It is November and that means NaNoWriMo! I have done this before, but never really stuck to it. This time I am working on a fantasy novel: young woman leaves a war torn land to go off in search of the man who is her father. Meets a dragon. Mayhem follows. (Bits will show up here.)
Why do I want to write? I have these stories rolling around in my head. If I don't put them down on paper somewhere, they just keep me up at night. Also, I have read some crap books lately and I know I can do better.
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So just yesterday I started and finished a book by Laurell K. Hamilton; her latest, Sucker Punch, is a bit of departure from her usual vampire f**k-fests. After the last few disasters I swore I would never read another Anita Blake novel, then the library went and offered this with no wait time and I thought: what the hell. The problem I have had with most recent Blake novels was the sheer volume of excessive and gratuitous sex, coupled with limited plots. While there were no real sex scenes in this one Just fondling and inappropriate PDA), there was a plot. At first it looked like a pretty good mystery, too. But it got buried under repetitious whingeing and way too much discussion of everyone's sexual wants and needs. It is like Hamilton went through sex and relationship therapy herself and wanted to talk it all out in this book.
The Olaf/Otto character is just plain stupid. "Hi, I'm a psychopath who usually tortures women before sex, but for you, Anita, I will be a good boy. Let's give each other pet names." Laurell, honey, you can't spend all your time making him out to be a horror show creep in the other books to suddenly make him dating material in this one!
Then there are the cops who are overtly stereotyped. Fat dumb belligerent sheriff, crooked pretty boy murderous deputy, horny lesbian female cop. They get in their own way more than not. There was a start to a decent mystery here, but even in bum-f**k rural Michigan I can't buy it that the cops are this blind and stupid.
I think the Anita character description is pure personal wish fulfillment on the part of the author. But it doesn't hold up. If she is still 30 something and so sexy, so very beautiful, and so very very well trained, why does she have to keep reminding the audience how awesome she is? About 40% of this novel is Anita's angst juxtaposed with her smarmy over confidence. And about one quarter of the way through the book I was already bored with the constant explanations and descriptions of the who's-who of Anita's polyamory chain. This book spent more time telling us about Anita's "awesomeness" than actually demonstrating any of it. She doesn't solve the mystery even with multiple suspects right under her nose. Then she ends up killing the guy who was framed for the murder! And now she's lining up to have sex with the constantly returning serial killer!
But you know what bothered me the most? Anita can raise the dead! Why did she not just raise the body in the morgue and ask him who sliced him up???
I don't know that I would have read this one if my library hadn't shoved it in my face. I know I won't look for any more of them. Sad. I used to look forward to Hamilton's work.
