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msagaraHaving covered probably the most common reader complaint I've heard over the years in the bookstore, I'm now going to move directly to one of the next most common.
I hate LKH for turning Anita Blake into such an oversexed solipsist. Doesn't she realize that she's losing all her fans?
This one, oddly enough, I have more problems with, for a variety of reasons. And this one follows more clearly![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
amber_fool's question, which spawned the previous two posts indirectly.
The first problem would be: LKH regularly hits NYT #1 with her later books. She is clearly not losing all her fans. The argument made here isn't based on what I can see as objective fact, unlike the previous argument downstream; in the previous post the base fact is: Book 5 or book 3 do not exist, which is immutable.
In this case, however, it's clear to me that LKH's writing choices are not losing her all her fans. An author doesn't climb to #1 on the NYT bestseller list consistently without any fans.
When it comes down to brass tacks (and where does that phrase come from?), what's being said here is: I hate what she's done with the series I used to love. Hate it. Hate it.
And I have no problems with that. But that's not how it's worded (let me just add: I get a lot of the flat-out Hate it comments, and those don't push entitlement buttons for me because there's no point for discussion; the reader hates the book. I can't very well say "no you don't!" and not seem insane or inattentive).
Did I read the early books? Yes. And I enjoyed them. Do I like the direction she chose to go in? No. No, I don't. Did I stop reading them? Yes, because I didn't like what she was doing. Do I hate her? Well, no. Do I make dire predictions for her future career based on the fact that I didn't like where she was going? No. I can see that if I didn't care for the direction Anita was taking, a lot of other people did; she's selling. She has a lot of fans; some people clearly did enjoy where she took her characters, and they wanted to go along for that ride.
I got off the bus.
It's her right as an author to write what she feels compelled to write as long as she has a publisher who agrees that it's viable; hell, it's her right to do so even if she doesn't. It's my right as a reader to stop reading when I don't care for what she feels compelled to write.
What I don't understand are the readers who still read those books, while hating on them so ferociously. The hate-on isn't going to change what she chooses to write because if you read her blog, she's clearly dedicated to her vision. I admire the dedication; I don't admire the results.
So, bottom line for me here is: I don't like where this book is going, and I'm not willing to shed money to get it there.
This, however, is the bookseller and reader response. The author response is different. So I'm now going to talk a little about me-in-my-writer-hat response, because in this case, the author response is a little more visceral.
I write a series of novels, which I distinguish from a multi-volume single story in a variety of structural ways. I try to keep the books as self-contained as possible, while allowing the characters the room to grow or change. I haven't been entirely successful at self-contained writing--but I'm continuing to reach for that in the Cast novels. As I write, and continue to write them, the world does change as consequences of previous actions come to the fore; the characters change as they grow. And here's the thing about that: some of the changes will not be the ones that some of the readers are hoping for. Do I know which changes those are? No, actually, I don't. But I do know it will happen, because it seems almost inevitable.
Am I aware that I, like LKH, will lose readers for making choices that seem natural to me--and don't to some readers--within a series? Yes. Yes, I am.
Does this fill me with joy? Why, no, now that you ask, it really doesn't. No one wants to disappoint their readers. And not just for mercenary reasons, although those exist. It's hard, when you put the time and work into a book. to have it fall flat or fail with readers, especially with readers who liked and supported the previous volumes in a series. They feel angry, or even betrayed, because the characters they loved are wandering off in a direction they didn't anticipate when they started reading the series. And as a writer, I feel insecure and worried because I did somehow have their attention, and I failed to maintain it. I failed to write something that could sell the changes and the story I was telling to that segment of readership so that said changes naturally seemed the only possible outcome.
What I hope is that those readers don't then assume that I'm writing a book that disappoints and annoys them with the intent of doing either; I'm not.
But, like LKH, I have stories I want to tell, and on some base level, they're my stories. I want to write them well enough that they're clear to the readers who read them; I want to make them compelling enough that the story I'm trying to tell works for them.
That's the important phrase for me: the story I'm trying to tell. There are hundreds of ways to fail the story I'm trying to tell. When I see reviews which point some of these things out, it's clear to me that I did fail, and it's clear to me how. Not all of the choices that seem clear to me while I'm writing are as clear to readers who don't have my brain.
But when readers don't care for the book because it's not the book they wanted, as opposed to not a well-executed book, it's trickier. When they are angry--as they are with LKH--about the fact that the books are not the books they wanted to read, it does push my buttons on the writer side, in a way that the reader/bookseller side fails entirely to notice.
I think it's ultimately a losing game to attempt to write novels--or TV shows--to a vocal subset of the readers a writer does have. Because while I understand what some readers want to see, I'm not at all convinced that a story that comes solely from a desire to placate readers, and not as a consequence of a writer's deep investment, is going to work for anyone.
I think a writer has a responsibility to their story.
I think a writer has a responsibility to write that story to the best of their ability.
I think a reader has the right to react to that story in whatever way they react: love it, hate it, fall asleep half-way through it. Throw it against the wall. Refuse to buy anything else by that author Ever Again. Tell people how much they hated the book, and why.
But. I don't think a reader has the right to expect or demand that the story be something entirely different; I don't think they have the right to demand that a writer's responsibility to them is much, much larger than it is to their story, because while a given reader may hate the story, not every reader will or does.
I can tell you what I hated about the LKH books. I can tell you exactly where I stopped. I can complain bitterly about what the books had become. But I don't hate LKH for not writing the books that I wanted to read. I don't, in my anger and disappointment, assume that because I didn't like the books, she should understand what she should have written instead, because it is not, in fact, all about me. I know that she feels strongly about the story she needs to tell. And it's clear to me that there are readers who want to read the story she feels she has to tell.
I hate LKH for turning Anita Blake into such an oversexed solipsist. Doesn't she realize that she's losing all her fans?
This one, oddly enough, I have more problems with, for a variety of reasons. And this one follows more clearly
amber_fool's question, which spawned the previous two posts indirectly. The first problem would be: LKH regularly hits NYT #1 with her later books. She is clearly not losing all her fans. The argument made here isn't based on what I can see as objective fact, unlike the previous argument downstream; in the previous post the base fact is: Book 5 or book 3 do not exist, which is immutable.
In this case, however, it's clear to me that LKH's writing choices are not losing her all her fans. An author doesn't climb to #1 on the NYT bestseller list consistently without any fans.
When it comes down to brass tacks (and where does that phrase come from?), what's being said here is: I hate what she's done with the series I used to love. Hate it. Hate it.
And I have no problems with that. But that's not how it's worded (let me just add: I get a lot of the flat-out Hate it comments, and those don't push entitlement buttons for me because there's no point for discussion; the reader hates the book. I can't very well say "no you don't!" and not seem insane or inattentive).
Did I read the early books? Yes. And I enjoyed them. Do I like the direction she chose to go in? No. No, I don't. Did I stop reading them? Yes, because I didn't like what she was doing. Do I hate her? Well, no. Do I make dire predictions for her future career based on the fact that I didn't like where she was going? No. I can see that if I didn't care for the direction Anita was taking, a lot of other people did; she's selling. She has a lot of fans; some people clearly did enjoy where she took her characters, and they wanted to go along for that ride.
I got off the bus.
It's her right as an author to write what she feels compelled to write as long as she has a publisher who agrees that it's viable; hell, it's her right to do so even if she doesn't. It's my right as a reader to stop reading when I don't care for what she feels compelled to write.
What I don't understand are the readers who still read those books, while hating on them so ferociously. The hate-on isn't going to change what she chooses to write because if you read her blog, she's clearly dedicated to her vision. I admire the dedication; I don't admire the results.
So, bottom line for me here is: I don't like where this book is going, and I'm not willing to shed money to get it there.
This, however, is the bookseller and reader response. The author response is different. So I'm now going to talk a little about me-in-my-writer-hat response, because in this case, the author response is a little more visceral.
I write a series of novels, which I distinguish from a multi-volume single story in a variety of structural ways. I try to keep the books as self-contained as possible, while allowing the characters the room to grow or change. I haven't been entirely successful at self-contained writing--but I'm continuing to reach for that in the Cast novels. As I write, and continue to write them, the world does change as consequences of previous actions come to the fore; the characters change as they grow. And here's the thing about that: some of the changes will not be the ones that some of the readers are hoping for. Do I know which changes those are? No, actually, I don't. But I do know it will happen, because it seems almost inevitable.
Am I aware that I, like LKH, will lose readers for making choices that seem natural to me--and don't to some readers--within a series? Yes. Yes, I am.
Does this fill me with joy? Why, no, now that you ask, it really doesn't. No one wants to disappoint their readers. And not just for mercenary reasons, although those exist. It's hard, when you put the time and work into a book. to have it fall flat or fail with readers, especially with readers who liked and supported the previous volumes in a series. They feel angry, or even betrayed, because the characters they loved are wandering off in a direction they didn't anticipate when they started reading the series. And as a writer, I feel insecure and worried because I did somehow have their attention, and I failed to maintain it. I failed to write something that could sell the changes and the story I was telling to that segment of readership so that said changes naturally seemed the only possible outcome.
What I hope is that those readers don't then assume that I'm writing a book that disappoints and annoys them with the intent of doing either; I'm not.
But, like LKH, I have stories I want to tell, and on some base level, they're my stories. I want to write them well enough that they're clear to the readers who read them; I want to make them compelling enough that the story I'm trying to tell works for them.
That's the important phrase for me: the story I'm trying to tell. There are hundreds of ways to fail the story I'm trying to tell. When I see reviews which point some of these things out, it's clear to me that I did fail, and it's clear to me how. Not all of the choices that seem clear to me while I'm writing are as clear to readers who don't have my brain.
But when readers don't care for the book because it's not the book they wanted, as opposed to not a well-executed book, it's trickier. When they are angry--as they are with LKH--about the fact that the books are not the books they wanted to read, it does push my buttons on the writer side, in a way that the reader/bookseller side fails entirely to notice.
I think it's ultimately a losing game to attempt to write novels--or TV shows--to a vocal subset of the readers a writer does have. Because while I understand what some readers want to see, I'm not at all convinced that a story that comes solely from a desire to placate readers, and not as a consequence of a writer's deep investment, is going to work for anyone.
I think a writer has a responsibility to their story.
I think a writer has a responsibility to write that story to the best of their ability.
I think a reader has the right to react to that story in whatever way they react: love it, hate it, fall asleep half-way through it. Throw it against the wall. Refuse to buy anything else by that author Ever Again. Tell people how much they hated the book, and why.
But. I don't think a reader has the right to expect or demand that the story be something entirely different; I don't think they have the right to demand that a writer's responsibility to them is much, much larger than it is to their story, because while a given reader may hate the story, not every reader will or does.
I can tell you what I hated about the LKH books. I can tell you exactly where I stopped. I can complain bitterly about what the books had become. But I don't hate LKH for not writing the books that I wanted to read. I don't, in my anger and disappointment, assume that because I didn't like the books, she should understand what she should have written instead, because it is not, in fact, all about me. I know that she feels strongly about the story she needs to tell. And it's clear to me that there are readers who want to read the story she feels she has to tell.
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no subject
Date: 2010-10-14 05:49 am (UTC)"Anita Blake" is a brand; it was even marketed as a brand, a series of novels about this "Anita Blake" character. The first nine books had a specific mixture of elements, with the mystery Anita had to solve or plot as the driving force, with a few side romantic/erotic subplots around the sides for spice. With Narcissus in Chains and the later books, the mystery became a subplot, and the erotica came very, very heavily to the fore as the driving force of the books. After nine years, and nine books, fans can get pretty emotionally invested in a series, and when you pick up the next installment of your favorite series only to find it's actually shifted subgenres and demographics--without specifically telling you this by a change in marketing or title or the like so you can bow out before you start reading the book--you kind of feel like a bait and switch was pulled on you. You went in expecting something that 9 books and 9 years of experience have taught you to expect. You really, really wanted another installment of what you had before. And instead you get something different--that still has the brand name attached to it, some how, some way. Bait and switch. The reader feels betrayed.
And like others have pointed out, the reaction really is sort of like breaking up with a boyfriend or girlfriend...they spring something out of the blue on you, something really big, and they're suddenly not the man or woman you began dating years ago. (That doesn't say it excuses bad behavior of ex fans either, any more than becoming vicious to an ex after you break up with them is acceptable.) The Anita Blake series went through a sudden, abrupt shift in focus, and suddenly a certain set of people who had loved and championed the series for years felt...baffled. Surprised. Confused. Very, very disappointed. It's easy for this to turn into bitterness, and vitriol on the web.
I agree with the person who mentioned how the Merry Gentry series, which are the same "kind" of stories as the newer Anita Blake books, doesn't really bother anyone because it's a new series that started out that way in the first place. And I do think it's because there was no previous brand that was being thrown out the window. Thus far, you sort of know what to expect from a Merry Gentry book. There was no previous standard to judge it by. It makes it a lot easier to accept a set of ideas or way of writing that vastly deviates from the before established "norm" (such as a prior series by that author) if you make sure to call it out some way.
Jacqueline Carey is actually pretty good with this; while she's almost completed 3 trilogies of Kushiel books (which is her best known world), but she also has Santa Olivia which is SO different in style and tone that it's hard to believe it's still the same author penning it, and the Sundering duology which is sort of a reply to the tropes set forth in LOTR and copied everywhere since. She has set expectations with fans that yeah, she'll write the stories she wishes to, but she'll be clear on marking them so that the reader knows if it'll be a Kushiel book or not.
So I think setting expectations for a reader by making it clear where the switch will happen--because I also agree that it's not a writer's job to endlessly slave for their fanbase without bothering or being "allowed" to explore and grow and tell new stories--is something to ponder if you're a writer planning to do a series, or a writer planning on being prolific and building up a devoted fanbase over the course of decades. That way, you can set expectations beforehand, and avoid the whole fan outcry fiasco.
Although I do suppose there's still a point in that despite the fiasco among a vocal portion of her fandom, she's still a bestselling author. I'm still pondering what forces are at work there.
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Date: 2010-10-14 05:59 am (UTC)among a vocal portion of her fandom, she's still a bestselling author.
I'm still pondering what forces are at work there.
Some of the readers here (two who quit reading, one who didn't) have said in this thread that they didn't perceive it as a bait and switch, which is to say, they didn't feel that it violated the character as she'd been written. Two didn't like the direction shift, one didn't mind it and kept reading. The fact that they still sell, and the fact that three people here said they didn't feel like it violated character, implies that this isn't an overall betrayal; it's a personal reaction to the text. And I get that, because I respond strongly to fiction--but at the same point in time, I respond to the book.
I'm guessing that a number of people didn't mind it and kept reading, and some of them came to the series expecting it to be what it became, so they didn't have the extreme hatred about the shift in character--just a desire to read the books.
no subject
Date: 2010-10-19 12:26 am (UTC)The thing that gets me about the sex scenes is that I don't find them absorbing. I can get lost in books quite easily, but my personal preferences mean that the later Anita Blake sex scenes break me out of the book much as if they'd included the word 'turgid'. Even though I know sex like that is possible, I don't read it as if it is (wouldn't she have to stop at some point when she got sore?). But this is due to my personal preferences with sex scenes, and they (sex scenes) are really hard to write such that they don't break me out of the book.
Then again, I'm the kind of person who, if I'm not enjoying something, will try to analyse to see why. I may not continue to read the book once I've figured it out, but I'll know what bit of the writing didn't work for me (and therefore figure out before I buy it whether other books will). I know I've never finished The Lord Of The Rings because the pacing is difficult for me to work through on a brainfog day. I can't get into most Gemmel books because the characters don't engage me - I don't identify with any of them, so I can't fill in the missing bits in their characterisation (which is something I also find in many other books my partner loves and I... just... don't.)
no subject
Date: 2010-10-23 07:57 am (UTC)So, to specify...the changes specific to Anita Blake as a character? I don't think they violated anything. I'd agree with those who aren't particularly bothered with how Anita is portrayed. (which is yeah, my opinion.)
But...the changes to the structure and "feel" and "flavor" of the later novels as a whole? The "Anita Blake" brand as a whole rather than as a specific character in the novels? That changed significantly, in my opinion as a reader at least. And that's what provokes the "bait and switch" reaction, in me specifically.
To make a comparison to cooking...say the original recipe called for a pinch of pepper, for spice. We could compare that to the frequency of the erotic scenes in the earlier books. It was there, but just a pinch for taste, to get people tantalized. The later books went from a pinch to half a cup or a full cup of pepper. That's going to significantly alter the taste of the dish. Likewise, the "taste" or "feel" of the series changed significantly in some ways.
I kind of hate to use the "erotic" = "spice" metaphor, because it wasn't the erotic aspects alone that changed the "flavor" of the series, and there's been some statements by the author that some of us folks who were put off by the changes in the series are being prudish. (I'm a fan of the Kushiel books by Jacqueline Carey as I said earlier, so for me at least, it's not that!) But at the same time, the frequency of such scenes ARE something easily identified as having changed in the newer books, and I suppose it makes my point. But there are other things that contributed to the "change" in the "flavor". I should go get my books and ponder it; it's been a while since I've read the old and new and compared.
It'd be interesting to see a poll of folks who read the books, and when and where they 'entered' the series, and see how that correlates to who's bitter about the changes and who are not.