I just finished reading 'salem's Lot by Stephen King, and I'm confused on something. Does anyone know why Barlow (the vampire) was so set on castrating Mark (the little boy)? Repeated reference is made to it, but I don't think any explanation is ever given as to why, and Barlow doesn't seem to want to do it to anyone else.
As for Bullet, this chapter is ten pages. I think it could easily be cut down to only half that if all the infodumping and the descriptions of hair/eyes/clothes were cut out.
As far as the info-dumping goes, I understand that there are things new readers will need to know. But this is the most ham-fisted, inorganic, awkward way of doing it as I can possibly imagine. LKH has really had enough practice as an author by now that she should have learned better ways of working these things in much more naturally and unobtrusively. As for all the clothes porn and waxing on about physical features...
I'm a really visual person. I like knowing what characters look like. I like knowing the coloration, height, etc., of everyone, even though it's completely irrelevant. When I was first reading these books in high school, I actually kept a list in my notebook about what everyone looked like so I would remember it when they appeared on-screen. But as with the info-dumping, there are ways to work this information in that 'flow' a hell of a lot better, and will not be so annoying to people who are very much NOT visual like I am. Hell, the way it's done here, even I want to just GET ON WITH THE STORY and get hints dropped about what they looked like later.
I'm also hugely into fashion. I may not always dress like it, but I actually have loads of style magazines, and I take notes from them not on how to dress myself, but for outfits that I want characters to wear, outfits I want to draw, etc. I am the target audience for the clothes-porn crap that you get with so many novels. That does not mean, however, that I mistake it for good writing when I am informed what every character is wearing. Unless it is relevant in some way, it just slows down the story. And if the outfits descriptions here bugged me, as someone who has a soft spot for that kind of thing, I have no doubt it would drive someone crazy if they had no patience for it to begin with. There is no reason we needed to know ANY of this. About the only relevant thing at all would be 'JJ and Vivian had on very pretty dresses and it made Anita wish she'd dressed up too' and everything else could be cut and not have the scene change AT ALL.
Asher is also now a creepy asshole. It has been a long time since I read these books, and I don't remember much about Asher besides the scar angst. I do, however, remember that I liked him. He wasn't one of my favorites, but I liked him. So I asked a friend who does remember the books really well if this behavior from him is new, or if I just didn't recall it/didn't see it for what it was when I was a teen. According to her, she doesn't remember him being creepy, but that "He had scar tissue that prevented him from doing anything [sexually]. He got rid of that. Then Anita bullied him into her bed. I felt so sick after reading that. He seriously was walking out and she emotionally blackmailed into things. Deliberately played on his trauma and need to be wanted. It was gross all around. I think he was crying at some point. I'll have to reread. But yeah, if that's how he was brought in, why wouldn't he think that's normal? Anita did it and it worked."
So basically it is potentially as a result of this, in my opinion, that Asher is now bullying someone else in order to get them into bed. What a lovely, sickening little cycle.
( BULLET, CHAPTER TWO )![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
