Recently, the idea of separating the art from the artist has been floating around a lot. It comes up when discussing movies, there’s always another director or actor who did something awful. In the fiction novel world, there are times when authors are found to have troubling beliefs or ideas, as well.
Photo by JULIO NERY
When this happens, there’s discussion around two schools of thought on the subject. The first is to not spend any money on the works of the author. The second is: separate art from the artist. The idea is that you–as a person, can take anything from the art that is out in the world. Yes, the ideas of the person behind that creation matter, but only to an extent.
Separating the Art from the Artist
The second school of thought is the one I subscribe to. There is a reason for it, personally, I would hate it if something stupid I said online one day, some idea I had was taken the “wrong way.” Or someone read too much into something I said. And, I was labelled in some way.
Photo by Steve Johnson
If someone is asking questions and seeking understanding, then there isn’t a reason to be judgmental. You don’t have to agree with their belief system to enjoy their creation. You can support your local library instead of them by just borrowing instead of purchasing, if you don’t want them to profit off of you.
Summary
To sum up, in my opinion, it is okay to enjoy the art made by a person who has troubling ideas if it’s inspirational to you. You don’t have to agree with their belief systems in order to enjoy their creations. Take what you will from their works, and leave anything that doesn’t inspire you, behind.
I’m enough of a dork to be a frequent visitor on Reddit. One of the sub-Reddits that I like to visit is called “horrorlit.” In this space, horror fans will ask for and receive book recommendations. I recently came across a post where the OP was requesting books with an unreliable narrator. I thought this was interesting. So, I took a look myself, and grabbed some of the titles to read. I ran through two such books fairly quickly. Because I read them back-to-back, I am reviewing them together, in this double book review post. Enjoy!
Book Review #1
I’m Thinking of Ending Things
I will start by reviewing Iain Reid’s I’m Thinking of Ending Things. It’s worth noting that there is a Netflix series made from this book. I’ve not seen the series. So, I won’t make any comparisons there. The plot of the book is simple, on the surface. It’s a journey/travel novel. A lot of the action takes place in a car, or at places that are unknown to the protagonist.
Book Review Cover
Once you reach the end, it’s hard to say whether the narrator is unreliable or not. Are they really that unreliable? Or are they simply playing out a fantasy? Do they believe the fantasy? Or do they understand everything that happened? You have to decide. The ending is not ambiguous, but the reliability or unreliability of the narrator, in my opinion, is up for debate.
The prose is incredibly precise, and the book is a work of art unto itself. Yes, I picked it out of a horror literature forum, and that’s probably where it’s shelved in a bookstore. However, based off of the character-driven plot and the beauty of the prose, this book is very likely considered literary.
If you are reading this book as a writer, and you are looking precisely at how to write unreliable narrators, this is a great book to read.
Book Review #2
A Head Full of Ghosts
So the next review, Paul Tremblay’s A Head Full of Ghosts, is a very different tale from the first. This one is the story of a crumbling family. There is a mentally ill sister, a suddenly religious father, a stressed mother, and a little sister who is witness. In addition to this, there is a camera crew who is there to record the family’s undoing.
Book Review Cover
This story is one that wants you to ask questions from the start. It invites you to try and figure out what’s going on. The argument for the unreliability of the narrator is made because she’s young.
But the narrator presents herself as reliable, and the readers never find any reason not to trust her. Even at the end, where the audience learns that things happened differently than everyone would have believed in the world of the book, she still doesn’t appear, to me, at least; to be an untrustworthy narrator.
Conclusion
At the end of the day, if you are looking to write something with an unreliable narrator. It is important to present evidence for the readers that shows the differences between the world the character sees, and the way things actually are.
In, I’m Thinking of Ending Things, the title itself has two meanings. By the end of the book, the tragedy of the whole thing crashes down on the reader. How much do I misunderstand? How much of a life can pass a person by? In AHead Full of Ghosts, much of the misunderstandings can be explained either by the youngness of the narrator, or by the fact that she wouldn’t have been told certain things, etc.
Both books are excellent examples of their genre. Both are stories worth reading, but only one has a truly unreliable narrator, even though they are both first person, which does mean that the narrators will be unreliable–to a degree.
Thank you for reading! Let me know if you enjoyed this double book review and if you would like to see more of this, or if you’d like to see something different. Thank you!
Historical fiction has special rules. Because of this, you’ll need to ask yourself a couple questions when you first decide to write in this genre. The first question would be if you are writing far enough in the past to be considered historical. The answer to that question, which I found here; is you need to be writing at least 50 years in the past.
Photo by Digital Buggu
The second question, which is a bit more complicated, is does your work fit in another genre? Sometimes you are telling a story that’s really literary fiction, just set in the past, or maybe it’s really women’s literature, again just set in the past. If the thing that the story is about is how the people in that time lived and worked, and of course there is a story there–then it’s historical fiction. But, if the story is really about how the words cascade like a waterfall down the page, how they live and breathe for themselves; then it’s probably literary. Or if it’s about a woman who would not give up no matter the odds, then it may be a women’s literature piece. Or, if it’s really more about the romance than anything, well… I mean, I think you get it. You probably get it.
Another thing about the historical novel, is the readers are very picky about the details. So, you have to do your research and get it right. Whatever timeframe you are writing in, it has to be accurate. It’s very easy now to read something that you think may not be exactly correctly and then check it, so you, as a writer in the genre, has to be better at checking everything than your readers could ever dream of being.
Let’s talk word count. For Historical fiction, the length is a bit longer, they come in around 100,000 to 150,000. Take that however it makes you feel.
Thanks for reading about historical fiction requirements. If you are looking for information on a different genre, check out literary, kid lit and Religious publishing requirements. There will be more information to come on the other genres shortly. Thanks!
How does literary fiction differ from genre fiction? There are several differences, but also a lot of similarities. It’s a type of fiction where people win awards, considered a prestige category. It’s normally the kind that you are assigned to read in school.
Literary fiction’s definition is: a category of novels that emphasize character, theme, and style over plot. Basically, if you have a work that is more concerned with the inner character arc over the plot and moving it forward, that work is a literary work.
There is a lot of crossover between genre fiction and literary fiction. The determining factor is if the work is focused on the plot, or other elements of literature. If you are writing something, and you think it will be awesome to write the entire thing without using the letter c or something, to emphasize your character’s complex emotions around their own cock; that is going to be a literary piece. If, however, said character is going around killing people with a chainsaw that he calls Zip instead of using the word chainsaw (because of the letter c) then, it may be more of a horror novel. However, it does depend on how it’s written more than anything.
Literary novels have a tendency to use words like magical realism (instead of fantasy) and verisimilitude when talking about great world-building. Because this is a ‘prestige’ category, they have a tendency to use different words from other genres when they mean the same thing. The books are normally about the inner journey about one person. Someone said that genre works are about extraordinary events happening to regular people, and literary works are about ordinary events happening to extraordinary people. Basically, plot v. character driven.
Length
The length of the literary novel: anywhere between 40 and 120,000 words, new authors should stick between 70 and 100,000 words. Good advice for any new author to any genre, if you are attempting to get traditionally published, do not submit something over 100,000 words. Also, do not say that it’s the first in a series of 17 or whatever. Although queries are their own thing, their own post.
Thank you for reading!! Let me know if this information is helpful or if you would like me to write about something different.
So I began to look into the different genres of publication. The one that I have little information about is religious publication. I am not a religious person, therefore I wasn’t sure where to start. I was able to grab some stuff about religious publishing. Here it is.
If you would like to be traditionally published, and you have written a book about religion, you will need to submit a proposal to the publisher you want to use. The proposal would include what the book is about, what it will lend to the subject (i.e. why it needs to be published), and what your expertise is (why are you the person to write this book).
Here is a link to Harpercollins about this kind of publishing.
This is similar to how non-fiction publishing works. When you are looking to traditionally publish a non-fiction work, you would do the same thing. It makes sense.
I assume that if the work is a complete work of fiction, then maybe you would just find a different place for it to live, and just put the religious undertones in there. Like a work of fantasy, with a really heavy moral undertone? I know for the LDS religion, they have specific imprints that they use for the fiction that they approve for the consumption of their flock (don’t have a better word for that). So, I assume there are others for different religions. Although I’m not having much luck finding stuff at this time. I’ll update if I find some better requirement information.
Thanks for reading, sorry this wasn’t of more help.
For the first post on genre, I will go over children’s literature (or kid lit). We’ll talk about the requirements for each category within this varied genre. Without further ado, let’s talk about genre: children’s literature.
This genre is unique, in that children (not even young adults) don’t determine what they read. There are librarians, teachers and parents who look over each book and decide if it’s appropriate for the audience before they get a chance to read it.
The genre is also broken down by age. We have infants, the books in the case of small babies are for parents to read to their children. Then, we have toddlers and young children who are still read to. It’s only after children begin school that they start reading on their own. Once they are in school, books start out easy and then get more difficult as their reading levels increase. I go into detail for each age below:
Board Books
Board books are designed for infants and toddlers, before they can read. The children at this time are called “pre-readers.” The word count is 300 max, some having 10-20 words. They should have no more than 10 pages. Board books are heavy on illustrations and convey early learning objectives such as colors, or numbers.
Picture Books
Picture books are designed for young children. The children who these books are for are around ages 2-7. They word count expectations are no more than 900, with 500 or fewer being best. 32 pages is standard, but there can be a max of 56. Picture books are also designed to be read to the child. It should one plot, one question to the child, and answer the question and resolve the plot at the end. Most of all, it should be very simple.
Easy/Beginning Readers
Easy readers are for children who are just learning how to read on their own. They are for children between 5 and 8 years old. The word count expectations are from 750-1,500 words. They introduce beginning readers to the concept of chapters, they have slightly more words than a picture book. They present one concept, idea, or theme to a beginning reader. Furthermore, they are usually lighthearted in tone.
Chapter books in children’s literature are written for children around 7-10 years old, and are meant for children who are becoming fluent readers. The word count expectations are 4-12,000 words. Chapter books are not typically longer than 100 pages. These books begin to get into the more complex world of story, we begin to see setbacks, possibly a subplot. The sentence structures are more complex, but the paragraphs remain short, at two to four sentences long. There are few to no illustrations. The protagonist is normally 8 to 9, as this is the upper limit for children who read these books, and children typically read about children who are older than they are.
Middle Grade
Middle grade books are for children who haven’t yet started middle school yet, typically children 8-12 years old will read these. The word count expectations are 20-40,000, depending on the publisher. They are over 100 pages. Middle grade books have longer chapters than chapter books (above). Will not have any illustrations. The content categories are similar to adult books (mystery, thriller, etc.) Series are very popular with middle grade readers. Any intense content will push the book up into another category (YA comes next).
Young Adult
Young adult books are for ages 12 to adult. Word count expectations are 40-75,000. Content categories are the same as adult books, they read like adult books. Young adult books are often coming-of-age stories. A lot of identity stuff takes place in the young adult literature world, which makes sense. There are books about first loves, first heartbreaks, finding yourself after loss. These things are fantastic to have in this world, because the kids going through these things need a way to identify what is happening to them isn’t unique, and yet it is unique because they are all unique people who need works of fiction to help them through their time.
So, there are all the kid lit categories, in one place. I decided to make this post because I keep seeing people asking if the query for their 100,000 word YA book is any good. Which, yeah, I’m sure that the query is fine. However, the book is too long. I know that there are probably a million of these. But, I just wanted to add my part. Make sure that I am another place where people can get the information they need. Hopefully one day someone will see this, and they will realize that they can’t have a world count of 300 for a Board book or something. And then, my life will be complete.
Thanks for reading! Let me know if you would like to see more of this, or if you need different stuff.
This post is the first in a series where we discuss each genre in depth, so that you can have an understanding about each genre and the expectations for each. But, before we do that, let’s think about why this information is important? Genres, what are they, and why is it important to know your genre and the expectations that the audience has when you write in it?
Starting with an example. Let’s say you want to write a horror novel, but you decide to subvert those expectations, and make it from the point of view of the killer. Totally fine, seems like a great idea. But, if you don’t understand that the genre has expectations to start the atmosphere of dread early on in the story, that you are supposed to be giving your audience that delicious rush of anxiety and adrenaline as they worry if their favorite character is safe; you may fall into the mistake of creating a happy atmosphere instead of one that stokes the dread in the story. Your killer may be excited about what they are doing, but that isn’t the right tone for a horror novel.
Let’s start with a list of the different genres and a brief summary of what each one is:
Before we dive into the genres, I am going to say that my list is generalized, and I will put as much information into each specific post for each genre, but this is a brief overview of the general genres.
Children’s Fiction
Literary Fiction
Historical
Young Adult
Religious
Western
Thriller
Action-Adventure
Comedy
Crime and Mystery
Fantasy
Sci-Fi
Romance
Horror
There are a lot of sub-genres for each genre. What I will do is go into each genre specifically. I will do an overview of what the genre expectations are for each genre. The general things to know are word count expectations, and then normal plot devices. For example, in a mystery, the readers expect that a person will die within the first chapters of the book, and then that protagonist will be tasked with finding the killer, and they will somehow able to do it when others can’t. A book is not a mystery if there are not several suspects running around with means/opportunity and motive.
Essentially, when looking to publish in any genre, you need to know not only the logistics of what will be acceptable, but you need to know what your readers will enjoy and pick up. There was the brief overview of genres: what are they? Please let me know if you have questions, if you would like to see something else, all of that good stuff. Thanks!
If you are anything like me, you spend a lot of time thinking about how much you can’t. Or possibly about why you can’t. When you can’t. Even the many reasons that it makes sense to not, instead of TO DO. Mindsets are hard things to change, but it is very important to try. This post will go over some methods for battling negativity, so that you can get to writing instead of making excuses.
I don’t know how many writers feel this way, but I am great at making reasons about the impossibility of getting it done today, all the way up until I’m doing it. Then, when I begin, it’s like all of that melts away, the entire world disappears; and it’s just me and my story, or essay, or post or whatever and none of the rest of it matters. So then I find my self wondering, why did I go through all of that?
I think one of my issues, boils down to self-care. I am a wife, a mom, a full-time employee, a dinner-maker, a laundress, a part-time gamer (haha), a shoe-finder, a maid, a time-out giver, a referee, a sister, a daughter, a dog-mom, a cat-mom, and at the very end of the list, I am the thing I most want out of life, a writer. Oh, and sometimes I even exercise.
With all of the things that I do, all the things that I have going on all the time, it is so hard to find that moment where I feel like it’s okay to write. I don’t get paid for writing, so why do it? The answer, because it is the thing that gives me (besides, you know, family and kids and love) the most-I don’t want to say joy, but that is the word that first came to mind- fulfillment, maybe is another one.
If we are constantly putting ourselves last, we not only get burnt out, but we also end up feeling resentment toward those who we love the most. In most cases, your family and loved ones will understand if you choose to spend a few minutes on yourself each day. I say most cases because I understand that there are exceptions. And simply getting the time to do the thing will increase your confidence in the story, which will help you to feel more positive about it, and negativity decreases.
Habit Building
I have spoken about habit-forming before. What does it have to do with battling the negative version of ourselves that either stops us from writing, by telling us we can’t do it? How does forming habits help us to put ourselves higher on the priority list so that we can write more and feel better about it?
Habits are like muscles. Think about any person whose great at sports. They practice, probably every day. They don’t just do their sport for a couple of days, and then stop for a while, and then practice again later for a few days. The people that come to mind for me are Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods, Tony Hawk, and Serena Williams. None of those people got to where they are without practicing their sport consistently over years and years. I am not talking about any kind of scandals or anything, simply that they are good at what they do, and the reason is because they consistently practice.
In the writing world, authors that have spoken about how important it is to write every day are: Stephen King and Brandon Sanderson. Those are the ones I think about off the top of my head. Brian Evenson said that you need to take the “speacialness” out of writing. Do it anywhere at any time. He uses hotel paper to write on, and he will switch to a computer if he finds himself stuck. Make writing such an everyday thing that it doesn’t matter how you are doing it, as long as it’s getting done.
The point about habit-forming is essentially that you need to get your writing muscles used to doing it. If you want to be a writer, you have to write. In order to conquer your negative self, you have to find a way to write even when you feel some kind of way about it that day.
Replace Negatives with Positives
This one is more of a psychological trick. Let’s say that you keep on thinking that you shouldn’t write because you have nothing to say. You need to turn that thought around and replace it with a different thought. You can acknowledge the thought, but then replace it. Tell yourself that you have lots to say. In a previous post: Coming up with Story Ideas I talked about how living in the world means you have something to say.
Or maybe you think that you write badly, so you shouldn’t be doing it. Again, it’s okay to acknowledge the thought, but then you can either ask yourself why you think you write badly. Why do you think that? Is it really true, has someone told you that? Or, are you concerned that you don’t have great grammar? Or do you think your descriptions are not great? Whatever it is, you can work on it. Writing is a craft. It’s not something that you can or can’t do. You just have to study, hone your craft, take the time to read and learn and take in new information.
What if you are just feeling negative/down/upset because you submitted to like 14 different literary journals and the ones you’ve heard back from rejected you. You think the story is good, and it has merit. Or, at least, you did until you got all the rejections. It’s okay to reach out and ask for POSITIVE feedback from a friend. I typically would say not to let anyone who loves you give your feedback. But, in times like these, when you are feeling like you just can’t take another rejection, when you are doubting your whole life. Have a supportive friend tell you how awesome you are. It’s best if you find that one friend who is always sunshine and rainbows, and they can tell you how much they think you rock. Moms are totally acceptable in these scenarios.
Maybe you can’t turn off the voice telling you that you aren’t good enough. Maybe you can’t stop yourself from having a lot of other priorities above your writing. But you can form healthy habits that allow you to have some time each day to write, you can turn those negative thoughts around, look at them and respond to them with positive counter-thoughts. You can take some time for self-care, even if it is taking a half an hour to hammer out a quick post on your blog.
Most elements of grammar are fairly easy to understand. If you are a native English speaker, you have been drilled on pretty much everything from the time you started to write. One thing that requires a little more thought, or maybe, re-training, is the active and passive voice in writing. Without further ado, we discuss passive v. active voice.
Passive voice is either when the thing being acted on is at the end of the sentence, or is unknown. A passive voice sentence example is:
The milk was spilled. Or
The milk was spilled by Charlie.
Passive voice gets what I would call “guff.” However, a lot of the time in academic settings, you will find yourself with a requirement to write an essay or paper without coloring it with a view. You will be asked (or maybe have been asked) to present facts and ideas, but not show those facts and ideas as your own. In these areas, and also writing articles that are journalistic in nature, it is important to take the actor out of the action, so to speak. Maybe it’s for reasons of anonymity, or maybe it’s so that the writing can speak for itself. Either of these reasons would cause the writer of the piece to choose to use a more passive voice.
Active
When using an active voice, the person or people doing the action are at the beginning of the sentence. An example of active voice would be:
This is the type of writing that writers are constantly told to use. In fact, even in writing a blog post, I have a plugin that tells me when I use too much passive voice. I personally think that passive voice can be used with great effect. You could even show a character coming into themselves, simply by thinking passively, and then actively. For example, if at the beginning of the story, they always put themselves at the very end. But, then by the end, they thought of themselves first. That change in voice, could be used to great effect, subtle, but great. The reader may not catch on at first, but they would get it. Even subconsciously.
At the end of the day, passive voice = actor at the end, action in the beginning, active voice = actor in the beginning, action at the end. Easy enough to remember. Keep track of what you are using, or even just be aware of it when you are editing.
Thanks for reading this post about passive v. active voice.
Recently, I realized while writing my current WIP, one of my main characters had an issue with their arc. After discussing it with a friend, I thought it may be a good subject to write about. Not only the issue at hand, but also how do we make character arcs that are compelling? Read on for more information about character arc, how to write it, why it’s important, and what kind of impact it has on the plot.
The character arc is the inner journey that the main character or characters go through over the course of the story. Usually, there is some important trait that the character(s) need to develop in order for the plot to resolve itself. For example: in A Christmas Carol the main character goes from being an old miser, who wants only to keep all of his money, to being a generous person. His inner journey is that arc. It walks hand-in-glove with the plot, all the elements that are happening on the outside.
How do you make one?
How do you make your character arc? Essentially, the first thing is to envision what you want the character to be at the end of the story. Do you want them to learn a lesson about being a better fighter? Do you want them to learn that it’s not good to be a bully? Whatever the story is that you are telling, you need to think about what you want the character to learn, and then you work from there. If you want your character to be harder than they were at the beginning, then make sure that they are soft when the story begins. If you want them to learn about kindness, then they need to be unkind.
How does this work into Plot?
It is, and it isn’t the plot, if that makes sense. The plot is the thing that the story lives on. The skeleton, or the roadmap, or whatever you want to call it. The character arc is the meat that goes on the bones, kind of, or the way that the story becomes believable, or maybe the way that the reader is able to suspend their disbelief long enough for the story to take place. The character arc is written into many plot points. There are moments where the character is able to learn a new skill. Or do something they failed at before. Those moments not only require that the character is at the right location at the right time, but that they have gone through enough mental growth that the moments are possible.
Character Arc Image
I don’t think I have one, do I need one?
Probably. Most stories involve some kind of personal growth. Even if that growth is learning a new skill (like going from being a down-on-their-luck paper pusher to being a CIA agent, or something). It is still mental and physical change, of some kind. Learning a skill will take not only practice, but also confidence building, and probably encouragement from someone the character admires. However, I will put a caveat here: there are some stories that don’t have a character arc, really long series’ like Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum novels. In these, the character doesn’t change much over the course of a single novel; simply because the reader expects that they will be getting into the same kind of antics during the course of the next one. Because of that expectation, we cannot have the character change and get their life together every single novel, just to have it fall apart again.
Character Arc Conclusion
At the end of the day, when you make a character arc, the trick is to think about where you want your main character(s) to end up. Then, think about what kind of story you are telling. Where can those two things meet? If you want to write a horror story, and you want to end up with a character who has learned that it doesn’t pay to be a bully; maybe you start out with your characters as camp counselors, and your main character is making the younger kids feel bad. Maybe there is one in particular they are picking on. Then, the horror starts, and the main character has to take care of the kids and make sure they are okay, and the main character’s arc is getting the kid that he made fun of to trust him, so that he will survive the ordeal.
Even though I am what you would call a pantser or a discovery writer. These things, if you want them to come out right, they do take planning. You either plan before, or you change everything during a rewriter when you figure out it didn’t work.
