What gets me seriously annoyed with books these days — especially the modern trend of urban paranormal — is the way they (they being so many other authors, perfectly good authors who can write) handle the fantastic element.
What I mean is, they dump in that perfectly wonderful magical creature, being, or phenomenon smack in the middle of downtown Manhattan or midtown USA, but instead of making it a truly life-shaking event as it ought to be, instead of showing the wonder to the reader, instead of making us relish the amazing mind-boggling notion of the fabulous magical thing being somehow real, they make it about as exciting as a stalled delivery truck.
Here’s a simple example. I started reading a popular urban paranormal that shall go unnamed (and that I’d been looking forward to reading for some time) and on the very first page — second or third paragraph — we immediately see a small fairy annoying our heroine, who takes the interruption much in stride. And, the fairy is introduced in that bored matter-of-fact default tone that is considered slick or hip and smartass, and pretty much necessary in any such story. Such a high level of hardboiled is injected into the fairy’s opening line of dialogue that it could as easily be Aunt Mabel in an old bathrobe shrunken down to two inches, hands on hips and hair in curlers, reeking of spring-fresh deodorant and urban mundania.
As immediately as this overwhelming mundane perception kicks in, already I am disappointed by the read. No, the author is fine, their style and command of storytelling is in fact better than the average of its kind. But I have seen this same damn thing so damn many times, that I am tired before we have even properly embarked past page one. Even the smart-alecky thing is old and unoriginal. And I’ve had such high hopes!
You see, I expect my paranormal elements to be real wowsers — to either creep upon me gradually like delicate lurking shadows and overwhelm me with the inevitability of their existence, or to come like blasts of blue-white lightning out of the ebony sky. I mean, even bird poop hitting my sleeve would be better — it’s far more exciting and unexpected than these fangy vamps in sleek leather showing up on page three and doing their brooding sexy thing to entrap the heart of the heroine. I want those hunky super-para-were-whatevers to instead make my mind reel by the magnitude of what they say and do, by the heroism, originality, gustiness, brazen balls, humanity, vulnerability, loyalty, kindness, cruelty, whatever — not simply be told by the narrator how the heroine dreams about them and their muscular tight ass or even wants to kill them and simultaneously jump their bones. Here’s your perfect opportunity, fellow author, to show not tell, and to make me want to jump his bones because that is how inevitable this para-mega-ultra- guy is. Attraction is a reaction, please remember that, and no one can tell you or me how to react to anyone or anything! That’s the key! Elicit it in me, please! Because attraction itself is a kind of wonder!
And even the humor — the humor that evokes a sense of wonder I expect to be so droll, so bizarre, so strikingly original that I am disgusted when I see the same semi-amusing cheeky crapola that goes for a fun read these days. Matter of fact and deadpan is but one of many sorts of humor, people. Please! Try something new for a change! How about more quirky? How about a comedic “straight-man” forced to be in a horrible set of circumstances that make this perfectly ordinary unfunny person hilarious? Anyone can be hilarious if bizarre shit happens to them — even you and I. So let’s have the bizarre shit already, well done, not just slapped together.
In short — I want to be genuinely moved by the magical elements, not TOLD they are supposedly moving. I want to be troubled, creeped out, amazed, disturbed, actually stunned, not just see characters from the corner deli wearing a thinly disguised fantasy veneer — as flimsy as a Halloween costume that fools no one — and mouthing off. Yeah, I want to laugh when appropriate, and to be absolutely gleeful with the joy of moment-to-moment revelations — whether amusing, or suspenseful, or emotionally tense.
Instead, what I get served most often is a kind of weak general tone of self-conscious amusement that serves as the basis of a spunky style (and thinks itself quite enough to serve its purpose when in fact it is but an affectation), and no sense of wonder whatsoever.
Yeah, I know it’s usually the tone that all these books have. And it’s a popular gimmick to put the reader smack into the story and make the POV character completely jaded by magic. But you know what? Doing this makes us, the readers, damn jaded too. And I bet the author is jaded to hell as they are writing that same old semi-cute and semi-amusing scene and trying to stick in smartass remarks into their characters’ mouths via inorganic means that are really just forcing the story as opposed to being forced by the inevitability of the events unfolding around them. And if they (the authors) are actually giggling along to it… well, I guess whatever I say will not be of any use.
So yeah, I want my sense of wonder, dammit! Enough of the matter-of-factness already!
Really, what it seems we’re getting here is a whole lot of “literalism” and “fundamentalism” in our magical offerings. Boring ordinary things found in our concrete physical reality are given attributes of the metaphysical and the numinous, and then made to pass for such, kind of like Renaissance cherubs being portrayed as just fat babies with attached wings. Or white horses with plastic horns tied on, being dubbed unicorns.
Sure, it’s nice to read a funny or silly romp, and those plastic faux unicorn horns can be amusing props for certain plot highlights. But even a funny silly romp with wild comic implications of “faerie clashes with New York” can still be done in a way that the moment of clash or coming together of the fantastic and the mundane is a memorable and hence truly pleasurable experience. In other words, enough with the bull; give me the real thing! Not a hollow façade but the real angel, the real alien, the real demigod or object of wonder. . . . Make me feel it, reel with it, make me drown in a crisp blast of wind suddenly engulfing me. Now that’s pleasure!
The pleasure is from the NEWNESS of the re-configuration of the FAMILIAR. It comes as a result of meshing well-known and expected elements that are all falling together as dominoes inevitably in a whole new pattern of circumstances. The dominoes are all the same but how they fall is different, see? How they fall must not be forced or predictable, but kind of stunning. And elegant. And just oh-so-right.
And no, it doesn’t have to be fireworks. What it has to be is the progression of verisimilitude — proper emotional reactions on the part of all the characters. The details they notice (and make me, the reader notice alongside with them). The way they react to the wonderful thing they are faced with. The way they do NOT take it in stride. I mean, would you? Really? Even if you lived in a world where magic was a way of life and everyone knew about it, wouldn’t you be stunned to see a fairy sitting on your face? I would be stunned by an ordinary cat sitting on my face!
So, why not still make the descriptions of it wonderful for us readers who do not know this world and its mores?
I repeat: I want to be moved by wonder. So, move me in any way you can — in any sneaky, deceptive wonderful, unexpected, or emotionally striking way, dear fellow author. Wonder and humor are not mutually exclusive. Wonder and smartass attitude are not mutually exclusive either. In fact, nothing is mutually exclusive with wonder except lack of true enthusiasm for it.
And if necessary, I as a reader, give you, the author, permission to step back even further and make the familiar unfamiliar. Alienate me from the ordinary, if that is what it takes! Make me feel a sense of wonder from staring at a crack on the wall.
And that means you might have to simply slow down. Because what I said a bit earlier about mutual exclusivity — I lied. There is one thing that can adversely affect a development of a sense of wonder, and that is fast pacing. Simply said, when you drive too fast, you miss out on all the neat scenery.
So don’t just give me another fat leprechaun or horned blue demon with a Brooklyn accent swearing like a mafia hitman. Once or twice is funny. All the time is a soul-dampening bad read.
I want to be stirred by the shadow of a shadow, the murmur of a ghostly breath of the Seelie Court that goes unnamed, and the hair to stand up on my skin and my hands go clammy with their impossibility…
Please give me what I’m truly yearning and reading for. After all, it’s why I bought your book.
Vera Nazarian is a writer, artist, and musician, the publisher of Norilana Books, and a one of this year’s Nebula nominees. This commentary was originally posted on her LiveJournal.
1 • Paul Jessup said:
April 16th, 2008 at 8:56 am, permalink
You’re wrong. That is not why the current influx Urban Fantasy sucks. It sucks for so many reasons far more profound and interesting then the fantastic presented as mundane.
Fantastic presented as mundane can be done with a way that still contains the wonder of the element of fantastic- look at almost all magical realism works, or the works of Kelly Link, or Ekaterina Sedia, or Alan De Niro, etc, etc, etc.
The problem with most -urban fantasy- is that it falls into two camps, Post-Buffy Fiction and Charles De Lintism.
While Post Buffy ism is usually filled with smart alecky and the trendy, it uses tired old tropes that wouldn’t even have wonder in them if they were coated in LSD and sparkles. There is no wonder left in vampires and werewolves- these are tired, old and cliche. Even by doing something new with it, you can only change so much before you’re ripping off Ann Rice or Buffy/Angel/Joss Whedon.
And the De Lint style is even worse. It uses tired old tropes and hangs them on a weak thread. It’s faeries, and native americans and oh boy it’s all magical and such. But it also is using the homeless and NA as a form of magical sidekick, destroying the actual context for the mythology it’s based on by turning it into another schlockly vision quest for the white protagonist who is overcoming some tragic point in their life or recover from their artists block.
There is so much wrong in Urban Fantasy. I don’t see why we need to dance around the real problems and focus on an almost non-problem. That’s complaining about the itchy black bumps on your skin when you have the plague, and then suggesting cover-up as a way of curing it.
2 • Jeremy Tolbert said:
April 16th, 2008 at 9:37 am, permalink
I have a hard time besmirching the Post-Buffy glut of paranormal fiction. There is an audience that craves it, judging from how well it seems to sell. I can’t really get up in arms about satisfying the audience. It’s kinda what we’re supposed to do. I don’t care for it, but it’s not _for_ me.
3 • Paul Jessup said:
April 16th, 2008 at 9:51 am, permalink
They may be filling a market need, yes, but that doesn’t mean we can’t point out the flaws inherit in it.
It’s not just PBF though, as I stated above, even non-PBF fic that’s Urban fantasy carries a similiar sickness.
4 • Jeremy Tolbert said:
April 16th, 2008 at 10:06 am, permalink
For you, there may be no wonder left in those tropes. I suspect for the younger crowd, there may still be. If there’s a marketing need, that is, an audience demand, then what’s the problem? You may have read a hundred books with vampires and werewolves in them, but newer readers, the ones I’d like to see get hooked, they might not have. Every tired old trope is new to somebody. And from what I’ve read, the types who read those nosferotica books are predominently younger readers (correct me if I’m wrong). They’ll develop more sophisticated tastes with time. But I don’t think you can objectively say “those books suck.” A large number of readers will disagree with you.
Second, while I value originality in my fiction, some people want their reading to be comfort food, and I just don’t feel comfortable criticizing a reader or a writer involved in that kind of literary transaction. Every book written doesn’t have to transcend literary boundries. Sometimes, it’s enough to entertain. Genre writers online in particular seem to get really worked up over notions of quality and forget that some just want to read something fun.
5 • Nicole said:
April 16th, 2008 at 10:18 am, permalink
“Fantastic presented as mundane can be done with a way that still contains the wonder of the element of fantastic- look at almost all magical realism works, or the works of Kelly Link, or Ekaterina Sedia, or Alan De Niro, etc, etc, etc.”
Yes. This exactly.
6 • Jeremy Tolbert said:
April 16th, 2008 at 10:23 am, permalink
Oh, and Paul, I want to say along with Nicole, you made a great counterpoint with magical realism.
7 • Paul Jessup said:
April 16th, 2008 at 10:27 am, permalink
“If there’s a marketing need, that is, an audience demand, then what’s the problem? You may have read a hundred books with vampires and werewolves in them, but newer readers, the ones I’d like to see get hooked, they might not have.”
Well, if all there was were books in the world, then I might agree with you. But these same youngins are assaulted daily with images of vampires, werewolves, zombies, monsters, etc, etc, etc, through television, movies, video games, the internet, etc.
You can’t tell me they’ve never seen it all or heard it all before. The writing in PBF is cynical and sarcastic for a reason- these are tired and old tropes that surround us daily, have become part of cultural landscape. From Vampire the Masquerade, to video games like Resident Evil, Castelvania and the like and comic books and manga and anime like Vampire Hunter D.
These tropes are so common place that you can waltz into a mall and shop at Hot Topic to get a cynical t-shirt making sarcastic comments on the whole thing.
“Second, while I value originality in my fiction, some people want their reading to be comfort food, and I just don’t feel comfortable criticizing a reader or a writer involved in that kind of literary transaction.”
I do. Just saying writing is comfort food and has no other purpose is destructive. It’s a falsehood in order to hide flaws of a fiction. I’ve known people that read comfort food, that read romance novels in a day, and yet they still criticize the bad ones, still point out the flaws in those that are poorly written.
You can’t hide bad writing behind the veil of escapism. this is not an either/or situation. Just because something is “fluff” to you or to others doesn’t mean it can’t have merit or importance.
“. Genre writers online in particular seem to get really worked up over notions of quality and forget that some just want to read something fun.”
And fun shouldn’t be well written? Shouldn’t be interesting? Shouldn’t be ground breaking? Fun should always be bland, boring, repetitive? Fun should be overtly racist? Should be perpetrating stereotypes?
Next thing you’ll tell me that Stephen King shouldn’t be criticised for his racism in books like the Shining or the Talisman because his is just pointless escapism.
But that’s just the point- all writing has the power to affect us in some way. By claiming something is just “escapism” tries to dodge past the idea that reading is an act of change, is an act of bringing in a new force into our mental landscape.
And writers have a responsibility here, a responsibility that they should be judged on.
8 • Jeremy Tolbert said:
April 16th, 2008 at 10:46 am, permalink
First of all, I want to say that you make some very good points about the ubiquity of said tropes.
But I did not say or intend to say that writing “is” comfort food. I said that some read primarily for entertainment, and I respect that, even if I don’t. I agree with you that if I did say writing is just comfort food, that would be destruction, but it’s not what I said.
I’m confused by your point about fluff. What did I say was fluff to me and wasn’t important?
Fun can be well-written, I agree, and I’d love it to be well-written. But the focus on literary qualities, sometimes what I see as writing for other writers, (mostly I see this in short fiction) ends up making a work less appealing to a more general readership.
My question to you: what is the inherent harm (to whatever, I
m not sure) in someone really liking vampires and werewolves in their entertainment? I’m not convinced that the writing is cynical and sarcastic because the tropes are worn–I think it’s a cultural/generational thing as much as anything else. I do not disagree that these tropes are worn. They don’t do much for me at all, personally.
You can criticize King for racism, and I have no problem with that. My disagreement would be, say, criticizing King for writing about something that a large number of people want to read because you find the subject boring or over-used. There’s a difference between the two forms of criticism, in my mind. One is a matter of personal taste, and the other is a cultural/sociological criticism.
9 • Chrononautic Log 改 » Blog Archive » The Decline of Things That I Like said:
April 16th, 2008 at 11:04 am, permalink
[...] God knows I have no particular brief for paranormal romance (Hannah reads it so I don’t have to) or even for contemporary fantasy, but I can’t help but laugh whenever I read a “critical” piece like this one. [...]
10 • Theresa said:
April 16th, 2008 at 11:34 am, permalink
This is my first post here. Hi everyone!
Personally, I think the author is onto something. Wonder and a sense of strangeness is what I’m drawn to in fantasy. Without that sense, I find there’s nothing to make it feel different from reading regular fiction. However, I think half of the author’s comments are really more about bad writing than anything else. Just because a novel is published doesn’t guarantee that the writing is first-class – it means someone thinks it will sell.
I actually quite admire Charles De Lint. Reading his ‘Onion Girl’ opened my mind to alternate mythologies, and the possibilities of fantasy beyond a wholly contained ‘fantasy world’. However, I didn’t think it was perfect. Something about De Lint’s writing unsettled me, and not in a good way. I wasn’t drawn in completely. Maybe it was a sense of wonder that was missing? Maybe it was just a lack of action? I still don’t know, but I think it’s something worth exploring.
I think there are two main tips for aspiring writers from this post: if you’re using a cliché, then recognize it, and see how you can make it original. And as always: show, don’t tell.
I also agree with some of the other comments posted here. There are novels I read when I was younger that I completely loved, and now, after many years and a re-read my opinions have changed (some of those books were really awful!). There are also some times when I know exactly what I want book, and its not always prize winning literature. It’s the same as going to the movie theatre and turning down the Oscar nomination for a romantic comedy. You know that there’ll be a happy ending.
11 • Paul Jessup said:
April 16th, 2008 at 11:38 am, permalink
“I’m not convinced that the writing is cynical and sarcastic because the tropes are worn–I think it’s a cultural/generational thing as much as anything else.”
I’m not so sure about that…being from the generation that Buffy and this fiction is aimed at in the first place.
12 • Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff said:
April 16th, 2008 at 1:00 pm, permalink
Paul, you said: “You’re wrong. That is not why the current influx Urban Fantasy sucks. It sucks for so many reasons far more profound and interesting then the fantastic presented as mundane.”
Why does Vera have to be wrong in order for you to have a valid point? She’s not wrong and neither are you. She simply said she finds this trend in fantasy fic annoying. You find other things annoying.
I find people who start a commentary with “you’re wrong” annoying. But I’m not saying you’re wrong to do that … just annoying.
You could have agreed with Very, but added, “I find this even more annoying, personally” Instead you chose to argue as if your points were mutually exclusive. Interesting…
I think, in fact, you’re right in proposing that the writing is cynical and sarcastic because it’s a cultural “thang”. That doesn’t mean that it’s the only reason for the trend. In fact, causal relationships are rarely, if ever, that simplistic.
As a writer, I find writing character’s reactions to magical elements both challenging and FUN because different people will react differently. It’s boring when everyone reacts the same way, whether it’s GOSH WOW or a yawn. But it’s especially boring when they react with ennui. If the characters are bored, so are we, don’t you think?
13 • Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff said:
April 16th, 2008 at 1:02 pm, permalink
Oh, and pardon my typos….
14 • Cheryl’s Mewsings » Blog Archive » Genre as Ossification said:
April 16th, 2008 at 1:13 pm, permalink
[...] in the blogosphere today was this piece by Vera Nazarian lamenting the current state of urban fantasy. David Moles is right to point out [...]
15 • Ashley said:
April 16th, 2008 at 1:19 pm, permalink
For me, there’s a difference between introducing a fantasy element into the world in which I live, and living in a world in which the fantasy elements are every day. I prefer the latter, because deep down I’m still an every day sort of person, who’s just delighted at the thought that there might exist some =place= magical. The sense of wonder, in that case, remains with the reader, not with the characters who live and move and interact with that world. Mileage varies, of course, which is why we have such a wide variety of books to choose from!
16 • Paul Jessup said:
April 16th, 2008 at 1:29 pm, permalink
Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff
She *is* wrong though. And I pointed out why- many great writers just introduce phantasmagoria and the characters do not react to it in a sense of wonder and yet the actual text itself contains wonder.
17 • EMoon said:
April 16th, 2008 at 2:28 pm, permalink
Mr. Jessup, you seem to feel that you’re divinely appointed to know right and wrong when you see it.
You’re wrong. Nobody died and appointed you literary god.
If you ever learn to read carefully and with discernment, reason clearly, and acquire minimal social skills so you don’t come across as rude on first acquaintance, you will look back on your posts here with some embarrassment.
If you read what Ms. Nazarian actually said, you’d realize your critism made little sense. It was as if she’d said “Beer is wet” and you’d retorted “You’re wrong! Water is wet!”
As it happens, I don’t like urban fantasy much (thus analyzing what’s “wrong” with it isn’t my problem) but Ms. Nazarian has points to make that deserve thoughtful consideration, not your brush-off. You could have contributed your own ideas without attacking her. You chose instead to be rude and abrasive. Get over yourself.
18 • JS Bangs said:
April 16th, 2008 at 2:42 pm, permalink
(First time commenter, long time reader…)
I have to agree with both the original writer and Paul. Introducing the supernatural into the mundane is great, but if you do it in such a way as to strip the magical of its magic, then what was the point? This is why I’m almost entirely uninterested in the current glut of vampirrific urban fantasy: they bore, once you’ve read one or two. This is also one of the disappointments of playing Vampire: The Requiem. Vampires are fascinating when they’re an unreal monster hiding in the shadows. Once they come out into the light they’re no longer interesting.
19 • Paul Jessup said:
April 16th, 2008 at 2:48 pm, permalink
“Mr. Jessup, you seem to feel that you’re divinely appointed to know right and wrong when you see it.”
No, I use logic and reason to discern this.
“You’re wrong. Nobody died and appointed you literary god.”
No they didn’t. But obv if anyone were to actually read my first retort (which is basically, a LOT of writers make the contemporary world have a sense of wonder EVEN THOUGH the main characters do not).
“If you read what Ms. Nazarian actually said, you’d realize your critism made little sense. It was as if she’d said “Beer is wet” and you’d retorted “You’re wrong! Water is wet!””
And if YOU had the rationality of a meerkat, you would see that IT IS NOT the case at all. And please, actually back up your comment logically. Not use metaphors that actual don’t make sense in the context of my comment.
20 • Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff said:
April 16th, 2008 at 3:00 pm, permalink
No, Paul, Vera is *not* wrong, and I pointed out why.
She wasn’t saying this is the only problem with Urban Fantasy (which I like a great deal in concept), nor was she saying it was the *main* problem with UF. She was speaking to a trend in UF that she doesn’t like.
You’re the one who’s insisting that your viewpoint is the only True Church. And as I said before, it’s not. There is room in the universe for your opinion and Vera’s. So don’t get your panties or boxers in a twist, please.
You cite writers who get a Sense of Wonder into their writing without eliciting reactions from the mundanes. I note they are writers of Magical Realism. Magical Realism and fantasy are not the same thing. There are different “tropes” and different qualities to them. I write both and I can tell you from an insider’s POV that they’re quite different.
Perhaps that’s part of the problem–you’ve been reading Urban Fantasy thinking it’s Magical Realism.
There’s also this, I might read the writers you feel do Sense of Wonder well and come to the conclusion that they do NOT do it well … in my opinion.
I would not be wrong, nor would you be right. We would simply be in disagreement.
21 • Michael Gordon said:
April 16th, 2008 at 3:06 pm, permalink
Oh man, I wish I had the time and brain power to read through all these comments (oops, trangression #1), but my two cents are obviously of earth-shattering importance.
My current fav series is the Dresden Files and the protagonist, being a professional wizard, is pretty used to the supernatural, so the sense of wonder is definitely not present unless we’re dealing with something way out of the ordinary, but the depth and detail make the stories worth reading and living in. Same for early Laurell K Hamilton works and the glorious writing of Susanna Clarke.
I also think that the common bias against vampire/werewolf stories by the more literary crowd is a bit unfair. Yeah, they’ve been done to death (and undeath), but so have spy novels, romances, westerns, and epic fantasy. And yeah, only a few authors are going to do a really fantastic job with those “tropes”, and a few more will use them exactly because they are so well known; the author no longer needs to explain to the reader about stakes and silver bullets, it lets the reader feel savvy and knowledgeable.
And maybe that’s where the lack of wonder comes in. When writing for the grown up fantasy crowd we can assume the reader knows a lot about vampires, faeries, wizards etc and so to some of us it would feel cheap to try to imbue that with the same wonder we had as children first encountering these beings.
22 • Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff said:
April 16th, 2008 at 3:07 pm, permalink
Paul Jessup wrote: And if YOU had the rationality of a meerkat, you would see that IT IS NOT the case at all. And please, actually back up your comment logically. Not use metaphors that actual don’t make sense in the context of my comment.
Elizabeth, I think you’ve got him on the ropes. He’s starting to misspell words and use sentence fragments.
Paul, Elizabeth’s metaphor was quite apropos. She’s merely underlining the point I was trying to make — you don’t need to make Vera wrong in order for your points to be right.
Your sense of “logic and reason” needs a bit of fine tuning I think. It is not logical to attack someone’s viewpoint so absolutely when you cannot empirically prove that it is wrong. Logically to prove Vera’s point *wrong* you would have to prove that either the trends she mentioned do not exist in Urban Fantasy or they do not annoy anyone.
The very fact of Vera’s article is evidence that they do exist, and do, in fact, annoy someone.
23 • Michael Gordon said:
April 16th, 2008 at 3:09 pm, permalink
And just to head off any unneccsary responses:
Mr Gordon, you ignorant boor, you have all the literary class of drunken toad. Remove your porcine excuse for a brain from your posterior and actually read something outside of your narrow contempurban fantasy sub (and I do mean SUB) genre and engage in some actual intellectual stimulation.
Good DAY to you sir!
24 • Tempest said:
April 16th, 2008 at 3:14 pm, permalink
Dearest readers,
Debate and disagreement are awesome. Referring to each other as various rodents isn’t so much so. Please refrain! Though continue to make your points.
Thank you.
25 • Paul Jessup said:
April 16th, 2008 at 3:21 pm, permalink
I stand by what I said. And so far have seen inadequate proof otherwise. She doesn’t have to be wrong for me to be right- but her statement, her whole argument IS WRONG.
And I pointed out examples.
And this-
“You cite writers who get a Sense of Wonder into their writing without eliciting reactions from the mundanes. I note they are writers of Magical Realism. Magical Realism and fantasy are not the same thing.”
Does not refute the examples of Eketarina Sedia, Kelly Linke, Alan De Niro
And I can list more!
Jack Cody, Joe Hill, Robert Aickman
Also, Urban Fantasy aside: the argument was simply that by introducing fantastic stuff in a mundane way the writer lost the sense of wonder.
If doesn’t matter what it is- what genre, DOES NOT MATTER. Her statement was basically touted as fact- and it’s wrong because writers have proven otherwise. Magical realism, interstatial, Post Industrial Fantasy, New Weird, Next Weird, ass weird, whatever.
26 • Paul Jessup said:
April 16th, 2008 at 3:24 pm, permalink
“Elizabeth, I think you’ve got him on the ropes. He’s starting to misspell words and use sentence fragments.”
It is a poor man’s argument, to attack someone’s grammar rather then their actual argument itself.
Not on the ropes at all. But this “I’m right, You’re Wrong”, “no! You’re right, I’m wrong” without any logical presence to back it up is annoying.
Pull out a real argument. And no, everyone is right does not count. Refute the writers I’ve listed, then. Tell me that they aren’t really fantasy writers, but instead figments of my imagination.
27 • Paul Jessup said:
April 16th, 2008 at 3:29 pm, permalink
“Logically to prove Vera’s point *wrong* you would have to prove that either the trends she mentioned do not exist in Urban Fantasy or they do not annoy anyone.”
No, to prove that she is wrong all I need to do is prove that her basic underlying structure to her argument is wrong. And that is simply that
Mundane wonders==no sense of wonder
And I’ve pointed out many writers (and can list more) that have done just that, produced a sense of wonder in the reader but not in the main character.
And here-
“Paul, Elizabeth’s metaphor was quite apropos. She’s merely underlining the point I was trying to make — you don’t need to make Vera wrong in order for your points to be right.”
I said it above, I’ll say it again. It has nothing to do with me being right. Her being wrong is her being wrong on her own accord.
28 • Paul Jessup said:
April 16th, 2008 at 3:31 pm, permalink
“The very fact of Vera’s article is evidence that they do exist, and do, in fact, annoy someone.”
That’s like saying cogito ergo sum is proof of the soul.
29 • Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff said:
April 16th, 2008 at 4:04 pm, permalink
Paul wrote: :And I’ve pointed out many writers (and can list more) that have done just that, produced a sense of wonder in the reader but not in the main character.”
Yes, but Vera is talking about the ones who DIDN’T do that. Their work has become almost a sub-genre or at least a formula. And it was a formula that my ex-agent tried to convince me I had to write to if I was going to do urban fantasy. That was nonsense. AS I SAID, clearly, there ARE writers who can bring a sense of wonder to their work. But they may have other problems.
Vera’s point was not that this was the only way to kill a sense of wonder, but it is ONE way to do it. I’ve read fantasy fiction that did exactly what Vera is talking about. Not just the POV character but *all* the characters reacted to the magical as if it was mundane. They were bored. I was bored.
The writer then did NOT do what the writers you cite do well — they did NOT introduce wonder in any other way. The mundane remained mundane, the magical lacked magic and the fantasy failed to seem fantastic.
You keep talking about logic and reason. Apparently it operates differently on your world than it does here. Fantasy writers do suck the fantastic out of their work by giving characters, and the unseen narrator as well, a blasé reaction to the magical in their work. This is demonstrable and I’m sure Vera would be willing to give you a list of the works she’s talking about.
Saying that Vera’s article is proof the situation exists is merely to point out that someone has found this particular fault in popular urban fantasy. You are trying to disprove something that Vera didn’t suggest — that this is the only thing wrong with it.
Let’s take a poll: How many people here have read fantasy fiction that falls flat in part for the reasons that Vera states in her article? (There are already at least three posters that I’ve seen who’ve said that.)
Of course, you may not accept the opinions of any number of other readers as evidence (I did not say proof) that mundaneness is a flaw in some popular urban fantasy. Apparently you believe only your opinion is the correct one.
Oh, and thank you for giving my commentary so much of your mental space. Four posts to respond to my one. I must be on a roll today.
30 • Vera Nazarian said:
April 16th, 2008 at 5:31 pm, permalink
Paul Jessup,
Let me begin with a tray of candies. It’s a large tray with a wide variety — chocolates, gumdrops, candied fruits, hard candy, lollipops, nutty bars, truffles…
I am offering you this tray for your perusal and delectation. I expect for you to admire the whole glittering galaxy of delights, the constellation of sweets, maybe try one or two, acknowledge how yummy many of the others look, shrug at some, leave the rest alone. Instead, you focus all your attention on a single solitary tootsie roll somewhere off to the center of the tray.
“Take several pieces,” I say. “Try the locum. And the raisins dipped in yogurt. Oh, and the marmalade rounds are heavenly, they are imported from a distant land…”
“No,” you say. “The tootsie roll is stale, bad. BAD. I will not touch your tray with that nasty wrong, un-tasty tootsie roll! Ugh! Your stinky worthless tray!”
“But… but!” I begin to say. “What about the malt or rum balls? Or the Roche in gilded foil?”
“Bad tootsie roll!” you say. “BAD TOOTSIE ROLL!”
“Don’t you see anything else but that tootsie roll on my great big cornucopia of a tray?” I ask, somewhat hurt by your single-minded intensity.
“Your tray stinks of tootsie roll!” you retort.
“Okay, well… I can remove the tootsie roll,” I offer, wondering if maybe you’re allergic, or have another valid reason for this dislike of tootsie rolls. “It’s not going to be missed in such a large tray of other candies. And it never touched any of the others, being in its own wrapper…”
“No!” You raise your voice dangerously. “I insist, there is now a taint of hateful wrong tootsie roll on your candy tray and therefore the whole tray must be disposed of immediately! In an incinerator preferably, or tossed out of an airlock in deep space! Your tray is all WRONG!”
I think of something else to say, and then simply shrug and keep holding my tray out. Maybe someone else might come by and try the other candies on it?
My candy tray is my tray of opinions. It is this essay here. (As much as possible, I am going to be using very short sentences, please note, from this point onward…)
My essay puts forth more than one opinion and makes more than one point. Allow me to list them now. Most of them — for your ultimate delight. (Though, I might miss some since I am very sleepy, and it’s a large tray….)
MY ESSAY POINTS AND OPINIONS:
- Evocation of genuine wonder requires subtlety.
- Evocation of wonder requires genuine enthusiasm for the object of wonder on the part of the author first and foremost — before any of that can be transmitted on to the reader (or to the characters, or to whoever).
- Wonder and humor and smart attitude are not mutually exclusive.
- Humor of the non-wisecracking non-streetwise kind is an option — give it a try (put an ordinary non-funny person with little-to-no attitude in a crazy situation).
- Fast pacing can detract from a sense of wonder; slow down.
- Show don’t tell: present the right details to the reader and that will elicit the wonder regardless of what the characters perceive (regardless of whether they are jaded or not).
- Take it a step further — make the familiar unfamiliar, alienate the reader from the ordinary.
- The pleasure of NEWNESS comes from the re-configuration of the FAMILIAR. No need to discard the familiar and comfortable, just reupholster it (who was it that said there were only 10 plotlines in the world?).
- Attraction is a reaction, to be elicited only, and only from a combination of specific elements that may all be different from reader to reader. There is no other real way to make it happen; no one leather vamp hunk fits all.
- Attraction is a kind of sense of wonder in itself.
- Flimsy facades of wood laminate paste board masquerading as the numinous in fantasy are overdone; give us the paranormal real thing, solid through and through.
- Unexpected real events can be just as striking or more so that banally presented fantastic events (bird poop versus boring fairy).
- Cliches jade not only the reader but the author who is writing them.
- Fairies can be very different — we haven’t seen your unique version of them yet…
Now, why are all of the above points so wrong? Whatever did they do to displease you?
Why is it that you choose to focus on the tootsie roll? On a single point out of many that I make in my essay, which — as you insist — is that fantasy from a mundane point of view lacks a sense of wonder if the characters themselves have a mundane point of view? Is that really all you came away with? Is that really the only thing I am saying in that long essay?
What about all the other points? Do you not see them, shiny, pretty, chocolatey? Not? In that case, I suppose I cannot offer you that nice chunk of truffle fudge. Because obviously you cannot/will not/choose not to see it.
Your loss.
Incidentally, if you think I dislike urban fantasy, or disdain its great practitioner authors, I am sorry to disappoint you. I genuinely enjoy a great deal of urban fantasy (otherwise I’d not have picked up that book with the hapless fairy in it). I happen to also admire Charles de Lint and his work immensely, consider him my friend, and in fact he even wrote the introduction to one of my books (my PS Publishing novella “The Clock King and the Queen of the Hourglass”). Ekaterina Sedia? Love her writing; I blurbed one of her novels. Would I do that if I didn’t like her work? Kelly Link’s whimsy is delightful and chock-full of sense of wonder. I love Holly Black’s work, enjoy tons of others.
Why do I not name specific texts and book titles? Because that would be mean. Because I feel sorry for the authors. I would never do that so somebody in public. Generic examples are plenty illustrative of what I’m talking about. And if not, then I must be talking to a wall. Hey, there’s an interesting hairline crack….
Finally, it seems to me that you misread a lot of the base assumptions and definitions. You willfully choose to blur together into one thing the fine differences between that what is mundane and that what is simply real. The word “mundane” has a special connotation attached to it. Yes, it implies the real. But in addition it has the semantic baggage of implying something banal — a handicap of extra meaning that the word “real” does not possess. So when I talk of mundania and mundane I imply “real with an overabundance of banal in it” — that which lacks sense of wonder.
Definitions of terms are so vital. You might want to reread my essay, and if unsure/blind to of specific points (candies) on the tray), then ask please, don’t jump to an incorrect conclusion. You don’t have to like my candies (or even all candy, period). But at least acknowledge them.
And on that sugary note…
Adieu, sweet prince.
31 • Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff said:
April 16th, 2008 at 6:04 pm, permalink
Paul wrote: “…writers have a responsibility here, a responsibility that they should be judged on.”
YES! YES! YES!
Exactly. And that was part of Vera’s point, in fact. The writer’s job as Ursula LeGuin so ably put it is to but into words what cannot be put into words. And do it in such a way that it will transport readers.
For me, good fiction transports. The best fiction transforms.
32 • J. T. Glover said:
April 16th, 2008 at 7:26 pm, permalink
This is one of the best discussions of urban fantasy/paranormal romance I’ve read. I particularly like Ms. Nazarian’s nice distinctions between different flavors of urban fantasy and paranormal romance. For a long time I’ve had a difficult time articulating my feelings about why I don’t like “PBF”; reading this essay was both a pleasure and a long series of “aha”s. And while I think Mr. Jessup makes some good points, I do believe the lady with the tray of candies wins…
33 • Ashley said:
April 16th, 2008 at 10:04 pm, permalink
Paul says,
No, to prove that she is wrong all I need to do is prove that her basic underlying structure to her argument is wrong. And that is simply that
Mundane wonders==no sense of wonder
And I’ve pointed out many writers (and can list more) that have done just that, produced a sense of wonder in the reader but not in the main character.
—-
But all you have to do to disprove the argument “all crows are black” is to produce one white crow.
IF in fact Vera was arguing
mundane wonders = no sense of wonder, and IF this statement is true for her,
then Vera has produced her white crow (and it’s one of a largish flock). Thus, LOGICALLY, Vera is not wrong.
If Paul’s assertion that Vera’s argument is
mundane wonders = no sense of wonder, then ipso facto, she is correct for her own perception.
You can have a million black crows, but the one white crow invalidates the argument.
Is that logical enough for you, Paul?
34 • SF Tidbits for 4/17/08 | Technophobiac Sci-Fi said:
April 17th, 2008 at 1:50 am, permalink
[...] in Fantasy Magazine tells us How To Kill Off A Sense Of Wonder in fantasy (particularly paranormal fantasy). There are some great comments in this thread. I echo [...]
35 • David de Beer said:
April 17th, 2008 at 4:16 am, permalink
Referring to each other as various rodents isn’t so much so.
awww, you take all the fun out of life *sad face*
36 • David de Beer said:
April 17th, 2008 at 4:41 am, permalink
eh, the phrase “show, don’t tell” is beginning to make me wince a bit lately. It’s becoming too much of an unthinking mantra and it can get pulled to silly extremes. Sometimes, a bit of telling, or even a whole lot, is good and can be used effectively.
Maybe it’s time to drop that phrase and start getting more specific about what’s meant by it – attention to detail, evoke a scene, etc, whatever.
In any case, interesting points Vera, I am particularly agreeing with the too fast paced. Unfortunately, this appears to be the “in” thing.
Then again, Jeremy pointed out something very true – there is a very large readership for these books. I may not be one of them (I keep ending up disappointed with authors I have high hopes for), but there is a massive readership and who’s to say, genuinely, they are wrong?
Look, how many times do people point out the SFF fields needs more diversity, needs to expand more and become more inclusive, not exclusive?
Clearly, this specific brand of UF that Vera mentioned (and it is a specific branch, the Urban Paranormal; took me a while to cop to that difference) does exactly that. It provides something that a lot of people need from their reading.
We all read for different, and specific, reasons.
These UF readers have a need, that need is being catered to.
I see no problem with that.
(Regrettably, my needs are different and I hope that there will still be some niche UF titles that can provide that need in future.)
If you don’t like the style of the books, then don’t read them.
Having said all that, I do think that the possibility of a backlash against UF can come, no matter how popular it is right now. The style and even plot from one to the other is just too much the same.
There is too much of a glut from the exact same thing, and that is a publishing mistake, not authors.
Still, I’d just like them to slow the pace of the books down a bit. Take the time to develop the world and the characters, or at least let me in. Everything passes in such a blur that I’m left only with a cast of featureless amoebas running around and doing stuff I don’t really care about.
The last 3 UF books I read in the last year followed the same schematic that I find increasing (and still annoying) in a lot of SFF short fic:
1) BANG!
2) long, meandering backfilling of past story so we can find out how we got to BANG!
3)not-quite-false-flashback over, plot moves a tad
4)BANG!BANG!BANG!
5) The End.
until the next book.
yeah, I don’t know, somewhere in-between all that I actually kind of miss where the story happens and so why I should care about the chars at all.
But what I want might not be what the bulk of readers from this sub-genre wants.
37 • Paul Jessup said:
April 17th, 2008 at 7:16 am, permalink
“But all you have to do to disprove the argument “all crows are black” is to produce one white crow.”
Welcome to logical reasoning! This is, to wit, the basis of modern philosophy and science. Heads all the way back to Aristotle’s famouse maxim, A!=!A (A does not equal not A).
“mundane wonders = no sense of wonder, then ipso facto, she is correct for her own perception.”
Now, now. We can’t go by perception here. We just can’t. Because that’s basically saying “If it’s right for her, then it’s right”. Which is bullshit. All opinions are not equal. If they were, the opinions of Ghandi would be on the same playing field of a white supremacist, or an anti-semite, or for that matter, anyone. No, opinions are not created equal. Their are well-formed opinions and opinions that have no validity.
And by the way, just reversing my argument does not reverse the actual outcome. Throwing in Latin does not make you’re argument valid.
For example, I could easily say your argument is reducto ad absurdum (or rather, reducto ad avis?), but that doesn’t tell us much of anything (other than it is a logical fallacy).
Vera-
I don’t take candy from strangers.
Also, I still disagree. Mostly because even though you say you have a full tray of sweets, you are just riffing on the one core idea, the one core concept.
And you also add a whole bunch of stipulations in this post that weren’t in the original argument that changes things. But it makes it easier if you name names, name genres, rather than just saying “This current trend of Urban Fantasy”.
I know you don’t want to hurt writer’s feelings, and that’s grand. I personally call them as I see them. And it’s great you’re friends with Charles De Lint- that’s fantastic! I’m sure he’s a great guy in real life. But his fiction, I feel, would also fall under this same argument.
And JT- read your post on Chronnaut- you are wrong. This is not about “OMG! NEW STUFF IS SO SCARY!” but rather, the need for something even newer. Mostly cause in Urban Fantasy, even the old stuff needs help.
What could that be?
Why, PIF!
http://behindthewainscot.com/?p=30
38 • JeremyT said:
April 17th, 2008 at 8:26 am, permalink
Paul, I said no such thing on Chrononaut. That’s twice you’ve attributed things to me that I did not say. Your reading comprehension skills leave much to be desired, and I will no longer engage you on this matter if you can’t even read what I’ve actually written.
39 • Paul Jessup said:
April 17th, 2008 at 8:41 am, permalink
When was the other time?
Sorry, if I got you confused with someone else. I saw this-
http://www.chrononaut.org/log/?p=317
And assumed that Jeremy T. was you. My bad, I apologize.
40 • JeremyT said:
April 17th, 2008 at 9:00 am, permalink
I did post on Chrononaut. I never said anything about “OMG NEW STUFF IS SO SCARY.” I have one comment about the line that Tempest asks about. Even if you are referring to my Livejournal post linked by David, I never said that. I would never say that. I’m a neophile.
The second time was above in this thread, and I called you on it then, and you seemed to ignore it and replied to one small portion of what I said.
41 • Paul Jessup said:
April 17th, 2008 at 9:03 am, permalink
I’m sorry, the Via JeremyT at the ending made it sound like you were being quoted, and a lot of blog software place the author of the blog beneath the post. So I assumed it was you, I’m sorry if that’s wrong. I don’t read the chrononaut, so I had no idea who had originally said that.
42 • David Moles said:
April 17th, 2008 at 12:33 pm, permalink
Paul,
“Via: preposition: by the agency or instrumentality of.” It’s me you’re looking for.
And no, this piece hanging over us here is not OMG NEW STUFF IS SO SCARY. However, it is very much Y RNT MOR THNGS RITN I LIKE?
For what it’s worth, I’m not a Buffy fan and I’ve been annoyed with the DeLint school for years. I suspect what I want out of fantasy has as least as much in common with what Ms. Nazarian wants (or what you want) as it does with what’s wanted by the readers who enjoy the books she (or you) are complaining about.
But that doesn’t mean I don’t recognize a parochial viewpoint and an aggrieved sense of entitlement when I see them.
43 • Paul Jessup said:
April 17th, 2008 at 12:57 pm, permalink
Meh, I don’t have a sense of entitlement, I do however think that debate and discussion are the meat of critical thought and are a boon to the genre as a field.
I don’t think I’m better than anyone else. But I do think that people can be wrong. I know, I know, since kindergarten we are taught to play nice and be kind. But I’m not that kind of person and I’m not that kind of writer.
Nor do I expect the same in return. If I’m wrong, tell me. But back it up. And don’t be surprised when I defend my thought if I still think it’s valid.
44 • Vera Nazarian said:
April 17th, 2008 at 9:42 pm, permalink
David Moles,
“A parochial viewpoint and an aggrieved sense of entitlement?” Is that the only thing you can go after in all of my essay? My passionate inflammatory tone? How lukewarm of you. (And no, leave poor Paul Jessup alone, admit, it’s my jugular you’re after.)
What about all the things I am actually saying? Do I strike a sympathetic string anywhere in your gray matter’s hoary depths, or is your semantic instrument completely flat? Because there is a world of difference between a “parochial viewpoint” and a classic one.
And yes, I do have a grand and rather healthy sense of entitlement because I _am_ entitled — entitled to have a strong opinion and to voice it in however manner I choose without being hurtful to others.
Suddenly you owe me an additional apology. Without such, regretfully I must disdain to acknowledge you from this point onward and merely fart SFWA Rainbows in your general direction.
45 • David Moles said:
April 18th, 2008 at 3:57 am, permalink
Paul, I didn’t say you had a sense of entitlement. (Also it, wasn’t your comment my post compared to Alan’s parody rant.) And in general I agree that vigorous debate is critical to the health of the field.
That said, I don’t see much value in complaining about tropes. The world is always going to be full of people writing books about things you aren’t (or I’m not) interested in. It’s generally fairly easy to avoid these books.
And if other people in fact are interested in these things, really, that’s their business, isn’t it? If we want to talk about why a particular pizza is not good pizza, I’m down for that. An argument that people should eat okonomiyaki instead of pizza, though, had better have a lot of entertainment value, because as criticism, it’s pretty thin.
(Not that I would say the Magical Negro, — or Women In Refrigerators Syndrome, or a homeless fetish — is a mere “trope” or matter of taste. But that’s a different question from whether it’s fair to complain when you pick up a fairy noir book that you’ve discovered it is, in fact, fairy noir.)
46 • Michael Gordon said:
April 18th, 2008 at 8:14 am, permalink
Vera wrote “instead of making it a truly life-shaking event as it ought to be…”
While I don’t think anyone else has pointed to this phrasing as troubling, I can’t help but feel that it lies at the root of the problem.
I dislike chick lit, depressing memoirs, social-experimenting speculative fiction, and a number of other genres, but I don’t don’t presume to know how they ought to be written. If a book immediately raises red flags on page one (as in Vera’s example) then perhaps that’s for the best. If the author’s handling of the subject matter displeases you from the get-go, put it down, step away, find a better book.
47 • Paul Jessup said:
April 18th, 2008 at 8:25 am, permalink
Both you and David Moles seem to be of the persuasion that if you don’t like, just don’t read it. And as a criticism of reading, can be true (but shouldn’t be, but that’s a long story). As a writer, who also writes in the Urban Fantasy market, I think we are *required* to look critically at our peers and make judgments based on the books.
And then announce these judgments as well as write counter-points in that area of fiction. Fiction itself is a conversation, with genre more than anything itself. And fiction that has a feedback loop turning in on it’s own navel (repeating the same conversation) gets stale.
This is important, that we criticize and challange and offer writing contrarywise. Else we would all still be reading and writing Scientifiction in the ole Hugo style and nothing would be exciting, new and different.
48 • David Moles said:
April 18th, 2008 at 10:37 am, permalink
Hmm, not exactly.
I’m of the persuasion that, as a critic, to a first approximation your job is to judge books by what they are, not by what you think they ought to have been instead.
If you want to talk about how Kim Harrison (say) fails as fairy noir, with examples of better fairy from (say) Kelly Link and better noir from (say) Ross Macdonald, that’s criticism. “God, I’m sick of fairies!” is not.
49 • Avigail said:
April 18th, 2008 at 10:39 am, permalink
I absolutely disagree with that. Why should you read something you won’t enjoy? You may derive a benefit from reading it and writing a critique, but no one is required to do so, nor do I think they should be. Original fiction does not only arise from disliking the way someone else did it.
50 • Paul Jessup said:
April 18th, 2008 at 11:41 am, permalink
“I’m of the persuasion that, as a critic, to a first approximation your job is to judge books by what they are, not by what you think they ought to have been instead.”
It depends on what you are talking about- if you’re talking as a critic divorced from the act of creation within the field, then I would say hesitatingly maybe (of course, deconstrucvism is a very handy tool, so this shouldn’t be just tossed aside).
If you are talking as a critic that is also a writer, that is a creator, that is ACTIVE in the field itself, than I say they are honor bound to look at the negative spaces within the text, not just the actuality of the narrative, but also the holes within that narrative, the things left out, changed, broken. This is important for us to move forward as a field and to have conversations within the genre itself.
Elsewise, we would have stagnation.
“I absolutely disagree with that. Why should you read something you won’t enjoy? You may derive a benefit from reading it and writing a critique, but no one is required to do so, nor do I think they should be. Original fiction does not only arise from disliking the way someone else did it.”
I would have to sorely disagree here and say that writers need to read differently than everyone else. For this very purpose. Original fiction rises up CONSTANTLY because they didn’t like how X person did Y.
Campbell pushing the first scifi revolution, pushing away from the pulps and into characterization and hard sf. The New Wave writers pushing against that, calling it all corny, hackneyed and trying to push a more intellectual and literary sf. The New Weird writers pushing against epic fantasy, the cyberpunks pushing against it all- these are all made up of people who wanted something that was missing, and then criticized all fiction before it for lacking this thing, lacking what they needed.
It is what makes genre so interesting, so unique.
51 • David Moles said:
April 18th, 2008 at 12:03 pm, permalink
“Original fiction rises up CONSTANTLY because they didn’t like how X person did Y.”
Paul, I think we’re in violent agreement here. Believe me, as a writer, I think about books I hate and what I hate about them… well, if not constantly, then at least more often than I’d care to keep tabs on. It’s my major source of inspiration, really.
What I’m objecting to isn’t the complaint that X handled Y badly, it’s the complaint that X went for Y when he/she should have gone for Z.
52 • Paul Jessup said:
April 18th, 2008 at 12:16 pm, permalink
“What I’m objecting to isn’t the complaint that X handled Y badly, it’s the complaint that X went for Y when he/she should have gone for Z.”
Yes, we are very much in agreement- I must’ve misunderstood what you had originally said!
53 • David Moles said:
April 18th, 2008 at 1:13 pm, permalink
All’s well that ends well!
54 • Jerry Bryson said:
April 18th, 2008 at 1:26 pm, permalink
I wonder, though, how much of this is due to writers and how much to others up the food chain–agents, editors, publishers, marketers, and the buyers at B&N and Wallmart? The blurbs inside the book jackets panegyrize fast pacing, promising that to the reader; sense of wonder, not so much.
In writing, I feel obliged to obsess about pacing when, doggone it, I want to look at the scenery. I want to inspect the strange car, the airplane, the B&B that always has the exact number of rooms for the current guest roster. I want to revel in the scene as my mundane POV learns to conjure butterflies and fairies. Instead, I write in apprehension of being passed over by an agent or editor for slow pacing. (But she did the butterflies anyway.)
55 • Artifacts»Blog Archive » Sense of Wonder said:
April 18th, 2008 at 7:36 pm, permalink
[...] Nazarain has posted an interesting essay at Fantasy magazine about how popular, formula-driven urban/paranormal fantasy (in the mode of [...]
56 • Vera Nazarian said:
April 19th, 2008 at 7:39 pm, permalink
Michael Gordon,
Vera wrote “instead of making it a truly life-shaking event as it ought to be…”
While I don’t think anyone else has pointed to this phrasing as troubling, I can’t help but feel that it lies at the root of the problem.
Thanks for bringing this up.
In fact a number of people have been bothered by my usage of “ought” because how dare I imply that things ought to be one way or another? (Or is it that they dislike stodgy vocabulary?)
When I say that sense of wonder should be “a truly life-shaking event as it ought to be” is somewhat like saying “I wish water was wet as it ought to be.” Because a great portion of what makes up wonder is a sense of the life-shaking and momentous. Without such, it will not be wonder but something else altogether. Even “quiet” wonder requires a heightening of awe and a profound moment of insight, and an internal explosion of meaning sinking in.
On the other hand, if people are not reading what is actually said but skimming with prejudice and extrapolating wildly, they are likely to assume I am implying that something else “ought to be” a certain way or another (and hence the “how dare you” conclusion and righteous indignation follows). Well, I am not referring to anything else here in that sentence (while this essay is about a number of points, this sentence is only about one). There is no proper logic that will immediately imply that oh, she is bemoaning the lack of sense of wonder, so necessarily she expects to have a sense of wonder every time she reads (I do not, I often read books for other reasons).
I dislike chick lit, depressing memoirs, social-experimenting speculative fiction, and a number of other genres, but I don’t don’t presume to know how they ought to be written. If a book immediately raises red flags on page one (as in Vera’s example) then perhaps that’s for the best. If the author’s handling of the subject matter displeases you from the get-go, put it down, step away, find a better book.
Personally I am with you, I dislike most of such books too (but always with exceptions for the truly well done). And that particular book with the fairy that I mentioned in the essay — I did indeed put it down and never made it past page one, and instead wrote the essay (and no, it is not DEAD WITCH WALKING and not anything else by Kim Harrison whose work I enjoy).
Let me reiterate here that I enjoy a whole lot of urban paranormal and urban fantasy in general (even though it’s not my favorite flavor of genre, I prefer “otherworld” fantasy), but there are times when a book one picks up is “stillborn” — it is lifeless from the first page on, which may not be the case for someone else picking up that very same book.
Thanks for raising valid discussion points, Michael.
57 • Carole McDonnell said:
April 20th, 2008 at 7:17 am, permalink
Great article. I don’t mind the breakthrough of the numinous or supernatural into common life…that kinda stuff happens often enough and everyone has a weird personal story. But you are soooo right about the reaction of the main characters to these events. What I don’t like is the lack of a ring of truth. When people face something supernatual, they don’t get into kissattidunial mode. IT just doesn’t ring true that there is no fear, or wonder, or dang! even giggles…something extreme that shows some emotion has been touched by this paranormal event. -C
58 • Michael Gordon said:
April 22nd, 2008 at 1:42 pm, permalink
Ok, I see where the interpretations diverged. I was reading the “ought” phrase as applying to “fantastic” creatures and events, which in the context of much of the UF genre are indeed commonplace (I know, the oxymoronic nature boggles the mind), but if you are instead saying that the feeling of wonder itself needs to be stronger then I understand, even though for myself I settle happily for half-assed wonder if the rest of the book is good.
And by the way, the word ought ought to be used more often now that we are living in the oughties (or is it noughties?)
59 • fritz freiheit.com » Links from last week (through 2008/03/18) said:
April 22nd, 2008 at 3:41 pm, permalink
[...] Fantasy Magazine » How To Kill Off A Sense Of Wonder (Writing,Fantasy,SF) [...]
60 • Twitter leads me to what’s wrong with Urban Fanatsy said:
April 23rd, 2008 at 3:41 pm, permalink
[...] popped up by Paul Jessup. That led me to his twitter, which led me to his website, which led me to an article on what’s wrong with Urban Fantasy these days. (read the comments too..they are [...]
61 • Once upon a mellow noon » What do I like in Urban Fantasy? said:
May 10th, 2008 at 5:48 pm, permalink
[...] to go about helping them to give me that . . .I can’t help them with. Vera Nazarian mentioned two more things that I like in her essay for Fantasy magazine (my interpretation, not her exact words): 1) Too fast-paced – a negative, but it leads into the [...]