Back in the late '90s I was on a couple of writing lists. Actually, back in the mid '90s I spent time posting to misc.writing (this is when people still used Usenet). Some of the most insightful comments about writing came from the romance writers. Some of them read SF, some of them didn't. But we all felt that the commonality of writing was what was important; genre was merely a matter of taste and technique.
I have heard from many authors, including people in my writing circle, that sometimes taking a different slant on a story can move it out of SF into romance, mystery, "mainstream", or whatever. Genre was just an artistic choice to serve the interests of the story.
The things I don't like about Harlequin Romances aren't the romance elements. It's the formulaic aspect: stories must be 50,000-55,000 words, hero and heroine will have sex around page 170, etc. I suppose it's possible to create art within those constraints, but it looks kind of paint-by-numbers to me. My aunt has rooms full of this stuff.
On the other hand, I like media tie-in books. I used to review them for SF Site (partly because nobody else wanted to review them). But I think it's fun to play with the archetypes, shuffle around how they get along, pull out some unexplored character trait and see where it goes. I've talked to some of the authors, and they're on the same wavelength as what you're saying. If you're going to write in a literary form, you have to respect the form, and you have to write the best story in that form that you got.
It's too bad your customer didn't take your advice. I don't know why anybody would take the time to write something they didn't like.
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branchandroot
no subject
Date: 2004-08-16 10:00 pm (UTC)Har, I am picturing that. :)
Back in the late '90s I was on a couple of writing lists. Actually, back in the mid '90s I spent time posting to misc.writing (this is when people still used Usenet). Some of the most insightful comments about writing came from the romance writers. Some of them read SF, some of them didn't. But we all felt that the commonality of writing was what was important; genre was merely a matter of taste and technique.
I have heard from many authors, including people in my writing circle, that sometimes taking a different slant on a story can move it out of SF into romance, mystery, "mainstream", or whatever. Genre was just an artistic choice to serve the interests of the story.
The things I don't like about Harlequin Romances aren't the romance elements. It's the formulaic aspect: stories must be 50,000-55,000 words, hero and heroine will have sex around page 170, etc. I suppose it's possible to create art within those constraints, but it looks kind of paint-by-numbers to me. My aunt has rooms full of this stuff.
On the other hand, I like media tie-in books. I used to review them for SF Site (partly because nobody else wanted to review them). But I think it's fun to play with the archetypes, shuffle around how they get along, pull out some unexplored character trait and see where it goes. I've talked to some of the authors, and they're on the same wavelength as what you're saying. If you're going to write in a literary form, you have to respect the form, and you have to write the best story in that form that you got.
It's too bad your customer didn't take your advice. I don't know why anybody would take the time to write something they didn't like.