Now I know there are those who thought she sucked all along, but I’m not looking for opinions from you.
I started the Vampire books out of order, starting with Lestat and then moving to Interview… from there I think I read everything in order. Those two books were really great. Queen of the Damned started getting silly (vampires can fly? I don’t THINK so). The only really GOOD book in that series since Lestat was Memnoch the Devil. Armand was passable, Vittorio was boring and uninspired swill. I read Pandora and it had so little interest that I don’t remember a damn thing about it even though I read it in the last year.
Her non-vampire stuff… well Feast of All Saints had it’s interesting spots, but was mostly 9 million pages of bore, but Cry to Heaven was good. More recently, Violin sucked.
Is Ms. Rice just running out of whatever she had? Or is she just getting sloppy churning them out too fast because she can? Or am I the only one who sees the decline?
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“it’s all real”
“I KNEW IT!!!”
O p a l C a t www.opalcat.com
I’m not the best person to ask, but I thought she started to suck after the second Vampire book. Actually, I didn’t like the second book nearly as much as the first. Sort of turned me off her work, and I quit reading her stuff.
But that’s just me - obviously not a “true” fan. (But I did love “Interview” as much as anyone.)
IMHO, Interview was very good, Lastat was okay, and everything else she has ever written has been the most boring drivil it’s been my displeasure to see published. I tried to read Feast and Lasher and only made it two or three chapters before I sunk in the mire. So yeah, I’d say that she started to suck quite a while ago and has been heading down hill at great speed since.
All you need to start an asylum is an empty room and the right kind of people.
I liked Lestat and Queen best of her books. (Note to Opal: IMHO, vampires being able to eventually fly makes sense, given the Rice’s explaination of vampires being a symbiosis of spirits and humans is true. The spirit simply gets more powerful as it adapts to its human host.)
I didn’t really care for Tale Of The Body Thief, The Mummy was OK, and the witch book (forgot the name) was too long.
I haven’t read anything else by her, except for excerps from her < ahem > Beauty stories under her pseudonym. Those were very silly.
Didn’t she write Interview and Lestat way back in the late '70s? That was a long time ago to be turning out quality work, especially if you try to limp the franchise along with new ideas and characters 20 years later. And her S&M porn (written with a fake name) was dreadful; no reason to quit the day job there.
She’s one of those people driven insane by a lot of money and the unlimited reverence of fans. Check out those crazy threads she wears, such as the massive gold lame Empress robes she wore on Politically Incorrect. I lump her right in there with Michael Jackson et al.
I read the first three vampire books and seemed to notice a decline as you got along. Her “Witches of Mayfair” series (I’ve only read the first two) plodded along interminably. I never had sufficient motivation to try anything else.
Oh, and when I got engaged, a friend of mine gave me the first two books of the “Beauty” series. I personally dislike the whole premise of the series. People learning to enjoy rape, humiliation, degradation. Not my cup of tea.
As a side note not really related to your post, I was sitting across from MS Rice in the Boston airport when a excited young woman that worked in the bookstore on the concourse came running up and asked her to sign a copy of one of her books.
The book was one with the cover removed meaning it was supposed to be trashed since the cover had been returned for credit because the book hadn’t sold.
MS Rice smiled and signed it anyway.
Don’t know about the insanity part, but what happened to her editors? It’s the Elvis Effect, I think. People who should know better don’t question anything these writers churn out.
Or are good editors harder to find than good writers?
Per the OP: I liked the first three Lestat books and The Mummy.
I’ve read the whole Beauty trilogy… the first one was ok just for shock value… the next one was ok, the third one… it was like WE GET THE POINT.
The Witches of Mayfair series was ok. Not great, but readable. I do recommend Cry to Heaven for anyone though. It’s not even about anything supernatural!
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“it’s all real”
“I KNEW IT!!!”
O p a l C a t www.opalcat.com
Opal, Is the book “Cry to Heaven” the book about the castratos? If it is the one I am thinking of, then I agree that it is a good book. I have read “Lasher” and “Taltos” (Witches of Mayfair), but they really didn’t hold my interest for too long. I have never read “Interview with the Vampire”, but I did read “The Vampire Lestat” and I liked it.
I remember all the hoopla that she made when she said that she thought Tom Cruise was a bad choice to play Lestat. I thought he did a good job in the movie, and Brad Pitt was really good as Louis (very yummy too…mmmm)
Shadowfox
“The dead have risen, and they’re voting Republican!” - Bart Simpson
I haven’t gotten to Armand or Vittorio yet, never really wanted to try Violin, and haven’t had the chance for Feast or Cry to Heaven. Haven’t read any of her pseudonymous things except Exit to Eden.
But I’ve read most everything else. I have a lot of patience as a reader, which you need for her stuff. Her typical novel is at least two thirds exposition of the setting. Loads of history before you can even understand the present-day parts.
That being said, I think she’s had more misses lately. But most of her stuff is still great. No one’s mentioned Servant of the Bones, and I think it’s one of her best.
Yes, but after she saw the movie, she took out another full-page in some major newspapers apologizing for her criticism of Tom Cruise and stating that he was a fine Lestat.
I liked the first three Vampire books. I read the first Witches of Mayfair book, but the end of it pissed me off so badly that I didn’t care to read any more. I thought that just once, Anne Rice was going to give me a modern female that I could really admire. Then she gives it up to that spirit-thingy (Lasher?). Geez.
Changing my sig, because Wally said to, and I really like Wally, and I’ll do anything he says, anytime he says to.
I’m with the folks here who loved Interview and slowly became disenchanted. She’s a real storyteller in the best sense, but she’s hit the plateau Stephen King did. She needs an editor in the worst kind of way.
For some interesting variations on the vampire thing, check out Chelsea Quinn Yarbro (St. Germaine series) and George R.R. Martin (Fevre Dream). My interest in vampires only extends to implied questions: would you want to live forever? at what cost?
I don’t have a problem with Rice, mostly because she has unapologetically explored dark corners and made it pay. Her Beauty series was ::ahem:: startling but gotta give her credit for taking it mainstream. And the brouhaha over her buying and renovating an old church in the French Quarter amused me greatly.
But (cutting to the chase), no I don’t read her anymore. And Tom Cruise was okay, but Daniel Day Lewis could have sizzled, haunted and translated Lestat into cinematic art.
Read the first three vampire books and I would say that “Interview…” was the best out of the three with “…Lestat” bringing up a close second. The only thing that threw TVL out of first place was the whole “rock star” gimmick that Rice tried with Lestat. Yeah, those were some really captivating song lyrics she whipped up for her hero to sing. Don’t let anybody tell you Anne Rice can’t rock (heavy sarcasm here).
Haven’t read any of her other stuff yet. “Queen of the Damned” pretty much cooled my interest in her books.
“It’s only common sense,
There are no accidents 'round here.”