but maybe she isn't in the right career?"

Hells yeah. If you become so disillusioned that you think your characters are real, then perhaps you should find another line of work.

Re: We are confused

[identity profile] nimnix.livejournal.com 2008-01-23 11:59 pm (UTC)(link)
And who is secretly plotting to take over the world through her...

[identity profile] kerame.livejournal.com 2008-01-24 12:12 am (UTC)(link)
Nathaniel was the Philip replacement, not Richard.

He was an early indicator of Laurita's predeliction for dependent, pathetic men who yearn to be utterly dominated by her.

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