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Dennis Collins
Mindsight Moderator
Post Number: 2387
Registered: 06-2002

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Posted on Tuesday, April 17, 2007 - 09:46 am:

I'm kind of a watcher; people watcher and one of the things that I observed in over forty years of hanging around automotive factories (the REAL ones) is that just about everyone carried a paperback mystery novel in their back pocket to read whenever they got a break or whenever the boss wasn't looking. In the Skilled Trades department there was always at least one or two filing cabinet drawers used as informal community libraries of books, about 75% mysteries and 24% westerns, 1% sci-fi.

In my younger years when I rode the bus to work I noticed that many of the commuters used the ride to catch up on the latest Mickey Spillane adventure.

Blue collar; lots and lots of blue collar readers and they ate up those mysteries.

To be sure there are members of the more sophisticated classes who have enjoyed mysteries but the blue collar reader is and will always be the bread and butter.

So why is it that we authors use the word assuage when we could say soothe? And don't give me that hair-splitting crap about the words not meaning the same thing because of some subjunctive form of the verb before it was translated from Latin. Who cares??? I'll tell you who it is. It's the snooty author who delights in challenging (pissing off) the reader.

We're not writing for editors and the biggest problem in the industry is that the editors don't see it that way.

Since I started reviewing books I've seen tons of vastly superior novels coming out of small publishing houses because they don't meet the New York standard while the big guys continue to pump out average material.

The business is standing on its head as far as I'm concerned because they refuse to see the obvious.

Dennis Collins
Moderator
www.theunrealmccoy.com
http://theunrealmccoy.blogspot.com

Pacwriter
Unity Member
Post Number: 2911
Registered: 04-2002

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Posted on Tuesday, April 17, 2007 - 10:10 am:

One of my favorite authors is John D. MacDonald (Travis McGee - wrote mysteries and always used a color in the title). What I enjoyed about his writing was not the plot but his characters. Travis McGee and his sidekick, Dirk Pitt and his side kick (Clive Cussler's novels) are people I can see in the mind's eye. The same can be said for Sam Spade or Archie Goodwin and Nero Wolfe. Gosh the list can grow long can't it.

The point is a great novel is not plot it is characters. I read the entire Executioner series (Not many people know about this one, cheap paperback reading is not great fiction it is great characters.

Why doesn't a well-written, well-plotted book not make the New York label? Could it be that the characters are run-of-the-mill? We tend to want to read about characters we can visualize, hate and love.

When you are reading a novel and the characters are hazy in your mind you may be engrossed in the plot (The Bourne Identity as an example) but have difficulty visualizing the character. You may read the book but come away feeling there should have been something more.

You can describe what a character looks like but it's not enough. The reader has to be able to see the character in the setting, understand the working of the character's mind and to some extent the character's soul. A person is passion, emotional, disgusting, scheming etc. etc. etc. When you can capture the character and confine him/her to the pages you can capture the editor.

http://www.perrycomer.com

Claudia Turner VanLydegraf
Mindsight Moderator
Post Number: 3037
Registered: 06-2002

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Posted on Tuesday, April 17, 2007 - 11:05 am:

I tend to agree with both of you a lot. I, too, am a reviewer and have read a good many wonderful books that will never make it to the big time, simply because the author didn't fuzzy up the wording to come off as highbrow or better than the average joe-blow worker, or blue-collar worker as Dennis said, and the editors and NYC just don't get that people are real and want to read about other real people. The characters in one of my favorite authors books, which I just got the third one of, are all believable and honest=to-goodness down-to-earth real people, She, Donis Casey, creates them, makes them very open to any interpretation that I want to put into them, as well as what she wants them to be for the book. Most people in the average world don't go around saying assuage in their everyday conversation, no matter who they are talking to, or what the conversation is revolving around. It is not a word (as many others aren't either) that is used daily by the general population.

I do think that sometimes an author ought to stretch his/her readers vocabulary a bit and throw in something to catch them once in a while, but not every page or two. There are obviously two or more centers of thought on this subject, so let's hear it from a lot of other players.

Claudia
MINDSIGHT MODERATOR

Dennis Collins
Mindsight Moderator
Post Number: 2388
Registered: 06-2002

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Posted on Tuesday, April 17, 2007 - 11:53 am:

Mike Hammer and James Bond were two of the most recognizable names in literature and it was their strong character, not the plot that carried their stories. One was ultra-sophisticated while the other seems to have crawled out from under a rock but both had huge followings from the same group of readers. The main similarity was the rapid-fire action.

There really aren't any stories quite like those nowadays because public taste has changed and demands just a little more credibility. I don't think that the average reader wants less action, just a little more substance and believability in the plot. And I doubt that anyone has the perfect hero in mind. He or She will evolve from some obscure word processor somewhere.

I just hope it's mine.

Dennis Collins
Moderator
www.theunrealmccoy.com
http://theunrealmccoy.blogspot.com

Mike Manno
Wandering Member
Post Number: 137
Registered: 11-2004

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Posted on Wednesday, April 18, 2007 - 09:12 am:

I agree: Character is all important!

About a year ago an editor from a big NY publisher was interviewed by The Third Degree (MWA monthly newsletter). The editor was asked point blank: What do you look for, plot or characters? The reply: characters, without a doubt. A good editor can buck up a weak plot, but nothing can be done with cardboard characters, she said.

I think if you look at any great mystery series you will find appended to it the name of a memorable main character.

Mike Manno
"Murder Most Holy"
Five Star -- June 2006
http://mikemanno.com

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