BLACKWOOD FARM, CHAPTER TEN
I think this is gonna be my last lengthy update/spork on Blackwood Farm. It's just too boring and lengthy and I don't have the time I used to. Plus, while it is distasteful in many ways, it's just not FUNNY like Anita Blake was. AB crossed the line into absurdity on a very regular basis in ways Rice just doesn't, and it makes for extra slow going.
( Read more... )
What's ironic is the women we're supposed to hate most as slutty slutty sluts are thus far the most sympathetic, interesting characters, and the most proactive at that. Again, I read ahead, and Rebecca seems to have done the best she possibly could for herself, and it didn't just all fall into her lap like Quinn. She was born to a dirt-poor family with an abusive father, and when she was raped and thus pregnant out of wedlock they almost gave her to a convent but then went with a brothel instead, and she was determined to find a man who would take her out of it. Which Manfred did. Of course, he also seems the most likely candidate for her murder, but that's not on her.
There's a line in there about how Rebecca was glad they chose the brothel over the convent and I bet that's just in there so we go OMG SKANK but like...in a convent, she'd have zero agency. In a brothel, she can at least make her own money, keep a portion of it, and have a chance of getting out and leading a better life, which she did. And it also explains why she told Quinn that stuff about just being an object for pleasure, somebody's pet, etc. Though I don't think she needs a tragic backstory for that to be ok---if someone wants to live like that, I say more power to them. As long as they say that's what they want, and no one is being hurt or exploited, why the fuck not? People can decide what to do with their own lives. And again, it's certainly preferable to people who live that exact lifestyle (Anita, Quinn) flailing about how they don't and judging people who do but are honest about it.
Honestly, there's so much focus on her OMG SEX OH NOES that I literally forgot she specifically told Quinn to light the old oil lamps and put them near the curtains. So she was probably TRYING to burn the house down. Which would make sense if Manfred did indeed kill her, but not a lot of sense since she also wants Quinn to find her remains in the swamp, and he can't do that if he's toast. But hey, she's an evil sexy woman, who cares what makes sense!
This weird kid has apparently never even finished a wet dream (what), and then he meets a ghost and immediately shags her. Shouldn't this be SERIOUSLY DAMN DISTURBING for him? He has so little sexual experience that he's never even had a dream orgasm before, but whoo-hoo, ghost lady, he's all over that.
I'm surprised he even knew HOW. Precious innocent Quinn has surely never seen pornography, has he? Obviously sex is something people will always eventually figure out on their own (hence why abstinence-only sex-ed never works) but like...he knew exactly what to do, he just put it in there without even having to think about it. Instinct? Sexy ghost magic?
Why did Anne Rice feel it was useful or necessary to make Quinn so staggeringly... pre-pubescent, anyway? Ick. Yeah, everyone infantalizes Quinn, but especially his own writer. Scary lady.
If it were contained to this novel, I'd think maybe it's meant to amp up the creepiness but...fetishization of children and childishness, especially but not limited to boys, crops up in a lot of her work. At least in what I've read of it. Marius does it, and it seems to be Armand's entire backstory (though from what I know, that's at least portrayed as tragic?), and I think Claudia starts being talked about as a sensuous adult in a child's body all of FIVE MINUTES after she's been turned into a vampire (seriously, there's some creepy line right after she's turned, I can't remember it though but I swear, because I remember being surprised and grossed out since I didn't expect this until she literally *was* an adult in a child's body). There's also a really gross bit with child prostitutes in The Witching Hour where a character says that they were born in a whorehouse and this is all they know so it's different and not like being with a regular kid, but he's meant to be a Depraved Bisexual who is also incestuous so we may not be meant to side with him.
I haven't read Belinda (16 year old girl/44 year old man) and don't plan to but I've heard it was sketchy as fuck too.
Reply
So she was probably TRYING to burn the house down.
That alone makes her the most sympathetic character in this book.
Precious innocent Quinn has surely never seen pornography, has he?
I'd guess he got some kind of sex ed. This kind of disgusting Southern aristocrat family would have educated their sons in sex (for some form of "educated") while trying to keep their daughters ignorant of it. Of course, that's interfacing with reality and probability, and Quinn's never even had a full wet dream, so.
I cannot get over that his first orgasm in his life, ever, was with a ghost lady. Or that he didn't go to the attic until he was eighteen. I wonder if Anne Rice originally meant Quinn to be a LOT younger, then realized even her audience would balk at that. Actually I wonder if Quinn would even have been able to have an orgasm with ghost lady if he'd never had one in his life before. Men have to learn about their own bodies too.
Stephenie Meyer has a weird prepubescent kink as well, obviously, and LKH... yeah. I guess it's not surprising that people who think vampires are the sexiest things ever would have massive youth kinks. But going as young as these writers do, and having such extreme fetishes for sexual inexperience -- and then they're bestsellers. I'll give this to LKH, at least her men are allowed to have had the occasional orgasm before they met Anita. Though of course since it wasn't with Anita it didn't really count.
(By the way, this isn't about vampire novels but is about a lot of the same issues: my husband is sporking the Black Jewels trilogy. Trigger warning for everything. There are a lot of similarities with LKH in the foul men whom who we are supposed to think are poor woobies sadly abused by evil women who are evil because they are women. It is STAGGERINGLY misogynistic. I think Anne Bishop's misogyny might be worse than LKH's.)
Reply
Oooh, I've heard about that series! Gonna check out the spork right now!
Reply
Leave a comment