A Quokka Dreeds its Weird

You all know I like L. J. Smith. But these novels are dreadful, almost entirely lacking in the playfulness, fun characters, and interesting twists on genre tropes I enjoyed in her better books in other series.

Except for the fourth book. The fourth book is fairly interesting. Largely because ( spoiler )

yhlee showed me an episode of the TV series, and I have to say, that was much better. Damon is lots of fun, though Elena and the ever-boring Stefan, clearly cast for his vague resemblance to sparklepire Edward Cullen, have no chemistry.

Back to the books, I give you The Vampire Diaries in Fifteen Minutes!

Elena: I rule the high school! Bow before me, minions!

Minions: (bow.)

Stefan: I have only just laid eyes on you, Elena, but you are fire, ice, fire in ice, a white tiger, a sugared violet, a ravaged princess in a tower, snow, sapphires, midnight, steel, and… Damon, did you steal my thesaurus? Anyway, let’s get engaged!

Elena: We’ve only known each other for two days and barely interacted at all, but okay!

Damon: (lurks; drops Stefan in a well; turns into a raven; eats the gym coach; laughs evilly; menaces Stefan; menaces Elena; drinks human blood to get more powerful; is way more fun than anyone else.)

Elena: Stefan, drink my blood so you can get more powerful and defend me from Damon, or else Damon will kill us all. I want you to and it won’t kill me.

Stefan: Absolutely not! Drinking blood from humans is wrong! Even if it won’t hurt them, they consent, and otherwise everyone, including them, will die!

Rachel: (stubs fingers trying to reach through book to strangle Stefan.)

Elena: My thoughts are layered, like a parfait.

Rachel: (notes that this is an actual line from the book.)

Kitten: (is possessed by Big Bad; tries to bite Elena’s little sister.)

Everyone: DOOOOOM!!! We must save everyone from the cats!

Rachel (is not making this up; also, is reminded of the episode of the X-Files where stage hands hurled stuffed cats at the actors to simulate a cat attack.)

( More DOOOOOOOOOOOOM. )

Book four is actually fairly entertaining and contains some deliberate comedy (thank God). The excruciating Elena-Stefan relationship is sidelined, which improves everything enormously. But not enough to make me read book five, which is supposed to be horrible. Not even on a plane, which is where I read the first four.

The Vampire Diaries: The Awakening and The Struggle

The Vampire Diaries: The Fury and Dark Reunion

Long-belated sequel, which I haven’t read; note that it has been nearly universally dissed as a trainwreck, including by people who loved the first four: The Vampire Diaries: The Return: Nightfall

Thank you all very, very much!

Nigella Lawson: How to Eat and How to Be a Domestic Goddess. Cookbooks. Because I love reading them, and Lawson's Feast (thanks gwyniera!) was marvellous: personal, funny, unpretentious, tempting.

The Freedom Line: The Brave Men and Women Who Rescued Allied Airmen from the Nazis During World War II. Self-explanatory, I would think.

Making the Corps. Nonfiction on Marines, recommended by oyceter. Love those training sequences!

Naomi Novik: Victory of Eagles. Adrian is now madly in love with the series, as am I. Perhaps we can read this one aloud to each other, if 1-3 chapters/week doesn't drive us mad.

Kathleen Duey: Skin Hunger. Loved this, loved it, loved it. Read it from the library, couldn't wait to own it.

L.J. Smith: Night World No. 2: Dark Angel; The Chosen; Soulmate. Didn't like the last and Smith rather hilariously dissed the first herself, explaining that it was conceived when she was fifteen (and since the charm of all her books lies in their closeness to the teenage id, I find that both terrifying and awesome), but the middle one sounds pretty good.

Jo Walton: Half a Crown. Final entry in her horrifyingly brilliant fascist England trilogy. Loved the first two and would even re-read them despite their creepifyingly convincing subject matter.

Neil Gaiman: The Graveyard Book. Because my favorite of his prose works is Coraline, his other book for children.

Teenage Cassie moves to New Salem and becomes part of a coven of teenage witches. Hijinks, battles with evil, angst, crytals, crystal skulls, magic silver garters, soulmates, deliberate comedy (Pizza Man He Delivers!), and a metric ton of barely subtextual lesbian longing ensue. Loved it!

The best part of this trilogy for me was how central and often sensual the relationships among the girls were. Especially the battle between the saintly good witch Diana and the sexy bad witch Faye, fought by proxy over the allegiance of new girl Cassie, who has a pro forma soulmate relationship with boring boy witch Adam, a much more interesting relationship with cool boy witch Nick ("Nick was not at all like an iguana"), and gives every indication of being head-over-heels with Diana. Cassie is constantly admiring Diana's purity, and at one point they share a bed.

The supporting girl characters are not hugely complex, but vivid-- especially sexy-but-not-stupid Suzan and babydyke (is that offensive coming from a straight woman, or in general? if so, I'll rephrase it) Deborah. One of the very sexiest bits in the entire book is Deborah giving a Cassie a totally heterosexual ride on her throbbing motorcycle.

Also, there are vampire kittens.

( Read more... )

That the first three books in L. J. Smith's Night World series have been reprinted in an omnibus. That includes Secret Vampire and Spellbinder which I have not read, and Daughters of Darkness, which I adored. I bought it, so if anyone wants my copy of Daughters of Darkness (reviewed if you click the tag), speak up.

The shortest way I can describe L. J. Smith is that she's like Stephanie Meyer with a sense of humor, way less padding, generally more active heroines, more action, more plot, and actually kind of good if you're in touch with your teenage id, and God knows I am.

I finally managed to obtain the sequels to the delicious psychic kids novel, This Strange Power. While I like the first book the best, partly for the thrill of discovery but also because it had my favorite plotline, "We all live together in a little psychic house," the third book in particular brought on the crack and came to a mostly satisfying conclusion, even though I don't ship the same characters the author does.

( In her heart, Kaitlyn was sorry she'd called them the human pupae )

I have obtained but not yet read the complete "Secret Circle" trilogy, book two of "The Forbidden Game," book two of "The Vampire Diaries," and two volumes of "Night World," which has no sequence listed: Soulmate and Daughters of Darkness. Can those be read in any order? How do you all like the ones I have?