(no subject)

[othellia.livejournal.com]

I was browsing around LKH's site the other day, and I found this. Now, I won't flog it since I have no idea how old this is and if it's been flogged before, but I do want to point out a couple things.



"Two things I do well are sex and violence, but I don't want gratuitous sex or violence. The sex and violence is only as graphic as need be. And never included unless it furthers the plot, world building or character development. Everyone [in the book] has someone to lust after, but Anita is like me. She doesn't see herself as a lust object."

Huh... I call shenanigans. Really though, I had no idea that massive group orgies with Anita screaming her head off in the center of it furthered the plot, world building, or character development. Thanks for informing me otherwise, oh great Laurell.

Other than that, if LKH really didn't want to have gratuitous sex, then wouldn't she just fade to black? There's nothing about sex that's really necessary. The before and after, IMHO, contain all of the important parts... unless someone dies in mid-thrust somehow. (Of course, by saying that, I could just be a jealous prude. I'll never know.)

And then I thought, how improved would the series be if LKH faded to black every time the arduer kicked up? Not only would her books be 10 times shorter, but no one would be forced to read that stuff she calls "love." Also, I think Anita would become slightly... cooler, I guess? Just imagine, instead of reading about choking on Micah's peen and various "spillages," the reader would see Anita pull yet another victim into a random bedroom, hear mysterious screams from behind the door, fade to black, and come back as the victim's uttering declarations of love at Anita's feet. It certainly would fit what Anita has become better.

I'd read it...


And just one more thing that Darla posted underneath the "biography" because I just couldn't pass it up.

"The awe she generates often confuses her. She sees herself as an ordinary person, nothing special."

I'll give you one guess as to who the "she" is in these two sentences.

Comments

[booster-blue.livejournal.com]

"Two things I do well are sex and violence"

AHAHAHAHHAHAHHAHAHAHAH *gasps* HOOOHAHAHAHAHAHhHAhHAHAHAAAA

God, I needed that laugh today.

[dominanefret.livejournal.com]

Admittedly though she can do violence pretty well when she puts her mind to it.

She just hasn't lately.

[duchym.livejournal.com]

Yes, some of the moments in the hospital in Obsidian Butterfly gave me as many creepy feelings as anything I have ever read anywhere. She does violence very well at times.

But her sex is so bloody boring...

[watersheerie.livejournal.com]

Shenanigans!

Not only is LKH the most uber special person on the planet, but she is the most modest as well. Yes, when LKH claims that she started the paranormal urban genre, insinuates that Josh Wheeden (however you spell it) stole from her, and is simply the greatest thing since sliced bread, she is only being modest.
How could we have been so blind? Have pity on us, Oh Great Dark Queen! For we are afraid of your brilliance, and suffer from repressed sexuality.

[sparklyappolion.livejournal.com]

Josh Wheeden (however you spell it)

Joss Whedon, if you're curious. And has she really said that Joss stole the genre from her? Not that I'm calling you a liar or anything, but I'd links to read the batshit myself (if there are any) > >

[watersheerie.livejournal.com]

Apparently, and I got this from the forums on amazon, during the interview in Writer's Digest, the question was brought up on whether she had 'borrowed' from Josh Whedon...or something of that nature. LKH gave this classic quote:
"I'm not going to get into debating whether somebody writing for Buffy borrowed from my series, but I do get tired of people saying I ripped off Buffy. I say, no. If you look at the dates, maybe it's the other way. It was a fun series though it certainly got less fun as it went along. It became something you wouldn't watch as a family."

[talymil.livejournal.com]

But didn't the Whedon guy get the idea from the 80's teen movie "Buffy the Vampire slayer?"

[talymil.livejournal.com]

Wait never mind I just saw that he wrote for the movie too. *Please ignore the above*

[moonbeamdancer.livejournal.com]

1992 actually and following that date, LKH has ripped off Joss. And frankly I would either watch the movie or the show then read her crap, because his genius is a billion times better.

[terratheelf.livejournal.com]

How did he steal the genre? If she did say that, I would like to point out the original Buffy, which he wrote, was released in 1992. And written several years before hand.

Her first Anita book was 1993.

Yeah, he stole the genre.

Do you have a link to where she said this? Just curious.

[watersheerie.livejournal.com]

http://writersdigest.com/articles/interview/laurell_k_hamilton.asp

I haven't read the interview myself...I'm not sure that I want to after hearing about all the bullshit she spews out during it.

[othellia.livejournal.com]

It says the article doesn't work, but I browsed around and found it (http://www.writersdigest.com/article/laurell-k-hamilton/).

God, it's nasty.

[polymexina.livejournal.com]

that, and anita/the supernatural detective gig looks cribbed from tanya huff's blood debt, originally published in 1991.

[daphne-gateau.livejournal.com]

From the article linked above...

YOUR ANITA BLAKE SERIES CAME OUT BEFORE "BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER," CORRECT? THERE SEEM TO BE SIMILARITIES.

Yes, Anita pre-dates Buffy by quite a bit. I wrote the first story in the late '80s; it took two years to write the first book and two years later for it to come out. That lets you know how much it pre-dates Buffy.

The problem with this logic is that she doesn't concede that Whedon also must have written Buffy before it magically appeared as a movie in 1992. Duh. Maybe he wrote it in the late 80's also, or even before.

WERE THINGS BORROWED FROM THE ANITA BLAKE SERIES?

I don't know, and I'm not going to get into debating whether somebody writing for Buffy borrowed from my series, but I do get tired of people saying I ripped off Buffy. I say, no. If you look at the dates, maybe it's the other way. It was a fun series though it certainly got less fun as it went along. It became something you wouldn't watch as a family. Now I wouldn't say sit down and read my books as a family either.

Wow. Let's get random. Nobody suggested Buffy or Anita were family entertainment.

And speaking about a series that gets less fun as it goes along... sounds like Anita is following in Buffy's footsteps more than her author knows.

I've only seen the first couple seasons of Buffy, so I'm not that knowledgeable but LKH is just too funny when she's defending Anita against Buffy. There are some really crackified quotes from her about Anita vs. Buffy.

[acostilow.livejournal.com]

*wordlessly points to icon*

Bitch.







LKH, not you. Don'tkillme!

[daphne-gateau.livejournal.com]

lol! You got me. I like Buffy I've had to watch it on dvd tho and just haven't got that far.

I don't know what happens with Buffy but it just amuses me so much that Laurell of ALL people would accuse another storyverse of getting less 'fun' as it goes along. Pot meet Kettle.

[acostilow.livejournal.com]

Especially since the series grew "less fun" because it had, oh, I don't know, character development? Plots? Various other things that LKH apparently won't touch with a ten-foot-pole because that would mean she would have to think about something other than really ugly sex?

.....I have issues.

[moonbeamdancer.livejournal.com]

Can I please grab your icon? I'd agree either way, I love them both.

[acostilow.livejournal.com]

Hee, of course. I said the quote, and jainadurron made it into an icon for me, so just credit both of us. :D Also, HUGE AMOUNTS OF LOVE for your icon. Wee kitty! *pets*

[moonbeamdancer.livejournal.com]

:) Thanks. And I love my icon as well, kitties are love.

[fadeinthewash.livejournal.com]

Teehee. And either way, Anita will never have the fame nor the cultural impact of Buffy. Perhaps LKH realizes that and so reaches for the "if not the biggest, the first" straw in defense. Or she's ignorantly narcissistic. Or both.

[daphne-gateau.livejournal.com]

I think it's both. Everyone has heard of Buffy even if they never saw the show. Whedon is still a successful force in the industry, more so than she'll ever be. Laurell can sell all the books she wants. Anita will never be the household name that Buffy is. Laurell probably thinks she is though. ugh.

[muse-books.livejournal.com]

I agree. The complexity of Whedon's concept is much richer than the Laurell's series.

Actually I doubt I would have picked up 'Guilty Pleasures' in one of its later reprints if I hadn't been a huge Buffy fan. So I do feel much of the popularity of this and other urban fantasy does owe to Buffy's popularity.

[mranon-y-mous.livejournal.com]

I didn't even know what Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter was until a few years ago. I only hear Anita's name being thrown around from time-to-time until I looked it up, and bought the first novel and went, "Hey, she's a lot like Buffy. He's a lot like Lestat. Oh, look a child vampire. Haven't seen that before. Hm. What the hell?" I did enjoy the first novel, but the simularities just smacked me in the face.

[jazzymegster.livejournal.com]

I remember picking up a copy of Burnt Offerings before I even knew who LKH was, reading the back, and saying out loud to my mum, "This is a rip-off of Buffy." (although I didn't mean it literally I meant in certain ways it was similar). That was way back in the Dark Ages of 2001, heh.

[ladymuttly1.livejournal.com]

My mom hates paranormal fiction. I mean really hates it. And even she knows who Buffy is. On the other hand she doesn't have a clue who Anita Blake is.

That's how far reaching BTVS series was.

[ex-naomi-ja.livejournal.com]

Surely a writer with as many books published as LKH knows about stuff like, I don't know... the time it takes between a book being written and a book being published? And the same for a film being produced? Looks to me like she was probably writing the first Anita book around the same time Whedon was working on the original Buffy film, so surely the question of influence/ripping off is moot?

[mranon-y-mous.livejournal.com]

Don't be so hard on Laurell. We all know Whedon broke into her house, and read Guilty Pleasures. He liked the idea so much that he made the original idea into something grand and kick the soruce miterial in the balls.

exactly....

[virtualmorrigan.livejournal.com]

Not only him....I mean, Mercedes Lackey must have been right there with him (Children of the Night , 1990, sexy French vampire, fearless monster-killing, magic-wielding heroine - she can't have come up with that herself, can she? And Anne Rice must have been driving the escape car...as she wrote about vampire societies, child vampires, and vampiric theatres in 1976. (Not that I don't want to smack Anne Rice over the head as well, but that's neither here nor there...)
*sigh*
I can't believe the ego of that woman, I really can't.

morrigan

Re: exactly....

[virtualmorrigan.livejournal.com]

Not only Vampire the Masquerade...they also very obviously modelled the Hunter: the Reckoning line off Anita's character, and Changeling: The Dreaming is clearly a blatant Merry Gentry ripoff. And the less said about Werewolf the better.
Oh and let's not forget Tanya Huff with the Blood series which started in '91...

Bus station? More like a drivethrough service...(Note to self: I will not expand on that thought. I won't. No.)

And I have to stop myself from commenting on the "Two things I do well are sex and violence, but I don't want gratuitous sex or violence" statement.
However, I tend to believe more and more that she has been caught by the bodysnatchers sometime after Killing Dance...only explanation that I have...

Re: exactly....

[easol.livejournal.com]

What is Hunter: The Reckoning?

Re: exactly....

[virtualmorrigan.livejournal.com]

Just another RPG set in White Wolf's World of Darkness, like the other I mentioned.
Basically, you play a human who's fighting all the nasties...vampires, werewolves, demons. Usually, hunters have special abilities, too. And they tend to be a mentally very disturbed lot.
Sounds familiar ;)?

Re: exactly....

[ladymuttly1.livejournal.com]

And Dark Shadows. The creators of Dark Shadows clearly had a time machine as well.

[sparklyappolion.livejournal.com]

Not only that, but after reading GP he time-traveled into the past to give himself time to write Buffy.

[watersheerie.livejournal.com]

LKH probably believes that every writer who writes vampire fiction stole from her. She would probably try to reason out that Bram Stoker stole from her...if she hasn't already.

LKH has to be the original, special snowflake.

[easol.livejournal.com]

No, I doubt it. But she would probably argue that Stoker did the vampire thing wrong, or that he mixed up vampires and weres (with Dracula turning into a wolf and whatnot).

[ladymuttly1.livejournal.com]

Gosh maybe I'm crazy but I'd let a teen watch Buffy. There are plots-not porn-Buffy and her friends learn, make sacrifices and pay for their mistakes. You know as compared to just fucking for 400 pages straight.

By the by-doesn't LKH, or her publisher, market to teens?

[ladymuttly1.livejournal.com]

Just in case you thought it was a one time comparison

http://comics.ign.com/articles/803/803762p1.html

[othellia.livejournal.com]

"The other thing is… in many ways, Anita's world is bigger than Buffy's. There's a wider variety of monsters on a regular basis... Anita's world covers every kind of shape-shifter I could find in folklore."

Note that it's not "every kind of monster." It's "every kind of shape-shifter." Hypocritical much?

[alex-lebeau.livejournal.com]

Holy christ, is she seriously serious? The only way she can argue her world is "more diverse" is if she completely ignores the fact her world barely deals with magic, whilst Joss plays merry hell with magic, and all the chaos it can bring. And his demons? Are ridiculously varied, on par with her shifters.

And Buffy changed the world. What has Anita done lately? Broken the record for "Most Screaming Orgasms in St. Louis"?

[ladymuttly1.livejournal.com]

If Buffy's universe, if you have sex, really horrible things happen to you. "It's like that old horror cliche that only the virgin will survive. I'm sorry, if you're going to have sex, in a work of fiction, it should be good sex and be between people who care about each other. You shouldn't be punished. I have a character who is hunting vampires, who is scarred by the attacks… now I'm going to strip her dating life too? That… that just seems wrong!"

Cause Buffy's relationship with Riley was so sexually unhealthy. Or Willow and Tara. Or Xander and Anya... as compared to Anita and every paranormal dick that walks down the street of St. Louis.

[longtail.livejournal.com]

The sex and violence is only as graphic as need be. And never included unless it furthers the plot

Oh, all that endless fucking that seems to act like Mario with a 1-up mushroom is supposed to be plot? Coulda fooled me.

"Damien's dying again! Quick Anita have sex!"

*does the power-up noise from Mario Bros.*

"Yaaaaay!"

world building

She lives, eats, and breathes supernatural strippers.

or character development.

Anita: "ZOMG, I'm having sex with everything that moves! What does this mean?! The wangst!"
"Yeah, you've been wondering that for the last five books."

[virtualmorrigan.livejournal.com]

Ow. okay. Mario reference = teh win.

I'm having a hard time slogging through her writing as is (yes. it's like a train wreck, I still read 'em. Don't buy 'em, though) - but I suspect that comment will haunt me, and that sound will be on my internal soundtrack the next time I read one of her "sizzling" scenes.

[missamii.livejournal.com]

Love the Mario reference. I seem to recall that LKH once said that the sex was crucial to the near plot-less wonder that was Incubus Dreams. I believe that's the one where the bad guy got away and everyone just said 'Screw it. Let's shag,' to that.
The only thing I can figure that the sound of loins slapping together in the sex scenes was supposed to reveal the bad guy's name in morse code. Or something!

[brandiweed.livejournal.com]

Oh, all that endless fucking that seems to act like Mario with a 1-up mushroom is supposed to be plot?

[nimnix.livejournal.com]

priceless

[cheeky-duckie.livejournal.com]

I'll be honest -- if she, in a moment of lucidity, posted tomorrow about why all the mindless sex furthered the plot/etc, I'd read it. I'd love to know what she thinks when she puts this stuff together, and why she thinks it's such a grand idea, in some coherent fashion.

Or maybe she has (for as far as she takes coherent on the topic) and I missed it? That's entirely possible. Please correct the wrong?

[watersheerie.livejournal.com]

I wonder sometimes if LKH will ever grow up, years from now, and look back at her books and actions. And realize how utterly immature and pyschotic she was.