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Anne Rice - Lasher

Ah, I’ve said a lot about this one. I seemed to have expected a lot more from it when I started, thinking it was all very exciting drawing me in once again to the Mayfair witches’ lives. However, as always, I speed-read the last 100 pages or so. Anne Rice, you are an awesome writer, but your books go on for much too long.

I had a considerable amount of difficulty at the beginning, as I had to read several articles online (Wikipedia for the main part) about The Witching Hour. It’s been over a year since I read it, and it was my most recent Anne Rice book aside from this one. Thankfully, Rice is one of those authors who spends the first third of the book explaining what happened in previous books. Usually I hate this, because I read one book after the other, so I feel it’s wasted time telling me what I already know. I get it now though, and I won’t be so upset about it in the future.

What really pulled me in was Mona, and I was disappointed that she didn’t play a larger role. She added a lot of conflict and confusion, even some might say comic relief, but in the end she was just one of the Mayfair witches, another body filling up space at the house on First Street, waiting for life to pick her up and take her away. I thought for sure she would be the one Lasher intended to impregnant, that in his clumsiness of unintentionally murdering the other Mayfair witches he’d come to realize how powerful she was. I was positive he’d try to sneak in late at night for her.

Instead, there was a lot of talking about the past, a lot of talking about Rowan, who spent the last half of the book in a coma. I really loved reading Julien’s story as he told it to Michael in the attic, but Lasher’s seemed very unnecessary. Of course, that’s my folly. The book is called Lasher, not Julien. Of course Lasher’s story would be wiggled in there somewhere, and the end only makes sense. It just seemed too convenient for everyone, though, the way he volunteered himself for study after all the difficulty he had with Rowan’s desire to study him.

One could say he only gave up because he thought his daughter, Emaleth, was with the Talamasca. It was only mentioned in passing, however, and he didn’t try to flee when he found out they were astonished to hear of her existence. It was much too succinct, too evenly put together, too perfect.

I’ll read Taltos before I forget the storyline, but I’m afraid it’ll be just as uninteresting as Lasher’s own narrative.

24-Hour Challenge: Hour 24

Finished: Lasher by Anne Rice
· Pages Read: 21

A little bit of distraction. Actually, a lot. My plan was to finish the last few bits, write my little review, and then sleep. Instead, I started writing letters to my characters which will come to life as I trudge through NaNoWriMo. It was too much on my mind, and maybe that’s a good thing. It’s time to start focusing a little bit more on writing.

I’m going to contradict myself once again. I said that it wasn’t necessary to pick shorter books. I was wrong. The last 100 pages or so are what did it to me. Those whole chapters about Lasher’s life and everything that happened afterwards - things I didn’t really feel like reading. I was so done with that book. The desire to finish what I started overruled interest.

So in summary I read for about 21 hours or so, with the rest of the period being interrupted by bathroom breaks, preparing food, conversing with Richard, and nodding off. I finished only 1 book in the horror genre. In total, I read 628 pages, giving me roughly 29 pages per hour.

24-Hour Challenge: Hour 22

Currently Reading: Lasher by Anne Rice
· Pages Read: 72

That seems pretty exciting, doesn’t it? Hour 22, only two more hours left. Except now I have to put the pieces of my Internet life back together, because I seem to have lost quite a lot of it. Things continue to be randomly useless to me - my browser deletes all my bookmarks, my precious links, my PC won’t turn on without immediately shutting down, my website rarely works and I fear I’ll soon lose all my writing and the countless hours spent databasing my books. What’s the point, really, I start to wonder.

I let myself sleep, setting an alarm for 8:40 to get in at least 30 minutes. It was futile to continue as I was, eyes closed with the book open, waking only when I felt my nose sink into the pages. Sort of puts a new angle on the “nose in a book” way of phrasing one’s interest in reading.

I didn’t really read 72 pages. The downfall of Anne Rice, as I’ve mentioned, is that it’s entirely too wordy. The beginning wordy is fine - I call it the excitment of being drawn into the narrative, subtly pulling you into this world of fantasy. The ending wordy is not so great, and usually disinterests me completely. I skimmed the entirety of Lasher’s story. I saw it. My eyes went over the words and picked up themes and ideas and general concepts, but I wasn’t deep into it, grasping every word as if it were the last I’d ever read. I’m fine with that, though it seems to be how all Anne Rice books end for me.

There are 20 pages left in this novel. I will read them, but then I think I will sleep. It won’t make a full 24 hours, but I’m frustrated and upset. It’ll make 23 hours, 21 of which was actually spent reading, truly, which is an excellent effort and accomplishment.

24-Hour Challenge: Hour 20

Currently Reading: Lasher by Anne Rice
· Pages Read: 30

I must have fallen asleep. I don’t remember doing this, but at the very least, my number of pages read suggests it. I wasn’t distracted by anything except Richard’s wakefulness, but I continued reading even through that. I remember making my entry at 5 and reading a few pages, and then looking up to see 6:00 and wondering where the time went. Maybe that’s when I fell asleep, but as I looked down to read from where I thought I had left of, I found that I had already read those pages.

Perhaps I was reading in such a zombie-like state that it was time truly lost, though the words seeped through my mind nonetheless.

I have a terrible taste in my mouth, but it’s hard to read and brush one’s teeth at the same time (I will do it anyway, you know). I’m hungry, and I want ice cream just as Emaleth ate ice cream hours ago. I’m starting to become disinterested in this book. In true Anne Rice fashion, the ending is drawn out and wordy, and not quite in the same exciting way as it was at the beginning of the book. But then again, I was more awake at that time…

24-Hour Challenge: Hour 18

Currently Reading: Lasher by Anne Rice
· Pages Read: 61

I wish that my apartment complex would go to sleep sometime tonight. At 5am, it might be a little too much to hope. Maybe it never sleeps - always watching television, vibrations in the sink, always pounding on the wooden steps with tired bodies weighing down on tired feet. Maybe I’m the only one who sleeps in a dimension of beings who never close their eyes.

I’m almost awake for 24 hours now, and expecting myself to stay awake for 10 hours at least after I’m done reading. My hallucinations consist mainly of giant bugs crawling up my skin and on my arm pillow, but every so often I’ll fancy a flash of light to my left or a shadow taking shape in the kitchen.

I thought of an ending for my book while I was reading. It wasn’t anything particularly suggested by this book, only that it suddenly occurred to me somewhere in the 55 pages between 445 and 500.

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