Paula's Reviews > Beauty

Yes, this is long. My issues with Beauty run deep and wide. Yes, I could just stop reading LKH's books if they bother me so much. I keep hearing that this book and that book are a "return to form" and I keep hoping against hope that this will one day be true. I love the pre-NiC books, I really do. And I would love to see that Anita, and those characters come back again. So I'll probably continue reading, no matter how bad things get. Because that's how I roll.

I love reading outtakes, especially ones that give me sexy times, especially ones with multiple partners. Throw in vampires and people topping each other, and it's an awesome combination of several of my kinks, all in one. So while I had some reservations (because let's face it, LKH hasn't exactly had luck writing good sex scenes lately), I really wanted to like this.

First, the non-writing related issues: This is not worth $3, not even with the sample chapter. This is 7 pages of publisher info/title pages, 25 Kindle pages of story (which take approximately 20 minutes to read, if that), 14 pages of the sample chapter, and another 4 pages of publisher/book info. This scene was cut out of the book for reasons, and there was nothing that warranted making this into a money grab. LKH would have done herself much better if she'd offered it on her website as a giveaway to whet our appetites, so to speak.

And then I actually read it, starting with the intro. Remember the good old days when Anita actually did animator work and helped the police on cases? Yeah, me neither, not anymore. But OK, let's give her that. She now has people to come home to, which is nice. Although if you need a *schedule to manage your love life, I think you're doing something wrong. I'm all for people being with more than one person. But let's not kid ourselves and call what Anita has polyamory, because that would require that Anita actually care about her partners, rather than them only caring for her. And I can't help but think that with however many men Anita has tied to her, she might be getting stretched a little thin, especially given her own previous emotional and intimacy issues. But OK, whatever, maybe it works for the men of Anita's harem.

And then we get into Anita's rant about the "jealous whiner babies" who give her shit for being petite (drink!) attractive (drink!) woman (drink!) who sleeps with a lot of men (drink!). I'm all for princesses rescuing themselves. I'm all for princesses rescuing the princes, too. But for crying out loud, why is this part of the paragraph even there? What does this have to do with Anita coming home to the men she's with? And don't get me started on the fact that the fact the men love Anita for being a "sexually-aggressive woman" and encourage that. The last time Anita was sexually aggressive, she slept with a kid. The time before that, she raped a guy and broke his mind. So, uh, you know, maybe a little less encouragement of that would be good. I get that this isn't what's actually being said, but given Anita's history with aggression and sex, maybe a slightly different word choice would have been more appropriate.

Then we get three paragraphs about gun safety (yay, responsible use of weapons!) and the fact that Anita is OK being naked, but not OK being unarmed. I actually like this characterization detail, but why do we need three paragraphs to say what could have been said just as well in 2-3 sentences?

The big black marble bathtub is weird, because later on, it's hard to tell how deep it is, and with the author's insistence on bringing up height differences and how bodies fit together, it gets a little disorienting. The big black marble bathtub also looks like something off a porno set. I know that it's supposed to be opulent, and demonstrate that Jean-Claude's a man of taste and wealth, but... I don't know, it falls flat for me. And, you know, we've seen the bathtub described multiple times, so why do this? If it was a full-length book, OK, fine, describe it for new readers. But in an outtake? Why? Who's going to start reading a series from a book numbered in the 20s, let alone a short outtake?

The same goes for the description of Jean-Claude. If it was written differently, less clinical observation and more through the eye of a lover waxing poetically about her man's body, I'd maybe be willing to let it slide. As it is, though, it reads about as passionate as a suspect description on a police report. The (blue) description of his (blue) eyes is (blue) very (blue) long and rambling, but perhaps Anita's finally getting into the spirit and waxing poetic about things.

And then at last, we have actual character interaction! There's love in people's eyes! Smoldering looks are exchanged! Anita gets excited! BUT WAIT! First we need to detour to Anita's issues yet again, because when sexy bathtub times are imminent, that's totally the best time to dwell yet again on how nobody thinks Anita's pretty and they're all going to get tired of her and then she'll be forever alone. Just... no. I'm sorry, but this is bullshit. I understand that Anita may have some intimacy issues, and that they come up at inopportune moments. But why not simply let Beauty be what it was promised to be, a steamy sex scene between Anita and her men, and leave the angst for another time? I'm pretty certain none of the positive reviews gushing about how "hot" this scene focus on the intricate interplay of the negative emotions hovering close to the surface and threatening to break through, upsetting the delicate balance of Anita's intimate life.

If there was some sort of exploration of Anita's feelings on her use of the ardeur and binding men to her, and a demonstration of her awareness that perhaps "magical mind whammy" =/= true love, then perhaps these repeated ramblings would have a place in the novels. But as it is, with Anita seemingly not even aware that what she's doing is problematic (remember Flirt, after the rape of Nicky?), what is the point to this, other than to them have the men falling over themselves to reassure Anita that no, she's the specialest, most beautiful snowflake of them all?

Then we finally get to the sex, and it... I don't know what it is. I don't understand, this thing is full of kinks I enjoy reading, but it does nothing for me. Something about the way it's written is so off-putting that I can't get past it. The strange insistence on bringing up the height differences again! I'm pretty sure that if a woman's legs are wrapped around the waist of a man, no matter how tall he is, their "naughty bits" (ugh) aren't going to be that far apart. But her, it seems like JC has some sort of freakishly elongated waist, because while Anita's humping his ribcage, he's still somewhere far below her.

And then Little Boy Blue Asher arrives, and rather than the scene seamlessly continuing and turning up the heat, we're subjected to a detailed (why?) description of Asher's powder blue tailcoat (for pity's sake, why?) without any explanation for why he's dressed like that. I assume it was because he was on stage upstairs at the Circus, but I don't know, maybe (blue) Asher (blue) just (blue) likes to (blue) walk (blue) around (blue) in blue satin. You get the (blue) idea. I guess he just really likes blue?

And then, once again, rather than just get straight to the good stuff, we get the eleventieth rehash of Jean-Claude and Asher's painful history, because of reasons. I got nothing.

We don't need this rehash, it brings nothing to the scene, and it just looks like wordcount padding. But then, eye candy! Asher recreates Mr. Darcy's fall into the pond for us, and we're treated to an impromptu wet t-shirt contest. Anita takes some time to ogle Asher, which I applaud her for. Two hot guys in a tub with her, a girl is entitled to a little staring.

And then, FINALLY, we get to the sex. The actual sex part is about 2,200 words long, and is packed with several kinks readers of the Anita Blake books probably enjoy. It takes a special skill to take a sexy threesome between loving partners, combine it with basically bulletproof kinks that the target audience enjoys, and turn out something that falls completely flat, but Beauty manages. Everything is so by-the numbers and analytical that any appeal is stripped out. The relentless in-and-out of the sex, the mindless screaming (either there's something wrong with her nervous system that makes her scream with pleasure as soon as the actual intercourse starts, or it's bad writing), combined with the clinically dry, completely sensuality-free language of the scene just falls flat and leaves me longing for something else.

I suppose it could be worse, they could be using soap for lube.