Yes, it was the second book in the series I started to have problems with. I couldn't bring myself to read the third. I still quite like the first, though.
Re: females in fiction, I think about it from the standpoint of archetypes. There are a few character archetypes I can think of that lots of female characters fall into. And then there are a few character archetypes I can think of that very few females fall into. Males tend to run the gamut of these archetypes, and the only one you don't see many men in is the weeping wilting damsel in distress type. Oy!
I think Bones is pretty interesting as a character, but the writing itself is lackluster. She is so smart, and so completely clueless about pop culture. She seems very free and open about sex, because she sees it as a bodily function (from which one can nevertheless receive pleasure). However, she tends to be clueless about intimacy, romance, sensitivity. Meanwhile her male partner is a devote Catholic who likes to think of himself as a relatively open and understanding guy, but is a lot more repressed and traditional about sex, while at the same time more attuned and sensitive to people and issues of intimacy. So, this is a very interesting dynamic which you just don't get to see that often in media.
However, this dynamic isn't always intelligently handled, and there's not nearly enough of said dynamic, and the pop culture stuff Bones doesn't know just seems dumb, and I don't like procedurals, and anyway it was a dumber procedural than a lot of them, and just, yeah, I couldn't get into it, even though I stayed with it for a while.
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2011-02-25 08:42 am (UTC)Re: females in fiction, I think about it from the standpoint of archetypes. There are a few character archetypes I can think of that lots of female characters fall into. And then there are a few character archetypes I can think of that very few females fall into. Males tend to run the gamut of these archetypes, and the only one you don't see many men in is the weeping wilting damsel in distress type. Oy!
I think Bones is pretty interesting as a character, but the writing itself is lackluster. She is so smart, and so completely clueless about pop culture. She seems very free and open about sex, because she sees it as a bodily function (from which one can nevertheless receive pleasure). However, she tends to be clueless about intimacy, romance, sensitivity. Meanwhile her male partner is a devote Catholic who likes to think of himself as a relatively open and understanding guy, but is a lot more repressed and traditional about sex, while at the same time more attuned and sensitive to people and issues of intimacy. So, this is a very interesting dynamic which you just don't get to see that often in media.
However, this dynamic isn't always intelligently handled, and there's not nearly enough of said dynamic, and the pop culture stuff Bones doesn't know just seems dumb, and I don't like procedurals, and anyway it was a dumber procedural than a lot of them, and just, yeah, I couldn't get into it, even though I stayed with it for a while.
Thanks again for making this list!