Tweet flog/Bullet update, Barnes & Noble forum Q & A

[dwg.livejournal.com]

I posted this on my journal first, so I'm sorry to the people who get this twice, but! News fresh in from Twitterland! So fresh, rigor hasn't even set in!

LKHamilton: I've finished crying over my imaginary friends, but I'm left empty and sort of numb. Stunned with the turn of events. Jan 18 8:44

LKHamilton: I've spent days trying to save this character. I pulled a major metaphysical event to save the day & in the end not enough. Jan 18 8:46

LKHamilton: Death will come, final and complete, and the light in their eyes dulls until the windows to the soul show nothing but emptiness. Jan 18 8:47

LKHamilton: The body is still warm, the flesh still soft, you can still hold them, cradle them in your arms and smell the sweet scent of their skin. Jan 18 8:49

LKHamilton: Death comes soft at first, lay a last kiss on their mouth while the warmth lasts and before the cold comes. Jan 18 8:52

LKHamilon: I'm out of here. I have not the heart to stay. Time to find someone real and get a hug. Should have known what was coming. Sometimes . . . Jan 18 8:55

LKHamilon: . . . even in fiction you can't save everyone. I fucking hate that. Jan 18 8:56

SOMEONE IS GOING TO DIE IN BULLET! This is doubly amusing because not three days ago, in a Q & A for Barnes and Noble, she said this:

Ok, this is a spoiler if you haven't at least finished Guilty Pleasures then please do not read this message. Ok, I've done the warning bit. Anita and I were both traumatized by Phillip's death in Guilty Pleasures. I promised her after that if she cared for a man I wouldn't kill him off. Her way of getting around that was apparently to care for every man we met in the books from that point on. Talk about unforeseen consequences.
 
I honestly think my subconscious is responsible for the low death count among major and major/minor characters. People dieing, or leaving, when I was very young have left their mark. In real life you can't save everyone, but in fiction, sometimes, you can. We may actually have some deaths at some point, but I think my muse and I would rather not.

Bold emphasis is mine.

I was talking to a couple of people over the weekend and saying that if LKH wanted to keep things as real-to-life as possible, as she claims she does, then she'd have to let some characters die. In my opinion, you can't really have it both ways; either you keep things gritty and real and deal with the tough breaks the story gives you, or you can make it a fancy fictional la-la land where nobody dies and everyone's sparkly and happy. Trying to fudge one just hurts the other, and...well, the books are a really good example to that with the random metaphysics and miraculous saves. So it's nice to see that someone's biting the Bullet.

Umm, on a related note, I went through the B & N forum and copied out the Q & A in more readable format, so that LKH's answers are right after the question and you don't have to scroll around to try and find what she's talking about: Part one and part two. I'm sorting through the Facebook chat in a similar fashion, but I'm going to add more blog links and commentary to it.

Comments

[dreamstrifer.livejournal.com]

GOD, LKH, go cry moar.

Yes, death is horrible. I've had my fair share of death in my real life. But I can also write about death and NOT FREAK THE FUCK OUT because you know what? As special as the characters are to me, and as much time and energy and emotion I've invested into them...

THEY ARE NOT REAL! THEY ARE NOT REAL! THEY ARE NOT REAL! Repeat that fifty thousand more times. Death in books makes me cry, yes, but at the end of the day, I know that I can always see them again because I can reread the books. If you REALLY didn't want to kill off the character, you wouldn't have killed them off. You know why? Because you are the WRITER.

Christ, I need to go have a drink. This just made me so angry and is offensive to me as a writer.

[dwg.livejournal.com]

Someone in the B&N forum asked if she would kill anyone, LKH went and turned it around and asked the OP who they'd choose to kill. The forum kind of went NOOOOO!!!! (well, maybe Richard or Asher) while the OP did a massive back pedal over the issue and basically said that she wouldn't presume to tell the author what to do.

So a mere few days after all this, to have LKH rending her Twitter in grief is just making me laugh. I could be a bad person, though.

[yaoihuntresse.livejournal.com]

I know what you mean. And then the fact that she goes around and brags how edgy and badass her writing is. God! Her work is like Dominic Deegan except without the porn and the hate is focused on jocks and not blond women.

[alondra-del-sol.livejournal.com]

OMG I CRIED WHEN ROBINTON DIED TOO!!! Sorry for random fan flailing, I feel like I never run into anyone who reads/has read those anymore. :)

I think JKR killing off Dumbles was one of my most traumatic book reading experiences ever, but it was still amazing.

I take fiendish delight in killing off my characters also, so the wank is just kind of like "*forehead-palm*; however, classic LKH response.

[kessie.livejournal.com]

I would be more sympathetic if I hadn't killed two secondary characters and a bunch of background ones in my writing in the last two days...

[dreamstrifer.livejournal.com]

I agree with this. In the back story of my current novel, I killed off half the population of a continent, and am gleefully plotting the deaths of other important characters.

[alondra-del-sol.livejournal.com]

Do we know who died exactly?

I mean... if it's Truth or Wicked or "random were-person X" then whoop-di-doo as far as the entire fandom is concerned. I mean if she killed Richard or JC or Micah or Nathaniel then maybe there is hope for this series after all. I'm not going to hold my breath.

I mean, it's sad she's killing off characters, but I really hope this drama is warranted for a major death and not some minor character she had sex with once to feed the ardeur, or rather "ar-dumb".

[dwg.livejournal.com]

There's no mention of who died, but there is a twittersplosion of "OMG NOOOOOOOOO PLEASE DON'T LET IT BE [character]!!1!" mixed with "TELL USSSSS!!!"

I think I'm going to have to hang out in the forums until the ARCs go out and we get some proper spoilers.

[pandaemonaeum.livejournal.com]

pleaseletitbemicah, pleaseletitbemicah, pleaseletitbemicah.

It's Richard Zeeman isn't it? He's been the whipping boy for about 8 books now, bound to be dead now?

But that aside... they're not real people. Killing them off doesn't leave a mark on this world.

Oh and this:
People dieing, or leaving, when I was very young have left their mark.

1) It's DYING.
2) You lost someone as a child. WE GET IT. There is only so long you can wring sympathy from people over it. Get some therapy for goodness's sake!

Well, it's done something her blogs, tweets and chats haven't done for quite some time. It's made me want to know what happens in one of her books!

[dwg.livejournal.com]

I had a horrible thought that it might be Edward, but I'll be content if it's any number of the other dudes. Odds are that it's one of the more recent additions. Or possibly Jason, I don't know. From the Twittersphere, she was writing something about Haven, so...it could be him too. The great thing about AB:VH is that the possibilities are endless.

But man, now I'm going to have to finish on my catch-up reading, because something's actually happening in this book. Goddamn.

[avalonnocturne.livejournal.com]

Dear lord, could the woman be more pretentious? Light fading from eyes? The sweet scent of the skin? This prose is so purple it's ultraviolet.

Excuse me while I go gouge my eyes out.

[yaoihuntresse.livejournal.com]

Ok, that is just plain creepy. You're not a rescue worker, LKH, nor are the characters real. This woman needs help.

[yaoihuntresse.livejournal.com]

Now that I think about it. It will probably be a minor, non-bishie character we hardly see like Dolph or some female character.

[ellenel13.livejournal.com]

So Richard is dead.

And LKH, death is painful and generally devastating IN REAL LIFE. IN FICTION, it is boring at worst, interesting if average, and kind of sad if the author does it right.

[fangedsekhmet.livejournal.com]

It better not end up being random third were-chicken to the left.

Good grief, though, her tweeting, it makes me want to disable the entire internet just to stop her.

I kill my characters off all the time. I never cry, mostly I've planned it months, years ahead because when the killing itch starts I just have to have at them *l*.

And oh lordy, she couldn't save them... was someone holding a gun to her head? She is one messed up woman.

[icecreamempress.livejournal.com]

NOOOOO! NOT THIRD WERE-CHICKEN!!!!!

Oh, were-chicken, we hardly knew ye.

[shadwing.livejournal.com]

"What character do I want to kill? I can kill any of them...any time. I have a word processor! I HAVE THE POWER!! *pause* Though I wouldn't mind seeing the Merlin dipped in boiling lead..."

Jim Butcher- 4-17-2009

THAT is how you deal with Char Death LKH!

[dreamstrifer.livejournal.com]

Jim Butcher is my hero. This is also my approach to killing my darlings (god, I put my characters through so much torture).

[flirtswithfan.livejournal.com]

My God this is a bloodthirsty group! Bodies piled up like cordwood. I haven't laughed so hard in weeks.

I'm cynical, all I can see is a great marketing ploy. Now her fans will be pre-ordering and flocking to the bookstores in droves to have their own copy to find out who killed JR, no,no, who died in Anita land.

I realised that there is no character that important in her books any longer. Even the former mains like JC and Richard have been so marginalized that who cares if they die?

[albinowolf.livejournal.com]

One thing I'm not sure she's getting... even if she kills her char in her published series it doesn't mean she cannot write about them ever again. She can write as many stories about a dead character she wants. She just can't publish them.

[mitrian.livejournal.com]

Or, if she really wanted to, she could write them as a prequel of sorts.

[flirtswithfan.livejournal.com]

I'm betting she does a Frost and brings back her precious in the next book or even in Bullet.

[magdalen77.livejournal.com]

This is Bullet that she's currently writing, so it would have to be the book after.

[telaryn.livejournal.com]

The way she's been going on about Haven lately makes me wonder if it's him? And then I try to remember who Haven is, and draw a virtual blank. I know he's one of the non-Joseph lions. Is he Cookie Monster hair guy?

Yeah...the handful of characters that would actually impress me with their death in this series is really, really small.

[othellia.livejournal.com]

Yeah, he's the Cookie Monster hair guy. And now I feel bad for actually knowing that. D:

Didn't know he was a were-lion though. There are so many animals, it's worse than a metroparks zoo.

[michael-b-lee.livejournal.com]

Keep in mind that she's killed off characters before (or come close to), and then gone back later and re-written the scene so that the special snowflake survives.

That's happened at least twice, if memory serves.

[rodentfanatic.livejournal.com]

I don't know what is creepier/more disturbing...these tweets on their own, or how much they remind me of a friend, both in her relationship to her characters and in general.

[karmyn75.livejournal.com]

I might read it if she killed off a main character.
Hell, I'm a Supernatural fan. I'm used to characters I like dying, some of them permantely.
Supernatural is the only show I know where the two main characters have died at least twice.

[triss-neya.livejournal.com]

Lol, another show that delights in tormenting its main cast: Stargate SG-1 has killed their main characters many many times, of the main cast only Cameron (of the last two seasons) didn't die. But then they all come back. Secondary characters die in large numbers and mostly stay dead though.

[graesea.livejournal.com]

LKH is stunningly self centered and should turn on the evening news once in awhile. Killing off a character pales in comparison to oh say...Haiti!

[magdalen77.livejournal.com]

That's what I thought reading her blog and her numerous tweets about how devastated she is that she was forced to kill off her imaginary friend. Then she goes on about how the last time she killed a character (Cisco/Crisco back in the Harlequin) there were all sorts of emotional consequences for Anita and her other characters and she would have to write that. I'm trying to remember if anyone mentioned this character ever again in the actual book much less succeeding books and I'm coming up with a blank.

I have a lot less sympathy for LKH and her dramehz when I'm thinking about people still being dug out of the rumble in Haiti.

[bubblefaerie.livejournal.com]

I'm going to guess that she kills Asher. That way JC can never leave Anita for him.

[morriganscrow.livejournal.com]

I'm voting marketing ploy, 'cause, Lord knows, her sales have to have been dropping!

[gwynethfar.livejournal.com]

Are you fucking kidding me? Real people are dying right now, with real rescue workers trying their asses off to save them. This is not a tragedy.

[brightlotusmoon.livejournal.com]

Seriously. FICTIONAL CHARACTERS ARE NOT REAL FOR GODS' SAKES.

[libwitch.livejournal.com]

I sort have had three thoughts 1. Let it be Anita. End the series. Please? 2. It probably won't be a vampire - they are soulless, right? 3. "'ve spent days trying to save this character. I pulled a major metaphysical event to save the day & in the end not enough" Its your story - if you want to save the character, then do it. The story is not the one in control, despite what you may actually think. Show some of that toughness you like pretend you have in your blog....