Modern Writing Styles

[WafflesToo]

CTG: Of course, you must remember that the Mission Impossible series and the Star Wars prequels were both wildly successful.

Suspension of Disbeleif must come with a volume discount these days if stories like those are not leaving audiences with a massive WTF debt.

[ray gower]

Originally Posted by popa

Please pardon me for getting in late on this conversation, but it addresses something I'm concerned about. I've recently retired from a 26 year very time-consuming career with the thought of doing some writing, but to my astonishment I've discovered that modern stories tend to be all conversation and usually have very little description of anything. I'm loath to give up description for the sake of trendiness. Is this really what editor's want?

The way things are going I suspect the first criteria for editors is does the desk survive the impact of a tome being dropped on it from 3 feet (black mark if it does). So go for your descriptions, within reason i.e. describe what is relevant to the story, not the shades of red roses on the bush. There are numerous posts complaining about just such stodgy padding all through Chronicles, and Peter's comment about BBC Radio 4's book of the week bear that out too- If a 300K word book can be condensed to 15K (or less) for a reading on radio, without losing plot, there is something seriously wrong with the original book: Worse, the author often does the condensing, so they know the book is tripe!

Always considered Chandler as one of the more literate Penny Dreadful (Dime Store) novelists, better than Christie or Chartris at least, a good example of combining emotive descriptions with short snappy action, even when the story itself is crud.

Really comes down to variety, variety with a side order of variety

[shadowbox]

I agree that more and more books today do things that make little sense, or indeed, leave gaps in plots. Humanistic actions are underplayed, and readers lose interest. As ctg wrote about a girl sliding down an elevator cable and her mom doesn't even object, books today seemed to be pushing for more action and less emotion. A character without emotion loses it's depth, leaving little to be admired.

[ctg]

Waffles, thing is, this fellow book is very engaging and I really like the way he has presented the anti-hero protagonist. However, those subtle moments that breaks the reality drives towards the edge of putting the book down and considering some other book. Although if I get to the end, then maybe the second reading will reveal me 'those scenes' in different light.

However, to the original point. With today writing session, I was watching the sentence length. In the action I really try to drive sentencing towards shorter punchier lines, but I also noticed that I don't forget to put in longer descriptive lines. Which kind of drives on the edge as I don't know if I'm doing it right. Nevertheless, there isn't any long or very long sentences. So I guess I'm doing something correctly.

[Malloriel]

Originally Posted by Highlander II

Personally - I feel that, unless an author has sold a *series*, s/he should not conclude book 1 with a cliffhanger ending -- I don't know of any that have - but I haven't been reading as much recently. . . .

I agree entirely. I've learned that even a series, which needs openings in order to continue at all, can frustrate the pants off me if the ends consistently lack resolution. It feels unfinished and bound to ravel like crazy and just eats away at me. A prime example, to my mind, is the Wheel of Time. With the first four or five books, there's a kind of resolution. You know he hasn't solved the major issues, but he's defeated an obstacle along the way. After book five, you're not even given that much, or should he actually overcome an issue, you don't see the actual resolution until halfway through the next book IF THEN.

Yes, there is a certain measure of loose-endery that needs to happen in order to make a sequel or series possible, but ending it mid-sentence, mid-conflict, mid-anything at all for the sake of another book is, in my terribly humble opinion, just poor form.

Originally Posted by popa

I'm loath to give up description for the sake of trendiness. Is this really what editor's want? Below is an example from one of my stories (the character is suffering from amnesia):

I turned and saw I was lying at water’s edge, an ocean from the salty smell of it. Looking inland I saw an empty beach dimly lit by a full moon, and beyond, the windows and store fronts of distant tall buildings. The faint murmur of mechanized civilization slipped out on a slight warm breeze.

There is a certain ear that must be kept to what is 'popular' and 'trendy', as ever, as it helps to give you a gauge from which to work, but the greater ear need be kept toward your personal style and choices. I've always believed that if you can't be happy with your own work in some way, then you've not just failed your potential readers, you've failed yourself. More importantly, you've failed yourself. I always understand the goal to become published and sell millions and become a fixture in every shelf in every home, but as long as I'm happy with what I've written, I also couldn't care less if a publisher decides it will sell. Just because a certain type of prose has drifted to the scummy top layer of popularity is definitely no reason to bother yourself trying to fit your style to it, unless it's something you find your writing is lacking. Admiring a style and assimilating it is vastly different than modifying your style to fit the trends.

I've always followed the idea of 'write for yourself'. If you wouldn't read it, after all, how can you expect others to do the same?

Originally Posted by Tobytwo

CTG's point about characters not acting credibly is an interesting one. I think this comes from the writer thinking about the book as "art" rather than a realistic, functional story. No amount of "ah, but it's artistically valid/beautiful/raises interesting debate" can answer the person who says "This guy wouldn't act like that." You can't imagine, say, Steinbeck or Orwell doing that, no matter how didactic their writing might be.

I think it goes beyond that, Toby. It's not just 'artistic', it's a complete disregard for what human nature and personality will provide a character in favour of expressing the events in an expedient way. Introducing characters with no greater reason to exist than to give the protag a reason to go into town while furious so that he can frustrate the local constabulary and get himself thrown in prison for a night, which is vital to the story as that's where he meets his mentor who will help him overcome his obstacles, both real and emotional, to defeat the antagonist. There's nothing wrong with expedient or ancillary characters per se, but if what they do when they show up is act in a manner completely contrary to their gender or station in life (my example living in a medieval-esque fantasy novel), then they're definitely not going about things the right way.

I audited a piece a while back with a sort of special ops . . . . thingie going on. Now, I'm not much for modern fantasy, and I certainly am no expert on anything militaristic, but I did know enough to say that the way these characters were behaving was not at all in line with reality whatsoever, and their behaviour existed only to allow the main character to react a certain way or believe certain things. Characters existing purely as validation for the protag, or any other character, just feels wrong to me. It feels very flat, as though the main character is living in a dream they can manipulate, so that no one around them has any more free will than they need to support him. Those are the stories where the characters will act only in the way the writer dictates, and no interesting new paths can be found because they're not allowed to explore their own personalities and choices.

It makes me think of Data from Star Trek: The Next Generation and what life would have been like for him if he hadn't been on the Enterprise, but had instead been taken on by a group that didn't believe in or support his sentience, but treated him as an android and nothing more. He's programmed to do things, and he does them. There's no allowance nor expectation that he may outgrow that programming for any reason, and should he try, the author/captain will 'fix' it.

THAT is the sort of thing I can't stand.

But to truly address the thread, while I haven't honestly encountered these trends as you paint them (broad strokes as they may be to illustrate the point), I can see how and why they'd crop up. I don't believe I fall into either side too deeply, though I'd say I lean much more toward the verbose (as if you couldn't tell :P). I pay mind to my action sequences to make them both swift, but descriptive. I run through my action many times to ensure that the sentences are short enough to depict the pace without getting choppy or rushed, but also try to interject a sentence now and then that consists of a little more description, or thought from the character. Or an observation that could save their lives. I also intentionally vary my sentence length in the body of the piece to even out the flow. Even if your sentences are consistently long, if they're all between 15 and 21 syllables, they'll sound flat and awkward in the reading anyway.

But I must go. My dinner calls to me. ^_^

[Tobytwo]

Well, I really meant to say that I didn't consider it artistic, although writers who did write like that might seek to justify themselves by saying so. I personally agree that in order to work any novel must have essentially credible characters, even if they are as strange as the people in Gormenghast or Dune (perhaps especially so).

There are characters who really only exist to create an effect/occurence, and those who don't. I don't think there's anything wrong in a character whose only job is to drunkenly provoke the fight that gets the hero into prison, or to loiter in an alleyway to help demonstrate how sleazy the neighbourhood is. Trouble comes when these minor characters become major. One of the great fantasy stereotypes must surey be the healer/priestess whose sole purpose is to patch up the hero when he's wounded (and perhaps, in a concession to "modernity", to tut and say "men"). This sort of person is ok for two lines, but if she became a major figure she'd be bad.

[WafflesToo]

Made from the finest gold-plated cardboard.

<RANT>
Perhaps the cynisism springs from dealing with the drek being belched from American cinima and television these days (would that make me a self-loathing countryman?) CG, bigger ka-booms, and akward tacked-on love storys seem to be dominant these days. And that's when they decide to hire writers at all (hack writing under the guise of 'reality TV' seems disturbingly popular). Or they just take some semi-famous comedian and turn his 20-minute sketch into the basis of an entire show where they seem to confuse the terms "Character Developement" with "Flanderizing".
</RANT>

K, I'm done. Cliff hanger endings are an entirely different peeve of mine. I hate hitting the end of the book in the middle of the scene. It's unsatisfying for one thing, and hardly endears the author to me (usually makes me mad enough NOT to buy the next book). Frankly, if the story is good enough, the characters interesting enough, and the writing smart enough, a gimick ending isn't needed to draw additional readership. (See also Matrix Reloaded and Matrix Revolutions for really good unsatisfying endings, oh, and has Trinity died yet? It's been a couple of years...)

[Ursa major]

Could it be that some books have cliff-hangar endings because their authors recognise that their characters (or, perhaps, the "universe") aren't really interesting enough to generate a second sale? (In which case, shouldn't they work on these weaknesses?)