Laurell K. Hamilton's STRANGE CANDY -- Not so tasty...

[mei_x]

I've been devouring audiobooks lately, ever since I decided to resume driving for my commute.  Today I listened to Laurell K. Hamilton's anthology Strange Candy.  After listening to a couple of stories, I am wondering why this author is a best-selling writer. The stories aren't scary or clever or anything spectacular in particular. Is this what

Comments

[maveness]

*scratches head* I don't get it either. I don't know of this author, but those descriptions...seriously, something has to HAPPEN. Because if something doesn't happen, then it's one boring character study, but if someone's throwing in random supernatural beings, the odds of there being character study are low.

[mei_x]

I know, right? I truly believe that she feels that the mere presence of supernatural beings in her story makes them edgy and good.

[mei_x]

And apparently she is renown for lacking humility about her work - there's a community called lkh_lashouts dedicated to her rants against criticism.

[eee1313]

I've heard terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad things about Laurell K. Hamilton's books. Supposedly the first few Anita Blake books were okay, but then they just got lazy and sloppy and had a lot of sex in them.

My friend missrachael read one of her latest books, and here was her one sentence description: "A Kiss of Shadows, by Laurell K. Hamilton, should actually be called Mary Sue Has Sex With Some Pretty Fairies." About a week after she posted that, a friend of mine at work was reading this book. I asked her what she thought of it when she was done, and she said that the book was just an excuse for the main character to have sex with a different fairy every chapter.

Needless to say, after hearing what you have to say about her short stories, I won't ever be reading this author.

[mei_x]

"A Kiss of Shadows, by Laurell K. Hamilton, should actually be called Mary Sue Has Sex With Some Pretty Fairies."

Bwahahaha!!!

[tigress35]

I saw her at Comic Con because I was waiting for the panel after hers, and instead of sitting behind a table, she stood and paced the entire time. She was threatening as hell, not in her words so much but her mannerisms. I was like sitting quietly the whole time feeling like, "Please don't hurt me."

She clearly had a lot of fans because they'd go up to the mike and gush about her work, so I was like, "Huh, maybe I should check some of these books out." So I looked up a few passages and found her to be not only a horrible prose writer, but just... uninteresting in general. So I chalked it up as an official "I don't get it."

[mei_x]

I chalked it up as an official "I don't get it."

I totally agree. Popularity is clearly not an indicator of quality! ;)

[mz_bstone]

May I suggest the Dresden Files Audio books? Not only is he a fun storyteller, James Marsters does a lovely job of reading them.

B

[mei_x]

Thank you so much for the suggestion -- I will definitely check it out! I'm happy to hear that James Marsters is a good audiobook reader -- the reader can often make or break the presentation.

I had John Glover's reading of Stephen King's Night Shift stories in my car for weeks. His reading was fabulous and I'm even more in awe of his acting skills than before. Each character had a distinct voice, he didn't just read, he performed.

[suzycat]

*zombie thread*

A few of my friends are really into LKH and loaned me the first few Anita and Merry books. The initial premises were good but they are really quite lame and then some. The latter ones are basically porn and not very good porn. I don't get why she's so bestselling either except that some of the books are kind of compelling. It's like ating some crappy junk food - you know it's shit but it's tasty and you just have to eat the whole thing, and then you think "why did I eat that. I'm still hungry!"

[mei_x]

Hee!

It's like ating some crappy junk food - you know it's shit but it's tasty and you just have to eat the whole thing, and then you think "why did I eat that. I'm still hungry!"

This has got to be it. Perhaps the anthology I stumbled upon was a collection of her very worst previously unpublished stuff -- maybe some of the novels show why her stuff can be so bad it's good.