Lliira (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
lliira) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
lkh_lashouts2013-09-18 07:51 pm
lliira) wrote in lkh_lashouts2013-09-18 07:51 pm
Entry tags:
Dancing
It's worse than we predicted. I did a really loose sporking of it here while reading it, as that was the only way I could get through it. It is deadly dull.
There are many pages of suburban children learning ballet steps. There is no crimesolving, no action, and no sex, though there are many pages about Nathaniel being a stripper and some Unfortunate Implications regarding the kid Matthew. All the characters but Anita, Micah, and Nathaniel are human, and they could be replaced with full humans with no effect on the plot, such as it isn't. I do not know who LKH wrote this book for. Perhaps she is trying to alienate the last of her fans.
(I hope it's okay to post this here.)
There are many pages of suburban children learning ballet steps. There is no crimesolving, no action, and no sex, though there are many pages about Nathaniel being a stripper and some Unfortunate Implications regarding the kid Matthew. All the characters but Anita, Micah, and Nathaniel are human, and they could be replaced with full humans with no effect on the plot, such as it isn't. I do not know who LKH wrote this book for. Perhaps she is trying to alienate the last of her fans.
(I hope it's okay to post this here.)
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43.) How did Anita get into the kitchen? Didn't it's mere existence repel her? And wasn't she looking forward to inflicting herself on the Manly Menz? And where's Micah? What if some married she-ho or, worse, an uggo is even now stealing him out from under her?
44.) This is complete bullshit about the men versus women on sexual aggression. I mean, you said that. But, still. I call bullshit.
46.) ...Why would one of these women be having a private party, much less a fully naked one? They don't seem to be in the socioeconomic class where that'd be a viable thing... unless Nathaniel is the nasty, skeezy sort of stripper, I suppose.
Also, at this point, most of St. Louis has seen Nathaniel naked, bitten him, fucked him, or all of the above. That was also probably true BEFORE they got together, since he's also a porn star (of movies of dubious value.) If Anita can't accept and be cool that everyone and their cousin not only knows what her guy looks like naked but also probably faps to it, she really shouldn't be dating him. Because, dude, he's apparently not looking to change his lifestyle and those videos are out there.
49.) Why are these married people running around and having sex with other people? Are they in an open marriage? And, if so, why would the husband get all upset? If not, why would Elise threaten her relationship by making that up? It's probably true, the husband knows it's true, and Nathaniel said that bit about Anita to subtly threaten the guy and his wife with Anita's (irrational) murderous vengeance.
51.) No 10-yr- old will be taken with a 'baby.' Additionally, no 10-yr-old is going to require stripper moves from a potential dance partner. They will want, at most, genuine interest in dancing with them. And fun. This is gross, more in line with that grooming bit from earlier.
53.) ...since when has Nathaniel been allowed outside of the kitchen? Shouldn't he be tidying up like a good little wife? And why the hell would a bunch of kids be standing around, waiting for him to direct them, especially since Nathaniel apparently has trouble intimidating creamed corn? Groups of kids are usually pretty good about entertaining themselves. Or, as parents, the Zerbrowskis could/should have activities planned for them.
55.) I admit, I know almost nothing about police ranks or organizations, but I think if you take the detective exam, you're a detective. So, theoretically, he could go work in either department? And, since most supernatural things in this 'verse seem to end in murders, it might actually be very similar, duties wise.
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But no no, a huge crowd of "other" people, ones that aren't "our kind," make Anita nervous.
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You know, I think that nasty Us versus Them mentality is practically a staple of urban fantasy at this point.
And all of the prejudices that the heroine can be above, point out, shame others for, and generally sneer at.
And the first person narrative style, of course.
And, of course, the hero/heroine has some 'charming' prejudices all their own to spew at the reader - and 'clueless humans' are always somewhere near the top of their hate list.
Oh, and mustn't forget that someone always belongs to someone else in an ownership sense.
And those are just off the top of my head. I enjoy LKH Lashouts but LKH's hardly the first or only writer to combine all of those tropes into one awful whole and peddle it to a segment of the population that laps it up. The genre's probably big enough by now that we, as a community, could literally make a list of (nasty) urban fantasy tropes at this point. You know, to mock and avoid.
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OMG CAN WE DO THAT PLEASE? Of course, it'll probably cause a lot of disagreement about what does and doesn't belong on there, but I kind of want to see that too since one of the most helpful things for me in that regard is watching people debate about the series in question (like when the folks at a-sporking-rat discussed The Dresden Files and Mercy Thompson series and the virtues/flaws thereof) Helpful both as in "do I want to read this" and for my own writing references
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* Alphas whose sole qualification is "because Alpha, SHUT UP"
** Claiming that therian group structure stems entirely from 100% kosher True Animal Behavior
* Soulmates
** Soulmates with handwaved noncon "because soulmates, SHUT UP"
*All therian women/submissives/etc. suck EXCEPT for the protagonist "because protagonist, SHUT UP"
* Worldbuilding invented just so the protagonist can stomp all over it later.
* Our protagonist's "flaws" consist of all these ~charming~ prejudices... that the author very obviously shares.
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I was talking with a friend the other day about how kids are taught to be civilized and that it is a learned social behavior. Just witness any play ground with adults too far away to hear or see or they think they are not being watched. They can be vicious, will band together to bully another kid, will hurt small animals just out of curiosity and many other things that make us say "kids can be cruel!".
What do you think they said to each other when they saw Nathaniel with his floor length hair and purple easter grass eyes?
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That's one of the reason that online schools make me wary. Yes, they're theoretically learning the same material and yes, enrolling a kid in local sports teams would certainly give him some socialization but the socialization learned in a competitive athletic setting isn't the same sort one learns and experiences in an actual school.
You just know that there was hair pulling and hair stomping when Anita wasn't looking. Because, again, Nathaniel couldn't stand up to creamed corn, much less a bunch of kids. And the ballet lessons... Yeah, there was probably quite a bit of bullying going on when Anita wasn't looking but I bet they weren't bagging on another kid.
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46) It was her bachelorette party. Sorry for not making that clear.
Is Nathaniel still doing porn now? I bet he is and is lying to Anita about it.
49) Elise told the bride-to-be (hereafter known as Jill for clarity as I don't remember her name) that Jill had slept with Nathaniel when Jill was black-out drunk. Which also would have made Nathaniel a rapist, but that of course is never mentioned. Jill gets upset and confesses to her husband, who threatens to beat up Nathaniel at this party with all his co-workers because apparently he does not mind if they all know about this. Then we learn Elise was lying because she came on to Nathaniel and he turned her down, and she's just plain mean to women so she didn't care about hurting Jill. Supposedly.
53) There was something about cleaning up and Nathaniel said doing dishes was the one chore he hated. Yes, he is so domestic that he loves cleaning the toilet. That's when the scene changes to the living room and teaching small children ballet. And Nathaniel is just so awesome that all the kids have nothing better to do than whatever he wants them to do, I guess.
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49.) Thanks for the clarification! I'm amending my head canon to the following: Jill gets blackout drunk, Nathaniel who is sober rapes her, and Jill doesn't know what happened the next day (but maybe suspects and tries not to think about it.) Elise isn't lying but she changes her story to help Jill out of a tight spot, defuse some of the situation, and save Jill from further public humiliation.
And Jill's husband, although usually a decent, level-headed cop, only flew off the handle because it was his wife, someone he knows and deeply cares about. Struck close to home, see? He didn't mean to publicly humiliate her (although he has no reason to be embarrassed and neither does Jill because rape and rapists at a police barbeque.)
53.) I bet they're plotting...