Sunday, January 4, 2009

Bookstore employees tied to Sookie Stackhouse

Sookie Stackhouse is nothing if not a lady.

She unfailingly offers guests a cold — or warm — beverage when they visit her home. She minds her manners no matter how strange or hostile the company. And she rarely leaves the house without makeup in place.

But also she is a woman of talents not to be underestimated. She is open-minded, perhaps to a fault, and can use her skills and strengths to overcome the nastiest of opponents.

On the printed pages of eight novels by Charlaine Harris, Sookie is the telepathic heroine who engages in love and war with vampires, humans and other creatures magical or mundane.

On television, she is the center of the HBO series True Blood, brought to life by actress Anna Paquin.

“What speaks to me is that she is always trying hard to do her best, that she is courageous, that she is loyal, that she has moments of weakness as we all do,” Harris said in a telephone interview last week from her home in Arkansas.

From Victorian ladies mesmerized by the powers of vampire royalty to Valley girl slayers and lovestruck teenagers, women and vampires have mingled on pages and screens for more than a century.

Harris’ creation offers a magical and mysterious twist on traditional vampire stories. Sookie is a waitress from a small town in north Louisiana who solves mysteries and saves her friends from certain peril. Unlike the dark underground of bloodsucker history, Harris’ vampires are an ethnic minority of sorts who have “come out of the coffin” to claim a place in society.

Tuesday, Harris will be in Houston to discuss Sookie, vampires and what it’s like to hear the words she wrote spoken on TV. Her talk at the Houston Public Library downtown was brought together in part by Murder by the Book on Bissonnet.

Indeed, the store and its employees have long been tied to Sookie and her creator.

Harris’ first Sookie Stackhouse novel, Dead Until Dark, sputtered into existence in 2001 with some help by Dean James, then the general manager of Murder By the Book.

Harris’ agent wasn’t keen on the idea of a vampire series, but bowed to James’ recommendation for the book and his knowledge of the genre and the market.

“I read it practically in one sitting and said, ‘This is wonderful,’ ” said James, who now works as a librarian in the medical center.

After two years, Dead Until Dark found a publisher, Harris said.

“The book might not have been published if he didn’t love it,” Harris said.

James was rewarded for his support with an acknowledgement at the start of the book. But his namesake in the book and show, Dean, is a very important collie. To give away more would spoil a surprise.

“Dean just has got sweet eyes, and I thought that was a sweet tribute to him,” Harris said.

Employees of Murder by the Book have appeared in Harris’ other works. But the 26-year-old new owner of the store, McKenna Jordan, gets a nod in two of the Sookie books. Her name is used for a minor character, a clothing-store clerk.

“I might just say, ‘Can I help you,’ but I’m in there,” Jordan said.

Harris has been connected with the store since the beginning of her career, before she struck success with Sookie Stackhouse, she said. Back then, she traveled on her own dime to promote her work and stayed with the store’s former owner, Martha Farrington.

After more than two decades of writing, Sookie has taken Harris to best-seller lists. Now the publisher picks up the publicity tab. The first Sookie books were originally published in paperback. But the newer ones started in hardcover.

The HBO show, by Six Feet Under creator Alan Ball, has earned a dedicated fan base and two Golden Globe nominations, one for best television drama and another for Sookie. Well, Paquin.

In 2007, the publisher ACE Books shipped about 230,000 copies of the books to stores and customers. True Blood has boosted book sales. Since it first aired in the fall, the publisher sent out 2.3 million copies of the paperbacks, said Jodi Rosoff, associate director of publicity for ACE. Before the holidays, special box sets of all eight novels sold about 130,000 copies.

“It was successful before the show,” Rosoff said. “She moved from paperback to hardcover, and that is always a sign of success. But since the show there is a whole new audience that I don’t think would have gone to this type of book.”

Part of the success of the novels, and the show, is Sookie, Jordan said. Sookie’s got some strange powers; after all, she can read minds. But she is also a mid-20s everywoman: She fluctuates between a size 8 and a 10, has boyfriend trouble, struggles with a crazy family she mostly loves, and sometimes gets mad at her boss.

“She’s a Southern woman,” said Jordan, a League City native. “Charlaine is also a Southern woman. There certainly are a lot of authors who might not be from the South and they get it wrong.”

Part of the appeal is that Sookie is an odd duck even in her own hometown, James said.

Through the series of novels, she comes into her own personally and professionally as she discovers a world outside of the fictional Bon Temps, La., where she is valued for her smarts and admired by men, vampires and other magical creatures.

“I think a lot of people can identify with that,” James said. “Lots of people have felt that way.”

In the show, Sookie takes a different turn, said Anne Kimbol, a research lawyer by trade and an employee at Murder By The Book and fantasy and mystery reader by passion. Sookie is much more naive in the show and lacks the edge she has in the books, Kimbol said.

But then again, “they very much HBOed the story line,” she said.

“There is so much sex that you don’t get a lot of plot in there,” said Kimbol, who does not consider herself a prude.

Harris, however, is pleased with the show and thrilled to have Ball and HBO take it on, she said.

“I didn’t want the books diluted,” she said. “They are a mixture of blood and sex and some really sweet moments, and I didn’t want to lose any of that.”

Ball had prepared her for some of the big changes when he moved her story to the small screen, Harris said. So the first time Harris watched the show she was able to hear the familiar words she wrote and feel the suspense of plot and character changes to her original.

“I understand why he made them, and, of course, it makes for a different story,” Harris said. “So I found myself surprised by my own work, which was actually kind of fun.”

After years of hard work, Harris said she was pleased to have found success with the Sookie books. The television show just adds a little more fun to the mix.

“This is just like getting a whole bunch of gravy poured over my biscuits,” Harris said.

tara.dooley@chron.com

CHARLAINE HARRIS IN HOUSTON

The author and creator of Sookie Stackhouse will speak about her books, vampires and turning her creation into the HBO series True Blood.

• When: 7 p.m. Tuesday

• Where: Houston Public Library’s central location, 500 McKinney

• Book signing: Those wishing to have a book signed will need to purchase one from Murder By the Book sellers at the library.

• Information: www.murderbooks.com; www.houstonlibrary.org

WOMEN AND VAMPIRES

Sookie Stackhouse isn’t the first woman to encounter the bloodsucking kind. For more than a century, women and vampires have mingled in popular culture as enemies, friends and lovers. Here is a sampling of the other women of the tradition, and why they are no Sookie Stackhouse.

• Mina : Depending on the Dracula • version, this woman is either the count’s eternal love or a mesmerized bride. In the Francis Ford Coppola film she is played by Winona Ryder. In most versions, she lacks Sookie’s spunk.

• Star: In the 1980s vampire flick The Lost Boys • , Jami Gertz plays an object of desire for boys and vampires.

• Buffy: In the movie original, Buffy was a Valley girl slayer who could work magic with hair spray. In Joss Whedon’s television show, Sarah Michelle Gellar puts vampires to rest with the help of her Scooby Gang. Though she has her affection for certain vampires, as does Sookie, Buffy’s tussles with them are mostly of the stake ’em sort.

• Selene: Technically Selene from the film Underworld • is a vampire herself, very un-Sookie. As played by Kate Beckinsale, she races around in tight black outfits slaying bad-guys and saving loved ones.

• Bella Swan: The vampire lover in the spotlight, Swan is the star of Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight • series of books and the hit movie of 2008. Bella is a lovestruck teen who is willing to give her all to vampire Edward Cullen. Sookie’s older, 26, and knows the pitfalls of trusting vampire loves.

• Anita Blake: A vampire hunter from Laurel K. Hamilton’s series of books. Blake is much more tough broad than Southern lady. Some say the later novels head well out of the R rating range for sex and violence.

Read on http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/life/main/6193787.html

1 comments:

Keyse said...

What a great description of Sookie! This sounds like a great event - wish I could attend.