Comments | peppermintyrose: True to Form

peppermintyrose

True to Form

May 12, 2013 01:07

Well, the bits are still rifling around in my head, but I noticed something funny about Dead Ever After, so I figured that I'd post on it. Since I'm going to post on that, I figured I'd point out just how in character Eric was. Even from the early books. I figured I'd deal with the whole idea that Eric is OOC in this book - that we have all never ( Read more... )

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Comments 62

elbly May 11 2013, 19:47:51 UTC

I think one of the things that demonstrates how good CH is as a writer, and how much depth her writing has, is the fact that even though the series has finished, you're still investigating it :oD

No criticism there, I'm still loving your ramblings, but it definitely says something very good about the books :o)

I was thinking back, the other day, to the pint in time when I started liking Eric, because I initially thought he was a cock (which I have returned to thinking he is) and it was when I started reading fan site (or rather a while after I started reading fan sites) and I started to think I must be wrong...

He's the type of person I'd have as a friend, but be REALLY conscious that I couldn't trust him not to put himself first at every turn, and if he was a friend's fella, I'd probably be really worried for my friend (just as Sookie's friends were for her)

elbly May 11 2013, 19:56:15 UTC

P.s. Ttbomk "form" is sort for "former convictions"

peppermintyrose May 12 2013, 07:47:32 UTC

Oh, I know - but I figured that Thyra (if not others) might not get the joke otherwise. :D

thyradane May 12 2013, 19:50:32 UTC

I actually didn`t get the joke even if it was explained. I think we have that TV show here but I`ve never watched it (I think). I tend to just write off things I don`t understand as "something cultural I`m not going to spend time googling because I am too busy reading the rest of the text." ;-)

Thread 18

Sentiment vs. practicality... anonymous May 12 2013, 03:25:00 UTC

I agree with Sookie though -- the no being harassed, tasted, killed, or being made a servant probably lies somewhere between practicality and sentiment.

Yes, there could be vampire suitors he's warding off, but there's some definite nastiness he's helping shielf her from too. He did genuinely care for Sookie--just not more than he cared for himself.

Re: Sentiment vs. practicality... peppermintyrose May 12 2013, 07:52:56 UTC

I think that it was a lot of practicality, and a little bit of sentiment. There was a pretty clear theme in this book about the maker/child relationship, and how that can taint someone's view of something. So I think Pam and Karin - who've no doubt realised after all the beatings they took for Eric (as his "guard dog" and his second) that there was a streak of using in there. I think their interpretation is off as a result - but as it should be.

I'm sure that he put in "tasted" as the kicker. All the other stuff is about doing things against her will - stuff Sookie doesn't want happening.

thyradane May 12 2013, 20:00:43 UTC

I never thought Eric was out of character. Alcide, possibly (I mean, he never asked for a favor in the last book), but not Eric. And I haven`t seen anyone complaining that he was out of character. Some did in the last book - or the book before the last (I can`t remember) - but in this book it seems most readers have accepted that Eric has his bad sides too ( ... )

peppermintyrose May 13 2013, 06:34:32 UTC

Ha! Alcide wised up *finally*. Lots of people complained that Eric was out of character, and moreover that he'd been out of character for a few books now. Based on the idea that Eric can do everything and everyone, and CH was "ruining" his magnificence out of spite. So I deliberately chose quotes pre-DAG to curtail that idea ( ... )

thyradane May 13 2013, 12:18:17 UTC

I just can`t imagine a character like Alcide wisening up. He must have had something up his sleeve. But to be honest - I would have preferred that he wasn`t in the last book at all. How he could ever be considered a friend, I don`t know. But then, this is Sookie who used to consider Arlene a friend. It`s sad how loneliness can make you stretch the term friend. So it was nice for Sookie that Alcide helped her out, but I didn`t buy it for one minute ( ... )

peppermintyrose May 14 2013, 07:09:49 UTC

No, I think his were pack being shit scared of Sookie finally gave the hint that he would not be able to incorporate her into his pack. And to my mind, Alcide's balance sheet is still way in the red, and I would not be unhappy to hear a meteor landed on his head ( ... )

Thread 16

anonymous May 13 2013, 01:06:07 UTC

I think a lot of the misreading of Eric shows the long shadow that DTTW casts over the series. There's something infinitely appealing about the lost puppy, who acts like you're his whole world and who can't do without you. And, sure, there was a lot of Eric not being any different to how he usually is in that book (he wasn't always that concerned with Sookie's safety and he was a little blase about the whole concept of eating people) but there was enough of a difference that there's a misconception that that's the 'real' Eric which was one day going to resurface if they could deal with Victor/Felipe/Freyda, if Sookie would stop pushing him away, if the stars aligned correctly etc. No one ever noticed that Sookie didn't want to keep Eric that way, under false pretences, anymore than she wanted to use the magic of the cluviel dor to make him hers ( ... )

peppermintyrose May 13 2013, 06:45:28 UTC

I agree - that does cast a long shadow over the rest of the books, with many readers swearing that Eric is really like that. I happen to mostly agree with them about that, but then I don't see him as an angel in that book. I think that was mostly Eric without the weight of 1000 years of bullshit weighing on him. I know lots of people were expecting him to do that - to 'go back' to himself, but that would mean forgetting all the stuff that shaped him. And hoo boy do they blame Sookie for not being ____enough to get Eric back to such a state ( ... )

anonymous May 14 2013, 00:26:11 UTC

I do wonder if, knowing what she knows now, CH would write DTTW in quite the same way. There were so many romance tropes in that book - the couple thrown together under tense circumstances, amnesia, the wounded, lost man who needs the help of a kind woman - that those grew a little bigger than the book itself and helped bolster The Myth of Eric. I can totally see why at the time it all made sense to do it that way - it allowed Sookie to move on from Bill, but still remain involved with the vampires so there could be a new mystery; it meant that Eric wasn't going to be immediately swooping down and claiming her as Bill's leftovers, and left him a little bit intrigued and a little bit beholden to her even when he did retain his memory; it gave Sookie some comfort and stopped her just rattling about in her house by herself, and they were all good things and would have had to be covered off in the plot some way for the series to continue, and I haven't really sat down and thought of another way you could do it. But it would be ( ... )

anonymous May 14 2013, 01:53:54 UTC

"all the stuff that happens in just the states"-and the southern Appalachian-born non-religious liberal feminist with interracial parents says amen. ;)
RachelW

Thread 10

anonymous May 13 2013, 10:04:50 UTC

Lol… ”I threw it on the ground”……sigh…So true. See, that’s the difference between the fangirl and Sookie. Sookie knows when to say, “Not just no, but hell no.”

The fandom has it flipped, really. In going with Freyda, he stays true to his character. Choosing Sookie would have been the stretch for him. I thought he’d pick her too-knowing it would have been the harder choice for him. But now that we see his decision, it’s a relief that ALO forced his hand. And it’s a relief he’ll soon have his mind on other matters and playing his tricks on a whole new crop of takers. ;) Looking back on it all, it seems Sookie got out from under his thumb just barely-and that was even with her playing it pretty damn smart.

Do we know whose idea was the extra 100 years with Freyda? It seemed like another win-win for Eric. JanineMNM

peppermintyrose May 13 2013, 10:48:09 UTC

I could have understood the whole "I hate it" phenomenon, but I find the whole "I'm burning my books, eating the ashes, pooping them out and sending them to CH/her publishers" quite bewildering. The fangirl is seemingly bewildered at stuff not going her way.

Freyda is pretty perfectly suited to Eric. I suppose CH had to think for a bit all about what the hell would get Eric to finally let go of Sookie, because if he was single and in the state, that wouldn't have happened. And it is a relief that he's had his hand forced by Appius - if he'd have done this in character thing after Sookie committed? Nightmare.

Eric proposed the extra time in order for extra concessions, like his wishlist. And like the original contract, Freyda put her conditions on it as well.