History Literature / AnitaBlake

As MerryGentry now has its own page, please put applicable tropes there.

* AuthorAppeal: Becomes more obvious as the series progresses.

* PurpleProse: [[CaptainObvious Ummm...]] Yeah.

* LovingForce: Micah forces sex upon Anita while she's in the [[ShowerOfLove shower]], and later he becomes yet another member of her harem. [[WordOfGod The author has stated many times that she did not intend for this to come off as rape]], but it's hard ''not'' to interpret it as such, especially since at the time Anita barely knew the guy and already had two boyfriends and wasn't looking for more, and outright said NO. Repeatedly. This is another example of Broken Base caused by you-know-what-book, and fans having [[TheScrappy gigantic loathing for Micah]].
** Pretty much every time Anita has sex with someone because of the ''ardeur'', it's stated she doesn't want to have sex with them. Rape by ''ardeur'', even on the wielder as well as the meal, is still rape.

* TenchiSolution: Kind of a moot point since half her harem would die without her {{LifeEnergy}}--and vice versa, eventually--but Anita claims to love them all.

* {{Slutshaming}} Anita is an active participant on a regular basis- she often sneers at women for wearing revealing clothing [[{{Hypocrite}} while she frequently dresses in some very {{Stripperiffic}} outfits herself.]]

* BrokenBase: To some, it is a BadAss vampire slayer that could give Buffy a run for her money with a great plot arc and wonderful character development. To others, it was once a great urban fantasy that was ruined when the main character became an ExtremeOmnisexual and it is just now gratuitous porn interspersed with a gunfight here and there.

* LovingForce: Micah forces sex upon Anita while she's in the [[ShowerOfLove shower]], and later he becomes yet another member of her harem. [[WordOfGod The author has stated many times that she did not intend for this to come off as rape]], but it's hard ''not'' to interpret it as such, especially since at the time Anita barely knew the guy and already had two boyfriends and wasn't looking for more, and outright said NO. Repeatedly. This is another example of BrokenBase caused by you-know-what-book, and fans having [[TheScrappy gigantic loathing for Micah]].

* {{Casanova}}: Jean-Claude, until he met Anita, who made him (mostly) monogamous and Master of the City. He still plays the part at his club, though.

* VictimFallsForRapist: Micah forces sex upon Anita while she's in the [[ShowerOfLove shower]], and later he becomes yet another member of her harem. [[WordOfGod The author has stated many times that she did not intend for this to come off as rape]], but it's hard ''not'' to interpret it as such, especially since at the time Anita barely knew the guy and already had two boyfriends and wasn't looking for more, and outright said NO. Repeatedly. This is another example of BrokenBase caused by you-know-what-book, and fans having [[TheScrappy gigantic loathing for Micah]].

* YoureJustJealous: This revealing exchange between Hamilton and a fan on Twitter:

-->'''Hamilton''':But yes, most of my haters are wannabe writers. Some loved my writing until I got "too popular". Jealousy is ugly.
-->'''Fan''': Im gonna take a stab in the dark & guess the negativity is mainly coming from the involuntarily celibate ;)
-->'''Hamilton''': I admit I wonder how much sexual frustration is behind the hateful comments.

* DidNotDoTheResearch: Hamilton's information on many aspects of real life are just flat out-wrong. Prominent examples would be her flawed information on BDSM and her belief that polyamory is a legitimate ''sexuality'' and not a sexual lifestyle.

* DeusSexMachina: in later books it's used and abused to no end

* DoubleStandardRapeFemaleOnMale: Anita's rape tends to get less note than other females being raped.

* ItsNotRapeIfYouEnjoyedIt:
** Anita's assorted rapes are considered okay because the ardeur intoxicates/overwhelms her victims. Though, not always by her.
** Anita ''herself''. The times she actually wants to have sex with the people the ''ardeur'' forces her to have sex with could probably be counted on one hand.

** Anita is in love with Richard, Richard is in love with Anita...the final stumbling block before they agree to engagement is to see him shapeshift, since the effect of his inhumanity spooks her a bit (understandable since she's first hit in the face with it by him getting turned on to the point of breaking up a bathroom after watching a horrifying snuff film.) Shapeshifting is apparently pretty gruesome, and gushes noxious bodily fluids, bits of flesh and a mysterious clear goop everywhere. So clearly, Richard, the solution is the pin her down, change right on top of her, and then eat someone in front of her. Anita, understandably, is freaked out, especially since as Richard is in her head, she can psychically feel not only his desire to eat someone, but the entire pack's desire to eat ''her''. It leads to a breakup when she bolts, traumatized, and Jean-Claude steps in to seduce her while she's huddled in shock in a bathtub; she sleeps with him - regretting it in the morning, and it's probably worth considering her state of mind at the time of the sex - and the split is forever more blamed on Anita.
** What "state of mind"? The first thing she did to JC was blow him. ''The first thing.'' Clearly she wasn't ''that'' sickened or traumatized by what happened with Richard if she could stuff a cold, dead penis into her mouth lickity-split afterwards. All because after incessantly badgering him through the entire book, Richard finally did ''exactly what she kept pushing him to do.'' Gee, why would the split possibly be blamed on her?
** She fucks Jean Claude she's sitting in the tub where the washed off goo is. This lack of personal hygiene is an evolving squick that should be mentioned, particularly after JumpingTheShark[[invoked]] when a wet wipe is the best Anita can routinely manage to stay fresh.

* RapeIsOkWhenItIsFemaleOnMale: Anita's rape tends to get less note than other females being raped.

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A character page has been added. [[Characters/AnitaBlake Please contribute.]]

* AuthorAppeal: [[BlatantLies No, no,]] [[MarySue none at all!]]
* AxCrazy: AlternateCharacterInterpretation of Anita, who has shown plenty of violent, sociopathic and psychotic tendencies, and has plenty of weapons and legal excuses to act on them. She herself worries about this, and skates the line since she only kills in self-defense or to protect others that are being victimized or threatened. Note that she has a broad definition of both "self defense" and "to protect others", which easily extends to killing those that are captured, helpless, or have essentially surrendered. Moreso in later books. Then came the Mafia-like removal of the Lions' Rex because he didn't want to have sex with her to 'save her life' which was saved immediately afterward by some single guy having sex with her.

* BlackBraAndPanties - In "Blue Moon" they are specifically noted to be a matched set. In "Obsidian Butterfly" Edward brings them to her on two occasions along with a change of clothes when she is checking out after stay in the hospital. The panties are satin.

** Made worse by the most recent releases that just feature a sexy, half-naked woman staring up at the reader with no indication of supernatural anything. The former books would usually have some supernatural elements on the cover--a wolf, a creepy tree, gravestones, a full moon, etc--but those went out the window as Anita soared over [[JumpingTheShark the shark.]]
* CreatorBreakdown

* DoubleStandard:
** Anita can have sex with just about anyone to slake the ardeur, but none of the men can have sex with each other, only Anita.
** This is later changed due to Anita's [[SuddenlySexuality sudden bisexual]] feelings and she enjoys watching all the guys in her harem get it on with each other while she watches and has one of them servicing her as well. [[SarcasmMode Classy.]]

* EveryoneIsBi:
** Seems that way sometimes. Everyone except Anita, who may or may not be in the closet (especially when you consider how much she worries about being a good Christian...).
** As of ''Bullet'', [[spoiler: Anita has now joined the EveryoneIsBi parade]].

* FurAgainstFang: Vampires and weres don't get along so well...unless Anita has sex with them.

* HairTriggerTemper: Everybody around Anita, and at times she herself, will admit she qualifies. It's pointed out enough to almost be a running gag that she's only comfortable when angry at somebody and the only way to coexist with her is to always let her have everything her way and try to never say anything she might be uncomfortable with (the term "mine field" has come up). [[RelationshipSue The men in her life tend to consider this part of what makes her so desirable]].

* RapeIsLove: Micah forces sex upon Anita while she's in the [[ShowerOfLove shower]], and later he becomes yet another member of her harem. [[WordOfGod The author has stated many times that she did not intend for this to come off as rape]], but it's hard ''not'' to interpret it as such, especially since at the time Anita barely knew the guy and already had two boyfriends and wasn't looking for more, and outright said NO. Repeatedly. This is another example of BrokenBase caused by you-know-what-book, and fans having [[TheScrappy gigantic loathing for Micah]].
** Pretty much every time Anita has sex with someone because of the ''ardeur'', it's stated she doesn't want to have sex with them. Rape by ''ardeur'', even on the wielder as well as the meal, is still rape.

* BrokenBird: Presumably Anita, with her dead mother and broken engagement, is supposed to be one of these--more obvious in later books. Others have it worse, too.

* CharacterDevelopment: In ''Obsidian Butterfly'', Edward's character gets much more attention than in previous books where Anita describes him as Batman (He swoops in, saves your ass, and then disappears). It turns out that the cold-hearted perfect killer has found himself trapped because of his alter-ego, Ted Forrester. Ted had been in a relationship with a woman named Donna: a widow with a little girl named Becca and a teenage boy named Peter. Edward had gotten so caught up in pretending to be Ted that he got engaged to the woman only to realize ''he was engaged to the woman''. However, Anita later discovers that a small part of Edward actually wanted to be part of their family despite knowing better.

* ContemptibleCover: The early ones, in which the books were actually about murders, necromancy, supernatural politics and so on. Later, of course, the covers became a perfectly accurate forecast of their content.

* DoubleStandard: Anita can have sex with just about anyone to slake the ardeur, but none of the men can have sex with each other, only Anita.

* EveryoneIsBi: Seems that way sometimes. Everyone except Anita, who may or may not be in the closet (especially when you consider how much she worries about being a good Christian...).

* HellBentForLeather: Everybody wears leather. Lots of leather. They were leather fedoras, miniskirts, boots, trenchcoats, fetish harnesses, etc.

* ItsNotRapeIfYouEnjoyedIt: Anita's assorted rapes are considered okay because the ardeur intoxicates/overwhelms her victims. Though, not always by her.

* {{One of the Boys}}: Particularly early Anita, aggressively so.
** So much so that it might reveal some troubling AuthorAvatar issues. One apt reader points out how Anita's gun is like a substitute penis. I.e, the only way she feels she can ever get respect is by having it with her at all times. She also insists that no one call her "girl" or "ma'am" and is actually ''happy'' when someone calls her a guy or a "son of a bitch." To even begin unpeeling the problems with this mentality would take years.

* OurVampiresAreDifferent: Vampires grow in power the longer they've been dead, up to a certain limit which is different for each vampire. If they become powerful enough they attain the status of "Master Vampire" which:

* SuddenlySexuality: Richard Zeeman is straight as an arrow, to the point of borderline homophobic, and originally, it was an issue that he tried to learn to deal with as he ascended in the pack. After his CharacterDevelopment, he suddenly decided he was bisexual and was perfectly fine engaging in four ways as long as Anita was present to get her rocks off.
** And of course Anita herself [[spoiler: having sex with a woman]] in Bullet.

* TheWoobie: Asher. Poor guy has been disfigured, tortured and revenge-obsessed for centuries, and now that he's finally made up with his ex-lover, said ex-lover has pledged himself to one-way monogamy with someone else. To make matters worse, his only request is that he have someone to love him exclusively... and he doesn't get it. You just wanna hug him.
** The in-universe woobie, Nathaniel: Nathan basically has had nothing else to do but be people's boy toy sex toy and Nathan's such the super-sub he can't say no so everyone has to protect him from being taken advantage of by well... everyone. Nathaniel has been pimped out to people who sliced him up with no care for his survival--bad enough to nearly kill him, a shapeshifter. Plus, as mentioned above, mindfucked by the previous leader until he was incapable of saying no.
** Depending on the book, a lot of the male characters become this. Before Richard descends into JerkAss territory, he had a few moments, Jason becomes this a couple times, Philip definitely had his share of moments, so it really depends on the plot.

* Not to mention leather tuxedos and pants it makes you question if there are any cows left in the anitaverse

* DeusSexMachina

* NewPowersAsThePlotDemands: Anita, even in early books--she was and is still growing. In the most recent novels this is {{handwaved}} as an explicit power of Anita's that [[MegaManning allows her to duplicate supernatural powers which have been used upon her]] if they were used on her during the right set of circumstances. (These circumstances seem to be "when it happens in the course of a novel".)

* ThreeWaySex

* BrokenBird: Presumably Anita, with her dead mother and broken engagement, is supposed to be one of these--more obvious in later books. [[RapeIsTheNewDeadParents Others have it worse, too]].