# Freaked out by Piers Anthony **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [October 6, 2000, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freaked-out-by-piers-anthony/35900 "2000-10-06T02:14:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Jophiel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jophiel/32/66_2.png) [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2000, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freaked-out-by-piers-anthony/35900/41 "2000-10-08T03:25:45Z")
> [@](#): > > while there’s a lot of sex, it isn’t, you know, explicit Well, some of it is. _Firefly_ comes to mind. The sexual stuff in the in Incarnation and Xanth serieses (serii?) is more tactful, though slightly creepy at times if you think too hard about it. Having never read his other books, I can’t speak for them. Of course, if Topaz didn’t like the books she _did_ read, there’s not much reason for her to read any more of them, sex or no sex. ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2000, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freaked-out-by-piers-anthony/35900/42 "2000-10-08T04:03:07Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Cervaise \* > \*\*Amazing that we’ve gotten this far in a Piers Anthony thread and nobody’s mentioned the _Bio of a Space Tyrant_ series. One of his few attempts at really “serious” or “adult” science fiction, and it’s just as ridiculous as everything else. That’s when I finally gave up on the man, and it’s been like ten or twelve years since I’ve even touched, let alone opened, another of his books. \*\* I quit the first book in that series after the “Joe Hill” references started. I mean for crying out loud… ---
**Author:** ![Flutterby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/6f9a4e/32.png) [@Flutterby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flutterby)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2000, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freaked-out-by-piers-anthony/35900/43 "2000-10-08T04:41:53Z")
> [@](#): > > I think that simply having sex scenes is important to him, because sexuality is a part of these people’s being. You know, full range of human behavior, serving the whole man/woman/monster, and all that. Oh the sex doesn’t bother me its just his writing style I guess. Sometimes I get books from the library I read maybe the first chapter and put it down cuz I don’t get it or something… I’ve read lots of literature with varying degrees of sexuality… everything from prudish to explicit so its not that. Though the way I was typing up in my last post it probably looked like that is what I didn’t like. Lately the books I choose don’t have much sex in them though at one time I did read a lot of that stuff. Like maybe a couple years ago. I also went through a romance novel phase when I was 12 and ended up reading lots of stuff like that… ---
**Author:** ![Badtz\_Maru](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e36b37/32.png) [@Badtz\_Maru](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Badtz_Maru)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2000, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freaked-out-by-piers-anthony/35900/44 "2000-10-09T19:08:39Z")
I sometimes wonder about the nature of Mr. Anthony’s relationship with his daughters… ---
**Author:** ![Saint\_Zero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c4cdca/32.png) [@Saint\_Zero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Zero)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2000, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freaked-out-by-piers-anthony/35900/45 "2000-10-09T20:10:18Z")
:sits down in booth: Forgive me Father, it has been… Um… 12 years since I’ve read one of **his** books. In the immortality series, I read the first one. Yawn. Read the second, found it dull. Started on the third, and found it even worse, so I gave up. I did read the original trilogy of Xanth stories, but realised that later volumes were nothing more than Pun-fests with a recycled, threadbare plot to hang them from. What is it with aging SF writers? Heinlein also slipped into that mode later in life. Granted it was incest rather than pedophila, but still. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2000, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freaked-out-by-piers-anthony/35900/46 "2000-10-10T02:06:07Z")
Some of you might find the Rinkworks “Book-A-Minute” take on Anthony amusing: [http://www.rinkworks.com/bookaminute/b/anthony.shtml](http://www.rinkworks.com/bookaminute/b/anthony.shtml) (The Collected works of Piers Anthony) [http://www.rinkworks.com/bookaminute/b/anthony.xanth.shtml](http://www.rinkworks.com/bookaminute/b/anthony.xanth.shtml) (Xanth series) ---
**Author:** ![the\_EJV](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e47774/32.png) [@the\_EJV](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/the_EJV)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 11:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freaked-out-by-piers-anthony/35900/47 "2017-03-28T11:46:07Z")
> [@lawoot](#): > > Has anyone else noticed a trend in his later books, where he seems to be focusing on the ‘sexual coming out’ of his teen characters, then when they’ve ‘matured’, he moves on to younger characters again, and restarts the cycle? > > Also, in the last book of the ‘Incarnations of Immortality’ series (_And Eternity_)he has a character that is 50 years old lusting after a 16 year old…and he paints it as a ‘loving, normal’ relationship, then sends the young girl into limbo, where she stays for four days, but conveniently returns to Earth two YEARS later, so that the old guy can legally have his ‘nymphette’, without ‘breaking the law’. > > Sorry about the pseudo-rant, this thing has been bugging me for years. When it is adolescents, it is referred to as Hebophillia. The Pedophilic book that Piers Anthony wrote is called ‘Under A Velvet Cloak’. It was released in 2011 and is Book 8 in the Incarnations Of Immortality series. There was two Instances of Pedophilia themes in that book (Which ruined the over all story for me) and it was a secondary character whom Kerena travels with and knowing his ‘penchant for boys aged 5 to 8 years old’ - shes was more than okay with it, in fact she was supportive (I’ve blocked out the characters name already)and even let him hold her child:smack: The other was a re-telling of Morley’s deepest darkest secret, that as a ten year old he had intercourse with an adult. My Logic is: The only people who celebrate or sympathize with Pedophiles ARE pedophiles (Or maybe I’m just angry about the fact that pedophilia exists and so am completely biased). -But yeah, it was more disturbing than ‘And Eternity’ was with its Hebophilia and so has ruined both the story and my perception of the Author. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 11:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freaked-out-by-piers-anthony/35900/48 "2017-03-28T11:54:52Z")
I wouldn’t worry about it - after seventeen years, all the characters are adult now. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![IvoryTowerDenizen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ivorytowerdenizen/32/17937_2.png) [@IvoryTowerDenizen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IvoryTowerDenizen)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 12:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freaked-out-by-piers-anthony/35900/49 "2017-03-28T12:05:56Z")
Moving this to Cafe Society \*\*Note this is a 17 year old zombie. \*\* ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 12:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freaked-out-by-piers-anthony/35900/50 "2017-03-28T12:10:46Z")
> [@IvoryTowerDenizen](#): > > \*\*Note this is a 17 year old zombie. \*\* So, too old to be a love interest in a Piers Anthony book. ---
**Author:** ![IvoryTowerDenizen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ivorytowerdenizen/32/17937_2.png) [@IvoryTowerDenizen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IvoryTowerDenizen)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 12:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freaked-out-by-piers-anthony/35900/51 "2017-03-28T12:17:38Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > So, too old to be a love interest in a Piers Anthony book. Apparently. ---
**Author:** ![Azeotrope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/0ea827/32.png) [@Azeotrope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Azeotrope)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freaked-out-by-piers-anthony/35900/52 "2017-03-28T14:40:10Z")
I know this is an old thread, but it’s as good a place as any to complain about the moment when Piers Anthony moved from “ok” to “:eek: backing away slowly.” It was in the authors’ notes of a novel he co-wrote with I think Mercedes Lackey. The gist was a girl from a nation where all the women have magical powers, but men don’t and so are enslaved by the women, has to go on a quest to fetch the McGuffin of Infinite Power ™ so she can beat the queen in a magical duel because reasons. So she mounts an expedition with the demon who’s trying to seduce her because she owes him money and a whole boatload of male slave soldiers and attendants. In order to keep the men happy, there are also some foreign whores, because foreign women don’t gain magical powers when they enter this country even though the protagonist keeps her powers all the way across Fantasyland. The only whore who gets a name is Pattee, who has dog paws instead of hands and feet and can only communicate with animal noises. In the author’s notes, in between rambling on about his kidney stones and whatever, he mentions that a girl who was contemplating suicide wrote to him and sent him her most treasured possession, a gold cross. Instead of using his author powers to speak out about suicide outreach or even wondering what happened to the girl and if she’s all right, he jumps right to how the cross is in a style called “pattee,” which means “pawed,” and so wasn’t that just the perfect name for this dog-pawed whore who can’t even talk. Blechhh! ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freaked-out-by-piers-anthony/35900/53 "2017-03-28T15:11:23Z")
The problem with Piers has also been discussed in [these](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=154991&highlight=Piers+Anthony) [three](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=278311&highlight=Piers+Anthony) [threads](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=788713&highlight=Piers+Anthony). ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freaked-out-by-piers-anthony/35900/54 "2017-03-28T15:45:51Z")
> [@Azeotrope](#): > > I know this is an old thread, but it’s as good a place as any to complain about the moment when Piers Anthony moved from “ok” to “:eek: backing away slowly.” I did some googling, and the stuff you are mentioning is from If I Pay Thee Not in Gold by Anthony and Lackey (1993). The suicidal girl part is much as you remember it, but there is no mention of kidney stones. The relevant part is: [QUOTE=Piers Anthony] This particular notion had a considerable history. It started in 1979, as an offshoot of my earlier research in the Arabian Nights Tales for another novel. I’m a Nights fan; I have several multi-volume editions. In one of those tales a highborn woman incurred a debt, and the man to whom she owed it suggested that there were ways other than monetary to expiate it. She caught his meaning perfectly, and declared-ah, yes, I see you understand. Thus the title and heroine of this novel. The project had a thirteen-year history as I considered doing it for another publisher. But by the time I had figured out how to organize it, my relations with that publisher had soured, and I had gotten caught up in so many projects that I was writing and selling more than half a million words of fiction a year and still barely keeping up. Thus the compromise, and this is the result. Naturally, as I reviewed it, fate stepped in. My belief in the supernatural is nonexistent; I write fantasy, I don’t believe it. This may be why supernatural occurrences keep pestering me. In this case, just as I was reviewing the scene in which Xylina contemplates suicide, I received a letter from a young woman who was doing the same. Her name was Julie, and she had a cross that she wore continuously, day and night, her most precious possession. She enclosed that cross, and it sits by my computer as I type this. By that token I knew that she was near the end. Yes, I’m doing my best to persuade her to take back her cross, but the issue is undecided at the time of this writing. I researched to ascertain what type it is, and concluded that it is of the general description known as pattée: that is, widening in the arms, in the manner of paws. Pattée means paw-like. And so I added a character in honor of that cross-a character who did not die. I hope. Further research satisfied me that the cross is actually of another description, clechée, meaning like an ancient key, but I decided to let Pattée the character be. There are limits. [/QUOTE] The book is only a snippet view on google books, but it provided me enough words to go a google search. I won’t link to the site that I found it, but if you look for “she had a cross that she wore continuously” in quotes, it will be the only hit. ---
**Author:** ![kopek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kopek/32/337_2.png) [@kopek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kopek)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freaked-out-by-piers-anthony/35900/55 "2017-03-28T16:33:37Z")
There have been various threads on this over the years. I like his writing and I enjoy some of the puns from the Xanth series. But even I have to admit that “Letters to Jenny” creeped me out quite a bit. I write it off to more something in the autism spectrum (Asperger’s spring to mind) but there is something there. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freaked-out-by-piers-anthony/35900/56 "2017-03-28T16:41:20Z")
> [@Sue\_Duhnym](#): > > IIRC, VC Andrews is dead. Some other author(s) just write the books in her “style”. I could be wrong as I’m not a fan of that crap. I know this is a very old post. But for anyone who cares, Andrew Neiderman is the author writing V.C. Andrews books now. ---
**Author:** ![Azeotrope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/0ea827/32.png) [@Azeotrope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Azeotrope)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freaked-out-by-piers-anthony/35900/57 "2017-03-28T18:32:14Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > I did some googling, and the stuff you are mentioning is from If I Pay Thee Not in Gold by Anthony and Lackey (1993). That’s the one. Thanks, that was starting to drive me crazy. The kidney stone business was either in another book or else I hallucinated it. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freaked-out-by-piers-anthony/35900/58 "2017-03-28T22:40:18Z")
What, no mention that one of his books (_Castle Roogna_, IIRC) featured a zombie romance? Eh, in any event, I think I’m going to Turn Undead on this zombie. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freaked-out-by-piers-anthony/35900.md?page=2)