storytelling

So if you've been following the off-again on-again discussion on what goes into a novel that is successful both commercially and critically, you'll remember about category seven. The Holy Grail of novels. The novel the critics fall over each other to adore, but at the same time it's got such a great story, so well told, such compelling characters, that it sells like the proverbial hotcakes.

If you're new to the topic, you may want to catch up. Or maybe not.

Now, people have been suggesting names of novels that they believe fit into category seven, and after thinking about some of those titles for a while, I've come to a conclusion. I have to set up a subcategory, or a different category all together. Because just as there are cult films, there are cult books, some of which may be category seven novels, but most of which are not. Here are the cult books I could come up with in a few minutes:

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance | Robert Pirsig
Naked Lunch | William S. Burroughs
The Catcher in the Rye | J.D. Salinger
On the Road | Jack Kerouac
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest | Ken Kesey
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas | Hunter S. Thompson
Breakfast of Champions | Kurt Vonnegut

I would argue that Gone with the Wind belongs in this category as well -- but I'm going to leave that for a moment, or the GwtW love squad will surely be after me again. Now, I have to say also that there are books that aren't quite category seven but may be cult books in the making, which brings me to my next point. Here are titles that have been suggested as Category Seven novels:

• To Kill a Mockingbird | Harper Lee
• Birdsong | Sebastian Faulks
• Regeneration | Pat Barker
• Fly Away Peter | David Malouf
• The Lovely Bones | Alice Sebold
• The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time | Mark Haddon
• The Name of the Rose | Umberto Eco
• Possession | A. S. Byatt
• Cold Mountain | Charles Frasier
• Ender’s Game | Orson Scott Card
• Outlander | Diana Gabaldon
• Flowers from the Storm | Laura Kinsale
• The Time Traveler's Wife | Audrey Niffenegger
• Cloud of Sparrows | Matsuoka Takashi

Of course, this whole process is highly subjective and thus ripe for disagreement and discussion. I personally wouldn't put most of these novels into category seven, for one reason or another. In some cases, simply because they miss out in critical success category -- for no fault of their own. Flowers from the Storm, for example, which I personally consider one of the five top romance novels ever written, isn't category seven simply because it is a romance, and as such falls below the radar of the critics. Right? Fair? No. I'm just observing, here.

However, there are many cult classics in the romance genre, and Flowers from the Storm is definitely one of those. In fact, if you think about it -- a cult classic is what it is precisely because it has been ignored (for the most part) or rejected (less often) by the literati, and it has been raised to its high status by the readers. I personally would far prefer to be able to say, at the end of my life, that one of my books had ended up a cult classic, because then people would still be reading it. That's worth a lot more than a couple weeks in the top five at the NYT. In my estimation. By the way, I would put Outlander in the cult classic category along with Flowers from the Storm, but I happen to know that Diana dislikes being classified as a romance writer.

I have this sense that this little experiment of mine hasn't been very useful to anybody but myself. At least I've succeeded in clarifying my own thinking on what makes a particular novel work -- for the readers, for the critics -- for the moment.

Posted by at 2:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)

I have no idea how many people are actually reading this weblog since I moved it. There is still a fair amount of activity at the old server site, and I haven't figured out how to read the stats over here yet. Not that it matters; I'll muddle along whether I'm talking to you or to myself. But a few organizational matters need to be sorted.

First, while I believe I actually deleted the earlier version of storytelling at saralaughs.com, it's still showing up. How that can be, I have no idea. Maybe I'll have the energy to figure it out tomorrow.

Second, inspite of helpful hints from various people, I still haven't been able to make the redirect work. Also a matter for tomorrow. Or the day after.

Third, while I was busy with my machete, hacking away at the old weblog site, I checked the logs. The ones that tell me what people were searching for when they visited. For a long time I've been meaning to raise this topic, but I put it off because I'm not sure I can say what needs to be said without sounding condescending or mean. But listen. If you're using the search box (lower right hand column) because you want to find something, try to keep it to one or two of the most salient words. This is what I mean. If you search for:

reviews and evaluations on the book "Look Ma I Published a Book" by Sammy Wiseman

... then you are going to get a ton of hits, every time the word 'reviews' and 'evaluations' and 'book' show up in a weblog posting. In this case, it makes most sense just to search the word 'Wiseman' or even 'Sammy' -- which is fairly uncommon. Search engines don't work well with whole phrases. Here's another search string that is badly formed:

writing about sex in scenes with men and women not slash

This isn't going to reap anything useful, because the search engine isn't going to see 'not slash' as a phrase. It's just going to go along on its mindless way and give you a list of every post with a 'not' in it. Not to mention posts with 'sex' and 'writing' and 'scenes'.

Here are some searches I noted which make sense: 'Gabaldon' 'sex' 'Deadwood' 'Wilderness' 'slash' 'orgasm'. Most probably these people found what they were looking for. Or at least a discussion of what they were looking for. Of course, the category archives in the right hand column would probably be a quicker way to find the posts in question, and also, I must note: this list does make it look as though all I write about is writing sex scenes, which is not true. For example, tomorrow I'm going to write about Category Seven novels, specifically the lists that people have come up with, and whether or not I opening up this can of worms is proving useful.

Posted by at 12:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)