Books I Loathed discussion

Just joined the group, so maybe this has been covered before, but...please, Anne, just STOP WRITING. I loved the first four Vampire books, hated the rest. Especially once she started writing the one-book-for-each-character ones--I read Pandora, put it down at the end and thought, "I learned absolutely nothing new about this character, and I just read hundreds of pages!" I loved the first three Witch books, hated the rest. I keep getting sucked in by characters that intrigued me in the good books, and invariably get irritated beyond belief by the stuff she makes them do in the subsequent really bad stories.

I really couldn't agree with you more. I'm all for creepy vampire/witch/occult characters and plots...but when all of that is simply used as a cover for a bad romance novel...well, I just have to vomit.

Ha, I rather enjoyed those but I was 16 when I read them so I think it was more of a curiousity to me. I dont think I could get through them now. I do recall skipping through a lot of the dry overly described section of narration. Has anyone read her sleeping beauty series? Its a very different series!

I used to be a closet Anne Rice hater. Now I'm very open about it. Everyone and their wannabe broomstick seemed to like her. I would rather put lemon juice in in my eyes and eat dog turds than read another boring Anne Rice novel. Her erotica is trite and yes her attempt at a "The Story of O" type story was very pathetic. Three lame novels of ponyboys/girls and spanking! Pollleeeeasse. Barf. Thank you fellow Anne haters.

Alright I hate on NEW Anne Rice. The Vampire novels(the first four and Armand) were amazing and some of my favorite books. I've never read the Witch ones so I can only speak for her vampire novels. And the first Sleeping Beauty one... which was more creepy than erotic. Danine I couldn't agree with you more!

Now my beef is the fact she's found Christ again and is now writing about Jesus. That I'm sorry is too much of a jump for me. Stick with what you know, I'm sure God doesn't hate you for writing about vampires... really.

i have never read anne rice, but i saw her house in new orleans ten years ago. she had a big dog statue up on the balcony. her neighbor said she had "wierd parties with all kinds a people..."
maybe she is one of those writers more interested in "unusual" public image than actual creativity.

Response to Travelmongoose, message 10: Ew, me too, reading some of my high school stuff. I'm just mortified. Could I have really written that?

I'm glad that someone started a post on Anne Rice! I have to put in my 2 cents. I can't stand ANNE RICE! I hate vampire novels! I've read 2 Anne Rice books and I've never picked up another one again. I've read THE WITCHING HOUR (took a long time reading) and LASER (only because it was a sequel to the former. I didn't pick anymore for this series. Every Mayfair family members should have been shot dead by now!! Maybe I should put the Mayfairs in the worst book characters post.

Well I'm not a fan of Anne Rice...I just finished reading a book by her son Christopher Rice ( A Density of Souls) What a self-indulgent, arrogant, smug writer. The entire book was his coming out of the closet, woo-hoo he's gay. I'm all for the gays I have gay friends. But come on now, I feel like I wasted my time, I could have been reading something worth while.

I think that she has a good premise or interesting characters, which is why the first books are good, but then she drags it out too long when she really should just end it, which is why the newer books suck. People need to learn to stop while they're ahead.

Interview with a Vampire was pretty good. But the rest of her stuff is lousy.

The only book that I liked even a little bit by Anne Rice was Interview with the Vampire. She has a tendancy to draw her plots out until the book is so boring that the words seem to just run together and you find yourself reading the same sentance 12 times.

I'm with Melissa, Anne Rice does need to just not write anything else!!

I have, I regret to say, read a lot of Anne rice. Just like Heather I read a lot of it when I was in my teens and early 20's. The vampire plot was clearly a metaphor for alternative urban lifestyles ,and was at least for a while kind of chic. She also did a lot for New Orleans, which she captured fairly well.

Then the tripe. The Beauty Series is tedious and self conscious. Exit to Eden is basically Rice's attempt to write porn in the style of Carl Hiassen.

She lost everything in Katrina and was brought out as a political spokesperson against the FEMA's botched handling. I grew to like her as a person during that process.

She needs to find another genre and explore that one for awhile- I mean poetry or something. No more witches, Vampires or Ghouls.

I quit at The Vampire Armand(I mean I bought it, read a few pages, and then chucked it outside for the dogs to devour) and really I could've happily stopped after The Queen of the Damned.


Someone, please....make it stop.

UGH I have read Anne Rice's erotica stuff- 1st Sleeping Beauty book and Exit to Eden- and it made me sick!!

The books were creepy and frankly, very very disturbing. Her writing is twisted, and I'm no prude- one of my favourite genres is romance/erotica.

I have witching hour on my shelf but don't know whether I should bother anymore.

Anna, the one thing I would never say about CRY TO HEAVEN is that it is a quick read.

Or that it doesn't require thought. Or that it was either a "romance" or "erotica"

I don't think we read the same book.

I actually sort of liked Cry To Heaven (although I remember being disappointed with the ending.) I liked it better than Interview with the Vampire. I don't think Cry to Heaven is a quick read, but it is definitely not great literature.

It did make me think though--because what the protagonist went through was something that really DID happen to young boys. So in that way it was heartbreaking.

I'll agree that it wasn't creepy or twisted. Sleeping Beauty is erotica. Actually Sleeping Beauty is porn. There are three books and they are semi-consensual bondage. If you read them expecting a normal novel, they could be very shocking. But she wrote them under a pseudonym on purpose. There was a time when you could not just fall over them; you had to go looking for them.

I've only read The Witching Hour by Anne Rice and i think she was great in that book. But im not that motivated in reading the next book, Lasher.

I've never got why people write erotica/eroge novels. It's mostly pornography wrapped in fancy words. I know Anne Rice wasn't sane to begin with, but her new Jesus routine just screams crazy to me.

I'm in middle of Interview with the Vampire, and the only reason I'm finishing it is because I liked the movie and want to see the similarities. I had heard of Anne Rice and was excited to read it, but was sorely disappointed. Mainly I hate her writing style and characterization. Her huge paragraphs, lack of emotion, and flat and unlikable characters are reminiscent of some of the classics, with the difference that most of the classics are actually interesting. I have read portions or Lestat and Armand, and cannot believe this stuff is actually popular. She drained all the magic out of the vampire genre and left behind volumes of dried out dead people drinking blood.

Update: I just put down The Vampire Lestat, and I'm done with Anne Rice for good. The pedophilic first part of The Vampire Armand and her tedious writing style were bad enough, but the relationship between Lestat and his mother Gabrielle overshot my "ick" threshold by several miles. Totally disgusted, I'm returning the book to the library as soon as possible and wish I never read it.

Glad you didn't include her first books- the Interview is a classic.

A classic it may be, but I also found it excruciatingly boring. I got about 3/4 of the way through, and then I gave up. Usually when I've gotten that far into a book I get stubborn and finish it, but here I just couldn't.

Bbfirecracker wrote: the relationship between Lestat and his mother Gabrielle overshot my "ick" threshold by several miles.

Thank you. No one ever mentions this and I thought I was the only reader that was icked out. I almost stopped reading it. But I did finish and slogged through The Queen of the Damned because I had bought it. And after that I gave up. Great premise. Total snooze execution. I still say that Interview With the Vampire was worthy though.

She seemed increasingly to be on a mission to shock and offend the Catholic church as the series wore on. Personally, I could care less about the offensiveness about it but the obsession was wearisome. The opposite of love, as they say, is indifference not hate so it's not surprising she is now back in the fold with a vengeance.

I shan't be reading any of the new Jesus books most definitely. I have to say though I did hear her in a interview a few years ago and she didn't sound crazy or fundamentalist. I was surprised.

Mallie, I read (or tried to, anyway) "Interview" when I was 15'ish (so back in the 1990s sometime), so long before these "vampire-saturated days" ;) In fact, it was my first introduction to books about vampires, so unfortunately I can't blame oversaturation for my thinking it boring.

Interview with a vampire was pretty good, the rest is dreck.

Well, speaking of Anne she says she has left the Church:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/07...

I do highly admire her reasons for it. Still don't want to read that Seraphim series the article mentions.

I agree - I admire her reasons for leaving the Church - not the Faith. Some "Christians" make you realize you don't want to be lumped in with them.

I have an admission to make.

I didn't even reach the end of Interview with the Vampire. I think I stuck it out until about page 100, then it just got too painful.

Then I actually through it in the bin. I didn't even want to pass it on to a charity shop and inflict it on anybody else...

I had a hard time getting through Interview with a Vampire, took me several tries. I don't get whiny vampires.

Anne Rice is such a controversial author that it's difficult to see her contributions to reading and books in a general sense.
While all of her books are not of the highest caliber (we can all agree upon that!), some of them truly are classics. "Interview.." as many of you mention, is an American classic literature piece and will stand alone as that forever, in my opinion and in the opinions of many professors and universities.
Where Anne fell off is when we see her ego take over the Vampire personas. However,she will always be known as the woman who changed how we perceive vampires.
Prior to Ms Rice, vampires were simply monsters and beasts. They were revolting and despicable, and they were ungodly. Rice gave us vampires who thought like humans, who had sensibilities, who were not just beautiful, but who were capable of mercy and love. In Louis we find the angst of a vampire who was turned without wanting to be a "killer," a vampman who suffered about having done what he did to Claudia.
In Armand and others we also have Rice giving us loveable, sexy, charitable and conscious-driven, nearly humanish vampires.
So, for all the boring and poorly written books; and I do agree her later vampire and witches books were just not up to par, her early books on those subjects are/were unusual, classic, never-before-heard perspectives on vampires.
She paved the way for our contemporary vampires who we love!!!
My most hated of her books have to be her "Beauty and the Beast" series and those individual character profiles, as well. And, I just hated "The Talos," (?) or whatever that one was. Pure drivel.
I started the Christ series...read a chapter and just couldn't....Never picked up another one, never will.
I read her newest angel series book (1) and though critics said it harkened back to her old writitng style, it missed the mark for me. I thought it could easily have been juvenile fiction, but I wasn't sure even juvenile readers would want it. She has to get a grip and go for somemore gut-wrenching and interesting writing. Anne has wimped out on her original fans. I was one of them and I still want to believe in her.
A professor at Harvard is using "Interview..." as one of the books in her course to teach on vampires and society.

It is disturbing that Harvard has a course on Vampires and Society.

Just wrong.

And people wonder what's happening to education in this country.

They've been going downhill ever since the alien abduction shrink came out of the creepy-closet, frankly.

Someone on the news recently made much of the Harvard profs comment that this study is relative in a time when we are dealing with "outsiders in our society." Vampires are symbols of "outsiders" who want to corrupt and take, kill and change others to suit themselves....I guess this is how it would reflect our current situation.

A topic I have to join. I was once a real Anne Rice fan, I never liked Interview but the other Lestat and Armand were great. Memnoch the Demon and the Vampire Lestat are still good books, they are great.

The rest of the series is utter trite as is her witches series. Lasher creeped me out big time on a number of levels. So did the character of Marius - anybody else creeped out or hate Marius or get really annoyed with Louis and find him useless???? The movie character of Marius in Queen of the Damned was so much better I admit.

The movie adaptions were no good either aside from Marius, horrible casting, Queen was the worst with bits from 3 books chucked in together with a complete change of Lestat's life story!

But her writing style, plots and erotica just went to hell on a bike very fast. Its really sad cos her earleir books were so great!

Has anyone read her sister Alice Borchardt? She's so much better, I read her werewolf trilogy and really enjoyed it.

Hi, Cin,
I'm a fan of Rice, but I do have to agree with you on some points, particularly on Louis's whinning. I adore him, but he does act pathetic. Only Brad Pitt could have (and did imho) saved him in the movie "Interview..." I absolutely hated both movies. Tom Cruise was a horrific Lestat; nothing like the Lestat she describes in her novels, and Anne Rice herself rejected him outright at first. I think the hollywood moguls talked her into him and she changed her Cruise story. But, he was just awful and played it like a farce...I could go on and on...I'm still offended!!

I think Val Kilmer who played Jim Morrison in The Doors movie would have been the perfect choice for the role. Lestat is beautiful, blond, evil and enjoys his dark side, but also has a very angelic and pensive side to him. He cares about alot of things and he love his vampires--Louis, Armand, Marius, and others; as well as several humans whom he respects enough not to turn.

I always thought "Queen of the Damned" was a stupid novel, so I thought it was an entirely ridiculous movie which was bound to fail.

Ms Rice really has to step up her literacy now. Her "angel" novel was only half of what I believe she should be capable of at this stage of her life. If she doesn't become a better author, she'll lose her place in history in the literary sense and will just be known as the writer who rejuvenated and changed the way our society saw vampires.

*shits self again* what is your problem lol dude she's incredible why should she stop writing when all u have to do is stop reading. (nah it's ok I know how u feel, I feel that way about that self important turd kings dan brown and steig larsson, and it's more because they're overrated and ubiquitous and inescapable than anything else--I have not even read larsson and I'm not going to. I resent his failure to get the fuck outta my face despite that I haven't read him. yeah I know how rational lmao. I have barely read Brown and I think he's a lazy self important bum. so I know how you feel despite I disagree soooooo bad) Have not read A.R's new angel stuff tho mainly cause a low level of time/interest. Specially cause it seemed kinda forced given her recent (at the time) religious conversion. And forced writing tends to suck.....

I used to love Ann Rice. ALthough, ONLY because I thought I had to, and it was almost a mortal sin to say you disliked her. In all reality, I liked Interview...the movie. Not the book. I was never able to get into her other books, at all. I find the older I get, the more I realize how one dimensional her characeters are, and how truly predictable they can be. I feel like I shouldn't say much, beacuse I have never penned anything worthwile in my life, and have zero valid creative talents. However, I just am happy I found likeminded people who agree and we have a place we come out and say we cannot stand the woman, and she really isn't...all that great. I guess it is to say , there was a point I could take her or leave her. If another movie came out based on one of her books, I'd probably go see it. I will probably never pick up one of her books again though. However , as of lately, my "take her or leave her" stance, has changed to "I can't stand her much at all." She has been using her FB "fan page" as a politicial platform. Not that I don't believe everyone should be able to express their opinions openly and yes, I am aware it is HER FB page, but she seemed to never care that much before and lately, to be frank, she has gone after Bristol Palin. Why, after all this time, as she singled out one indivdual and why Ms.Palin? I am not wishing to get into a discussion about right-wing/left-wing anything, or spark a debate over the Palin clan. Everyone has their reasons for what they think and feel, I just meant I find it very odd how seemingly out of the blue, she is choosing to do this. Then going on by saying that any charitable organization that critizes Obama should be taxed? That seems very out there to me and I can't wrap my head around it. Anyway, just wanted to put that out , thanks for letting me vent. I am sure I will get backlash now for saying all that, but I had to let it out somehow.

you are all idiots. Anne Rice is a brilliant author who changed the way fiction was written forever. Her vampire chronicles were simply fantastic and her witch novels were near perfection! I'll agree that towards the end she trails off a bit, but her novels are still wonderful. as for her erotic novels, I have not read them but I have heard that they are gross. obviously if you're looking for porn, there are websites for that. go there and stop judging a brilliant author because you were not pleased. I believe people shouldn't read things like that at all anyways. read the Mayfair witches or the Vampire chronicles so that she is judged on her magnificent stories and relatable characters. not her dirty books that she was so embarrassed of that she didn't even put her own name on them.

Xox wrote: "I like her for a long time. I hate her for joining back to the evil as fuck Catholic Church. Now that she left the fucking piece of shit church. I could like her and enjoy her books again.

She sho..."

You need to realize that you can speak about things and give your opinion without being insulting, especially about other people's religion. You may have your opinions but you should find tactful ways to express your opinion otherwise you sound like a trashy classless idiot. And you should check your grammer. This thread is about an author not about your views on the catholic church. If you want to rant about your religious views go to a site that cares.

And you said that you used to like Anne Rice until she rejoined the catholic church, then you hated her but now that she left the church you like her again. What are you 5? You should like or hate an author regardless of their religious beliefs. You base your opinions about an author on their WRITTEN works not their personal life. What does that say about you that you can easily love then hate a person? Not much.

I would say don't even bother to send a response post because I won't read it and you are not even worth this response but I felt like I have to say something because you are certainly offending at least one person in this group. But I know someone as childish as you will sent a response but I won't be reading it or responding to you again. Your not worth my time.

I remember when I was a teenager, I admired "Interview with the Vampire" movie - I guess I was 15; later, at the age of approximately 18 years I read the first book of Anne Rice's series, after which the movie was called. I don't exactly remeber my feelings about the book, I can just tell that at that time I at least finished it. Now, a decade later, I was impressed by a beautiful and mysterious autumn weather and decided that it was time for some gothic vampire story, and turned my attention to the "Interview with the vampire" book once again. I couldn't make a greater mistake. Though in the beginning it was good, specifically the first part, describing the life of Louis and Lestat in New Orlean, and the second, describing Louis and Claudia's trip to Eastern Europe, then suddendly I found myself reading the description of a little boy's erection (!), which the vampire Louis felt through his trouser-leg (!!), while he was sucking this boy's blood (!!!). And shortly before it there was a scene in which a group of vampires seduced, stripped and drained to death a single young girl in front of the audience of French art admirers. Is something wrong with me, and should I really be fascinated by the stories of boys interacting with vampires while having, pardon my French, a boner? Or maybe I am right and there is something deeply unhealthy in stories of pedophilia and rape, enveloped in such a sensual and abstruse vampiric charm? Whatever the answer, I closed the book and put it away. I'm not that really fond of perverse erotic, and find it quite strange that someone can actually be interested in that kind of literature.

Gordon wrote: "Is something wrong with me, and should I really be fascinated by the stories of boys interacting with vampires while having, pardon my French, a boner? Or maybe I am right and there is something deeply unhealthy in stories of pedophilia and rape, enveloped in such a sensual and abstruse vampiric charm?"

Nothing wrong with how you feel. It is perversion after all, and Rice's vampires are representative of any number of perversions (depending on your point of view, of course). Rice's fascination with such scenarios has left me questioning her state of mind about such things.

====
Interview has put me to sleep almost every time I've read it. Seriously, Louis and David are boring together. Zzzzzz. Lestat isn't much better. I did enjoy Queen of the Damned, though, it too, has some seriously dull points which make you take a trip to the snooze zone.

Lori S. wrote: Interview has put me to sleep almost every time I've read it. Seriously, Louis and David are boring together. Zzzzzz. Lestat isn't much better. I did enjoy Queen of the Damned, though, it too, has some seriously dull points which make you take a trip to the snooze zone.

I thought Interview was the best of the vampire novels and the series declined further with each book from there (Although Queen of the Damned did have a lot of action, I can see why it would be a fun read.)

So, FWIW, if you didn't like Interview, my opinion is don't bother with any of the others. Her writing style is consistent between series, so Mayfair Witches has the same flaws.