we can write if we want to
Feb. 8th, 2003 10:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lauralhHow totally unnecessary.
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I finally caved in and bought the About A Boy DVD. And Steve bought the novel the other day - so I read it, too. Although I didn't really enjoy High Fidelity the novel, objectively I saw evidence of craft. I mean this novel is actually a slightly more interesting story than the other one, but the characters don't hit you in the gut quite as hard. Still pretty hard though - they have that brutal and painful honesty that Rob did, although no one is quite the fucking jerk that he is.
I keep saying that there's two things you have to do to write a good book - you have to have an interesting story, and you have to be able to tell it. I think one of the best ways to tell it is to have sympathetic characters. For years and years The Eyes of the Dragon by King was the pinnacle of a well-told story for me - though if you think about it, the plot is pretty weak and formulaic. But you fall in love with the characters. That's always been my bag, too. I don't have so many interesting stories to tell, as just a bunch of stuff happening to people I love. (Although technically they aren't actually people.) This is why I can't bear Tolkien; first of all, he can't tell a story for shit, and second of all, well, I didn't feel for the characters, anyway. Except Bilbo Baggins. No one else, though.
--
I finally caved in and bought the About A Boy DVD. And Steve bought the novel the other day - so I read it, too. Although I didn't really enjoy High Fidelity the novel, objectively I saw evidence of craft. I mean this novel is actually a slightly more interesting story than the other one, but the characters don't hit you in the gut quite as hard. Still pretty hard though - they have that brutal and painful honesty that Rob did, although no one is quite the fucking jerk that he is.
I keep saying that there's two things you have to do to write a good book - you have to have an interesting story, and you have to be able to tell it. I think one of the best ways to tell it is to have sympathetic characters. For years and years The Eyes of the Dragon by King was the pinnacle of a well-told story for me - though if you think about it, the plot is pretty weak and formulaic. But you fall in love with the characters. That's always been my bag, too. I don't have so many interesting stories to tell, as just a bunch of stuff happening to people I love. (Although technically they aren't actually people.) This is why I can't bear Tolkien; first of all, he can't tell a story for shit, and second of all, well, I didn't feel for the characters, anyway. Except Bilbo Baggins. No one else, though.
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Date: 2003-02-09 01:06 pm (UTC)