Anne Rice was not my kind of writer - I like happier/wittier writers but my person taught a class where she used one or two Rice gothic novels (not the s+m ones -the vampire ones). I only know about the beauty ones because after seeing the (not good but for me -not scary and reasonably okay to play in the background) ODonnell/Ackroyd movie - I thought I might finally enjoy an anne rice novel. I was wrong.
It was not quite as awful as trying to read the Gregory Maguire novel that the broadway show Wicked was based on (so loosely about all they have in common is a green protagonist).