I just finished The Killing Dance which was pretty good except for the sudden focus on Our Heroine's Love Life, and I'm wondering if the next few books in the series are worth reading. I really liked Blody Bones . I can hardly believe I cried at the end, except it was all about Anita missing her dead mother. I guess it makes sense that THAT would get to me.
Hamilton's writing has gotten better, but the story in this last one I read was secondary to the love triangle, which sort of saddened me. I really liked the blood and guts and zombies and stuff. The smoochies to action ratio was just a bit high for what I had been expecting (since all the others had been all bout the Case of the Week).
Those of you who have readBoyhouse may now giggle at me (Hello, Pot? This is Kettle...).
So, I'm moving on to The Dark Tower next, which I will avoid discussion of until I finish, and will then bring up the old thread about it.
Has anyone else heard of/read Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell ? I've heard good things about it from a few different sources, and I wondered if any 'rackers could give me their opinions. Is it any good?
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Eve's reading Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell - I'll ask her what she thinks.
Posted by xnera (Member # 187) on :
I just recently finished reading Bloody Bones myself. I loved it. Unfortunately, I've heard that the later books do have more of a focus on her love life. This from the Buffistas board:
quote:I know it's been said before, but I liked the Anita Blake books so much more when the focus was on her skill at raising the dead, and by that I mean dead people.
The Buffistas are also the source of my very favorite quote about the Anita Blake series:
quote:On Anita Blake's behavior in recent books:
Boink city is the least of it. She's lying naked at the intersection of Hello and Sailor with her legs wide open.
Have you read Kay Hooper at all? She started out as a romance writer, then morphed into romance suspense, and now is usually just categorized as suspense. Good stuff. Her books do have a tendency to have a light "made for each other!" feel to them, but the suspense is so strong that I always find myself turning the pages rapidly. I did a review here.
I also recently read The Surgeon by Tess Gerritsen, and found that enjoyable, too. It's a medical thriller / mystery / suspense, with a dash of romance.
Posted by Olivetta (Member # 6456) on :
I guess what bothers me about the Anita Blake books is that they followed the same formula for what? six books? then changed. NOw, I admit that what happened in The Killing Dance was logical for the character. Horrified after seeing Richard go all wolf-y and eat his rival, she had a weak moment that the bloodsucker (aka The Other Monster in her Life) took advantage of. But then at the end it sounds like she's got an ongoing relationship with him, which doesn't seem like a given. Yeah, she's got the pre-marital sex guilt thing, which might be enough to keep her in a relationship for a while, but...
Okay. I confess-- I am thinking about this WAAAY too much. It's just that she seemed to go to such lengths to keep the characters consistent in the beginning. That she seems to have given that up for extolling the joys of sex with the undead... *face palm*
Posted by Belle (Member # 2314) on :
Olivia, she totally gives up the forumla.
I was really disappointed in the later books. I liked Anita the tough gal that took no crap from either the living or the dead, and who had to deal with her own emotional hang ups while fighting her attraction to two men who are both monsters in their own way. I liked the mystery-solving aspect of the first few books.
Now, they're all sex and violence. And violent sex.
Move on to something else, you'll be happy not to have wasted time on the later books.
Posted by Dan_raven (Member # 3383) on :
I am a fan, mainly because she is a successful writer from my home town.
And yes, much of her description of St. Louis is accurate.
however I've been on a buying limit recently. That will change this weekend--Yea Borders "Educators Weekend" with 25% off all books for teachers (my Wife qualifies, kinda).
Last year I went to the local Wolf Shelter's open house. Among the things up for auction was a "Anita Gift Package" including a bumper sticker, a night shirt that looks all torn up, with the phrase "Marucus's Teddy Bear" and a signed copy of Lunatic Cafe.
I got it.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
You could do much worse than to drop whatever you're reading right now to pick up Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell. Even if you dropped it on your foot, and even if it were heavy.
Especially if what you're reading involves angsty, formulaic sex with movie monsters.
[ October 05, 2004, 05:25 PM: Message edited by: TomDavidson ]
Posted by Kwea (Member # 2199) on :
Well, Jenni and I bought the newest one that just came out...in hardcover.
We are fans, in case you couldn't figure that out...lol...
I like them a lot, even though the focus does shift...but there are a lot of good things that happen, even in the more recent ones. I love how LH talks about the mystical aspect of things, and how she blends Fantasy, Mystery and Horror (or Whore)...I have read a lot of failed attempts of other authors, but no one has been able to write it as well as she does.
LH gets even more racy, but there is still a solid story in there too, and her love life complicates things too. I have seen a lot of moral growth in her characters, but unlike most authors she shows both sides...the good things and the bad.
There has been a very interesting moral progression, and I am curious to see where it goes...although it has been getting a bit much.
I think they are still worth reading...but unless you are hooked, wait for the paperbacks...
Kwea
Posted by Zalmoxis (Member # 2327) on :
So, Tom...
Is this an admission of your "novel recommendation"?
Posted by Olivetta (Member # 6456) on :
I think my sister-in-law has all of 'em from cheap library donations, so I can get 'em. I probably will read them eventually, but I doubt I'll buy anymore.
I do understand what you mean about moral complexity, the way her attitude changes toward various monsters from book to book. I just liked the gumshoe style of plot and the casefic aspect of it, even though I always figured out the twists early on.
Tom, I'm glad to hear it. I want that book. However, I must slog through Getting Things Done before I am allowed to read anything else. It's supposed to be good for me.
Posted by Synesthesia (Member # 4774) on :
I love the Anita Blake series. It sucks me in. I too just finished the Killing Dance again. They are hard to put down and I like books like that. Even better is the Merry Gentry series, but it is not good if you are thinking, EW SEX. Personaly, I am amazed and Anita's control... I respect it and am awed by it. But, the arduer is a little annoying to some fans. I do not really mind it though... and she did bring it on herself in a way.
Posted by Olivetta (Member # 6456) on :
I can see that, and I don't mean to be prudish. I was just used to the formula, and the change made me uneasy. The Merry Gentry books are all sex all the time, and that seems to be the point. I don't mind that so much, as it pretty much started out that way and stayed that way. Plus, my sister in law gives them to me for free.
It's just a little jarring when what basically has been a suspense/adventure series morphs into kinky horror porn. Not that there's anything wrong with kinky horror porn, just that that wasn't what I went in expecting.
Posted by Kwea (Member # 2199) on :
The arduer is annoying...but in the new one it gets a bit more intresting.
I l;ike how LH makes everything have a concequence, even the metaphysical stuff....it all has unintended effects, and not just to Anita.
Kwea
Posted by Synesthesia (Member # 4774) on :
I hope she gets rid of it soon, but I guess *Spoiler* she bought it on her self a few books ago...
Posted by Olivetta (Member # 6456) on :
I'm thinking that I don't know what that is.
Posted by Synesthesia (Member # 4774) on :
It doesn't appear for a few books... *edit* Just noticed the title!
[ October 05, 2004, 06:59 PM: Message edited by: Synesthesia ]
Posted by TMedina (Member # 6649) on :
Bah - sorry, the "not so soft" core porn factor is just way beyond what I want to read.
If I wanted porn, I'd be thumbing through Playboys.
I read _one_ Merry Gentry book before swearing off the rest. As for Ms. Blake - yeah, it's all up...and down...and up...from there.
There are several parallel writers that aren't bad and do explore the "alternate reality" theme with a minimum of soft core -
Jim Butcher's series is pretty evenly balanced but it lacks a female protagonist
Tanya Huff has a former female cop with a romantic triangle going on
Charlaine Harris - she's gotten good reviews, but I haven't read it yet
Janet Evanovich - nothing supernatural, but tough female character and, while repetitive, it can be quite amusing.
-Trevor
Posted by kwsni (Member # 1831) on :
Speaking of Boyhouse... ::cough::
Though I'm just as guilty as you are of not getting anything written.
Ni!
Posted by xnera (Member # 187) on :
Janet Evanovich! That was the other person I was trying to think of earlier. Yes, I love her stuff, too. Very entertaining.
And Synth, it took me a while to notice the title of this thread, too. Posted by imogen (Member # 5485) on :
Mmm, and i just noticed it. After reading the thread several times and actually using it in the adjacent thread titles thread... Posted by Traveler (Member # 3615) on :
I just finished the latest Anita Blake book, "Incubus Dreams", and well, ahem....it was a little...no change that, ALOT smutty.
It went from one sex scene to the next...I was beginning to feel embarrassed that I was reading this book..especially if I had it out in public.
Posted by BookWyrm (Member # 2192) on :
The last LH book I read more or less turned me off. Like others here, I liked them for the formula sha had. Now its all sex. MAYBE had they started out that way I would continue to read them. But after (I think) Narcissus in Chains, I put them on my Do Not Buy list. I like Tanya Huffs Victory series. Been a while since I've read one though. Book money being scarce means I have to pick and choose what to get. And I've been trying to rebuild my Sword of Truth, Wheel of Time books (hardbacks) the Ex took, and I've found first eds of GRRM's first two Song of Fire and Ice books in hardback, both the VF condition.
Posted by xnera (Member # 187) on :
quote:I've found first eds of GRRM's first two Song of Fire and Ice books in hardback, both the VF condition.
*covets* I bet those must've cost a pretty penny. I looked into obtaining a first edition of "A Game of Thrones" several years ago, when I was still working at a cushy techie job, and it was out of my reach even then. Can't imagine how much they're up to now.
Posted by BookWyrm (Member # 2192) on :
Actually, I ran across a deal that had them for less than cover price. I *RARELY* get that lucky. The third book is the one I'm still looking for. I missed a chance to get it at cover price a while back at Barnes and Nobel because funds were lacking. It too was a First/First.
Posted by xnera (Member # 187) on :
You are incredibly lucky, then. I did a search on Abebooks, and while there were a few available at about cover price, the majority of the really nice first eds were in the $100+ range.
Posted by larisse (Member # 2221) on :
Did someone mention Boyhouse? Oh... wait... wrong thread. This is about Anita Blake. Well... I've not read any of those books, but I have heard of them. Friends of mine keep touting them. I might just borrow a couple.
Posted by Olivetta (Member # 6456) on :
They are not great literature, but the first several are great fun. The first one has a great story, but the writer's style is still spotty. The style improves and the stories are fairly consistent as the books go on. Though, if it's true that the Bamp chicka BAMP factor is higher in all of 'em past The Killing Dance I'm not sure if the trend holds.
Sara was telling me that her books seemed to get more sexual after she had a baby, or something. Posted by TMedina (Member # 6649) on :
Interesting idea - I thought she just decided to appeal to the more common denominator.
-Trevor
Posted by Belle (Member # 2314) on :
I can assure you, Olivia, there is no real plot in any of the later books. Narcissus in Chains has an incomprehensible plot, and serves only as a way to introduce another character for Anita to boink.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Narcissus in chains does have a plot. It's just that every time it looks like it might advance a step or two, Anita stops it with a quickie. Kinda like Robert Jordan in the later Wheel of Time, except the interruptions are more... interesting.
Posted by TMedina (Member # 6649) on :
Sigh. I still haven't read the latest WoT book because Jordan fumbled through the plot like senior citizens at a strip club.
-Trevor
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
If you refer to number ten, you are missing exactly nothing. Number nine was pretty good by comparison; ten is 800 pages of pure, undiluted pap. You remember Rand, the saviour type who is supposed to be the main character? Tall, grey eyes? He makes two appearances, each less than a page in length. And it's not as though the various subplots move along, either; Perrin manages to move his little army about ten miles in search of his wife, who went missing two books ago. Posted by TMedina (Member # 6649) on :
Bah. I'll wait for the Cliff Notes.
-Trevor
Edit: Although I still love the line, "Kneel. Or be knelt."
[ October 06, 2004, 09:50 PM: Message edited by: TMedina ]
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Permit me :
quote: (Rand BROODS and DREAMS about his THREE WOMEN.)
Minor Characters There is a large use of the One Power over there. (repeat indefinitely)
Perrin I was going to save my wife, but that will have to wait for the next book.
Egwene I was going to attack Tar Valon, but I won't finish it until the next book.
Mat I might flirt with Tuon in the next book.
THE END
Which makes the ultra-condensed New Spring vastly funny :
quote:Reader I was going to wait for the next book, but that will have to wait for the next book.
THE END
I literally lol'ed for that one.
Posted by Olivetta (Member # 6456) on :
Robert Jordan blows.
And by 'blows' I mean 'Puts me to sleep in ten pages or less, without fail.'
But maybe that's just me. Ron read the WoT stuff until recently, but I think he's given up.
It's like one of those jokes from the Simpsons, where Bart calls Krusty's recorded phone message thingy for like, a dollar a minute, only to discover that he. talks. reeeally. slow.
Posted by BannaOj (Member # 3206) on :
"ultra condensed New Spring"
-sounds like a laundry detergent.
Actually RJ's version of Ultra-condensed means that the plot ran along at a normal pace like his first few books and didn't drag while he described random battle insignia of some insignificant country. Apparently he is a Civil War fan which explains his penchant for useless random battle insignia details. I enjoyed New Spring a lot more than his series books. I keep hoping we will get somewhere one of these days before RJ croaks. At least J.K. Rowling is younger and I don't think we have to worry about that issue.
I don't know if I mentioned it before on Hatrack proper but I organized my bookshelves recently, and my devious twist of mind thought it would be a great joke, that would scandalize OSC fans, if I put my Robert Jordans, and OSC books on the same shelf. Would have done it too, but they didn't fit right.
AJ
Posted by Mabus (Member # 6320) on :
I'm always baffled by complaints about Jordan's writing. Not, you understand, because I have some counterpoint; I don't. I freely recognize that it probably indicates I have no taste, but I find him fun to read. Must be the worldbuilder in me...Some part of me is wondering why he still hasn't given us more scenes in the Borderlands or, until recently, in Arad Doman. Or on Tremalking. I want to know what Qain is like....
Clearly something is wrong with me. Maybe when this cold passes my head will be clear.
Posted by BannaOj (Member # 3206) on :
I'm not overly critical, I don't mind reading for fun, even if they arent "high literary fantasy masterpieces" but the last couple books *have* dragged, and that is ticking me off.
AJ
Posted by UofUlawguy (Member # 5492) on :
I've never heard anybody complain about RJ's worldbuilding skills. I think he is one of the best in the business when it comes to that. It's the writing they generally can't stand -- well, that and the tendency to unnecessarily draw out the plot.
Posted by TMedina (Member # 6649) on :
World building is fine, character background is fine.
When the characters do _nothing_ for 350+ pages, we have a problem.
Now, I loved book 4 - "Shadow Rising". I could re-read the quarterstaff encounter in Book 3 over and over, but he's gone a bit far afield from his early roots.
-Trevor
Posted by imogen (Member # 5485) on :
I just read Obsidian Butterfly and I quite enjoyed it. No vampire (or werewolf for that matter) humping.
I also found it the most disturbing of all of her books - I actually had to put it down now and then in some of the really icky bits (especially with kids getting tortured *ugh*).
But I thought the character development in it (especially of Edward/Ted Forrester) was very good.
Posted by Mabus (Member # 6320) on :
You're no doubt right, Trevor and UofU....only it never seems to appear that way while I am reading. It always seems like the characters are doing something.
Posted by Olivetta (Member # 6456) on :
Imogen, I would like to read more about Edward. I always thought he was cool-- Anita's enigmatic sociopath, um, friend? I mean, he's usually there when she needs him. He's always up for a fight and addicted to the thrill of killing really dangerous things, and Anita thinks he'd kill her, too, if he had a reason. But then in the Killing Dance, he's the one who warns her that someone has a contract out on her, because they tried to hire him to do it.
It's an interesting lack of warmth in a relationship that seems quite close at times. I'd be interested in reading that. Just please tell me she doesn't boink him, please.
Posted by Synesthesia (Member # 4774) on :
She better not. I love Edward. He's just so... Cool. He's like her brother or something.
Posted by Kwea (Member # 2199) on :
She hasn't...yet....
Obsidean Butterfly is very cool, adn the first time (but not the last) that someone pulls one over on her. Until that point she was pretty much the bada$$, and she still is to a point...but as the books progress things happen...
I don't want to give anything away...lets just say that her powers aren't always fully under he control...and that is what causes a lot of things to happen.
And it is interesting, watching her try to gain control of her own life, and her powers.
Kwea
Posted by Belle (Member # 2314) on :
No she doesn't boink him. She and Edward are soul mates. Just not the dewey-eyed, sickly lovey dovey way most people use the term soul mates.
Personally, I didn't like Obsidian Butterfly because I think Hamilton departed too much from the character of Edward that I loved so much. She tried to make him more interesting, but instead she made him like another character we didn't know. And one I didn't like nearly as much.
Posted by TMedina (Member # 6649) on :
You could read into the character's motivation as an attempt to be true to himself, that of hired and trained psycho and the kid looking in the window, trying to be a part of something he can't quite understand - the family in the window.
That said, I didn't much care for learning about Ed's family - they weren't particularly sympathetic and the grand battle at the end was just...anti-climatic, somehow.
Malus - how far into the series have you read?
-Trevor
Posted by Mabus (Member # 6320) on :
All ten books, Trevor, and the part of New Spring that's in the Legends anthology. (I always wait for books to come out in paperback.)
Posted by TMedina (Member # 6649) on :
To each their own, I suppose - I don't even recall which book I left off on.
Matt was being pursued by the Queen just before the Sanchean arrived, I think.
I thumbed through the latest release - Spring...something and was vaguely intrigued, but he went into such detail to illustrate the differences of Lan and his Borderman companions from the Tairen (?) noble, I just lost interest and this was just in the first fifteen pages or so.
-Trevor
Posted by Olivetta (Member # 6456) on :
I real all of Robert Jordan's... prologue. Yup. The whole thing. Then I managed about 8 pages of the first chapter, which I re-read every night for a week, because I couldn't remember what I'd read before I fell asleep. Then, I gave up. Ron was thoroughly disgusted with me, but he got over it.
Right now I'm struggling through Getting Things Done by David(?) Allen. Seems it has changed the hubby's life. All I know is, the garage is clean, and he won't let me read The Dark Tower until I finish it. Posted by TMedina (Member # 6649) on :
Oooh, now that sounds like a good endorsement.
-Trevor
Posted by Olivetta (Member # 6456) on :
It really is. One side of our garage was piled higher than my head with crap a few months ago. Now, he's got his heavy bag set up and a new pole thingy with our bikes and stuff hanging from it in an organized fashon. Plus, he can actually use his workbench and tools and stuff. It's amazing.
But I really hate books that are supposed to be good for me. Posted by TMedina (Member # 6649) on :
Of course - it's like medicine. If it's good for you, you just know it's gonna taste worse than boiled gym socks.
What's the author and title?
-Trevor
Posted by Olivetta (Member # 6456) on :
Getting Things Done By David Allen (I think).
Posted by Kwea (Member # 2199) on :
Thanks...it sounds like something I need to read...
kwea
Posted by TMedina (Member # 6649) on :
She insists on adding the "I think" to her posting on the author's name.
-Trevor
Posted by Olivetta (Member # 6456) on :
I looked, and it is David Allen. Ron sent me to a bookstore to buy it for a client as a gift, and I asked for it by the author name "Robert Allen," for some reason I don't fully understand. So, they are forever mixed up in my mind. Same reason I still give people the wrong number for my cell phone-- I've given it out wrong so many times that I have as many memories of the wrong number as I do of the right number. I pick between the two, but I am only now starting to get which one is right. It's quite embarrassing.
I'm about halfway through Incubus Dreams at the moment.
Blake's not-so-gradual change into horror erotica didn't bother me, and the character inconsistencies weren't that big a deal. But where the hell did her structure go? She could have easily made Anita's power changes and personal struggles more intense without taking up a few hundred pages and sex scene after sex scene after sex scene. And I like sex scenes!
So far the impression I've gotten is that as she wrote, she had no idea what the next scene would be. THe chapter endings and the this-happens-and-this-happens-and-this-happens style in this book are getting to me. I'll finish it, because I've liked (most) of her books so far, but it better have a damn good ending for her to win my confidence back.
Posted by TMedina (Member # 6649) on :
*bump*
A friend sent me this review and I thought I'd share it with the thread since I found it hysterical.
quote:Amazon.com As Incubus Dreams opens, Anita Blake may be America's most powerful vampire hunter and necromancer. So it's no surprise that the Regional Preternatural Crime Investigation Team seeks her assistance when a St. Louis stripper is murdered and the evidence points to unusual serial killers: a group of seven vampires. It appears a master vampire has gone rogue--and may prove too powerful for Anita Blake, even if she can gain help from not only her vampire consort, Master of the City Jean-Claude, but from the wereleopard king Micah, her other lover, and the alpha werewolf Richard, her bitter ex-lover.
It would be an exaggeration to say that Laurell K. Hamilton's Incubus Dreams is just one sex scene after another. This twelth novel in her bestselling Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter series presents a wedding, a murder, and a lot of relationship angst before getting down and dirty on page 89; and the sex scenes pause on page 377 to let the mystery plot resume. The series deftly blends elements of alternate history, horror, romance, erotica, and mystery, but anyone reading Incubus Dreams for the murder plot is going to be frustrated. However, Incubus Dreams is a considerably stronger and more interesting book than its talky predecessor, Cerulean Sins, and fans will enjoy the many new developments in Anita's complicated love life. --Cynthia Ward
-Trevor
Posted by Kwea (Member # 2199) on :
I have liked all of the books, but I would like them a bit better if she backed off some of the sex scenes. Not all of them, or my wife won't want to read them anymore... ....but she could almost cut them in half.
Now, her other series made it quite clear from the start that sex was extremely important to the fey, so I have no problem with it...but I expect a bit more than that from the Anita Blake stories.
Kwea
[ December 02, 2004, 02:26 AM: Message edited by: Kwea ]
Posted by Olivetta (Member # 6456) on :
Just bumped to say that I have now read all of them except Incubus Dreams , and that is only because I'm too embarrassed to ask for it on interlibrary loan.
I don't mind violence with a side order of sex, but the other way around seems sort of pointless. I don't read Romance novels for that reason, since they seem to exist to tittilate.
But anyway... I guess I'm done with LKH.
But I'm going to use a gift card to get Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell.
Posted by TMedina (Member # 6649) on :
LKH has spawned an entire sub-genre of the modern horror series.
Jim Butcher Tanya Huff Kim Harrison
There is another author whose name escapes me - but the protagonist is a waitress with a vampire boyfriend.
You can't escape the sex as vampires are forever linked to phallic fangs and soft-core porn, but most authors keep it toned down to a more manageable level.
-Trevor
Edit: Charlene Harris, "Dead Until Dark" - she has a few more titles in the series.
Borders is a great way of finding similar authors by exploring the "customers who bought this book also bought..." links.
[ March 17, 2005, 03:02 PM: Message edited by: TMedina ]
Posted by Myr (Member # 5956) on :
Ooooo, I'm addicted to the Dresden Files. They're so much fun, like the X Files used to be.
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It's supposed to be good for me.
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