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644 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 2001
With the exception of Micah, I've read the entire Anita Blake series up to this point (Blood Noir, #16) and, in the aforementioned opinion, Obsidian Butterfly was the last decent book, after which the series should have been renamed Anita Blake, Vampire Humper since the majority of what little action takes place occurs in the bedroom, the back seat of automobiles, on the kitchen table, the bathroom floor...etc, etc, etc.
Beginning with Narcissus In Chains, gone are the days when Anita spends her time raising the dead, kicking monster butt, and slaying rogue vampires, with threat to life and limb. Instead, we’re treated to her increasingly frequent sexcapades--watching as she dips her toes (and other body parts) into the murky waters of BDSM and pseudo-beastility (I mean, really, what else do you call sex with a partially-transitioned werecreature--and we’re not talking gender issues here, but rather "Does it, or doesn’t it, have fur and a tail?"); tedious repetitions of her ambivalent and animosity-laden encounters with Richard (“He loves me, he loves me not; He loves me, He’s full of snot.”); and long discourses regarding monster--and especially vampire--sociopolitical structures.
Call me provincial, call me shallow and two-dimensional, call me Al (or some other A-word), but when I pick up a book about a vampire hunter, I anticipate, well...vampire hunting, or something of its ilk, not a weird blend of Penthouse Letters, teen diary, and Royal court treatise. It’s too bad, ‘cause Anita Blake was pretty kick ass, back when she was kickin’ ass.
"'I enjoy rape. Adds spice.'"
"He was dressed in a black vinyl shirt that looked poured on."
"Knee-high leather boots completed his outfit."
"She offered me a hand and gave me one of the best handshakes I've ever had from another woman."
"His eyes had gone drowning blue." What color is that exactly?
"He kissed me hard enough to bruise, hard enough to force my mouth open, then he crawled inside." It's Aliens!!! Quick, get Sigourney Weaver!!
"The POWAH didn't just build; it exploded. It was like lying at ground zero of a nuclear explosion, the shockwaves shooting out, out, out into the room, while we melted together in the center."Aren't similes typically supposed to compare something less tangible with something more tangible? Now answer this question honestly, Anita: How many nuclear explosions have YOU been through?
"He literally breathed, bit, ate the healing into me."I literally have a hard time believing you understand how to use the word "literally".
"Someone was making small animal noises...and it was me."If you can't tell you are making noises, you might want to see someone for that.
"It deepened my breathing, made me have to swallow my pulse."This sounds painful!!
"I found my voice, shaky, but mine."Good thing, we'd hate to have you be silent for the rest of the series. We got lots more cop p!ssing matches to get into!
"I drank him in as he exploded inside me."Again, this sounds IMMENSELY painful. And somewhat impossible
"And I spasmed underneath him, bodies slamming against the bed, not from Richard's thrusts, but from the power of the orgasm itself. Screams spilled from my throat."Things I've learned about sex from Anita Blake: 1) Spasming during sex is normal, 2) Orgasms are strong enough to slam bodies into bed, 3) screams are now a white, translucent liquid.
“’Lovers?’ I made it a question.”Good thing you let us know that was a question; I would NEVER have been able to tell otherwise. I mean, aren't questions marks meant to be thrown in at random? (BTW, that last part was a question.)
"The room was black, utterly black, like being flung into blindness, nothingness, like a cave."Adjectives were buy one, get one free the day that LKH wrote this sentence.
"You could ask me to cut my heart out at this moment, and I might do it. Instead you ask for aspirin and a toothbrush."
"He was wearing a black lace dress, long-sleeved, fitted at the waist, showing a slender but muscular chest. The skirt spilled out around him, almost June Cleaverish, and his stockings were black, with a very delicate spiderweb pattern. He wore open-toed sandals with spike heels, and both his toenails and fingernails were painted black. He looked... lovely. But what made the outfit was the sense of power in him. It hung around him like an expensive perfume, and I knew he was an Alpha something."
"There was something graceful in the way he was made, fine bones, smooth skin, very... refined, especially for a man. Jean-Claude was prettier, but he was too tall to ever be called delicate. Micah was delicate. The only thing that saved him from looking fragile was the play of muscles in his arms, the way he walked, like the world was his and everywhere he moved he was the center of the universe."
"...other girl talk … pretty ordinary talk. Sex, guys, turning thirty, vampires, werewolves. You know, the usual."While Anita does tick me off with her self-righteous, holier-than-thou approach to the men in her life, I appreciate that she's capable of change. Able to absorb new information and change her mind to accept truths. Ronnie, now, she's really buggin' me with her sanctimonious pronouncements. A friend is supposed to be supportive. To say no, to push you to reconsider bad choices. Then there's being so damned stubborn and unyielding, not listening to your friend, not taking her lessons or experiences into account.
Tell me the truth, but not if it pisses me off.With "I didn't know" and "I didn't understand" Anita's only rallying cries.
Why didn't you tell me this would happen, but yes, I'd have wanted to kill you if you had.
Richard should have counseled Louisa better, forced her to practice beforehand, but don't make Anita do it.
Let's worry more about appearance than about reality.
Yes, give me the mark so I can save you, but don't expect me to follow through on anything.
Don't feed on me, but don't feed on anyone else.
Don't sleep with anyone else, but don't sleep with me either.
I can sleep with anyone and everyone, you can't sleep with anyone but me.
And you don't get to sleep with me.
"You are simultaneously one of the most direct women I know, and one of the most self-deluding."
"To give up his moral code is to give up who he is."Narcissus is so pushy and demanding, and Jean-Claude gets his own back on him. At last. And we learn, right along with a horrified Anita and Richard, a lot more about Jean-Claude's past. Appeasing Narcissus is Asher's opportunity to hurt Jean-Claude and explain the basis for dominance and submission.
"True power comes when others offer it to you and you merely accept it as a gift, not as the spoils of some personal war."Let me smack her! Please, let me whap her upside the head a few times...please, please, please…! She makes me so nuts. Why must she always fight so damn hard? She hears what Jean-Claude tells her, and I swear, she doesn't take it in. Doesn't apply it to herself.