Welcome to bookchat where you can talk about anything...books, plays, essays, and books on tape. You don’t have to be reading a book to come in, sit down, and chat with us.
In Sensible Shoes’ weekly diaries on Thursdays, Write On!, we have been learning that our protagonist should have troubles that increase as the story goes on. I agree that makes exciting reading and it is necessary. We can identify with the poor hero/heroine and wish them success in reaching a goal or solving a problem. Suspense makes us turn the pages and stay up late at night. A fast-paced book is thrilling, I agree.
But…
Can there be just too much pain? One reason that I read several books at a time is when I hit a really bad spot, I have to lay a book down for a while and do something else. That may be because I participate in the actions going on and I get tired and too anxious and I need a time out.
I think one reason I have trouble with modern literary fiction is that it seems too true and reminds me too much of painful things that seem too real. In some of those stories, there is no good ending possible. I can handle that if there is inspiration and courage and I learn a great deal about dealing with problems. I have read many accounts of the Holocaust because I felt that if the author could live the story and write about it, I can read it.
Some writers give the reader a break along with the main characters by allowing them a safe night’s rest in an inn or a warm fire and singing in a cave or something where the reader can see hope is coming. That really helps.
In the middle of Cibola Burn, I hit the kind of place where disaster piles up on disaster. The fourth book in a series by James S. A. Corey is well written and I care about the characters, but I have to say that I think the author slightly overdid things. The story does draw back from one group in trouble to another, but they too are in trouble and so it doesn’t give the reader that great a rest. It has conversations that advance the plot, but break your heart.
Dorothy Dunnett was a master at putting her characters into serious trouble. She could pull Lymond and Nicholas out of the fire and put them into the frying pan in just three paragraphs.
The hardest book I have ever read was Styron’s Sophie’s Choice. Also very hard were Mary Doria Russell’s series The Sparrow and Children of God.
I was interested that in Paretsky’s Critical Mass, V. I. says on page 294:
Sometimes the pain I encounter in my job is more than I can rightly handle.
What stories have you read that you think were exciting, but just took too many horrible turns?
Diaries of the Week:
Write On! Plot pitfalls and misplaced metaphors.
by SensibleShoes
http://www.dailykos.com/...
AIDS Walk Austin - it would be Magnificent to get matched donations
by anotherdemocrat
http://www.dailykos.com/...
Robert Fuller says:
I just posted the epilogue. There is a coda next week, and then my "great American novel" winds to a close. Love conquers all.
http://www.rowantreenovel.com/....
Here is the Amazon link for the free Kindle version: http://amzn.com/....
The rest of my books are available for free on Smashwords, including the new book of quotes - The Wisdom of Science.
https://www.smashwords.com/....
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