lkh_lashouts | (no subject)

Random thoughts about LKH and AB:VH

- LKH is essentially a very mediocre writer who had the luck to find her niche in the marketplace in the mid-nineties when empowered, ass-kicking heroines and the hip, supernatural mystery genre were the new black in popular culture. I'm just sorry that a better writer didn't get there first with the same basic premise.

- Where the LKH books went wrong - and I mean so wrong you couldn't ignore the sheer wrongness anymore - was when the authorial presence went from a polite indoor voice to a hectoring, raging shriek. I just skimmed the sample chapters from Incubus Dreams and am quite sure now that not only do I know to the decimal point LKH's stance on abortion, I am also certain I can discern her, rather than Anita's, disdain for commitment-phobic women through the text. You could always smell the author in Anita through the details, but later on it got to the point where Anita had basically become nothing more than a shrill mouthpiece for LKH's opinions/issues/hang-ups/prejudices. It's the self-importance that seems to come with some authors when they achieve success and start believing that their message is more important than their craft.

- LKH's take on sexuality in AB:VH reeks of the Madonna/Whore complex. There's no middle ground regarding sex in the AB:VH series - one is either a frumpily-dressed, born-again virgin (early Anita) or a raging whore (late Anita) who'll do anyone at any time and dresses like the world is their gynocologist, or if male, out of the 'Do Me' section of the International Male catalogue. Of course, this being LKH, even the raging whores can't have good clean fun - we can neatly divide the shagsters into the ranks of Sexy, Irresistible, Empowered Whores (basically Anita and her lovemuffin du jour) with everyone else who so much as thinks about cock herded into the Pathetic, Needy, Out-of-Control Whores catagory, where they get sighed at and periodically worried about by the Sexy Irresistible Empowered Whores. It's such an immature version of sexuality it makes my teeth ache. Nobody in LK:VH has their sexuality integrated into their character to the point where it isn't a huge issue or a great, big, important lifestyle choice. It reads as the work of someone who discovered the pleasures of shagging late in life and has to squee publicly about it in the manner of all converts, whilst still retaining a core of Judeo-Christian-based sanctimony in regards to the subject.

Threaded | Flat

That was an incredibly well done rant on exactly what is wrong with Anita Blake, and LKH for that matter.

Have you also noted? Aside from her ONLY screwing what's male, and hating all other females, that she only sleeps with WHITE and HISPANIC men, men of a similar background to her own? Jamil hates her, and Shang Da isn't that close, either...the token OTHERS, and neither of them are hitting her bed, though the rest of St Louis has been through it repeatedly.

I'm just wondering when she'll start on cops.

Oh, wait. No..they're ONLY HUMAN.

-Dira-

I do agree that her choice in men is only varied by what species they happen to be. but can someone refresh my memory of what hispanic man she has slept with? the detective in new mexico never really made it with her.

oh, and on another note

1. i'm 5'2 1/2, which makes me shorter than anita. i've hung out extensively with very tall males. they DO NOT INTIMIDATE ME THAT MUCH. nor do they try. really, the whole gender/height thing anita/laurell have going on is really ridiculously antiquated.

2. As a hispanic female, i'd love it if anita would own up to her mexican-ness for more than just really really dark hair and her first boyfriend dumping her. I mean really. w.t.f. add into the mix that laurell is NOT hispanic and i was severely disappointed and confused that an author would go to such lengths to um, give their character dark features...and then NOT explain anything about the origins (i.e. i'm mexican, whoo i'm dark, oh noes boyfriend dumped me...wtf is an empanada? huh, cinco de mayo?) it's just really gratuitous.

whoa. sorry, long rant.

LKH is essentially a very mediocre writer who had the luck to find her niche in the marketplace

It's rather shocking how often that happens.

LKH's take on sexuality in AB:VH reeks of the Madonna/Whore complex.

I suppose she can blame it on the Catholics?

This was a very well-put rampage. Kudos. I also agree with the height issue someone else brought up. I'm 5'1, and while I do get unnerved when large men get upset (and are displaying signs of Very Unpleasant Tempers), I don't just look at a bigger guy in a normal situation and become worried. When I was six, maybe... But wait! That's Anita's maturity level! Mystery solved.

Eurgh. I also wish her ethnicity served as more than a token plot device. If she doesn't like Mexican food, does not speak Spanish and is generally just a white girl with dark hair and tanning ability... wtf was the deal with that college fiancee? Did he just dump her for a blond? For a blond with a rich daddy? Then she shouldn't have been dating a frat boy anyway. ;)

God, I hate the character of Anita so frelling badly. It's all wrong! It doesn't fit and she's a 13-year-old with make-up and a slutty wardrobe, damn it. Anita is that girl in high school that was so uptight/angry/sheltered that you didn't even bother teasing her, you just ignored her. So now that she's an adult she's acting on all that crap the rest of us got out of our systems in 7th grade.

It's such an immature version of sexuality it makes my teeth ache.

Word! The constant ~~undertone~~ overtone of "sex is evil and bad and nasty and nice girls never have it" really started to grate on me, especially when it became apparent that LKH seemed almost incapable of writing consentual sex without guilt-trips all through it. *sigh*

Dear GOD the abortion issues in the DM excerpt annoyed me. LKH is the classic, "Oh, I'm prochoice, HONEST, but *I* would never have an abortion 'cause it's evil and bad and wrong, but I'm STILL prochoice, even though I clearly think only sluts and prostitutes ever get them! Honest! Look how liberal I am! But *I* would never have an abortion!"

My flatmate and I have a theory that Anita will forget all about the pregnancy test due to vampire attack / sexing everything in sight, and in the epilogue of DM we'll find out the test was negative.