Short Story Collection

[pastygothchick.livejournal.com]

blog.laurellkhamilton.org/2008/09/lkh-bit-090808.html

Dear Deluded Darla stopped by to let us know about some new stuff in LKH's life.  Including this nugget...

ANTHOLOGY
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The Living Dead - a horror anthology will be out September 29, 2008. It will feature the short story "Those Who Seek Forgiveness" from Laurell, in addition to short stories by: by Stephen King (Author), Joe Hill (Author), George R. R. Martin (Author), Clive Barker (Author), Neil Gaiman (Author), Laurell K. Hamilton (Author), Joe R. Lansdale (Author), Poppy Z. Brite (Author), Harlan Ellison (Author), John Joseph Adams (Editor)
Publisher: Night Shade Books (September 29, 2008)
ISBN-10: 1597801437
ISBN-13: 978-1597801430

Those That Seek Forgiveness was in the Strange Candy story collection.

So, Deeply Dumb Darla needs to inform you that OMG LKH is being featured in another collection with a previously published story.  I believe “included” would have sufficed unless it is a special story in a place of honor.  That would only be in LKH’s delusional world.

I remembered reading this particular story and being pretty disappointed with it.  To complete this flog I had to once again read it.  This is Anita in her pre-Skankomancer incarnation.

Edit:  LKH is in bold.  Me in plain

I have to start with the intro because she’s just asking for it.

How different things would have been if I’d stuck to my original plan. No Jean-Claude, no Richard, not much of anybody except Anita. What a bleak world it would have been, with just Anita and me in it.

Bleak, maybe.  At least I wouldn’t need brain bleach after reading the vampire/lycanthrope pron that infects this series like Necrotizing fasciitis.

“Death is a very serious matter, Mrs. Fiske. People who go through it are never the same.”

Generally, they’re dead, Captain Obvious.  She’s speaking to a Weeping Widow whose wardrobe she begins to describe.  Evidently the obsession with wearing only one color started early.  I will summarize the conversation.

Weeping Widow:  I want you to raise my dead husband.

Skankomancer:  Why?

Weeping Widow:  I want to say bye. He had a heart attack.

Skankomancer:  You really shouldn’t do this, but I know you will anyway.  He’ll be a zombie and start rotting.

Weeping Widow:  Could you make him a vampire?

Skankomancer:  We do not do vampires.  (At least not until book six, then we do vampires, lycanthropes and pretty much anything male that wanders close.)

Weeping Widow:  Ok, zombie.

Skankomancer:  Then we need to make an appointment to put him back in his grave.

Weeping Widow:  What for? 

Skankomancer:  See above about the rotting thing.  What do you want him to do?

Weeping Widow:  I want him to forgive me.  I had an affair then he had a heart attack.

Skankomancer:  He will probably forgive you.  He died of natural causes.

Weeping Widow:  Ok, I’ll meet you at the cemetery.

Skankomancer:  I already know exactly where.  Either I read your mind or we have been talking for awhile and the author failed to allude to it. *facepalm*

After a few paragraphs of Skankomancer’s pointless wangst about how animators have it so rough, we leap to the mentioned cemetery.

As Carla had said, only two of them [trees] grew close together.  That must have happened in the unmentioned conversation.

Weeping Widow had been chain smoking and is now dressed in only white.  Weeping Widow has sudden morphed into Stone Cold Bitch?  Skankomancer gets a weird vibe about this but completely ignores it.  She gets her zombie making stuff and gets to the raising.

“You stand just behind the tombstone throughout the raising.”  Three days dead and he already has a tombstone?  Must be just a blank stone or maybe Arthur isn’t as newly dead as his widow claims he is.

Its first artery blood splashed onto the grave.  Where’s the first artery?  Maybe you meant “The first spurt of arterial blood splashed onto the grave as I cut the chicken‘s neck.”

Mindless chanting ensues.  Evidently, they have to call the zombie by name.  Then we get the first look at the dead husband.

The top of a dark-haired head was in sight, but the top was almost all there was.  The mortician had done his best, but Arthur’s had been a closed-casket funeral.   *facepalm* The last line was unnecessary.  Delete it and join it with the next paragraph.

“Is that Arthur?”  *facepalm* Were you calling for anyone else?  Did you check the tombstone?

“That is not a heart attack.”  *facepalm* No, that is a zombie.  What killed him wasn’t a heart attack.  Maybe.

“You killed him, and had me bring him back.”  *facepalm* She just said that she killed him.  Why do you have to repeat everything out loud?

I forced her to look at me instead of the thing in the grave. “Carla, a murdered zombie always kills his murderer first, always. No forgiveness, that is a rule. I can’t control him until after he has killed you. You have to run, now.”  *facepalm* Ok, I need to stop this for a rant.  Anita has been an animator long enough to know this.  So, why does she automatically believe someone she doesn’t know?  If I were in Anita’s shoes and this kind of thing could happen I would have a waiting period, a consent form which outlines this problem that the client would sign and I would research the death of each person I was supposed to raise.  That wouldn’t protect me 100% from doing this kind of thing, but at least I wouldn’t look quite so stupid.

So, the inevitable happens the zombie kills Stone Cold Bitch.  Skankomancer can only put him back after the woman dies.  Then its time for some Anita wangst.

The world had become a one-dimensional cardboard thing.  *facepalm* TWO-dimensional!  One-dimensional is only theoretical and it consists of a single point. 

I really don’t understand what is so fabulous about this story that another short story collection would buy it.

Comments

[gehayi.livejournal.com]

I really don’t understand what is so fabulous about this story that another short story collection would buy it.

It doesn't have to be fabulous. It's by Hamilton and about Anita Blake. It may be shit, but it will sell.

[manekikoneko.livejournal.com]

The world had become a one-dimensional cardboard thing.

BWAHAhahahaha! LKH fails at math worse than me.

I really don’t understand what is so fabulous about this story that another short story collection would buy it.

I think it's just a collection of successful people's stories, quality optional. I was a little frightened to see her in a collection with Neil Gaiman and Stephen King, along with several others that don't deserve the association, but I suspect it's all reprints of previously published stuff. Like a "Hits of the 80s" compilation album. (NOT implying that's what the authors are, just a silly simile.)

[kynekh-amagire.livejournal.com]

I want a one-dimensional cardboard thing! Think of all the effort it would save you if you wanted to move to a new house. Or ship a large package.

[manekikoneko.livejournal.com]

I just moved, and it would have been so nice to compress all that packing into a single dimension. Instead I had to use banana boxes.

[kynekh-amagire.livejournal.com]

I dunno. Now that I think about it a bit more, compressing all of your possessions into a singularity might not be the way to go. I mean, it's a space-saver and all that (not having to bend over and take it from U-Haul: priceless), but how do you get it all back?

I bet the math is complicated. It might be easier to just pack.

With that said, The Postal Singularity is a concept that needs a story attached to it, unlike this revolting dreck of BabyLaurell's. Or maybe it's been done. (http://www.amazon.com/Going-Postal-Terry-Pratchett/dp/0060502932/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1221177449&sr=8-1)

[pastygothchick.livejournal.com]

I bet Bloody Stupid Johnson could build it. He'd do it by accident.

Me, I'd prefer a fourth dimensional cardboard thing with the Doctor inside.

[manekikoneko.livejournal.com]

That would also make moving a lot easier. Two- and three-dimensional space is just so darned inconvenient.

[silent-sybil.livejournal.com]

Who's Bloody Stupid Johnson? (It sounds like an allusion to something COMPLETELY AWESOME that I may have missed. ^_^)

[pastygothchick.livejournal.com]

Only Bloody Stupid Johnson could have invented the 13-inch foot and a triangle with three right angles in it. Only Bloody Stupid Johnson could have twisted common matter through dimensions it was not supposed to enter.

And only Bloody Stupid Johnson could have done all this by accident. Thud by Terry Pratchett

He's an inventor in Terry Pratchett's Discworld. He invents things that have a major flaw in then. For instance he invented the Post Office Mail Sorter and made pi just 3 instead of 3 point whatever and a little bit because it was neater. It did indeed sort mail, but it also got mail that hadn't been written yet, popped out with all those checks you tell people are in the mail, and things of that nature. The warping of space-time made being around the machine pretty dangerous.

He made an ornamental trout lake 150 yards long and one inch wide.

[silent-sybil.livejournal.com]

Hahaha... I think I actually remember him now! I didn't like Going Postal all that much, so I didn't remember a lot of the details, but that sounded awfully familiar. I'll have to pick up some Pratchett again! Thanks. :D

[notadoor.livejournal.com]

He's in a lot of Pratchett. Definitely mentioned in Guards Guards, and either Maskerade or Carpe Jugulum -- but he never shows up, it's just that someone references one of his inventions.

[ruas1000.livejournal.com]

What you want is Italo Calvino's short story, All at a Point. You get it back with a Big Bang.

[longtail.livejournal.com]

The lulz, they make me nauseous. :P

[pith]

The world had become a one-dimensional cardboard thing.

Impossibilities aside, LKH basically summed up her fictional words in that sentence, and she doesn't even know it.

[rodentfanatic.livejournal.com]

So, was the woman's motivation ever actually explained? Did she really want to say goodbye, or was this some kind of suicide? And just HOW did she kill this poor bastard if his corpse is that fucked up?

[pastygothchick.livejournal.com]

All she says is she shot him at close range. No further explanation.

[delilahkanes.livejournal.com]

And she totally was not jailed for murdering her husband. All of the cops were too busy yelling at Anita Blake for being a cute girl at their crime scene. They have to line up to do that.

[thelittlebudgie.livejournal.com]

Neil Gaiman, George R.R. Martin, and Laurell K Hamilton in one volume. Nooooo. I just hope people who haven't read any of the first two don't assume they're of the same class as LKH.

[brightlotusmoon.livejournal.com]

OH GODS NO.

I feel like warning Neil and George.

[yaoihuntresse.livejournal.com]

Throw in Clive Barker and Harlan Ellison as well.

[icecreamempress.livejournal.com]

The world had become a one-dimensional cardboard thing.

She always misses the point, doesn't she? ;)

[bludflower.livejournal.com]

My brain is bleeding.

LKH in a book with Stephen King and Poppy Z. Brite--the "parents" of my obsession with writing. The contrast will be hilarious... and sort of sad, because so many stupid people won't even get it.

[lucky-ninja.livejournal.com]

To a certain extent, I liked TTSF (it was better than the lame one that involves Laurita and JC making whoopee on a desk) but I would have liked to have seen Anita get indicted for negligent homicide more.

[suzycat.livejournal.com]

Three days dead and he already has a tombstone?

I suppose he could be in a family plot. But what, oh what, was her rationale for raising the dead then? Forgiveness for murdering him?

[the-willow.insanejournal.com (from livejournal.com)]

Y'know, here I've been thinking as I read your flog that she only has some stranger woman's word for all this - what happened to certificate of death and proof that the deceased did not have a will strictly forbidding them from being raised. And what about ID for the requester that they're who they say they are?

Anyway after having read those titbits via your flog, I will now say this is the reason the police glower at Anita. Cause she was an idiot who got murderers zombie attacked in the middle of Walmart.

[zgirl714.livejournal.com]

Stephen King (Author), Joe Hill (Author), George R. R. Martin (Author), Clive Barker (Author), Neil Gaiman (Author), Laurell K. Hamilton (Author), Joe R. Lansdale (Author), Poppy Z. Brite (Author), Harlan Ellison (Author)

One of these is not like the others. One of these is just not the same.

[morriganscrow.livejournal.com]

It's good to see Anita was always the consummate professional....

[guardians-song.livejournal.com]

When I read the full story, I got the impression the woman was doing it as an indirect-suicide thing out of guilt. So she MEANT to get killed off. Sort of like offering herself up to a metaphorical Angel of Vengeance in the form of her husband.

Brain could just be rationalizing what I read, though, but it's the only thing that makes sense. ...Which probably means LKH didn't mean it that way. Damn. |P *sigh*

[yaoihuntresse.livejournal.com]

I like that more than having it be an excuse for Anita to wangst about something.

[silent-sybil.livejournal.com]

I'm wondering now if the "kill the killer" thing also applies to, say, vehicular manslaughter. Or just plain old fatal collisions, or other accidents, in which someone is "responsible" for the death but didn't intentionally cause it. Would the zombie know magically and come after the other party? And is this some kind of a zombie-magnetism thing, or do they have to have seen the killer first? Possibilities! It would be a really interesting story if someone raised an accident victim and they broke out of the circle, trundled across town, and tore apart the unsuspecting cause of its death. :P Maybe I should write and ask her...

[amamelina.livejournal.com]

I think in the Anita world, it's only applied to murder. Vehicular manslaughter is 9 times out of 10 an accident. Though, if there wasn't that silly rule, then in times of accidental death, the person responsible can say sorry to the victim.

[siedhr.livejournal.com]

Skankomancer. Bwahahahaha. I haven't heard that one before.

[amamelina.livejournal.com]

Ok, call me crazy, but when you're asked to work on an anthology, doesn't your work have to be unpublished? Most publishing companies like to have first rights to it. If it's already been published, isn't that cheating?

Also, why don't the Animators ever do any research on the people they're raising? Seriously, do they all just go on what they're told and not look it up in the papers? And, if the zombie kills your client, can't you be sued by any surviving members of the family for negligence?

Ohhhh, look. Shiny plot bunnies.

[pastygothchick.livejournal.com]

Ok, call me crazy, but when you're asked to work on an anthology, doesn't your work have to be unpublished? Most publishing companies like to have first rights to it. If it's already been published, isn't that cheating?

Right there with you. I checked this particular anthology online. Some of the lesser known authors might be publishing new work, but both the Stephen King story "Home Delivery" and the Neil Gaiman story "Bitter Grounds" were previously published.

Also, why don't the Animators ever do any research on the people they're raising?

If LKH doesn't do research why would her avatar?

[pastygothchick.livejournal.com]

http://www.johnjosephadams.com/the-living-dead/?page_id=4

This is a link to the table of contents.

[notadoor.livejournal.com]

JJA -- that's John Joseph Adams, listed as the editor -- mostly does reprint anthologies -- finding a whole bunch of already-published stories with a similar theme (which sounds like zombies right now), contacting the authors and asking for permission to reprint.

It's nice for him cause he doesn't have to pay as much (since first print rights are already gone), and nice for the authors cause they get a bit more profit on the story, plus more exposure.

"Some Zombie Contingency Plans" by Kelly Link has already been published at least twice, and "The Skull-Faced Boy" by David Barr Kirtley is also a reprint -- "Bitter Grounds", Neil's story, has also been put in at least two different short story collections.

[twistedimp.livejournal.com]

So, Deeply Dumb Darla needs to inform you that OMG LKH is being featured in another collection with a previously published story. I believe “included” would have sufficed unless it is a special story in a place of honor. That would only be in LKH’s delusional world.

Especially since, with names like Stephan King and Neil Gaiman in there, I doubt that Laurell's name will be the one in big letters on the cover.

[mystoflare.livejournal.com]

Don't forget it's big whopping letters that are LARGER than the freakin' book title! Because who cares what the collection is called, Laurell is to be admired and worshipped! */sarcasm*
On a similar note, dear gods, I just found a copy of Guilty Pleasures I thought I lost. I should burn that shit like the last stupid book I bought. Send the poor trees to the afterlife!

[moonbeamdancer.livejournal.com]

Bleh... And on my birthday.