lkh_lashouts | What happened to Anita Blake?

I mean both the books and the character. Everything seemed promising from the start: Anita was amusing and witty, though somewhat haughty at times. The world was interesting, especially the lore surrounding the supernatural characters. I really got into the books but my interest faded and I stopped reading them after having read Skin Trade. I just got fed up with the constant wash and repeat of the unexciting sex scenes, *metaphysical sex?*, I-just no, what was supposed to be interesting or appealing about that? The writing coincidentally also degraded with the appearance of these shenanigans. The ever increasing abilities and powers of Anita Blake that made her basically God of her universe. I felt like I was reading bad fanfiction. And don't even get me started on wereleopards. There were so many interesting supernaturals we could have explored, I particularly always wanted to know more about the demons of the AB universe, since we got such little but fascinating snippets about them. But instead we got wereleopards?! Why? I always groaned when I had to read about them in the books, and the frequency increased. I had no interest in their weird and disgusting customs and hierarchies, nor any other were animals for that matter. They were the least interesting supernatural creature out there. The books and the character of Anita had such potential, it makes me kinda sad and angry to see it have degraded to such degree. Did the author just get bored? I feel like with the right author, AB could have been something wonderful, and it is showcased as such by fanfiction. Does anyone else have similar thoughts?

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From:

desertvixen

I think the no-edit contract she got at one point really did a number on things - too much rambling, all the sections about workout or other tedious things) no one telling her hey this part doesn't really work.

Micah and Nate were also not good for the series. They don't really contribute.

Stuff like the scene in Narcissus in Chains (soap as lube?! the rape/dubcon/noncon overtones that somehow got worse when they rewrote the scene.

From:

femaleeunuch

No edit? Lmao she really got way over her head with that one. The plot of the books really degraded the further we went. But it's not like there wasn't anything interesting to write about either. Remember the demons? The whole plotline with that schizo woman being possessed? Also that brief moment in a book I can't remember, where Richard and Anita meet a man in a diner who's probably either possessed by a demon or is a demon himself. Why couldn't we have more of that?

From:

thegrandhighmarysue

I can't say for certain, because I came into the series well after it turned the corner. My local library only had Cerulean Sins, Blood Noir, Skin Trade, Affliction, and Dead Ice on CD. So, well after the series jumped the shark. I read the only Meredith Gentry novel they had first (I was fourteen and having a fairy phase. I'm twenty-eight, so I didn't get to this in its heyday. I was only one when the series was first published.)

Disappointed they didn't have any more audiobooks, I turned to Cerulean Sins, found it intolerably boring, and moved on. Anita wasn't as awful in that one as she'd be in other books in the series. Then I picked up the rest later because I'm a completionist and I like to see things through. My thought was, well maybe it was a fluke or I don't have the full context and it was just a mid-series slump.
I picked up Dead Ice next because it was available and ended up screaming at my car's CD player "Where are the zombies? I don't care about the rest of it!"

At this point, I didn't read as critically and missed a lot of the worst aspects, but I knew I didn't like Anita as a character. The things really slammed home when I read in-depth critiques of the books. I also got a look at the passion people had around the series. I can only hope that if I get published I'll have fans half as devoted.

If I had to guess why the series took a steep downhill turn, it was really death by a thousand cuts. I've read Strange Candy and her early work has a lot of interesting concepts, even if high fantasy is by the numbers. She seemed incredible at sci-fi horror and had some funny pieces in the mix as well. From AB you'd think she was incredibly dour. Most of these were written when she was still a struggling writer mailing short stories to magazines, and only writing when she could eke out the time in the mornings. The attention to craft shows. In the early books she was a relative unknown and still cared about worldbuilding and plot. As her popularity grew, so did her confidence. Which can be great, unless you start to buy your own hype.

And buy it she did, if her blog posts are any indication. When you begin to think very highly of yourself, you believe everything you do is above reproach. You also tend to get defensive of your work, because it'll pop the bubble you've constructed. Because if someone finds flaws in your work, maybe you aren't as amazing as you think you are. Maybe you don't crap golden manuscripts. Maybe you do need an editor.

Then her marriage went straight into the gutter for personal reasons we'll never know. Whatever the case, she should have taken a sabbatical, sorted herself out, and returned to writing when she was less likely to drag the issues onto the page. (Jim Butcher did exactly that after he got a divorce, moved, and got remarried. I'm not sure if that was exactly his reasoning, but it at least kept any bitterness off the page. Sure, it was five years but I prefer that to therapy on the pages of the Dresden Files.)

A divorce is going to be taxing on even the best writer. I'd put LKH from meh to good in the early books and then bad to what the actual fuck in later books. It's pretty much established that Anita is LKH's avatar, so when her life took a turn, so did the books. Anita became a nastier person, and the books became about what LKH wanted to focus on. Namely, her personal drama, a need for reassurance and adulation, and exploring how great her new lifestyle was.

I suspect she was also suffering from mid-series burnout. I'm currently taking a break after ghostwriting for four and a half years without pause. Writing can be taxing, and you have to recharge so it won't come out like utter crap. If she'd taken a few years after her divorce, gotten herself settled, and came back to the series fresh, I suspect it would have been less trashy. Still bad because of the no-edit clause, but better, simply because she wouldn't be creatively spent.

As for the character of Anita...eh, not sure if it could have been salvaged. She's always been a tiny self-important, incandescent ball of rage. I read for the world and the side characters, never Anita herself. I've written fic now where I do change her character to a blunt but semi-compassionate character, cause I can't write her in canon style. I refuse. But again, if the world and side characters were still intact, instead of playing out the author's ideal personal life, it would be tolerable.

Just my thoughts. :)

From:

femaleeunuch

I do agree on Anita's character being too self-important, though maybe she could have grown throughout the series, if the author bothered with that sort of thing? Btw, I'd really like to see what you have written for AB.

From:

thegrandhighmarysue

Sure thing. I will warn you they are spitefics/fix-it fix so there's some anger and a lot of corrections made based on sporks. Particularly those done by A_Sporking_Rat and duamuteffe, though I've drawn comments and ideas from all over the place.

I originally intended it to go beat for beat, but realized quickly that wouldn't work with the changes I intended to make. JC has been gender-flipped because I wanted Anita to have a female equal who she considers a threat, and to introduce her bisexuality much earlier in the series. Richard's become more of an asshole, so that doesn't come out of nowhere and completely derail his character. I've pretty much completely changed up her family history (though she still hates Judith. I just really, really hate the constant trashing of her family. Yeah I know families can be shitty, but I like the idea of Antia having a support system that she's too proud to use, but learns better later in the fics.)

There are also some inconsistencies and typos I haven't found time to fix because I'm working full-time and have a toddler. But since January of 2020, I've gotten through the series to Bloody Bones. I've renamed every one of the books, so the first one is called Iniquity and it's by Redgeandlilly. All of them are on AO3. Hope you like them. :)

Edited Date: 2021-05-28 01:32 pm (UTC)