Well, well, lookie here....

[sweettalkeress.livejournal.com]

I was perusing TwilightSucks awhile ago, and came across this little gem, detailing why Bella Swan is a good match for Draco Malfoy. You can read the madness below:

http://twilight-sucks.livejournal.com/1584746.html

I nearly burst out laughing when I read the line: "Draco doesn't want friends. He wants fans and henchmen. Harry didn't fawn over him, and so their enmity was born." Seriously, that describes Harry more than anything!

And actually, no, Rowling would not write the story about Eric or Mike or whoever. Chances are, Eric and Mike would still be nobodies, just like Dean and Seamus. Harry is no everyman, after all- he's a self-absorbed jerkass Gary Stu just like Edward and Bella- he just hides it better!

Seriously, every so often someone will critique Twilight and immediately follow it up with "But Harry Potter is sooooo much better!" Newsflash: Just because it's better than Twilight... doesn't mean it's good!

Comments

[charlottehywd.livejournal.com]

Wow, that's... special... Also, she marries a 15 year old girl to a 61 year old man? Eew.

[oneandthetruth.livejournal.com]

Not quite. Remember I said she chops 7 years off Pseudo-Holmes's age, so he's "only" 54 when they meet. And they don't get married until a month after Mary turns 21. However, she's only dated 2 other men by that time, and one of those men only went on a single date with her.

What's even more disgusting is that King sets the two up as both father and daughter and future lovers at the same time. I can do no better than quote from my book again. (Numbers in parentheses after quotations refer to page numbers in the mass market paperback edition.):

Following this abuse-excusing scam art form, King underlines the supposed equality of Russell and Pseudo-Holmes upon their very first meeting. Russell and "Holmes" meet when Russell nearly stumbles over a seated "Holmes" as she walks across the Sussex downs. Because she has her long, blonde braids piled up under a hat, Pseudo-Holmes mistakes her for a boy, which causes her to yell at him. A short time later, she thinks he's mocking her, but figures, "Well, at least I had taught him to be subtle with it." (12) This implies that after only a few minutes' acquaintance, Russell was already bending to her will this rich, powerful, accomplished man, whom she had herself described as "a figure of pure genius, one of the great minds of his generation. A Legend." (9) How the mighty have fallen.

While the "Holmes"/Russell relationship doesn't turn physically sexual until the end of the second book when they marry mere weeks after Russell turns twenty-one, the signals that it's headed in that direction are there from the first. For starters, Russell's introduction is signed, "M. R. H," for "Mary Russell Holmes." Then, right after Russell puts Pseudo-Holmes in his place (two steps behind her?), he invites her to his home, confiding in her about his eccentric and very personal theories on a variety of subjects as they walk together. Russell says of this conversation, "When we arrived at his cottage we had known each other forever." (13) In the next chapter, she continues in the same vein: "After some years we came to end the other's sentences, even to answer an unasked question--but I get ahead of myself." (33)

Now, as anyone who has ever read a romance novel or heard a woman talk about a romance knows, two of the ways she supposedly knows she's met the man of her dreams are that (1) they feel as if they've known each other forever when they're barely acquainted, and (2) they can communicate almost telepathically after they've known each other for a while. The "instant intimacy" (clearly an oxymoron) described in (1) is a hallmark of the "swept away" syndrome, in which a woman pretends she's "in love" so she has an excuse to have sex with a man she finds desirable but hardly knows.

TBC

[oneandthetruth.livejournal.com]

(Skip two paragraphs.)

The important point here is not just the romance between orphan teenager and much older man itself, but also that said romance is clearly developing covertly at the same time their father/daughter relationship is developing overtly. In fact, in the same paragraph from which comes the reference to finishing each others’ sentences, Russell refers to "Holmes" as her "substitute father," and adds, "Looking back, I can admit to myself that even with my parents I had never been so happy, and not even with my father, who had been a most brilliant man, had my mind found so comfortable a fit, so smooth a mesh." (33) She continues, "If Holmes slid into the niche my father had occupied...." (34)

Having read the discussion about this book on King's Virtual Book Club site, I realize King's fans whitewash this relationship by insisting it was never really one of father and daughter at all, but rather master and apprentice, or mentor and mentee. As the above quotations make clear, these people are victims of their own ignorance and/or dishonesty.

Like the author herself, King's fans contradict themselves, gliding around the subliminal ugliness of this theme with a skill not normally seen outside of professional ballroom dance competitions. One of them wrote she never mentions the "Holmes"/Russell age difference when recommending the book, apparently fearing this would turn off potential cultists, I mean fans. Instead, she gives it to people with no warning, counting on the magic of the story and its teller to seduce the unwary. This is not unlike the practice of slipping LSD into the drinks of unsuspecting people in the 1960s and 1970s, which makes me wonder: If there's really nothing wrong with this relationship, as she stoutly asserts, why is she so afraid of mentioning it? Doesn't she believe in informed consent?

Silly me. Of course, she doesn’t. If she did, she wouldn’t be a fan of the Russell books in the first place.