Lasher Book Review

Lasher by Anne Rice

My review

rating: 3 of 5 stars
I hated this book. I gave it 3 stars in reverence of it being the sequel to "The Witching Hour" which I loved. I'm not generally a squeamish reader, but this one took it too far. The overwhelming and almost venerated abundance of incest and borderline pedophilia, the incredibly disturbing attitude toward rape, the lack of interest in coherence in plot... these all added up to a huge mess that I couldn't wait to put down. Rowan and Lasher explore their complicated relationship through a series of S&M-ish episodes; the only highlight of the book is the family history that is revealed through much of the book. The stories are genuinely interesting and the characters are at times even likable. It is interesting that the almost exclusive homosexuality in the Vampire Chronicles is replaced with an almost exclusive incest here. Oh, Anne Rice. I hear you are a devout Christian (perhaps a recent evolution). How did your brain ever create such terrible scenes?


*Note-- I have no clue what's up with that awful cover. The book I read was a hardcover with no dust jacket so I always think of "Lasher" as just big and black, but apparently the publishers decided to put a picture of a John Travolta look-alike on the cover. In my mind, Lasher looks NOTHING like that, he is very tall and very skinny and very pale, with yellowish hair and very very soft skin. Ew now I am remembering certain scenes from the book... which I would tell you that you need to read to understand the creepy factor, but I really don't recommend this book. So you either have to venture out on your own and face the creepiness, or take my word for it and pick up that dusty Judy Blume instead. Trust me, much more rewarding!!! ;-)

**Note update -- Now that I look at him closer, he looks more like Stephen Baldwin than John Travolta. This does add a tad to the creepiness factor...
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