lkh_lashouts | Oh How The Mighty Have Fallen...

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Oh How The Mighty Have Fallen...

One of the things I enjoyed about the early Anita Blake books was how LKH handled the consequences of the supernatural being out and about in the real world. At one point LKH did paint a pretty realistic picture of what would happen if werewolves and vampires turned out to be real in our world. The panic, the laws and court cases, the way people tried to deal with and contain the threat of these monsters. I really enjoyed it, ah those good ole' days when I actually looked forward to an Anita Blake book.

But not anymore...

There is one instance that comes to mind when thinking about how LKH showed us what would happen if supernatural creatures came out of the closet. Remember Cherry? Wereleopard, cute and blond, unfortunately not-fuckable by Anita's standards so eventually she disappeared. She was a nurse for a time, but when it was revealed that she was a were-leopard she lost her job. Lycanthropy was, and appears to still be, treated as a blood disease. Which it is, it's transmitted by blood and LKH even has cited a few instances when blood transfusions of tainted blood has turned people furry. Cherry couldn't keep her job as a nurse with an infectious blood disease. Even Richard worries about losing his job as a teacher, which would be a distinct possibility if he is outed.

So why does Anita still have her job?

I'm almost positive LKH was aware that if she actually had Anita go furry all the way, she would have to deal with the consequences. But LKH found a loophole and with a glee-filled cackle she proceeded to make the leopard Anita's 'animal to call' in NiC. But a leopard wasn't enough and soon Anita wound up as a "metaphysical miracle" with four types of lycanthropy that she carries in her blood. Let me repeat this, Anita carries four different strains of lycanthropy in her blood, yet isn't technically a lycanthrope since she hasn't shapeshifted.

And this doesn't work with the rules LKH established earlier in the series. Cherry lost her job for having an infectious blood disease. One that Anita shares. The only difference here is that Cherry is actually infected (furry), while Anita is simply a carrier. Anita is the supernatural equivalent of Typhoid Mary. She carries four different strains of lycanthropy without actually being infected, so that one can't tell that she is infected unless told. And Anita wouldn't be keeping her job if this was known, both as zombie-raiser and Executioner. I'm surprised that the doctors Anita has seen haven't raised a fuss about this, because in the real world and early Anita Blake books there would have been trouble for Anita. There have been attempts made in the early Anita Blake books to minimize the spread of lycanthorpy, yet now in the later books no one seems to care that a prominent figure in the vampire-hunter community, one who routinely works with the police and ends up in hospitals with bleeding wounds, is now wandering around merrily as a carrier of this infectious disease without actually being infected.

I know the answer already: SUE. A supernatural Typhoid Mary Sue.

Anywho, just had to get that off my chest. Here's a fun fact after the rant. I notice that a lot of those Troos claim to like the Merry series because it's a veritable fountain of accurate knowledge when it comes to old Celtic myths, Irish stuff and whatnot. Some of the stuff in the Merry books is interesting, when they aren't sexing it up, but I wouldn't call the series an authority on Celtic lore. I noticed that LKH continuously refers to all old languages of the British Isles as 'some sort of Gaelic', it didn't bother me so much until I started to learn Irish. I also learned that the one time she attempted to put an Irish word in her book, she failed. In KoS one of the hags calls Merry a 'corr' which according to LKH means 'slut.' In old Irish 'corr' means 'heron' or 'crane.' In modern Irish dictionaries corr is also given the meanings of 'eccentric' or 'odd.' I'm not sure where she got slut with this one. I know this might be something of a nitpick, but seriously a minute or two on google could have cleared it up for her.

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That would make me look at the band "The Corrs" in a whole new light.

LKH does have a special way of shining a new light on everything, a special uv light that quickly reveals that she thinks everything is covered in cookie crumbs.

There has always been a bit of a contradiction in LKH's explanations of lycanthropy. On the one hand, she says it's possible to catch it from the vaccine or a transfusion. On the other, you can only catch it directly from a person infected if they are in shapeshifted form. In human form they're not infectious. I wonder how on earth anyone got a transfusion of blood taken from a were in animal form!

But on the subject of Anita's job, I don't think it's true that she'd lose it if she became a were. A nurse or a doctor - well, that's obvious. A teacher - I can see parents being worried about the teacher eating the kids.

But Anita is, in effect, self employed as a vampire executioner. I can see the likelihood that she'd get fewer contracts due to prejudice but she's not in a place where she can easily be fired. (The federal marshall thing could be another matter, but I don't know how that works.) And as a zombie raiser it was clear from the second or third book that she's literally the only one who can do it if the zombie is old enough. If someone needs the job done, they have to go to her. Hard to lose that job, too.

There has always been a bit of a contradiction in LKH's explanations of lycanthropy. On the one hand, she says it's possible to catch it from the vaccine or a transfusion. On the other, you can only catch it directly from a person infected if they are in shapeshifted form. In human form they're not infectious. I wonder how on earth anyone got a transfusion of blood taken from a were in animal form!

I think the difference (for her) is that a human doesn't have claws. I assume that would then mean the claws themselves can secrete a substance that, once they scratch a human, would get into their bloodstream and infect them. And as for transfusions...likely, the blood is always infectious, but there needs to be a special circumstance to infect someone; spilling blood on someone without an open cut or wound may not do anything, but directly injecting someone with the blood would infect them. LKH did basically model lycanthropy on HIV, after all.

I took it as the saliva is infectious in were form (as some people catch, some don't, and they haven't been able to figure out the difference).

The blood is always infectious.

About the only time that Anita would be a public danger with her lycanthropy was when she was cutting herself to raise zombies back in CS, but then she went back to using chickens or whatever else is on hand. She used Micah's blood to raise a zombie in front of a court, with an FBI agent that knew Micah was a lycanthrope, and nobody raised any objections. Also, Anita's used Graham's blood to help raise the dead in front of a client. Not to mention, in Flirt, she used werelion blood. And while she doesn't always succeed, she tries to use the lycanthrope hospital instead of the human one. If she had human sexual partners, she'd probably have to disclose to them that she's infectious, specially given her propensity to bite and scratch.

But as

alex_lebeau says, LKH originally modelled lycanthropy on HIV. It's...no longer treated as such. From what I know of Bullet, lycanthropy now gives you element-bending skills if you're a tiger and Anita has a metaphysical zoo living inside her brain.

Seriously. I haven't read 'Bullet' yet, but is Anita the fucking Avatar now?

Pretty much. Or Captain Planet, but that might be a bit too old school. I don't know if she's an Avatar fan, but I know she's talked about watching Naruto with her family.

The weretigers have different powers according to their different colours, and Golden Tigers are the most powerful (I think they have earth powers?) and they play an important role in how MOAD was defeated the first time around. Naturally, this means that Anita is queen of the tigers. Shocking, I know.

Definitely Captain Planet. She's stuck in the late 80's/early 90's. Besides, the Avatar animated series is far, far too cool for anything LKH related.

And hasn't got enough white people in it.

I think the Avatar movie might be white enough for LKH.

LMAO "is Anita the fucking Avatar now?"
Your comment is priceless. I also havent read Bullet and was considering it since I heard people raving about how good it is and since Jean Claude makes a comeback and I'm a jean-claude fan but am not so sure now that I know about Anita's avatar powers.

I have very little memory of the exact details, but were employers in these cases more concerned about student or patient infection with lycanthropy, or Richard or Cherry going were and attacking vulnerable humans? That prejudice makes more sense in the context of the series, since LKH has pointed out that weres in human form aren't contagious, but there is still a strong fear of uncontrolled lycanthropes.

In any case, Anita is purported to be the best of the best of the best of the animators. She doesn't interact with the public in the same way as a nurse or a teacher, so even if the rumors flew Burt would probably be more concerned about his profit than retiring Anita, and it didn't seem like there was an actual legal policy keeping weres from working. These are all such interesting questions, it seems like a shame that LKH is never going to return to explaining more of this background info unless it relates to angsty backstory or a setup for porn.

In my opinion, the real question of why she still has a job should be concerned with the fact she spends too much time having sex and dealing with her relationships to actually do any interesting work any more.

I know, right? I've had a couple of lengthy conversations about how the animation industry actually works as a business and why Anita should basically be fired from it, and either severely reprimanded from her federal status (suspension, reassignment, hearings etc) or even stripped of her badge. The world's been twisted and warped so much just to make Anita's life more convenient, but there's been no thought into how it would effect the rest of the world. Mostly, I'm guessing, because the rest of the world beyond Anita does not actually count.

I agree with you - Anita would have realistically been stripped of her Federal Marshall's badge for any number of reasons. She should have been hauled up on serious charges many books ago. She doesn't really function as an animater and frankly is in bed with too many monsters to work with any police agency.

Why isn't Anita fired for being infectious: Because her job doesn't relate to healthcare or contact with children.

I actually have no problem with Anita being highly infectious and maintaining her job. Cherry worked in a hospital. Richard works with kids (it shouldn't be an issue because he shouldn't have blood to blood contact with them, but look at how people react to homosexuals. The Richard issue is a "protect our children who aren't actually in danger" knee jerk, not an actual biological contamination issue at all).

I agree. People might panic about shifters working around sick people or children, but Anita works with zombies. She's already in a weird job and doesn't deal much with the public (most arrangements seem to be done by Burt and Co.), so why should people care much if she's a shifter?

Unless it's the full moon, of course, but as that assassin observed, she takes full moons off anyway.

What you say has a really interesting point. I too seem to recall in one of the earlier books, not sure which one at this point in time, but I think it was Jason or some other young 'wolf or 'leopard was very very new to being a were and had to have an alpha, I believe it was Richard at the time, come and help him control the change. I believe she initially put into her books that a very young and inexperienced were can be a danger to those around him or her if they didnt have the control and would need an alpha or stronger were to help them get through the teething stages of a were. With that being the case I can see why the you wouldnt want a were working with children, the sick, the elderly or any professional where you run the risk of having someone attacked.

It would make more sense ot me if this was the reason Cherry lost her job and Richard didn't want to be outed. It is very like HIV or homosexuality in the context of how she portrays it all. Again its all a very interesting angle that lyconthropy is similair to a blood disase like HIV and spreads in a similair way. In that way I can see why the blood would be a huge danger as well, if that's the main way you could become a were. But alas most of this interesting stuff has been dropped. I too have no real concern with Anita keeping her jobs either, I just have a problem with the fact that her career has been dropped as it doesn't fit in with her private life.

Don't you know that Cherry is a typical woman while Anita is the special one there to satisfy her creators ego.

Ok what is a Troo? When I was still allowed on the other forum that was a big No No there but I have no idea what that means. Also after several heated debates about all the contradictions most people just concluded that LKH was too lazy to go back and read her own work to make sure she stuck to her own rules. Besides, if the rules can't be broken to make it work for Anita, then LKH has no plot whatsoever and then where would we be hahahaha.

Short answer: Troo = Troo Believers

Longer answer: Troos are those who read LKH books and still think that they're brilliant. People who read them for the lulz or have issues with the problematic elements are not welcome among the Troos.

Ahhhh I see, well then no I would not be a Troo hahaha

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Oh How The Mighty Have Fallen...

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