A new blog feature!
On her blog, Patti Abbott asked: Have you read a book recently you're passionate about? Has that sort of book disappeared or is it my youth that has?
I replied: Yes, but it was an old book by a dead author. It's been a really bad reading year for me and I've found few modern, recently published books that were worthwhile.
I’ve noticed the same complaint in a lot of my blogger buds’ year-end review of the good, but mostly bad and ugly of 2007. Looking back myself, this year marked an all-time-low in the quality of books I’ve read, most of which were written in the past couple of years, and I too wondered: has the hey-day of great novels passed?
Welcome to the "2008 Author Challenge!"
I’m going to take a “scientific statistical” approach (it’s a grad school thing) to the question, and throughout the year gather data on all the books I read, or attempted to read, but could not finish.
At the end of the year I'll tally up all the books and see how many were written by dead vs. live authors, books published in the 19th and 20th centuries vs. 21rst century books.
As I go, I'll be reviewing some of the good ones, and blogging about the bad ones in my “Why and When I Stopped Reading (This) Book” blog feature.
Since there’s no time like the present and I’m enjoying a break from school, I’ve already started the “2008 Author Challenge.” See my blog roll for the number of victims I’ve racked up so far. Oh yes, there will be blood.
Tomorrow, I’ll kick off “Why and When I Stopped Reading (This) Book” with a bang, skewering some of the biggest, most over-rated books of the past couple of years, and talking about why I could not get through them in spite of all the (fake) hype. Tomorrow, I’ll be giving out the first “Naked Emperor Award” - a prize given to over-rated best sellers. Yup, this kid is brave enough to shout out to the entire village: “People! Get a clue! This book sucks!”
For the record, my intention is not to be “mean-spirited,” and no, I’m not some “wanna-be” trash-talking published authors because I’m jealous, though no doubt I’ll be accused of both. My goal is illumination, by pointing out the Writing 101 basic rules the author failed to follow, I’ll shine some light on why they lost me as a reader. The honest opinion of the faults of these books is to illustrate to us writers what NOT to do.
My tastes are eclectic but do not include SF (unless it’s written by Margaret Atwood), Urban Fantasy, or romance (unless it’s “The Far Pavilions” which I intend to re-read since it’s been 30 years), or the obvious clap-trap written for the masses (the junk food being churned out these days by James Patterson – not that he actually writes his own books anymore - or Danielle Steele) or self-published books, otherwise my TBR list and pile has dozens of books - fiction, non-fiction, and memoir, classic and modern - “literary” and genre (to answer Lisa’s question), and I intend to burn through these books like a house a-fire, reading with the most critical of eyes in the same way an agent or editor does, until the author gives me good reason to stop reading. The older I get the more often I say to myself, “Live is too short to waste a minute of it reading bad books.”
14 comments:
I'm looking forward to this and I'm glad you explained your approach. This is going to be interesting!
It's already interesting to me in that I've got a treasured classic on my "Why I Stopped" list, which I'll be discussing.
From the obscure to the mid-list to the biggest bestseller, I'm going to be critiquing all kinds of books.
I admire your ambition and believe me I've been there but I'd be cautious in getting too critical. You never know when an agent or editor has a vested interest in one of the projects you are criticizing.
Then there is the matter of tastes being subjective.
But i do agree there are a lot of books that are crap that get published but the real question is did they make their house any money. IF so, that is all the publisher cares about. Besides without a lot of those crummy best sellers the houses wouldn't have the ability to take on risky or less profitable, but more artistic works.
Guess what I'm saying is be careful. You don't want to shoot yourself or your writing career in the foot in the name of good literature.
All very valid points, Travis, which is why I'll not type out the book's title or author on the blog just show a picture of the book in my "Why I Stopped" feature. I don't want any author to think I'm trying to incite some kind of flame war or argument.
Could a potential agent check out my blog, read that I was critical about a client? Possible... but my impression is that agents don't have that kind of time....
I do have a list of agents I'll query and am mostly aware of whom they represent, and if I'm not wowed by their clients books, I'll keep my opinion of those books to myself.
I hope that everyone sees that I'm just offering valid, honest constructive criticism and opinion.
Very interesting = and I love the new award feature!! I can't wait for this!
I'll be reading along. And I did read a book I very much liked. The Great Man by Kate Christensen, which turns out to be about four pretty great women. Close to passionate at least.
Ello, I hope this new blog feature is well received and not mis-interpretted. My goal is to emphasize the importance of craft and story telling basics.
Oooh, Patti, thanks for the recommendation. I'll definitely check out that book.
I'm looking forward to the discussion. There have been classics and critically acclaimed work that I wasn't partial to - such as your first offering for the award, but I tend to think it's my own taste rather than fault of the writer.
There have also been books that I couldn't for the life of me get into, but when I give them another chance at some later point in my life, I love them... sometimes what the reader brings into it, I think, makes a bigger impact than what the writer put there.
Still, I'm interested in seeing it detailed; where in the prose you lost interest. Definitely a worthwhile discussion.
Merry, it's not your taste, it's more likely than not the fault of the writer.
I often find that books that I once raved about don't stand up to a second reading. I think we all evolve as readers, and that tastes change - also I think "relatability" is a big factor - if you have a lot in common with the characters, you tend to like a book more - I this this is especially true of agents - you need to know a bit about their age, interests and background before you query, and their reading tastes as well.
I can think of two books by bestselling authors that I really struggled to finish. I guess I wanted to learn what not to do.
I have a couple more that I had trouble getting into, but I'll give them another shot. I'm kinda stubborn that way.
Chumplet, the older get, the more I realize there are a ton of classics I've yet to read, and this makes me even more impatient with less-than-wonderful modern books.
There's a lot of writers coasting on their own reputations, especially in mystery series, where they hardly make any effort at all to tell a compelling story.
I've wasted too much time reading these books because I got sucked in by bad reviews. No more. Life is too short.
I'm glad to see you have thought this out and your tact seems very reasonable.
Travis, thanks for the advice. I knew you were concerned. So much of this business is subjective, and agents are readers just like the rest of us, with their own likes and dislikes.
I also see that "relate-ability" is a huge factor - I'm willing to bet a lot of "Road" lovers were parents of young kids who could easily put themselves in the shoes of the Dad, get caught up in the kid's peril, and therefore overlook, or not care about what I considered to be flaws in the story-telling technique.
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