A Little More Powerful than the Pope's Blessing

If you have known me for any decent length of time, you will know that I am a lover of all things Anne Rice. She has served as my idol and inspiration for about 10 years now--ever since I started seriously writing. I darn near worship the woman. Seriously though, her books are simply amazing. I developed my love of New Orleans because of her, and even went to see the massive house she used to live in when Dad took me there before the Hurricane hit.

Ah, Anne. Such a magnificent woman:

Younger


And more mature



I don't care what people say. She GAVE BIRTH to the vampire genre:





I'm leading up to something.

Can you tell?

I wrote Anne Rice an e-mail.

And she WROTE ME BACK!

Are you curious to see what I said, and how she replied? Keep reading!

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Dear Anne,

I've started this e-mail about a dozen times, and I think that rather than make it the perfect e-mail, I'm just going to write from the heart.

Mainly, I wanted to thank you for being the most influential writer I've ever read. I started reading your books in high school when I was about 16 years old. I'd always been an avid reader, but after catching Interview with a Vampire on TV one evening, I became interested in the story and read the book. I got completely absorbed in the story and characters and saw the world you wrote in a completely original way--I didn't imagine the characters as portrayed in the movie; the way you described them and the time period and everything was done so perfectly that it stood on its own. I read the sequels, as well as some of your other books like Belinda, and even a bit of Sleeping Beauty. I have to read at least one of your books every year or I feel deprived!! No matter what you write, I am always transported and enveloped in your words and the magic that they create, like no other author can do for me.

It wasn't long after I read Interview that I became serious about my own writing, and while I was in college (I'm now 26) I wrote a trilogy about angels. (I shook in my boots when I saw that you wrote one about angels, and it came out on my birthday! I thought, Oh, no!! If Anne did it, then my little self-published angel effort is going to fall by the way-side!) In all honesty, I am excited about your book. I plan to read it soon. Also you have taught me through your writing that a dozen people can write about a topic and it won't be the same. For instance, you could write about dirt and I'd probably be interested, no joke!

Looking back at my own writing, and particularly the angel trilogy I wrote, I noticed that some of your themes--universal themes that live within us all--emerged in my own writing. There's the fallen angel, the question of redemption, the power of music: particularly the violin. You opened my eyes to the world I live in through your beautiful prose.

I am personally proud of you for writing what you feel in your heart that you need to write, and the anti-Christian people that try to put a box around you and label it just don't get you. Like you put on your recent facebook post: "I see now that I don't fit anywhere. I never did. I never will." And that, Anne, is why your books will be read long after you have gone from this world. Because you have the courage to be yourself and allow yourself to evolve, you're among the few living writers that will live on for hundreds of years through your mastering of the written word and your philosophy, which you have so generously shared to those of us who love you.

Thank you again, my most amazing favorite writer!

Carrie

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(Her reply.)

Thank you for this deeply encouraging letter. I wish you well with your books, and you know my advice to writers: have nerve. --- Thanks for taking the time to express these positive sentiments. Anne.

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If that didn't make my year, I don't know what will!