You Never Expect the Spanish Inquisition

True Blood Season 4 (So Far)  Review

You know, I had high hopes for season 4. It's the season of AmnesiaEric! Of werepanther Jason! Of Witchy Witches who are weres hopped up on vampire blood.

Yeah, well.

TV Amnesia Eric seems really lame. His vulnerability is child-like, whereas book Eric was introspective, scared sometimes, and yet still very manly. And the outfit. THE OUTFIT. Dear lord. How Sookie falls in love with this version of Eric I do not know. But Eric's essential superiority complex is totally gone. In the book he was a kind of combo, but here he seems totally defanged. It's not sexy. The speech he gave to Bill tonight about how he'd gladly go to his death and he hopes Sookie and Bill find a way back to each other? Blech. I hope when he gets his memories back and realizes how totally embarrassing he is to vampires everywhere, he feels what I'm feeling right now.

Also unsexy? Rotting Pam. A Pam who sold Eric out to Bill fucking Compton. Even as king, Pam would lie through her teeth and send Bill on a wild goose chase. I am thoroughly disappointed. 

Shifters
Alcide, Debbie, Luna, Tommy, new werewolf Alpha asshole who totally is going to end up being Luna's ex and thus a pain in Sam Merlotte's ass? Not as into it as I thought I'd be. I kind of don't even want to talk about the werepanthers. What happened to Jason is horrifying. And I will never unsee the woman who cried after raping him because sex with her "brother-husband" was so much worse.

Arlene and Terry's Haunted Baby

Ok so is the baby magical? Is he haunted by Rene or by some other random ghost? If he's haunted by some other random ghost, why does the ghost know how to fuck with Arlene and Terry regarding said Rene awfulness? And how does it manage to mess with Arlene's eye and light fires and write on walls? These are the questions I have because I totally gave up on the shifter storylines and what I'm left with is the haunted baby.

Oh, but there's the witches!


Marnie/Antonia

I love the actress who is playing Marnie. She really was able to become Eddie the vampire in the first episode, and she seems to have conveyed the depth and complicated nature of loneliness and absence of faith. Her surprise and anger over being dangerous to Sookie in the palm reading scene was amazing to watch.

Alright,  so the Inquisition wasn't really based on human fears but vampire fears? Of witches who were necromancers? And so via their already entrenched operatives in the Vatican, vampires took on witches and pissed one off so bad that she is returning to take vengeance hundreds of years later?

I like it, kind of.

I mean, she's got some totally justifiable beef. That rapist vampire? Any vampire old enough could also totally be a rapist. They can glamour. I'm telling you, this mythos is leading towards old-vampires-are-probably-rapists territory. It makes too much historical sense! Anyway, I'm interested in where this is going. And I hope most of it happens at night because the daytime scenes of fantastical creatures seem very Xena: Warrior Princess to me. And that show is a favorite of mine, but not because of production values.

Brujeria

The Mexican witchcraft story is just taking off. I hope it does cool things. The pregnant lady is really freaking me out. What's she carrying?! Is it.....SATAN?!

Random Complaints

Maybe I'm in a really weird mood or something, but I was bummed on the Eric/Sookie sex scene in the woods.  Not only is that not in keeping with the frustrated shower scene in the book, but it also seems kind of...ill advised..to get completely naked in a forest full of shifters during a full moon. One of whom may be your brother. Who you were looking for and were really concerned about. At least this time she was wearing short shorts and a hoodie and had a shot gun to go traipsing through the woods instead of a sundress.


Great things about this episode (besides Marnie/Antonia):

Bill is still Bill underneath that black leather blazer. And his loooove for Sookeh trumps his new kingship. Aww, Bill. Will he ever grow a pair? I don't know if I really want him to.

No fairies! They will make their return, because it seems like the Antonia storyline is hitting the fan soon, which means the big bad will reveal itself at the end of the season, and I'm thinking it's Mab the queen of the fairies, who lives out in Joshua Tree and has a bad case of shark teeth. But they weren't in this episode. Hooray!

Jessica's growing up. She's making mistakes, but she's also trying to understand them. And she's done well for someone with such awful, awful fathers, both human and vampire.

The foreshadowing of vampire Luis' (rapist vampire) final death. I can't wait to watch that.

No HotShot scenes!

Tara had great scenes where she didn't yell. The stuff at Merlotte's was hilarious.

I feel like now they've laid the groundwork and the season can really start. Everything's going to go off in the next episode, so we'll see what we've got left to work with after next week!

True Blood Season 4 Premiere

You knew I was going to review this right? It's a celebration, bitches! True Blood season 4 has begun. The season of (hopefully) Eric Amnesia, memorable shower scenes, and intriguing manimal behavior!

I have to say, I LOVE the way the show is deviating from the books. I mean, Sookie needs some reality checks, but there was some great stuff in this episode.


Story lines I'm excited about:

Tara (nka Toni) the lesbian cage fighter! You know, I gotta say, Tara really does stuff when she sets her mind to it. She was like, I'm going to go away from here and get a whole new personality (but keep my cell number). And she did it. She's totally my new tv girlfriend.

Mohawk Lafayette
Can I just say that Lafayette is my moral anchor here? Because it's true. He knows there's a part of him that has scary power, and he's right to be cautious. This witch coven seems more interesting than the one in book 4. I wonder if there will be any similarities.

Cop Jason
I like a grown up version of Jason. Here's hoping his time in the freezer is short!

Arlene's homicidal infant
Who wouldn't love this kid?

Towel Catching Eric

I think we all know where this is going. And I think we all agree it should go there.

King Bill.

Dude, major major twist. Would that book Bill become something as awesome as this.  Mad props Alan Ball.


Now that we know why I'm going to stay tuned, let's admit to some stuff I wasn't delighted by.

Fairies. Sigh.

Portia Bellefleur
Boring.

Sookie just can't wear jeans and a t-shirt can she?

Hotshot - ugh.

Hoyt and Jessica
Do they have to do the madonna/whore thing here? Really?

Here's hoping the rest of the season has me happily criticizing!

Dead Reckoning & Hard Bitten Reviews

I'm still working on the ghost post (hee), and have gotten a couple good ghost stories. Submit yours to me if you haven't already!!


Today's post is a review of two vampire series titles released on the same day. The latest Sookie Stackhouse novel, Dead Reckoning, the eleventh book in the series, and Hard Bitten, the latest installment of the Chicagoland Vampire story. Most of the time my reviews are detailed but not spoilery. This time, I'm spoiling all over the place.

If you haven't read them and plan to, go away! Come back after you finish and tell me what you think.

If you haven't read these stories at all, go start at book one. Also, go away or you'll get all spoiled!

If you watch True Blood but never read the Sookie books, you can stay. They may or may not use the plot line or character development and really, 11 seasons? Doubtful. Meanwhile, 7 years from now you won't remember this blog post, so feel free.....




*      *       *       *      *        *        *        *        *
Dead Reckoning: Sookie Gets Mistreated, and I Feel Bad About Ever Liking Any of These Characters

I think this book made me do something I never thought I'd do: get back on Team Bill. Can't believe it! Don't even feel comfortable here on Team Bill. Of course, where else to go? Oh yes, Team Sookie. I have many fantasies for the future of our dear Ms. Stackhouse. Most of them involve leaving Bon Temps and trying to make her way in the world under an assumed name. I picture her perhaps teaching English in some country where the buzz of other minds is practically gibberish and thus soothing. I see her getting a job in an office or at a library, getting a little apartment, having a cat. Maybe she meets a vampire turned after the Great Revelation, you know, someone who fulfills her guy qualifications, but isn't as ridiculous with the chivalry and politicking. Really, what would make her awesome is if she became a demon or something. Something where she can just say, "You know what guys, back off. I'm watching Golden Girls right now, and I'm going to eat this pizza, and if you don't like it, I'm going to fire blast you out of my house with my magical demon hands. Sookie needs a goddamn break."


This book is about Sookie's history, her lineage, and (yet again) a bunch of really blatant reasons why she can't trust any supe but Sam Merlotte (who I'm still mad at over his tryst with Callisto. Yeah, I've got old grudges).



Fairies: Untrustworthy Jerks

First off, the fairies: Her new roomies are her fairy cousins Dermot and Claude. They are comforted by being around other fairies, and she feels the magical comfort feelings as well. They admit that they are drawn somehow to her house. Turns out, there's a fairy trinket hiding there that belongs to Sookie. It was given to her by her grandmother, and it is like a 1-free-wish magical thingamabob. Typical Sookie, she gets a gift and its something that probably people will kill her over.

Sookie's grandmother, as it turns out, totally knew she was cheating on her husband with fairy Fintan. In an old letter hid in the attic, Adele Stackhouse admits to Sookie that she had children as a result of her liason with Fintan, and that the Stackhouse children since then have been visited in their  youth by their "sponsor," Mr. Cataliades (the demon lawyer).  It's revealed that Mr. Cataliades gave Sookie her telepathy as a gift because she's more fairy than the rest of her kin. Yeah, a great gift for a baby, right? How was Adele able to keep this immortal sin a secret from a telepathic child? If this tryst was at once the most amazing and awful thing she ever did, how did she keep it from Sookie? And how could she live with herself when she realized that Sookie was telepathic and yet never clued her in to any of this crap?! Adele Stackhouse, no longer awesome. Thanks. Really, that's just great. Now I have to be mad at a nice grandma whose only sin in life was wanting to have kids.

In this novel, her fear and caution around her cousins is palpable. Since she was gnawed on for hours by freakish homicidal fairies who filed their teeth into points, she's got good reason to be wary of all things fairy. She starts to think that Claude, Dermot, Niall, and the random assortment of fae creatures hanging out at Hooligans are not her people. There's a lot of groundwork laid for a bunch of fairy bullshit in the future. The fairies shut out of Faery (ugh) are trying to get back to their homeland. It's not going to be pretty.

Vampires: Not Immortal After All
So Victor bites the big one in this novel, and he reaches a bunch of new lows beforehand, making just about everybody wants to see his ashes. Not only does he buy two bars that directly compete with Merlottes and Fangtasia, he prevents Pam's girlfriend, Miriam, from being turned even though she's dying from leukemia. Poor Miriam, her existence served nothing more than to illustrate Victor's depravity. Truly, we get no depth to this character at all. And the idea that Pam could fall in love with someone so much that she wants to save them by making her own vampire child? And that this happens off page? It's pretty much cheating me out of important Sookieverse stuff. Pam's a central character! Her disdain for humanity and love of vampire life was tempered by this frail gal? I want to know about that! Pam herself gets throttled and choked by Eric. He also prevents her from saying/doing things with his master-commands-it mojo, which is dickish behavior if your vampire child is over a century old, in my opinion. I mean really, at this point, disobeying your commands to tell your secrets are her decision. Your job as a daddy is done.

Eric really took a backseat in this novel in terms of page time, but for me he hit center stage in a show called "Asshole". He was keeping a lot from Sookie (nothing new there), he was very tense, he seemed to have his usual arrogance about him, but he was being bested for a majority of the novel by Victor, who was taking away his Fangtasia revenue with his competing vampire bar. So he didn't get to be BMOC the whole time, which I like. Eric's love for Sookie was supposed to be transformative, getting him closer to humanity than he has been in a thousand years.

That's, I think, what draws people to the vampire-human love story. The idea that someone so hard and cold and calculating could be melted by looooove. It's a typical romance trope, adapted for the supernatural circumstance of immortality. Usually these guys have outdated views of gender roles, superiority complexes up the wazoo, and the obligatory giant penises. Not sure if this would work well in reverse. Powerful female vampire with outdated ideas about masculinity courts a human man who shows her that vulnerability and emotions are also male qualities. He tames her beast within and they fight important battles together. She learns to love him even though she must be the protector, not the protected. Also, her vagina sometimes squeezes his penis so hard that he needs to put frozen peas on his junk for 20 minutes after each session of lovemaking (yes, this is taken-in reverse-from the latest Sookie novel). Yeah, that story sounds like it sucks. The Pam-Miriam story would be much cooler.

So anyway, Eric. Not only do we find out that he's been betrothed to some vampire queen and must give up Sookie to be with this new broad, it is revealed that he fucked up Sookie's life royally years ago by connecting her with Niall, paying Terry Bellefleur to spy on her, and spying on her himself well before they became "friends." He also spends a good deal of time preventing Pam from telling Sookie anything about his upcoming nuptials. Oh, and to top it all off, one of his last scenes involves him feeding from her and making it more painful than necessary! This is an abusive relationship, folks, and I'm officially out of love with Eric. Sookie manages to get the guts to break the blood bond, but feels bad about it. She feels that she should have consulted with him first on a decision that affects them both. Which would be true, if the decision wasn't "whether or not I should be magically tethered to your emotions based on a decision you made in secret and imposed upon me without my consent in the first place." Thankfully this blood bond is gone. Hopefully she'll see this Eric stuff in a different light without it. I don't think he's her


Witch Match Makers
Amelia comes into play in this book in order to break the blood bond. She finds out a spell that can break the bond and gets Sookie to agree to it pretty quickly, which I enjoyed. It's something Sookie would do, it was her instinct to be free of Eric, and it was nice to see someone specifically in Sookie's corner. Amelia's a bit tactless, and she hates learning from past mistakes, apparently. This is big magic, something that is going to piss of a very old, powerful vampire, and she's like "let's do it!" She also goads Alcide into seducing Sookie. Remember when she was all interested in setting Sookie up with this really cute guy and it turned out to be Dermot? WTF Amelia!? Stop setting Sookie up with horrible matches.


Shifters: Not Great Decision Makers
Alcide returns to make his play for Sookie's affections. How does he do this? He sleeps in her bed in what he thinks is sexy underwear, hoping she'll come home and take him up on the offer. She's pissed about this, obviously, but it made me laugh. Then I thought, what if that happened to me? What would I do? I'd be so livid! Not only do I have shitty roommates and a house guest who felt this was appropriate (they'd all be in the house, I presume when this impromptu sex-fest was going on, by the way, which, eww), but this dude has some real cojones to think that his mere presence in bed can make her forget about her vampire lover. I'd do just what she did. Kick the whole lot of them out and then begrudgingly let Dermot back in because he's kind of slow.

Sandra Pelt gets out of a jail we didn't know she was in and goes after Sookie in impersonal ways until all the loser assassins she paid don't do the job right and she has to actually do the job herself.  You can tell she's a crafty adversary when she decides to hijack Sam and Janalynn (a shifter and a werewolf enforcer) to get to Sookie. Not surprisingly it takes them like 5 minutes to kill her and shove her body into the fairy portal, where she's eaten presumably by black dogs/hell hounds. So glad to put the whole Pelt family in the ground. It seems like this book was all about running things into the ground. It's like reading about a plane crash, only in the middle of the plane crash there's a kindergarten open house and a baby shower.

Demons & Telepaths
Cataliades comes by to let Sookie in on her fae heritage and to explain the Cluviel Dor. It's a magical fairy trinket that gives her one wish, but it can't be used to wish away her telepathy (lame). She decides to hold of on wishing, and gives Cataliades a stern rebuke for all the "gifts" he has bestowed upon her. He leaves her house in a rush because something is following him. And he is later seen zipping around the yard being chased by..things...it seemed like a big deal to me, but it was given two sentences of page time, so maybe in the next book he'll make a reappearance or he'll be dead and leave her his demon estate. Missed Diantha not being there. I liked her insane club-kid outfits and machine-gun fire way of talking.

Hunter also enters the story here. As a side-note, how many damn characters can be shoe-horned in to this story?! Geez. Anyway, Hunter's about to go to kindergarten and Sookie goes with Remy to his school's open house, giving us a peek into teachers' minds, which now adds elementary school teachers to my list of creeps. Sookie seems to be helping Hunter deal with the telepathy in a group setting, trying to prevent him from making the same mistakes that led to her legacy in Bon Temps as "Crazy Sookie." I think this Hunter thing seemed like it was going to lead to Sookie possibly having a family. It really would be the only way she could have a child and have a vampire husband. But now I'm not so sure that's the direction the story is going.  Poor Hunter, he might have to get killed in book 12.

In conclusion:

You know when you finally realize that a friend you've had for a while isn't really your friend? That there was some ulterior motive for being around you? Yeah, so Sookie pretty much only has that going on right now. The most telling and poignant line in the entire novel was when she's riding in the car with Sam and tearily realizes, "I've been a fool." It's an indication that Sookie's growing up. I can't wait to see how grown-up Sookie deals with the bullshit coming her way.  I think it's time to put Eric out to pasture. He was an important step in her life, and a relationship that she can use to understand herself a little better, but in the long run, I think she'll end up with Sam.







Hard Bitten

I've been reading the Chicagoland Vampire Series since book one. This is the fourth entry, and its gone to places I didn't expect. I liked the idea of a grad student who gets turned and has to traverse a whole new universe of vampire politics and super strength. I also liked that the vampire universe is a little different in these novels. Vampires are organized into houses, kind of like fraternity houses. You get turned and become part of a vampire family of sorts. Merit, the central character, is a little different than other vamps in that she was turned in what seemed like a last-minute decision. She was dying and the head of the Cadogan vampire house, Ethan, turned her. So she didn't choose this life (or unlife). The writing is good, the character is fleshed out, and the love for Chicago in the story is palpable. Chicago is almost another character in the novel. Merit takes us through a lot of Chicago landmarks and helps us understand the local cuisine and culture.

This installment does some pretty gutsy things. It puts some things out there that I wasn't expecting. The mayor isn't human (but we don't know what he is yet), Celina takes a stake to the heart, and oh my god, Merit's love interest, the leader of Cadogan house, Ethan, dies. Since his relationship with his child/novitiate/underling/employee is totally inappropriate, I was cool with it. He will magically resurrect in future books, I'm sure, because his character arc is not complete and in a 7 book series, I doubt at the end of the 4th they'd trade in one soul mate for another. But in my fantasy universe, I'd have him resurrect as human, so Merit would be superior in terms of vampire hierarchy. It would be better if they were on equal terms, but these books hate that, apparently.

There was no sex in this book, but really, there was no time! Merit was on the go the entire book and manages to not only solve the mystery of the V trade, she also learns about her own history. Turns out her dad wanted to pay Ethan to secretly turn her, so she'd never die. Micromanage much?! Ethan declined the offer, but Celina decided to do it anyway. Once the offer was made to Ethan, he decided to protect Merit (secretly, vampirily, like they do). But he was really bad at this, and when she got mauled by one of Celina's vamps, Ethan had to be a big boy and decide whether she died or undied.




I liked the book, because it did make some abrupt and confusing changes to the story I wasn't expecting. That's a rarity in a genre book. But I'm always concerned about books that make the hero transform into a marshmallow of love and devotion. Ethan dies taking a stake meant for Merit, which only means he's coming back. I wonder what hot beefcake body he'll return in?


OK, folks, reviews are done. I know I'm a bit all over the place, but the books were both released Tuesday and I had to get something down. I'm sure I'll settle down and rethink a lot of this stuff, but this is my first reaction.

Book Reviews - Vampires and Witches, of Course

Thanks to my graduate school honed skill of speed reading, I got through two books this week. I'm happy to report my findings.


1st up, Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter by Seth Grahame-Smith.

Gotta say, it wasn't a book that I felt like I needed to get my hands on at first. When it was first published, I liked the idea, but decided to keep it on the reading list for later. It's central characters are men, it's about killing vampires not loving them, and it wasn't written by an historian. And despite those things, it is a very interesting read. It's an epistolary novel, which is one of my favorite literary forms.


Epistolary novels are stories told through a series of letters or other written documents. They gained popularity in the mid 1700s, the most popular then being Samuel Richardson's Pamela and years later Clarissa, about young women who have their virtue continually tested by the world around them. Epistolary novels do some interesting things that other novels don't. They show you the story from one person's perspective, with 'factual' additions like newspaper clippings or historical documents, and without the value judgments of an omniscient narrator. In many ways this conveys a sense of realism.  You get the story in the character's own words. Some think that the popularity of epistolary novels coincides with the rise of democracy. These are stories that tended to focus on ordinary people, generally the trials and tribulations of the working class or servant class, and in doing so encourage a sense of empathy for the experiences of those who are not like you. I like epistolary novels. Dracula is one of the most famous, with letters and diary entries from the different characters creating the story.



Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter begins with the story of a young writer who has given up on his dream of writing a novel. He instead runs the counter at a small town hardware store. He is given a gift one day by a strange local customer: what appears to be the collected diaries of Abraham Lincoln, detailing his life as young boy, and moving all the way through to the days before his assassination.

The stranger asks him to write a novel based on the diaries. As he begins to read these journals, he realizes that Abraham Lincoln was obsessed with, and very good at, killing vampires. He devoted his entire life to ridding the country of them, and only stumbled into politics. Lincoln eventually surmises that the institution of slavery is not only reprehensible on the basis of denying human beings rights, but also because it is held in place by vampires, who buy up the slaves who are old or disabled in order to feed. He believes slavery and vampires go hand in hand, so he sets out to get rid of both.


Even though it's about hunting and killing vampires, there are your "good" vampires, though they aren't as fleshed out as they could be. His good vampire sends him a hit list every now and then, and the story moves forward as Lincoln tries to fulfill his assassinations of the vilest vampires. Lincoln is definitely given a fascinating voice, and a clear picture of him emerges as the novel goes on. He deals with a lot of conflicting values and ideas, and is thoughtful about them.  The novel's historical inaccuracies are plenty, but I didn't find this too troubling. I mean, it's a novel about Abraham Lincoln as a vampire hunter. Changing history to suit the story seems like a no brainer. I loved all of the doctored photos that point out "proof" of the vampire hunter aspect of Lincoln's life. I loved the moral anchor that was the Lincoln character. He doesn't always do the right thing, but he does explore his ideas and opinions.

There were some things that disappointed me, though. It's clear that the writer isn't an historian, and that really makes the novel less than what it could have been. You see it in places throughout the novel, but most of all in the way slavery and the abolitionist movement is presented. Slaves are talked about in the abstract mostly, and usually only as victims. The underground railroad, the work of free blacks in the north, and slave rebellions are all attributed to the "good" vampires who want to end the reign of vampires in the south. Only one of these "good" vampires is developed as a character, and even he is more of a way to move the plot forward than a real person. None of the characters are black, and I think a black "good" vampire would have given the story some depth and add a counterbalance to the depiction of black people as only slaves and only victims with no power over their own lives. Lincoln never encounters other vampire hunters, which is strange. And the story spends so much time on his life before politics, that it seems odd that his road to the presidency was so short and so convenient.


All in all, the book does paint an elaborate picture of Lincoln's life, with vampire stuff added in there. His marriage, children, and the Civil War are all explored in interesting ways. I think probably this could have been an epic story, rather than a whimsical little novel. It's worth it just for the cameo by Edgar Allen Poe, who knows about vampires and chats with Lincoln about it from an interesting perspective!



My second review is a book I found via the Barnes & Noble nook recommendations page. They saw that I liked The Phyisick Book of Deliverance Dane and Daughters of the Witching Hill, and handed me A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness. I was hungry for another novel after finishing Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter, and I am glad I went back to witches for a time.

The cover of this novel isn't bad, but it isn't good. I would have preferred it to look like a page from an illuminated manuscript, because it features so prominently in the story, but I don't work in book cover design. I should though. I sometimes wonder what the hell those people are thinking. This is a big one at 592 pages, but I was fascinated the whole way through. It's a witch story, but unlike the last two I reviewed, this one takes place in the contemporary world, without a lot of flashbacks to the past. It's about a world where witches, daemons and vampires have worked hard to keep their existence secret from humans. It's also a world where the three creature groups are insular, and never mix across "species." It's also about the weird world of academics. In this case, however, some of the academics are relics themselves.

Diana Bishop is a witch, but has worked hard to create an academic life without witchcraft. A descendant of one of the Salem witches, she knows the fear and hysteria around witchcraft. She wanted to make a name for herself without resorting to magic, and manages to become a well known historian teaching at Yale. At the start of the novel, she is on a sabbatical doing research at Oxford, analyzing alchemical texts and illuminated manuscripts in the Bodleian Library. Her life changes forever when she requests a particular manuscript from the collection that was once thought lost. It's a book that is sealed shut with a spell, and Diana manages to open it. It seems like a confusing alchemy text that has magic running through it. When she sees the magical aspect of the text, she suddenly decides to return it and tries to forget the experience. The creatures in Oxford take notice, and pretty soon they are hovering around her, waiting for her to recall the manuscript, which is rumored to have secrets about the origins of the supernatural species and powerful spells. Another academic at Oxford seems to be most interested in her and her stack of books at the Bodleian, Matthew Clairmont, a vampire.

This is not your usual vampire romance, but it does go to similar places. What makes this novel different is the careful eye to science and history (the author is an historian of science and medicine at USC). It's not simply the history background that makes Harkness's work great. It's also her ability to create a lush, detailed world, with characters that have flaws and quirks. Even tertiary characters seem modeled on real people. Matthew, the vampire, is a great character, but I had a bad feeling about him at the beginning of the novel when he found Diana's smell to be too intoxicating. These vamps also don't have fangs. Which is stupid. I'm sorry but vampires have fangs. It's the way of things. I won't see them without. Anyway, I was worried he'd head into Edward Cullen territory, but things go a different, more mature way.

I guess that's what I liked best about this novel. It's central character, Diana, is a woman who is "different" like Bella and Sookie and so many others, but she isn't naive or prone to do ridiculous thins to prove she's independent. She is a thinker and mature about her actions. Whereas many other vampire romances are about vampires sweeping women up into their vampire bullshit, this story is about the communal bullshit of supernaturals, and Diana takes control of her life in beautiful and surprising (and sometimes wrong) ways.

The novel is long, but I didn't feel like it when I was reading it, and I wanted it to continue after it was over. If you are reading it and having a hard time moving through it, you should at least push forward to Diana's visit home to her family's witchy house. I could have read a whole novel about that house.

If you liked The Historian, there are elements of academic life, research and travel that are interesting, but it isn't a treasure hunt so much. If you liked The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane and Daughters of the Witching Hill, the culture of witchcraft is fun and fantastical, but the balance of power is not with humans here. If you like vampire romances, this book will provide you with a romance, but you'll have to deal with more than a few mysteries and side-journeys that take away from the romance part. Oh, and the sex is minimal. As in the supe couple never consummate their relationship. Which is the only part that I really disagreed with. Well, that and the princess fairy tale that features in a very small but annoying part of the story.

I'm hoping Harkness writes a sequel, but even if this is the last of Diana Bishop's story, it was a worthwhile trip. It's about time someone capitalized on the fact that real vampires (and people who know they exist) would be excellent academics.

I've got only academic books on the horizon, but I'm hoping to go in a different (but still supernatural) direction. I'm thinking less professor characters and more fuck-ups. A decent fuck-up centric vampire story, incidentally, is Christopher Moore's Bite Me!

Italian Market

Finally went to the Italian Market today. I managed to get no Italy-related things. Instead, I got tacos at El Costeno, so far the best Mexican spot in the city. It's a tiny little place with a smattering of tables, but it was good and cheap and lovely. I then went to Fante's, a bakery supply store. Here's where I got excited! I bought some stuff:

The mini bundt pan will be used this Saturday when I make dessert for the break the fast dinner for Yom Kippur. Yom Kippur, the Jewish day of atonement, involves 24 hours of fasting from Friday evening until Saturday evening. I am looking forward to the dinner, which will be more of a breakfast, with fishes and bagels and stuff. I, however, am not fasting. What I will be doing is making nice sweet tiny cakes with various drizzles and fruit. They will hopefully fit nicely nestled in the little square paper cups.


I also found sprinkles in the shape of bones and a lip-shaped cookie cutter. Something tells me vampire lips cookies will be part of my Halloween baking this year. 

True Blood Season 3 In Review

Well folks, it's another season gone. I can't believe we've just finished season 3 of True Blood. I thought it would take forever to get to season 4, aka book 4, aka Dead to the World, one of my favorites in the series. But lets get to the review, shall we? I have spoken on the pros and cons of the season so far a while back, but it's nice to see it all in retrospect.

Spoilers ahead!

Rather than one over-arching problem (like Maryanne last season), we had a more intimate look at the characters' personal issues. Most of them revolved around Russell Edgington's sudden case of the crazies after 3000 years, but really they placed themselves in Russell's way as a result of their own ridiculous issues.

The A Plot

Bill Loses His Shine

Bill got kidnapped by crazy vampire -blood-drinking werewolves and taken to Mississippi, where he was held captive by vampire King Russell Edgington. And by held captive, I mean "gets to wear tuxes and hang out in a mansion and eats delicious blood-based cuisine." It's a gilded cage, the Edgington manse. His capture catapults Sookie into motion, trying to find him any which way she can. She goes to Eric for help, who hooks her up with a hot werewolf named Alcide with contacts in Mississippi. She learns (very very slowly) that Bill hasn't been completely up front with her and that she's a fairy. And she's pretty miffed about both. In that sorta kinda way. Lorena meets the pointy end of sharp stick after realizing she's truly unlovable.

As a result of Bill's kidnapping, we find out about Eric's viking past. Originally interested in securing Sookie for himself (he has some silly Sookie fantasies) and getting rid of Bill, he goes to Russell only to realize that his entire family was killed by Russell's werewolves. This propels him into a plan for vengeance that leads to an ultimate sacrifice: a really bad sunburn.

I have to say, this plot line ended well, in the way that it didn't end completely but we feel some kind of closure. Talbot got insinkerator'd, so he's not resurrecting any time soon. Russell is in a vat of hardening concrete, which I think will probably hold him for 3 months tops, not the 100 years Eric and Bill predicted. I mean, I'm not an idiot True Blood. I've seen Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. If Han Solo can make it, Russell can totally make it. I also know that if you don't decapitate a vampire and see his or her goop explode all over the room, that sucker is still a liability.

Anyway, Bill and Sookie are broken up again. No really, they're really for real broken up. Probably forever. Maybe. Eric outed Bill's vampire plans to capture Sookie for Queen Sophie Ann, firmly putting himself in the "vampires aren't really first, I'm first" category. That dastardly Bill; and we thought he was such a gentleman!

TV Eric Rulez

In the past few seasons, Eric has actually struck me as better than the book Eric. Book Eric is too sweet and protective of Sookie to be the ferocious guy his reputation insists he is. I like that True Blood showed that dual nature he must have to be able to care for a human and maintain a leadership role among bloodthirsty creatures.

Sookie Screams a lot and then Goes into the Starlight

Sookie got a little bit stronger in the last episode, able to take charge and not be a victim, but honey, I waited much too long for this girl to come to her senses....and then after rescinding all vampires from ever being in her house, she invites Bill in. AGAIN. Like, hang out on the porch, you live in nowheresville. Christ! You don't have to invite in everyone that knocks. You know who aren't good at teaching someone how to be fierce and powerful? Flighty, flowy, sunlight drenched fairies. They better butch up these fairies next season or I'm gonna have a problem. 

The B Plot(s)

Tara's Origin Story or How I Make Sense of this Tragic Woman

Tara was mourning Eggs this season and ended up getting involved with a bad vampire named Franklin Mott,  who continues the Torture Tara sideshow that has gone on since she was born. As good as the actor was, her rape and torment was played for laughs, and his psychotic fantasy of their "love" was not given the darkness it deserved. Her anger afterward seemed justified, but she spends so much time angry (even her depression is angry) that it didn't have the same impact. I did like, however, that she's the smart one who figured out how to escape her captor and flee the mansion.

If I was Sookie's friend, I probably would have left her ass for wanting to go back to rescue Bill. It was nice to see her take a step forward and realize that she needed to be a different person, rather than just heading for self-destruction. She cut off her hair and got the hell out of town. In my fantasy, she becomes a vampire slayer. Not like an "every one of those things should die" kind, but a protector of humanity from the bad ones.  I kind of wish this was her superhero origin story. Superheroes need to go through some effed up stuff to get to the point where they go nuts and wear costumes patrolling the streets. That's the level of stuff Tara's had to go through.

Who Cares About Jason? You? Anyone? *crickets*

Jason decided he wanted to be a cop this season, but doesn't want to do any of the actual work involved in getting there (as per usual). So he blackmails Andy into giving him a job at the station, which results in him meeting a werepanther named Crystal from Hotshot. Hotshot is an inbred redneck community that loves to make crystal meth. Do you think Crystal's dad bestowed her name upon her in honor of the family business? He blunders his way into saving the town from destruction, but really, it's Crystal whose choices freed those people. I don't think Jason will ever see that. You know what, though? I don't care about this story. I haven't all season. I actually felt like it took precious time away from Eric and Pam. We hardly got any Pam!

The Fall of Sam Merlotte

Sam meets his biological family and they are all a-holes who take advantage of him and his hospitality. He learns that he's become a bit of a pushover since moving to Bon Temps. Once upon a time, he was a thief, and an accidental murderer, and he was into putting gel in his hair. He was fierce and unafraid to threaten people while being naked. These days, he just gets drunk and berates customers and his friends. After slowly convincing Tommy to see himself and others like human beings, he decides to treat him like dirt. This results in Tommy stealing his money, Sam chasing after him, and in the only real cliffhanger of the season, Sam shoots at Tommy. Did he kill his own brother? Is Sam really a bad person and he's been pretending to be nice? I....also don't care about this story. I liked that Sookie had one person in her life that was genuine and good. Her abandonment of Merlotte's and his fall from grace doesn't sit well with me. Can he come back from this? Hmph.

I Would Totally Hang Out with Jessica Hanby

Jessica was lost without Bill, who taught her nothing about survival or about what to do if he were to go away for the weekend. She had broken up with Hoyt last season and spent the season hating what she has become. After trying to clean up the mess she caused by draining a trucker, she gets a job at Merlotte's and is actually very good at her job. Eventually, she and Hoyt reunite and it looks like he rented a house for them to live in together.  I heart this girl. I want to take her out for a girls night of dancing and help her with her problems. I'd have to wear 7-inch heels and lose 80 pounds to walk into a club next to her, though, so maybe I'm not the right gal for the job. She needs a best girl friend. And NOT SOOKIE, for the love of god.

Lala + Jesus

Lafayette continues to live (which I LOVE) and is amazing. We learn about his mom's schizophrenia, he gets a cute boyfriend who is a witch, and manages to have some moments of joy. He goes on a V trip with said boyfriend that really teaches the lesson that you shouldn't take hallucinogens if you've got a bungalow decorated in varieties of freaky figurines. Just a tip. And now it seems he has some measure of clairvoyance. But not the "bad feeling" or "dark aura" kind that you would want to have. No instead he gets the "frightening visions" form of the affliction. Great job universe! That has to be the most disturbing power ever. Whatever, I'm just glad he's still alive. He's one of the best characters that has ever been on television.


Arlene and Terry get serious, she finds out she's pregnant with Rene's baby (time sure goes slowly in Bon Temps) and freaks out about carrying serial murderer DNA into the world. This leads her to attempt a mystical witchy herb tea abortion that doesn't work. Don't you hate when that happens?



The Fall and Rise and Possibly Fall of Sophie Ann

Sophie Ann wore some fierce outfits this season, and was a delight even though she didn't play that large of an on-screen role. She started to lose her grip on her queendom by peddling V, attracting the attention of the Authority and Edgington, which resulted in her time in the cage (above) and a forced marriage to Russell. She lucks out with Russell going to sleep with the pylons. At the end of the season, she's back on top.

This dress, with the scarlet lining on the inside? Amazing:

Our real cliffhanger this season happens when Bill lures her to his house to kill her (to save Sookie from her clutches, aww..he wuvs her still). But, in true Bill fashion, he fucks it up. You never tell the lure that they are caught and then explain why and how you are going to kill them. That gives them time to come up with a battle plan! Anyway, I forget why I was supposed to worry about things between Bill and Sophie Ann because I was distracted by the lameness that was the flying across the room at each other.  It reminded me of Rocky. It didn't make me wonder what is going to happen to Bill. Bill, you make bad decisions. Almost all of the decisions you've made in the past 3 years were bad. Take a step back, reassess, OK? Maybe start working on a vampire database or something. Geez.


Au revoire season 3! I love you for bringing Russell into our lives.

Dante Valentine

The internet is slow today. It could be our internet company, though, which sucks big time. Anyway, that's why this took so long to upload!

As you can guess by the book in the "Sweet Lady Reads" section on the sidebar,  I'm reading Working for the Devil by Lilith Saintcrow.  Like most paranormal series, this one totally owns me until I'm finished, which luckily is only in another couple books. There are 5 in the series:


Working for the Devil (2005)
Dead Man Rising (2006)
The Devil's Right Hand (2007)
Saint City Sinners (2007)
To Hell and Back (2008)


All of the covers seem to have the red/black/white style, which is a nice reprieve from the "bare-midriff-leather-clad-seductress" cover on every other paranormal book ever.

I can only vouch for books 1-3, but man they are totally addictive. This series isn't about vampires. Well, there are vampires, but they aren't in the foreground (at least not yet). The books are about a necromancer named Dante Valentine. She also goes by "Danny" Valentine. In a future (seemingly) where paranormal creatures have come out, humans with what we would call a "sixth sense" are called "psions."

Psions are people with all kinds of magical abilities: witchy spellcasting, precognition, raising the dead, all kinds of stuff. Psions in this new world (and it is new, with different kinds of political formations and religious groups) are not exactly popular. They are mostly feared, but legally tolerated.  What makes a necromancer different is that they are instantly recognizable. They have a face tattoo and are legally allowed to carry weapons. They are all forced to dye their hair black in order to maintain some kind of united front and also to certify that you are dealing with the real thing. They have an gemstone implanted into their tattoo that sparks when they get angry. It's not really very earth-mothery. Somehow it reads to me like sci-fi. I can't explain why just yet.

Dante, our heroine, is a necromancer, she can raise the dead to ask it questions. She does it for money, and she's considered one of the best. She can raise the dead from ashes, which is apparently a big deal. You usually need most of a corpse, and she once raised hundreds of dead to account for the victims of a huge disaster. So people know her in the paranormal world. She is also a bounty hunter, specializing in bringing in paranormal bad guys. And since I just read The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and saw the movie, I pretty much pretended she looked like Lisbeth Salander the whole time I've been reading the series.

Also, because of the futuristic setting, with its weird language and dystopian elements, I also think of the Whedon comic Fray, about a vampire slayer in the future. 

What I don't think really of is Harry Potter, and even though there is a magic academy, and hints of horcruxing, it's definitely darker and more subtle. I was going to write about the magic academy here and then I started to see parallels to Hogwarts that might really mess with your brain when you're trying to read the story. Not Hogwarts. Remember that, ok?

In the first book, Dante gets roped into working a bounty that poses some emotional and physical challenge. She is supposed to take on a serial killer who is also a demon. Did I mention the Devil makes her do it? I guess you can figure that one out by the title. He assigns her a demon bodyguard. Anyway, great story, full of action, a kick ass heroine who has some serious anger issues. I love it. There is a romance element, but it is very small in the first book. The subsequent books deal with it more, and it goes places I wasn't expecting. When you're dealing with futuristic necromancers and demons, though, who can make predictions?

Oh, and I almost forgot, if you hate cliffhangers, these books are not for you. There are all kinds of questions brought up that don't get answered until the following book. Some answers I'm still waiting for. Plan to read the whole thing or nothing at all!


If you're looking to pass the time...I'd say get reading.

Molasses

Don't know why things are so slow going the past two days, but it could be that I'm not 100%. Still feeling achy and tired, but I got my butt up and went grocery shopping, which was desperately necessary. I also managed to do some painting today. I'm working on tiny paintings of vampire librarians. It's a niche market, but I'm taking a chance! Lately, I've decided to make things I would want, rather than trying to create what I think people would like. We'll see how that goes. I bought an ad in Bust Magazine for their Oct/Nov issue. Just a tiny image in their product showcase, but hopefully it will drive people to the shop. I have got to get back to blogging about that kind of stuff on the SLS blog...Slow as molasses, I swear. At least I've made time for reading this summer.

I finished a series of vampire books, the Undead series by MaryJanice Davidson. Yes, I read all the books, even though I disliked the central character intensely. I wanted to see where she took the story (hoping Betsy would get better), and to read a chick-lit vampire story. She started a genre, or at least mixed two together that hadn't really been mixed before.

Summary of the plotline:

Elizabeth "Betsy" Taylor,  has a very bad birthday. She gets laid off from her administrative assistant job, then promptly gets hit by a car and wakes up undead. After a few attempts to make herself dead-dead, she realizes she's a vampire and finds herself embroiled in vampire politics immediately. It seems that she isn't like other vamps, she can handle sunlight, doesn't get burned by holy water, and is much stronger and in control of her hunger than a young vamp should be. In fact, according to a couple of vampires she just met, she's not just a weirdo, she's the prophesied Queen of the Vampires. This, not surprisingly, pisses a lot of vamps in power off to an alarming degree.

With the help of her two vampire friends (Sinclair and Tina), her human friend (and billionaire) Jessica, and a guy she saved from suicide (Marc), she navigates her new situation. Oh, and she's obsessed with shoes. Like Carrie Bradshaw obsessed. It's a sickness.

Pros:

• Betsy is a ballsy lady, who won't take no for an answer. 
• I like that it's set in Minnesota, and has a midwestern sensibility
• Vampires are blood drinkers, with fangs, who grow more powerful with time and can't go out in the sun. Like they should. 
• Even when Betsy gets involved with a romantic partner, she doesn't do the googly-eyed romance stuff. In fact, she saves that for shoes and wedding stuff (see cons).
• Her love interest is not as powerful as she is and never will be!
• Betsy's best friend Jessica is an African American billionaire who rules in many ways. 
• Vampire Tina is really amazing.
  The devil (Lucifer, the Morningstar, Baal, etc) makes good appearances, and looks like Lena Olin, which I kind of expected. 
• Betsy's speaking style is really fun sometimes, she talks like Busy Phillips talked in Dawson's Creek. Super sarcasticy. In fact, in my brain, she's totally Busy Phillips.
• Her stepmom is awful and a great character.

Cons:

• For someone who's existence is prophesied and constantly in danger, Betsy doesn't ask good questions. Sometimes she doesn't ask any questions. It's a failure that is pointed out to her all the time. ALL. THE. TIME.
• Betsy is a narcissistic a-hole and it actually made me want to quit the series in book one. 
• Seriously, so many characters could have good, elaborate stories, but since it's in first person from Betsy's perspective, and she doesn't give a shit about her friends until they are almost dead, we never find out their cool histories.  Not a cool gal. Not at all.
• The shoe thing is stupid and goes on and on in each book. Sometimes to the detriment of story lines, which are summed up in severely short sentences

A much better series (in my humble opinion) is the Mercy Thompson series by Patricia Briggs, but that's really about werewolves more than vampires. I wasn't really super into weres of any kind, but Mercy is a really amazing character. A definite contribution to the list of great warrior women characters, Mercy is a Volkswagen auto mechanic who happens to turn into a coyote. She was raised by werewolves and makes fun of them a great deal, which I love, but also has good relationships and does encounter vampires from time to time. Her vampire friend is actually an interesting guy. If you are looking for a relatively short series that isn't finished yet, I'd definitely check it out. Oh, and don't mind the covers, they suck big time.

What's with her constantly changing tattoos? The character does have a paw print tattoo and I think some tribal arm bands (she's part Native-American), but not on the scale of these images, which are all different! Also, she is never described as working on her cars in this way. She's always wearing coveralls and all grubby. Arg! Do publishers believe they are selling these books to men? Boys? The heretofore uncornered lesbian fantasy reader? I don't understand.

True Blood Season 3 Review (So Far)

True Blood Season 3 is in full swing and I am feeling feelings y'all!

Good ones and bad.

Synopsis so far: Bill has been kidnapped by werewolves and taken to the neighboring territory of  Mississippi, headed (vampire-wise) by King Russel Edgington. He wanted Bill so he could stage a takeover of Louisiana. It appears that Bill is on a special mission for Queen Sophie Anne and he wants to know what it is, so he has him taken in the middle of his proposal dinner to Sookie. Bad timing! Russell apparently has werewolves that work for him and do his bidding in exchange for sips of his extra old and vintagey vampire blood. He only chooses the most redneck werewolves, though, so at least we know he has a screening process.

Since Bill is all kinds of missing, Sookie tries to track him down, figuring out through Jessica (who still rules) that he was taken by werewolves hopped up on V. This leads to her getting Eric involved and eventually going to Jackson, Mississippi with Eric's business associate Alcide, a werewolf who promises to protect her and give her some werewolf contacts.

Shit hits the fan, though, because when Bill is taken to Russell's mansion, he finds Lorena there, all up in this scenario. Russell's "official consort" boyfriend Talbot, who worked all night on a dinner of blood soup, with blood sorbet for dessert, was supremely pissed when Bill set Lorena on fire, destroying a rug. He queens it up big time in every scene, and even though he's awful, I love him.  Anyway, stupid Lorena lives through his fire bombing.

Meanwhile, Eric has been selling V for Sophie Ann in an effort to make money for the failing queendom of Louisiana and totally gets caught by the Magister, who dickishly takes Pam hostage as punishment! In a pinch, Eric blames Bill for the V sales and goes to Mississippi to bring him back to the Magister in exchange for Pam.

At Russell's manse, he finds he has to act all sorts of gay to charm both Talbot and Russell into giving over Bill, getting back at Sophie Ann for selling him out to the Magister, and reclaiming his human-life era Viking crown that was taken by Russell after he murdered his whole Viking family! So Eric is a super multi-tasker this season. He also has time for secret fantasies about Sookie being into him and knowing things about him and touching his hair. He's crushing hard and fighting it big time. Oldest guy story ever told. 

Meanwhile in Tara's sad corner of the universe, she is so depressed over Eggs' death that she goes to bed with a vampire who totally stalks her life! He is in psycho love with her and wants to make her his vampire bride, so he tortures her for days and she has to play along to survive. In a show with Sookie Stackhouse, how can you possibly be labeled the Queen of Bad Decisions?

Franklin Mott  (Tara's vamp) is apparently a spy for Russell who finds out that Bill has been researching Sookie for Sophie Ann. Bill, it turns out, has a special skill, besides brooding. Who knew? He procures things. And since Russell is obsessed with having special souvenirs, he wants a Sookie. So he manages to get her by luring Bill and paying Mott to find out about the situation.  She does the big light thing that she did to Maryanne in response to being abducted, but still gets taken to the mansion anyway.

Everyone's at the mansion, snug as bugs in rugs for the day, when Tara manages to break free of Franklin, break Sookie out, and rescue Bill. This results in several amazing things:

Tara takes a mace and bludgeons Franklin Mott! Even though every vampire movie/tv show/book ever says that decapitation is best. And having the option of several axes over the mace. DUM.

Sookie kills Lorena!

Bill drains Sookie in a starving vampire rage blackout!

Alcide seems to shut the door on his redneck ex, Debbie Pelt! Or does he?!

Other things happened, but basically, at the end of "Hit the Ground" we're left with a barely surviving Sookie, a free Pam (Russell hates the Magister, and loves his cane, so he separated our Magister from his head. Bye Bye Magister), and also there's a BIG SECRET ABOUT SOOKIE. That I totally know.

Some things about this season:

Thing 1: Bill Compton is the Worst Dad Ever. AGAIN.

Not only did he not visibly worry once out loud about Jessica (which is exactly like last season), but he never taught her anything about being a vampire, including the depth of the sire/child bond. And yet he had time for a lecture on recycling. Bill, no pun intended, sucks in general, but you'd think he'd be better at handling a newbie vamp what with him being over a century old. Just sayin'. He also manages to play almost every angle of his capture poorly. For someone so old, and on a secret mission to procure Sookie for the queen, he's really bad at lying.

Thing 2: Alcide Herveaux, Were-Abs

I didn't really like Alcide in the books, and I know that I was supposed to (at least in the beginning). He had really dumb werewolf qualities, like being all 'master race' about being a wolf, wanting to marry only a wolf bride so he can have wolf babies, getting erections after killing other wolves...you know, dumz, right?  But in the show, well, see the picture above. Nice. Also, he is bummed on the werewolf rules and doesn't want to procreate with another wolf. Kind of a departure from the jerk in the books. We'll see how it goes.

Thing 3: Gay Eric Northman
Yay for Gay Eric, who has a special smile just for his gay times! Its hilarious.  He's in a really tough situation this season, so I can't wait to see how he comes out of it in the end. His brutality is somewhat balanced by his fascination with Sookie, but this Eric isn't the book Eric. Book Eric seemed to care about Sookie, making sure to follow her to Jackson and keep an eye on her, focusing his time on rescuing Bill (even though he knew it was in his best interest to let him rot) because Sookie felt the need to rescue him. Also, book Eric has a funnier nature. Though calling the Hotshot folks "brother-cousins" earns him major points for this season.


Thing 4: The Mickens'

These people are proof that just because you're related, doesn't mean you need to ever have contact with them. They make their kid shift into a pit bull so he can win dog fights. Wow. I don't get it, can't you shift into all sorts of things that would allow you to finagle money and free stuff? Anyway, Sam has to deal with his bio-family in a big way this season, and since Sookie is off galavanting around Mississippi, he has no one in his corner.  I hope that changes. At least he seems to have his brother Tommy.



Thing 5: Lafayette Loves Jesus

I'm still pulling for L+J, even though it seems like they have hit a rough patch. Their one date was magical. It ended with Lafayette saying, "Tell yo mamma two faggots kicked yo ass." Sweet.


Thing 6: Talbot Plus Russel Forever (or at least until their inevitable end and or ends this season)
I love this relationship. 

Thing 7: Goodbye Lorena

 She wore the best outfits on the whole show. And, she clearly had a backstory that gave her psycho behavior some context (despicable as it was). l was hoping the show would do cool things with her, but maybe we can still see some flashbacks?

Thing 8: Goodbye Book Sookie

Just for the record, the Sookie in the show is a total moron. I get naivete in the first season, given her sheltered and chaste upbringing, but it's season 3. She's seen a vampire staked in front of her, a maenad out of control, a vampire suicide by sunrise and killed a serial killer with a shovel. What gives?! In the book she staked Lorena without help, she managed to silently extract Bill from Russell's mansion, and she had a more sobered approach to Bill's betrayal with Lorena. She knew that he was an ass for giving her up, but she felt that he shouldn't die for his connection to her, and so set out to rescue him anyway.  This Sookie yells and screams and pleads and cries and seems to be kind of an asshole sometimes. And she wears clothing that is inappropriate for being chased, chasing someone, or being stealthy. I'm not as in her corner as I was in the books, especially book 3, Club Dead, one of the best of the series in my opinion. Breathy Sookie in the show needs to get a pair. Maybe by the end of the season, we'll see that.

Thing 9: Jason Stackhouse Continues to Steal Minutes from Important Storylines

Sorry, I love the actor, and his Jason gives me all kinds of giggles, but I don't care about him, his ridiculous plan to be a cop, nor his attempt to save Crystal from Hotshot because he's such a better catch. 


Finally, Thing 10: Jessica Continues to Rule

I loved Jessica and Pam's discussion on how to get rid of a dead body. Even though she's been totally abandoned, she's managed to do much more than anyone else in this whole show. She was proactive about getting rid of said body by asking good questions, trying to rent a chainsaw instead of buying, she got a job, keeps up the Compton house, pines over Hoyt but doesn't kill him or anyone he likes, and barely even eats people because she's trying to be good. She's all Lestat about only eating evil-doers, too. She only eats a really nasty, bitchy customer. It's fitting punishment for someone who has the audacity to show up in public to eat in curlers and proceeds to stay past closing.

In closing, True Blood Season 3 has so far kept me interested, but it has changed the core values and qualities of some of the characters from the books so much, that I feel a bit disconnected from all of them, leaving me without someone with whom I can really identify.