Ann Rice trolls Twilight
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Skepticemea
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RobRoy
Not A Mormon
If you say so. To me, Angel had the capacity for violence, tempered by a conscience and a past of hedonistic sadism. Angelus was flat, cardboard, and one-note which Spike summed up nicely:
We like to talk big . . . vampires do. "I'm going to destroy the world." That's just tough-guy talk. Strutting around with your friends over a pint of blood. The truth is, I like this world. You've got dog racing, Manchester United. And you've got people. Billions of people walking around like Happy Meals with legs. It's all right here. But then someone comes along with a vision. With a real passion for destruction. Angel could pull it off. Good-bye, Picadilly. Farewell, Leicester-bloody-Square."
For my money, I prefer Angel. It was better storytelling anyhow.
The difference being that Angel/Angelus didn't seek out his soul. Spike did. Angel didn't have any basis for comparison. There hadn't been a "vampire with a soul" prior. Spike had Angel to draw from. Angel was "cursed" wish his soul, while Spike's feelings/love for Buffy drove him to find his.
And to be fair, I think it took Spike some time to come to terms with both his feelings for Buffy and to finally win his soul, though I don't recall how long.
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ZirconBlue
Sole Survivor of L-Town
It sounds like the author got vampires confused with elves.
Halfcentaur
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My mother got me into them in highschool. I loved them. I used to love historical periods, but certain periods totally bored me. Reading Ann Rice got me interested in the Roman Empire, the Renaissance in Italy, as well as a slew of other cultures and histories.
Rice may have gone a little wacky with her Catholicism and religion lately, but in these books she introduced me to finding meaning in a life where meaning is nothing but a subjective experience as well, and she writes great period fiction I think.
I haven't read any of it in 10 years or so, but I'd still recommend it if you aren't bothered by sexuality in books.
Halfcentaur
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I've been going to the Hoh Rainforest near Forks every few years since 1989. I had no idea Twilight was based there until this summer. Holy crap! Twilight stuff was all over the place. Strange to see near one of the most beautiful places on the planet.
FattyCatty
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I feel the same, so haven't bought any for a while, nor even checked them out of the library. But if she's changing back, I may try her again.
ZirconBlue
Sole Survivor of L-Town
Good series. I like the blend of vampires with the 1930's Chicago setting. I've only read the first 5 or 6, though.
ETA: I see there was a big gap in publication between the 6th and 7th books, so that's probably where I stopped reading.
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Skeptic Ginger
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We hiked up the Bogachiel River a couple months ago. It's the next valley over from the Hoh and devoid of the hundreds of hikers that are always on the Hoh. I cracked up at the Twilight stuff in Forks. One car had "Stupid Lamb" on the back window. Clearly appropriate.
We didn't have time to go to La Push but I've been there before. It's like most of the impoverished coastal Indian towns. I was really curious to see how it was changed. Maybe next time.
Halfcentaur
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My mother's ashes were spread on Ruby Beach, so we go there all the time as a way of visiting her resting place. I tend to go to the fire tower trail on the Hoh, as people tend to avoid the 19km hiking trail in favor of the mile long loops near the parking lot. I've always meant to stay a few weeks and explore the surrounding areas. I have family in Seattle, but I live in Oklahoma City and usually drive there in the summer and only spend a week or so poking about.We hiked up the Bogachiel River a couple months ago. It's the next valley over from the Hoh and devoid of the hundreds of hikers that are always on the Hoh. I cracked up at the Twilight stuff in Forks. One car had "Stupid Lamb" on the back window. Clearly appropriate.
We didn't have time to go to La Push but I've been there before. It's like most of the impoverished coastal Indian towns. I was really curious to see how it was changed. Maybe next time.
Skeptic Ginger
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Next time you plan to come to Seattle send me a PM. If you have time we could meet or I could introduce you to the local skeptics group. We meet at the pub once a month.
My parent's ashes were both spread in the Rogue River.
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Ausmerican
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They werent a bad read at the start. A world were all the supernatural monsters are full citizens, necromancers could raise a murder victim to testify in his own murder trial, and, if a girl worked hard at being a good necromancer, she could wind up being the state sanctioned Executioner when aforementioned beasties broke the law.
But believe me, if Sookie is "porny" Anita is more like Debbie Does bloody near Everyone.
In book 1 Anita states her main rule in life; "Dont sleep with the monsters."
By about book 5 it's more like "Should I have Anita have a threeway with two wereleopards, two vampires, or some other combination this chapter? What did she have a threeway with last chapter? Werewolf and a vamp? Leopards it is then!"
RobRoy
Not A Mormon
Pretty much. It ceased to be about any kind of investigation, how the supernatural has effected the modern world, or how Anita was going to maintain her humanity while still confronting the things that go bite in the night. It became about how many different ways and with how many people she could have sex with, and how none of them were allowed to judge her for making those "choices".
This all happened while Hamilton was getting divorced and re-married. She claims that it didn't impact her storytelling, but pre-divorce Anita and post-divorce Anita don't even appear to be the same characters. This was also when Hamilton started to release her Meredith Gentry "faerie" tale, which was supposed to have been a fully-contained story, but which is now into its eighth book, with no end in sight.
Skepticemea
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Ker-ching moo!
RobRoy
Not A Mormon
Exactly. If golden eggs is what you're after (to mix the metaphor), you don't serve it for Sunday dinner, once it starts laying.
But it really is too bad, because a fully contained story with definite ending (as she stated) would have been pretty groovy.
Aepervius
Non credunt, semper verificare
Oh yeah. Don't tell me about that one... I got it as a gift started a-ok-ish, but quickly turned to women-harem-fantasy-porn-show. The last one I read before thro2wing in disgust, I counted the porn page , and I counted the story page, and I came up with a LOWER number for the later one.
In all fairness Tom Cruise was not Ann Rice's choice and she was publically against it. That is until she was forced, pressured into making a public declaration that it was alright. It is my understanding that she still feels Tom Cruise was a bad choice.
Oh and the Twilight novels are pieces of literary teen angst porn of the lowest type, entirely deserving of being burned or used as toilet paper. (I've read two, - UGH!!) The movies are pieces of sludge, (I watched two - ARRRRRRRGGGGHHHH!!), unworthy of being compared to a herbal essence ad much less the film version of Interview with the Vampire. And of course Ann Rice's Vampire novels even the later ones are Shakespeare compared to the literary abortions that are the Twilight novels.
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Halfcentaur
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Thanks for the invite, I'll keep that in mind.Next time you plan to come to Seattle send me a PM. If you have time we could meet or I could introduce you to the local skeptics group. We meet at the pub once a month.
My parent's ashes were both spread in the Rogue River.
Vortigern99
Sorcerer Supreme
I thought Cruise played Lestat with intelligence and a sinister playfulness that did the character from the novel justice. Rice was positively glowing in her review of his performance; she thoroughly and lovingly revoked her earlier misgivings.
If one is going to claim now, 17 years later, that the studio put her up to it seems to challenge the evident sincerity of that published piece, and to question her freedom as an author to express her opinion in print. Such a claim needs support before I'm willing to accept it.
These days it seems that dislike of Cruise as a person colors the perception of his acting ability. Personally I've never been anything but impressed with his performances, even if I think his religion is absurd and some of his off-screen behavior is questionable. In Interview with the Vampire he stretched his acting skills to the limit and acquitted himself nicely.
If one is going to claim now, 17 years later, that the studio put her up to it seems to challenge the evident sincerity of that published piece, and to question her freedom as an author to express her opinion in print. Such a claim needs support before I'm willing to accept it.
These days it seems that dislike of Cruise as a person colors the perception of his acting ability. Personally I've never been anything but impressed with his performances, even if I think his religion is absurd and some of his off-screen behavior is questionable. In Interview with the Vampire he stretched his acting skills to the limit and acquitted himself nicely.