Hi, procrastinators and blog chain readers! I'm kicking off this month's blog chain, a prospect that made me really nervous at first. But then I realized that there was nothing to worry about-after all, all the people I've met from this blog chain have been really nice. :) So I'm excited to present to you the first post to the first blog chain of the year! :)
This month's prompt is:
This month's prompt is:
“What is something you feel is generally written well in fiction? What is something you feel is generally written poorly?”
I've got a lot of opinions on this, so this might come out as a kind of rant. I apologize in advance.
One of my favorite things about young adult/teen fiction (hereafter shortened to simply "fiction") is that many authors are breaking out of the "storybook" mindset-the good guy is perfect, the bad guy is a horrid, irredeemable person, the love interest, no matter how unattainable, falls into the protagonist's arms, and everyone is happy at the end (except for the villain). In life, things aren't always so perfectly compartmentalized, and fiction is starting to reflect that. Of course, there were some books way ahead of the curve in this matter (The Outsiders comes to mind), but these books have become less and less anomalic (is that a word?) over time.
Of course, sometimes this is too much of a good thing. Some authors throw in as many problems for their characters as they possibly can, creating this soap opera-like overload. Plus, it's hard to juggle so many plot lines without dropping a few, leaving lots of unanswered questions. But I even prefer these books to fairy tales, unless I'm in a gloopy romantic mood, because now that I've gotten hooked on contemporary fictions, it's hard to go back to fairy tales.
One of my favorite things about young adult/teen fiction (hereafter shortened to simply "fiction") is that many authors are breaking out of the "storybook" mindset-the good guy is perfect, the bad guy is a horrid, irredeemable person, the love interest, no matter how unattainable, falls into the protagonist's arms, and everyone is happy at the end (except for the villain). In life, things aren't always so perfectly compartmentalized, and fiction is starting to reflect that. Of course, there were some books way ahead of the curve in this matter (The Outsiders comes to mind), but these books have become less and less anomalic (is that a word?) over time.
Of course, sometimes this is too much of a good thing. Some authors throw in as many problems for their characters as they possibly can, creating this soap opera-like overload. Plus, it's hard to juggle so many plot lines without dropping a few, leaving lots of unanswered questions. But I even prefer these books to fairy tales, unless I'm in a gloopy romantic mood, because now that I've gotten hooked on contemporary fictions, it's hard to go back to fairy tales.
However, I've noticed some issues are glossed over or unaddressed. For example, racism seems to be a big no-no zone when it comes to fiction. A lot of the books about racism are set during the civil rights movement, and the majority of the books that address racism in the 21st century tend to gloss over the matter-it's either too easily solved or blocked out fairly quickly. A lot of people like to ignore racism, claiming that it doesn't exist anymore because the Jim Crow laws are gone, but it's not. And in a genre that forces you to look at the reality of things, I think that racism should be inspected more closely.
And what about life with disabilities and chronic illnesses? I don't have one, but I have friends who do, and as a result, I went searching for books with characters whose lives were affected by such things. To my surprise, these were the hardest to find-for example, when I searched "juvenile arthritis," I could only find a couple of picture books and an out-of-print book from the eighties. I can't speak for those who suffer from chronic illnesses, but I know that if I had one, I would want to meet myself in a book more than anything.
And what about life with disabilities and chronic illnesses? I don't have one, but I have friends who do, and as a result, I went searching for books with characters whose lives were affected by such things. To my surprise, these were the hardest to find-for example, when I searched "juvenile arthritis," I could only find a couple of picture books and an out-of-print book from the eighties. I can't speak for those who suffer from chronic illnesses, but I know that if I had one, I would want to meet myself in a book more than anything.
So there you have it-the things I love and hate about fiction. Sorry if it got a little political towards the end-I usually don't address that stuff on here, but I felt that, with this post, an exception was in order.
Do you agree with my thoughts? Or have any book recommendations? Comment below!
T
Check out this website I found while doing some researching/Googling on this topic!
Do you agree with my thoughts? Or have any book recommendations? Comment below!
T
Check out this website I found while doing some researching/Googling on this topic!
