There have been grumblings for a few years about the direction Laurel K. Hamilton has taken her Anita Blake character. There has been a lot of criticism that LKH has failed to address.
Now she has.
In a rant of particular venom, LKH accuses negative readers of lacking intelligence and not understanding the characters. Her blog entry of 29 December deserves reading - if you can tolerate the light blue text on a black background long enough - if only for the first couple of paragraphs. Then it descends into a patronizing diatribe of why you shouldn't read the books if you don't like them. Fine, okay, but to insult the negative comments, to dismiss them as being inconsequential, is inexcusable.
If fans can see something wrong with the writing, the writer should pay attention. Yes, the sales maybe going up (the quality of the fan maybe going down though), but apparently, "I have the sales figures to prove it. Each book’s sales are more than the last." Laurel says on the site. "The vast majority of people standing in line love the books, love the series, and tell us so. Some people even ask for more police procedural. I want more, too. If the person asks nicely, not rudely, or in that tone that seems to imply if I don't do what they want the series is doomed to failure, I listen."
Apparently, 'hearing' and 'listening' are two separate things, because fans have been asking for more police procedurals ever since Obsidian Butterfly and less sex since Narcissus in Chains.
The next post on 31 December is the cooing, "I'm okay" reply to the rabid fan base who will see no criticism unflamed. LKH's blog has degenerated from an interesting weblog of the process of writing to the twee "What we did on New Year's Eve", and only a cyber-stalker would be interested.
If you think this is a one off, go to The Smart Bitches site and read the comments.
One last comment: LKH should never have written this piece, it leads to more talk, more sniping, more criticism. But if you are going to defend your characters, do so in a respectful manner, without criticising critics. It's a tough business and this post came off as childish, patronizing and smug.
3 comments:
Hi, I'm new here.
On the subject of attacking reviewers, I always thought writers, if they received a negative review, no matter how hurt they were, either listened to the advice or took it with a grain of salt. Then again, maybe I'm naive.
Jason
sure she should have written it! It reads like she churned/turned it out in a towering rage. Everyone does crap like that.
It was posting it in public that might have been a bad idea.
If I were her mother I'd say, "honey, sit on it for a couple of days before you even thinking about putting it up. And don't forget to check the spelling, doll-face. I think you got ardeur/arduer/whatever wrong."
Jason, welcome.
I think you’ve raised two questions here: should a writer pay attention to bad reviews, venomous critics and the howling public and fix the perceived errors?
And the second question: should writers stay true to what they want to say in their book?
The first answer is yes. LKH says she does listen to her fans, but from the results, she’s only listening to one set of fans – the Grima Wormtongue group - and that is a shame.
The second answer is also a yes. A writer must stay true to the story and characters or risk becoming the writer of their own fan fiction.
LKH, sadly, has listened to the Grimas for too long and Anita has become a mockery of what she once aspired to be.
Of course, the simple answer is: don't read reviews and don't listen to the fans. LKH would probably have escaped this vilification if she'd done both.
Kate r: Absolutely right. LKH could have ranted and raved and ***** her husband in a fit of rage like Richard and Anita would(then written it into a scene) - but not in public!
The worst a writer can do is respond publicly to this kind of criticism; it provokes more. the best a writer can do is sit back, look at what's being written, think about why it's being written and make adjustments accordingly in the next book.
LKH has decided to moan and gripe and bitch and whinge. We'll just let her stew in her own juices. Twenty years from now, who knows where she'll be? But I know her books will be off my shelves.
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