So…. in 1996 I was in middle school and had a friend over and my dad “caught” us watching IWTV in my room – of course it was the version that was (heavily) edited for TV but that didn’t occur to him so he actually took the TV out of my room so that we couldn’t watch anything else. Well I wanted to know how the damn movie ended so I convinced my mother to let me rent (on VHS, btw) the original movie (which was way more graphic than the version we had been watching).
Then, at the middle school I was attended, they let you read any book you wanted for the reading requirement as long as you read a certain number of pages per day. So I’m in the library that was attached to the school and – whoa – IWTV! So I picked that book to read for my middle school reading requirement. And when I was done with that I asked my mom to buy for me TVL… My mom was *thrilled* because I had been homeschooled for a few years and even though I whizzed through math text books, I *hated* reading and always did the bare minimum. My father was less thrilled and threw my copy of TVL in the trash several times.
So, my mother, bless her heart, calls up a local book store and asks them to put one of every Anne Rice book on hold for her – because she thinks Anne Rice ONLY wrote The Vampire Chronicles. Apparently without really looking at what she was buying, she has the book store put all the books on hold into a bag and ring them up….. and THAT is how my mother accidentally bought me smut when I was in middle school.
I’d finished all the vampire chronicles that were out in time for TVA which came out one week before my 14th birthday in 1998 (I was gifted three copies – I probably should have thought to ask for more than just that book…).
Seeing phrases like “I was sucked into the VC obsession hellhole when I was 14” and “Once I finished TotBT on January 22, 2012” in the same sentence make me feel positively ancient! Buuuut I couldn’t be happier, of course, that there are so many new and young fans. We can always use the fresh blood. 😉
^Yeah, it makes me feel a bit old, too, similarly, I’d read #1-4 by 1994. #5 (Memnoch the Devil) was my first fresh one. But hey, I’ve aged like a fine wine!
^LOUIS OMG RUDE I know it gets cold so quickly but show a little respect!
Well, as you know #I love these kind of stories. We may be old, but I think we got to experience the VC in a unique way. Like you, I was at the age when I could yearn for a new VC book and then get excited asking for it as a birthday present or going to the bookstore to pick it up. I didn’t like the feel of new hardcovers, though. Preferred the paperbacks, as they had a more friendly handfeel and pleasant scent.
When I find myself in times of trouble Father Louis come to me, speaking words of wisdom “You crazy, careless, flamboyant, vain monster, I don’t mean this to hurt you but I love you”. And he said all this in the space of 4 pages lol
A question only I can answer?! Pffffft, that would be true only if I was Anne Rice herself. Although really she ought to deputize me as one of her fandom spokespeople, my VC obsession has made me such a great resource for the fandom!
1. Does Louis just not care that she put a “fix” on him or does he still not believe her?
In his letter, Louis says that she admitted to bewitching him:
“No talk from Merrick of her potent spells can excuse my actions, though in fact, she does indeed claim to have brought me to her with magic I cannot understand. What I understand is that I love her…” – Louis de Pointe du Lac, Merrick
I think that as he writes this, he feels love for her, but he knows it can’t be real love. He must feel tricked at some level, why else commit suicide right after making a loved one into a vampire? If he really loved her, he would want to stay alive and be with her. I think he’s chosen death because he knows what he did was wrong and rather than just adding another vampire to the world, he’s taking himself out, so there’s no change in the number of vampires ;A;
2. Is that spell still there?
I think Louis is still bewitched as he writes his letter, but it’s probably worn off to some extent in the process of his resuscitation. It has definitely worn off by the time he is himself again, but I think at that point he has to consider Merrick with some natural love, because she is his fledgling and there will always be a bond there. The Dark Gift is probably the most intimate experience a vampire can give/receive.
3. And why does Lestat react so nonchalantly to it, as if it was funny rather than a bad thing? Shouldn’t he be a bit more…I dunno, jealous and pissed?
Lestat has just woken up again, cut him some slack! He’s disoriented! “With an awkward step, as though his body, so long unused, revolted against him, he made his way closer to Merrick,”
Lestat also often goes into a kind of emotional and physical paralysis when such devastating things happen. It happened when he was mortal, too. The humor that follows is also a defense mechanism against feeling the pain of the situation.
He knows that there will be an opportunity much later to get jealous and pissed, but in the immediate aftermath his thoughts are narrowed to the emergency and how to save Louis ;A;
I’m not sure why he insists on sharing his blood with Merrick, though. That seemed to condone her trickery too far for my tastes, but I suppose he did it because he saw that Louis still loved her. Making Merrick more of an equal was a gift to Louis.
Or, perhaps he wanted to drink from her to experience her side of the story, without any of her witchery, and sharing blood with her was an excuse to do that.
i love the idea of lestat being a huge fan of selfie culture and also sending gabrielle awful snapchats all the time with louis unwillingly participating in them
I-want-my-IWTV 