Into the Fire

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Credit where credit is due . . .

 

You may recall a comment which accused me of lumping readers into black and white stereotypical categories and not giving them much credit in my post here: http://hopeofglory.typepad.com/into_the_fire/2011/04/when-story-trumps-writing-.html.

 

I make an effort to speak with all kinds of readers to ascertain what they want, expect, and look for in their choice of novels. Some expect very little besides entertainment. Others want a specific experience and dismiss novels which don’t meet their requirement. Some readers will finish a book no matter how much they detest it, and others will chuck a book if it fails them in any way after a chapter or two or twenty. Some readers place no limitations on genres. Others read within a tight framework of specific genres.

 

I thought I covered the variety of readers in these sentences:

 

“It’s important to remember that many parts of writing, stripped down from all the high-falutin’ critiques, opinions, praises, and assaults, are merely a matter of taste. Some highbrow and some lowbrow. Some with intelligent assessment and some with gut-feeling. Some with a teacher’s mentality and some with a student’s appreciation. As writers or readers, we do not walk the same literary paths, but we all have the option to travel our favorites.”

 

So let’s look at giving readers “credit”. I don’t know a single reader who’s ever had trouble with POV shifts, no matter how frequent or complex. Maybe minor annoyance, but nothing that warrants major concern. Many of the classics, written by the supposed best and brightest, include multiple “head-hopping” as the current literary talking heads choose to call this experience. It seems the powers that be and many of the writerly crowd of today’s literary consumption have decided that POV shifts within scenes are too complex for today’s readers to understand, follow, and/or keep up with, and therefore make for inferior writing and marked confusion among readers. Who’s not giving readers much credit now?

 

Ditto for passive verb usage, too many adverbs, adjectives, and metaphors spoiling the reading experience. For writers who’ve studied the current trends for “good” writing, they might agree. Many readers might also agree, but many readers will also not agree. It has nothing to do with knowledge or intelligence, but it has everything to do with taste or preference or indifference to technique.

 

This isn’t so much about my previous post—either defending it or emphasizing it. It’s about assuming things about readers which simply don’t matter to some of them. Devoted readers can surf through any literary waves, some precisely identifying why they like or dislike a novel and others simply content to enjoy a story or toss the book across the room when they don’t.

 

If publishing at large—for all of its great successes—could boast that more than 75% of their selected fare earn back the author advances instead of the widely accepted number that upwards of 60% do not, I might agree that the current trends in publishing and writing give unmistakable proof that they know what readers want, giving credit where credit is due.

 

 

Father, your “credit” is all that matters. Storing up treasure in heaven . . . help it to be my goal. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.

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3 responses to “Credit where credit is due . . .”

  1. Brenda Jackson Avatar
    Brenda Jackson

    Which is why I’m glad that, despite how stressful change is, that the industry is undergoing some growth and that there is a more direct link between authors and readers with the growth of self-pubbing ebooks.
    One of the things that has always driven me batty is the oft repeated phrase “if more of such and such a type of book had the sales figures to support it, we’d publish more of such and such.” Yes, publishing companies have got to have some kind of baseline to draw from. I get it. But I just can’t help but feeling that’s like a restaurant saying “How did you like our new entree?” when they never let you try it in the first place.
    Of course other people deciding things for us is nearly universal. It’s what happens when companies and systems get too big and clunky. Look at healthcare–who willingly wants their insurance plan to question what kind of medication their doctor prescribes and jump through hoops to get it approved?
    That’s why I think self-pubbing is gaining steam–it’s a chance to cut through the layers of bureacracy and get straight down to business.
    Not that the new and emerging models for publishing don’t have problems, but I think it will be refreshing to deal with a few new problems for a change.

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  2. Brenda Anderson Avatar
    Brenda Anderson

    You’re right that readers don’t notice, or aren’t bothered by the same thing writers are. What passed for sterling literature 100 years ago, or even 20, might not make it today.
    For example, both Francine Rivers and Frank Peretti are notorious head-hoppers, but I never noticed that until I started writing.
    When I go back & re-read Rivers or Peretti, I do believe that their stories would be stronger if they avoided head-hopping. Not because readers can’t figure it out, but it does deepen the perspective of the POV character when only one POV is used per scene.
    In the end, though, what really matters to the reader is story, not quality or technique.

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  3. Nicole Avatar
    Nicole

    Thank you for your thoughts, Ladies. And that’s another interesting take on the self-pubbed e-books, Brenda J. – a new set of changes/problems. Also much needed new opportunities.
    Just like going back to our older manuscripts, Brenda A., maybe we like things written differently now, but we loved other things then. And of course we improve the things we do like over time. But I can’t imagine enjoying RL or Frank Peretti’s novels any more than that first experience with them. Maybe that’s why I rarely – almost never reread books.
    It’s good to know what works for particular scenes and stories, and just maybe different approaches and techniques work for different stories. The uniform telling of stories eliminates unique styles and can make for boring literature. However, no matter how clever the style and lovely the prose without the story to go along with it? Rarely success. (Danny Gospel comes to mind.)

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