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We all have characters we love. Let’s spotlight these fantastic creations! Whether you want to be friends with them or you have a full-blown crush on them, you know you love them and want everyone else to love them too!
Most of you will probably post about how much you love each character, but this is a great place for the more creative ones among you to let go and have fun! Write a love letter to Captain Wentworth. Write yourself into a scene with Anne and Diana. Draw a picture of yourself in Jamie’s arms. The possibilities are endless.
Be sure to post the book’s title and author, and be very careful not to give away spoilers while talking about how much you love your characters.
Mr. Linky will be posted here on The Introverted Reader every Thursday.
It’s time for another character I love to hate! I should probably have saved this for October, but I have to write what my little muse tells me to.
Annie Wilkes from Stephen King’s Misery gets my vote for his scariest villain. I haven’t read It, so that clown might eventually take the crown, but right now it’s Annie.
What makes Annie so scary is that she’s so real. She’s a reader (!) who obsesses over author Paul Sheldon. I know we all say we’re obsessed with this or that author or book, but Annie’s for real. She is Paul Sheldon’s “Number 1 Fan.” *shiver* So when she has a chance to have Paul all to herself, she grasps it with both hands. But people in the flesh can never live up to the idealized dream versions of them, so psychotic Annie starts to have problems with Paul and punish him accordingly.
Whatever kind of psych problem she has, she cycles up and down and up and down, and it’s a great big terrifying carousel. When she’s being coy and flirtatious, she starts calling Paul little pet names, like “Dirty birdie.” But then she starts to get angry, and somehow “Dirty birdie” goes from being faintly ridiculous to being one of the most horrifying things you’ve ever read, because you don’t know what she’s going to come up with this time.
She’s a pretty prosaic soul, a nurse with a little farm, complete with lawn tractor and animals, but she is amazingly imaginative when it comes to punishing Paul for his transgressions, real or imagined. I’m getting knots in my stomach just thinking about some of the things she did! I haven’t seen the movie starring Kathy Bates (who won an Oscar for the role) and I don’t know if I ever will, simply because I don’t know if I could stomach some of these scenes. I mean, just look at her up there. A nutcase with a sledgehammer does not add up to fun and games, but she’s so very flat. There’s no emotion on her face at all. She’s terrifying.
As the book goes on, you eventually find out Annie’s history. I was left thinking, “What a psychotic bitch!” Crazy does not even begin to describe her! I’m trying to remember if there was anything in her history that would ever turn her into a sympathetic character, like some abuse that left her the way she is, but if there is I can’t remember it. She was just born crazy and she got worse from there. Oh, wait, maybe her dad was psycho too, so it was all in the genes. That sounds right, but don’t hold me to it.
Anyway, much as I hate her, King did a fantastic job bringing Annie Wilkes to life. Maybe a little too fantastic, because I know what you’ve been up to, you little dirty birdie….
Who did you connect with this week? Write a post and link up! Be sure to visit everyone else’s posts too!
5 Comments
Kind of funny – yours is the second reference to this book (movie) that I've heard this week! My sister is laid up with a broken foot and says she feels like James Caan/Paul Sheldon right now. So long as her husband doesn't become Annie, that's a funny comparison.
The movie really did the book justice. I remember reading interviews with stephen king, where he said he took the story from real life. I bet he has had some bad experiences with stalkers.
Sounds like a lady you wouldn't want to mess with… love the photo of her. Creepy. = )
I have never read the book but the movie is fantastic. Not only did Ms. Bates deserve every inch of that Oscar, but her co-star made things even better by contrasting her calm psychosis with a look of absolute terror brimming underneath the surface of attempts to smooth things over with this crazy bitch!
The only King I've managed to read was The Shining and it was far superior to the movie, which I love but is truly a different beast than how it was written. I'm curious to see if you would enjoy Misery the movie as much as you did the book.
As for that damn clown, I couldn't bring myself to watch that last third of that mini-series so there is no way I'm going to leave myself only with him between the pages.
Great pick! Annie is definitely one of the creepiest characters in literature. One can take obsession a bit too far.