Tag Archives: anne rice

Hey…ya know it’s basically illegal to write fanfics based on Anne Rice’s books right?

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vampchronfic:

She has  said (2013-14?) on her FB page that she basically doesn’t care one way or another, she chooses to ignore it—she hasn’t given her blessing but no, not “illegal”. 

@vampchronfic is correct, AR currently ignores fanfic:

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(^I don’t know the year of that one, I screencapped it before FB had the year listed in the comment, I think it’s 2014.)

Much argument and analysis has been made of the war on fanfic that Anne Rice waged against her fans in the 1990′s and early 2000′s, and yes, those being copyrighted characters, she was within her rights to wage that war.

However, many of us, in many fandoms, have written fanfiction for pleasure and not for profit, for many years. And times have changed. Anne Rice said, in 2012:

“I got upset about 20 years ago because I thought [fanfiction] would block me,” she said. “However, it’s been very easy to avoid reading any, so live and let live.”

There are authors who currently recognize fanfiction as just one of many ways that fans engage with their published and copyrighted works, Anne Rice being one of them.

AR now “ignores fanfiction.” That’s her current stance. We don’t have her approval, we have her tolerance.

*~And AO3 has pledged itself as a safe haven* for fanfic writers to post their works!~*

A few screencaps under the cut, cut for length.

Snippets below were screencapped tonight. [X]

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Some of AR’s fans also disapprove of VC fanfic, and that’s fine. But if she ignores it, I would ask others to ignore it as well. This fan explains his reasons for ignoring VC fanfic:

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Speaking for myself, and other fanfic writers, we feel that we can realize her characters, storylines, and detailed worlds. For us to translate our imagination into words for the fandom’s enjoyment is a gift for us, too. There are many types of fanfic, many things left unaddressed in canon, and then there’s the AU fanfic, etc…. we just want to play with her toys, we are not taking them away from her, or trying to sell them as our own. And she is tolerating it.

Anne Rice Facebook livestream breakdown

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firelight-fading:

firelight-fading:

Today, Anne Rice had two livestreams on Facebook, the first as a general Q&A and the second specifically related to the Vampire Chronicles television show. Part way through the second livestream, the video glitched and I missed a minute or two, but overall this is what I had.

I’ve divided the information into 3 sections and highlighted the most important or interesting things she mentioned in my opinion):

Anne Herself

  • Anne wants to assure fans she is the ONLY one who answers and sees emails sent by fans. She tries hard to view all of them
  • She also reassures that shes been trying to read as many comments given on Facebook as possible and to consider them
  • In her writing process, she can’t do all-nighters anymore; her books about Christ were the last time she really did this
  • She
    loves how people in New Orleans love life and celebrate it. She misses
    New Orleans terribly. She notes, “Lifestyles [down there] are inherited and have a
    beauty”
  • She reads more non-fiction than fiction and constantly
    takes notes from them, especially about archeology (which she loves:
    “It’s like eating ice cream for me! I love it so much”)
  • She
    says she no longer identifies as a Christian, but still has a love for
    Jesus and what he has done for her, such as helping her solve problems and beyond that
  • She has some new announcement coming soon not concerning the vampires
  • She feels this is the age of the nerd where
    readers’ opinions are most important. Says she has always taken us the readers seriously and wants us to feel appreciated. She appreciates our
    power and what we have done for the series.

The Books and The Characters

  • *spoiler* There is NO certainty Mona and Quinn are dead. This is just what Lestat believes.
  • She went through the pronunciations of characters’ names
    • Marius is pronounced like Marius in Les Miserables
    • Mekare is May-care-ee, but thinks other pronunciations are beautiful too
      • (And I think as a fandom we’ve come to agreements on everyone else’s names. She went by the names fast!)
  • Anne says she sums up the story of the chronicles as “how badly Lestat wants to be the hero of his own life”
  • She appreciates fans pointing out mistakes in her writing since she wants to be as accurate as possible, especially when it comes to history/time periods
  • When
    asked about the taste of blood/how it functions, Anne says blood is
    like every kind of drug- it’s sex, alcohol, drugs, everything
  • She
    writes a TON of notes since she occasionally forgets when/how certain
    things are mentioned, such as how the Savage Garden was introduced in
    the novel (which she no knows as something that occurred during Our Conversation with Nicolas and Lestat)
  • The name “Talamasca” came from a book on old witchcraft she found
  • Lestat’s
    name was a “blunder” rather than a “eureka” moment. His name was NOT
    based on her husband Stan intentionally. She was trying to look up old
    french names.
  • The transformation process of human to vampire (after getting the Dark Gift) is a little slower than how the IWTV film portrayed, but close in Anne’s mind (she truly appreciated how the film went above to stay close to her own visions and her work)
  • During his time with Louis and Claudia, Lestat attempted to give answers
    that would “keep them alive” rather than actual answers, knowing that he
    couldn’t reveal what he knew due to what Marius had told him     (essentially, not just answers that he thought would satisfy them but that he thought would carry them on by themselves…which worked in my opinion)
  • There were several questions
    about Gabrielle and Becket commented about how Gabrielle is a fan favorite before he introduced the questions:
    • Anne says Gabrielle is cold, but admits that she loves Lestat yet at the same time doesn’t need him.
    • She does not see Gabrielle as
      autistic (she laughed at this question which really irked me :/ )
    • She will not write about a memoir from Gabrielle’s point of view since
      she wants Lestat to stay the focus of “the tribe” and she’s done with
      writing those sort of side books.
  • Lestat’s main concern right now is “keeping the tribe together”
  • She wants to continue with exploring some of the newer characters, Fareed and Seth were mentioned as a part of this.
  • Anne
    has an “ambivalence” towards Louis and she loves him since he
    represents an old part of her, but this is also the same reason she has
    trouble going back and writing for him, because she feels she is now a different person
  • She
    appreciates that there is no “real” consensus on what is the best/worst
    of her books amongst the fans (though Memnoch was her first example for
    worse soooo 😏)
  • In some ways, how Amel speaks to Lestat is a metaphor for how Lestat speaks to Anne.

The Television Show

(Casting)

  • Armand will NOT be played by someone around 14, because of the long filming process and how it will age the actor. She acknowledges fans want someone young for Armand but feels it
    will be too difficult to use     (um, hello Anne, CGI??)

  • She thinks Cate Blanchett would be a wonderful pick for Gabrielle.
  • Says
    the looks are most important for Lestat, Louis just has to be beautiful
    (lol)
  • She really cares about the appearances of the cast and their availability to do about 5-6 years of filming

(Chronology and Production)

  • She
    thinks she will not go through network tv, so the home to the show would be Amazon,
    Hulu or Netflix.
  • She feels the show won’t be as violent as Game of Thrones but wants that
    integrity and style, and that “authenticity” to the books that Game of Thrones has (So for the rating,
    I’m guessing she feels around M?)
  • Anne wants to be true to the books and what the fans want to see (in regards to characters and plot points)
  • She appreciated
    the commitment of the team for the IWTV film and wants to keep up to that standard. She does not want unreasonable changes and compromises
  • Chronologically, she wants to begin with TVL with Lestat as a young man.
    • Feels around the 2nd/3rd season is where IWTV would start
    • The books are long, so it will not be a one season / one book situation.
    • It
      will begin chronologically, so it won’t be Lestat reading IWTV and THEN
      starting with his story as a response, it will start in France as the
      events happen       (I was hoping it would be the former…)
  • No Mayfair witches in the show
  • Characters who are introduced later, but existed chronologically earlier like Benedick and Magnus, will be put earlier in
    the show
  • The Talamasca will be heavily involved “eventually” in
    the series, possibly earlier on. Related to this, she wants to tell the
    history of her vampires and those entities.
  • She
    wants to definitely (so badly) cover the scene where Lestat is being
    turned “stage by stage…” meaning him being in the tower and having
    realizations about his strength after drinking the blood. Also, how he
    turns Gabrielle (possibly wants to have a young actress to play
    Gabrielle and have her human age appear through makeup so the transformation will be more dramatic)
  • Louis’ story WILL be told, but the show will be mostly from Lestat’s POV
  • Anne hopes the show will go into production before the end of this year. Around 2018
    is when it would come out
  • Anne and Chris have had a lot of interested companies already looking into
    developing the project (but she doesn’t want to reveal who is talking to them since it “wouldn’t be fair”)
  • She isn’t sure if the show will break the 4th
    wall. She acknowledges that Lestat does it in the books, but she feels
    she would have to stick with it for the entirety of the show and that
    would be difficult (so it sounds like mostly a “no” but she’s considering it)
  • Christopher
    and her are currently outlining around 5 seasons (estimated) for the TV
    series. They are also writing drafts for the first 4 episodes

Clarifying a few notes for everyone since they were brought to my attention:

Casting Armand: Anne said she wanted to do this chronologically as the events happened in the books, not as the order the books come in. When we are first introduced to Armand, yes, he is 17, but his story in The Vampire Armand begins when he is 14/15 (when he is kidnapped and before he meets Marius). She mentioned something about the later half of the first season or the second season being dedicated to Marius telling his tale to Lestat and the history of the vampires, so, based off her suggestions, it was implied TVA would also be a part of this (maybe expanding a viewer perspective to outside of what he tells Lestat)…
Or maybe she totally forgot his age, but she said “14” in the stream, so that is what I wrote down.

The lengths of the seasons going along with the books: Anne said it would depend on how many episodes there would be per season. I guess she’s thinking of shorter lengths of episodes and seasons to focus solely on certain plot points? It’s a bit odd. I think one book = one season could definitely be do-able, however…

I think with the production quality she wants in the amount of time she wants it, I think her goals are unrealistic. I have other thoughts about what she said, but I will keep them to myself unless asked. That being said, if anyone has questions or concerns, feel free to send me an ask and let me know

Also adding, from @firelight-fading, just so it’s all on one post:

Here is the Youtube video of the first Q&A

Here is the Youtube video of the second Q&A, specifically related to the television series

If there is anything I missed in my highlights post in regards to these two videos that you would like to bring up / discuss, feel free to mention it in a reblog or in the comments section.

Thanks ~

Anne Rice Facebook livestream breakdown

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firelight-fading:

Today, Anne Rice had two livestreams on Facebook, the first as a general Q&A and the second specifically related to the Vampire Chronicles television show. Part way through the second livestream, the video glitched and I missed a minute or two, but overall this is what I had.

I’ve divided the information into 3 sections and highlighted the most important or interesting things she mentioned in my opinion):

Anne Herself

  • Anne wants to assure fans she is the ONLY one who answers and sees emails sent by fans. She tries hard to view all of them
  • She also reassures that shes been trying to read as many comments given on Facebook as possible and to consider them
  • In her writing process, she can’t do all-nighters anymore; her books about Christ were the last time she really did this
  • She
    loves how people in New Orleans love life and celebrate it. She misses
    New Orleans terribly. She notes, “Lifestyles [down there] are inherited and have a
    beauty”
  • She reads more non-fiction than fiction and constantly
    takes notes from them, especially about archeology (which she loves:
    “It’s like eating ice cream for me! I love it so much”)
  • She
    says she no longer identifies as a Christian, but still has a love for
    Jesus and what he has done for her, such as helping her solve problems and beyond that
  • She has some new announcement coming soon not concerning the vampires
  • She feels this is the age of the nerd where
    readers’ opinions are most important. Says she has always taken us the readers seriously and wants us to feel appreciated. She appreciates our
    power and what we have done for the series.

The Books and The Characters

  • *spoiler* There is NO certainty Mona and Quinn are dead. This is just what Lestat believes.
  • She went through the pronunciations of characters’ names
    • Marius is pronounced like Marius in Les Miserables
    • Mekare is May-care-ee, but thinks other pronunciations are beautiful too
      • (And I think as a fandom we’ve come to agreements on everyone else’s names. She went by the names fast!)
  • Anne says she sums up the story of the chronicles as “how badly Lestat wants to be the hero of his own life”
  • She appreciates fans pointing out mistakes in her writing since she wants to be as accurate as possible, especially when it comes to history/time periods
  • When
    asked about the taste of blood/how it functions, Anne says blood is
    like every kind of drug- it’s sex, alcohol, drugs, everything
  • She
    writes a TON of notes since she occasionally forgets when/how certain
    things are mentioned, such as how the Savage Garden was introduced in
    the novel (which she no knows as something that occurred during Our Conversation with Nicolas and Lestat)
  • The name “Talamasca” came from a book on old witchcraft she found
  • Lestat’s
    name was a “blunder” rather than a “eureka” moment. His name was NOT
    based on her husband Stan intentionally. She was trying to look up old
    french names.
  • The transformation process of human to vampire (after getting the Dark Gift) is a little slower than how the IWTV film portrayed, but close in Anne’s mind (she truly appreciated how the film went above to stay close to her own visions and her work)
  • During his time with Louis and Claudia, Lestat attempted to give answers
    that would “keep them alive” rather than actual answers, knowing that he
    couldn’t reveal what he knew due to what Marius had told him     (essentially, not just answers that he thought would satisfy them but that he thought would carry them on by themselves…which worked in my opinion)
  • There were several questions
    about Gabrielle and Becket commented about how Gabrielle is a fan favorite before he introduced the questions:
    • Anne says Gabrielle is cold, but admits that she loves Lestat yet at the same time doesn’t need him.
    • She does not see Gabrielle as
      autistic (she laughed at this question which really irked me :/ )
    • She will not write about a memoir from Gabrielle’s point of view since
      she wants Lestat to stay the focus of “the tribe” and she’s done with
      writing those sort of side books.
  • Lestat’s main concern right now is “keeping the tribe together”
  • She wants to continue with exploring some of the newer characters, Fareed and Seth were mentioned as a part of this.
  • Anne
    has an “ambivalence” towards Louis and she loves him since he
    represents an old part of her, but this is also the same reason she has
    trouble going back and writing for him, because she feels she is now a different person
  • She
    appreciates that there is no “real” consensus on what is the best/worst
    of her books amongst the fans (though Memnoch was her first example for
    worse soooo 😏)
  • In some ways, how Amel speaks to Lestat is a metaphor for how Lestat speaks to Anne.

The Television Show

(Casting)

  • Armand will NOT be played by someone around 14, because of the long filming process and how it will age the actor. She acknowledges fans want someone young for Armand but feels it
    will be too difficult to use     (um, hello Anne, CGI??)

  • She thinks Cate Blanchett would be a wonderful pick for Gabrielle.
  • Says
    the looks are most important for Lestat, Louis just has to be beautiful
    (lol)
  • She really cares about the appearances of the cast and their availability to do about 5-6 years of filming

(Chronology and Production)

  • She
    thinks she will not go through network tv, so the home to the show would be Amazon,
    Hulu or Netflix.
  • She feels the show won’t be as violent as Game of Thrones but wants that
    integrity and style, and that “authenticity” to the books that Game of Thrones has (So for the rating,
    I’m guessing she feels around M?)
  • Anne wants to be true to the books and what the fans want to see (in regards to characters and plot points)
  • She appreciated
    the commitment of the team for the IWTV film and wants to keep up to that standard. She does not want unreasonable changes and compromises
  • Chronologically, she wants to begin with TVL with Lestat as a young man.
    • Feels around the 2nd/3rd season is where IWTV would start
    • The books are long, so it will not be a one season / one book situation.
    • It
      will begin chronologically, so it won’t be Lestat reading IWTV and THEN
      starting with his story as a response, it will start in France as the
      events happen       (I was hoping it would be the former…)
  • No Mayfair witches in the show
  • Characters who are introduced later, but existed chronologically earlier like Benedick and Magnus, will be put earlier in
    the show
  • The Talamasca will be heavily involved “eventually” in
    the series, possibly earlier on. Related to this, she wants to tell the
    history of her vampires and those entities.
  • She
    wants to definitely (so badly) cover the scene where Lestat is being
    turned “stage by stage…” meaning him being in the tower and having
    realizations about his strength after drinking the blood. Also, how he
    turns Gabrielle (possibly wants to have a young actress to play
    Gabrielle and have her human age appear through makeup so the transformation will be more dramatic)
  • Louis’ story WILL be told, but the show will be mostly from Lestat’s POV
  • Anne hopes the show will go into production before the end of this year. Around 2018
    is when it would come out
  • Anne and Chris have had a lot of interested companies already looking into
    developing the project (but she doesn’t want to reveal who is talking to them since it “wouldn’t be fair”)
  • She isn’t sure if the show will break the 4th
    wall. She acknowledges that Lestat does it in the books, but she feels
    she would have to stick with it for the entirety of the show and that
    would be difficult (so it sounds like mostly a “no” but she’s considering it)
  • Christopher
    and her are currently outlining around 5 seasons (estimated) for the TV
    series. They are also writing drafts for the first 4 episodes

(ﾉ^ヮ^)ﾉ*:・ﾟ✧  

Re: the above, it’s a #Long post, so extra huge thanks to @firelight-fading for taking one for the team and not only watching the OVCFB livestream but gathering up all this info into such clean formatting for us! We salute you.

Going to be liveblogging the Facebook stream in 5 minutes!

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firelight-fading:

Anne Rice is starting off with a Q&A livestream on her page and then in half an hour (30 minutes) will do one regarding the new Vampire Chronicles tv series on that page.

I will be posting some of the questions and conversations here in a singularly reblogged feed (meaning it will start with one post and I will reblog that post with updates for everyone to see)

So I’ve always held VC as a back burner fandom on account of how little I’d read of it(though I’ve been reading it a lot as of late)but after going on Anne Rice’s FB and seeing talk of a series I nearly cried real tears out of my own eyes bruh.

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Welcome to the *~front burner~*, fam. When??? we’re actually getting that TV series is always a question – and those of us who have waited for years between adaptations have the patience of saints – but hell, why not be excited about it? Or at least cautiously optimistic 😉 Let it out. You can cry, bruh.

AR is planning on starting with TVL and she’s asking for fan input*, so…. let’s give it to her!

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*@claudias-ashes shared this w/ me JUST TODAY:

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Gallery

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It’s happening. Cracked it open. 

Figuratively, bc I sent my signed copy to its proper owner, but I have the e-reader version OPEN. Notes are being taken.

Don’t expect me to rail against it, what I’m looking for is good stuff. Anything from vampire physiology to clever dialogue, to good characterization, really, I am keeping an open mind and looking for the silver lining ❤

BUT, I do want to make a masterpost of links to ppl’s reviews, so please comment/reblog/

message me

w/ links so I can put together and share the most comprehensive masterpost.

Gallery

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Oh my gosh, well… I waited 6 hours, but there was no further message, so I’m just going to answer now.

“I don’t know how to feel about Anne…”

Respectfully, I’m not going to tell you how to feel about Anne Rice. I must regretfully decline.

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I know how I feel about her: that she has given us a wonderful gift and that she has committed no actual crime for which she would deserve to be boycotted. We can poke fun at her, at her books, we can critique them, bc she has set herself and her works for public review. We can feel distrustful for her past behavior towards the fandom and distrustful of her handling of her own characters. Those are all within our rights as a critical public.

I always recommend that people read the books and draw their own conclusions about them on their own merits. It’s part of what makes fandom great, that we can agree on some things, disagree on others, and have lively discussions about it all.

What I will tell you is that you don’t have to like Anne Rice to read her stories. To my knowledge, she has not committed ANY REAL LIFE ACTUAL CRIMES. People boycott actual criminals bc we do not want to financially or morally support them. IMO, Anne Rice should NOT be lumped in with REAL LIFE ACTUAL CRIMINALS.

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It is not a crime that she waged war on fanfic. It was incredibly painful and it shattered the fandom, and drove us all underground for years ;A; But she was within her legal rights. Keep in mind that fandom was not really socially acceptable or understood like it is today, authors understand now that fanworks are types of fan engagement with canon and each other. She seems to understand that now, or if not, she at least ignores fanfic.

It is not a crime that she waged war on reviewers. Also painful and oppressive at the time, AR used to be very offended by critical or negative reviews of her books, and would sic her People of the Page on reviewers. Again, she now seems to understand that people are within their rights to critique her work and she can ignore them.

What she writes is not an actual crime. She has problematic elements and explores taboo subjects in her writing, refuses any editor’s advice, refuses anyone’s idea of what she should write. That’s her prerogative as a ‘music maker,’ as a ‘dreamer of dreams’ (<– like Willy Wonka!). To argue that any of her writing is a crime is, to me, a form of censorship, and I do not believe in censorship of fiction.

^^^^None of these are Real Life actual crimes. Personally, I may not accept all of her writing as canon, and I may poke fun at it, too, that’s my prerogative as a reader.

The idea that all art should be entirely unproblematic all the time…kills art. Like, I really don’t think we as readers have some all-solemn duty to constantly make sure we’re only having the ~right~ kind of fun.

But that’s just my opinion. You’ll have to draw your own conclusions and decide whether you want to financially/morally support Anne Rice by buying/reading her books, or not.