Essay rec: the components of reader response to a book

[julesjones]

Janet at the romance blog Dear Author has posted an excellent essay discussing the three main strands that go into a reader's reactions to a book (correctness, style and taste), noting that only one of these is objective, and considering how that can lead to misunderstandings in online discussions.

The subject is something I've often seen discussed in fanfic circles, which has a whole critical vocabulary to indicate stories/books which have a high score on one aspect but a low score on another. But this is one of the best single-post discussions of the subject that I can remember seeing, and while it's written from a romance reader's perspective, it does not rely on prior knowledge of any particular fiction genre or fandom in-group knowledge. The comment thread has some good discussion as well. If you're interested in meta, you may well find this an interesting read regardless of your preferred genre.

Comments

[shriker-tam.livejournal.com]

Very interesting, though I feel she's missing the element of "believability". If a book is set in another world, or there are elements in it about which there are no objective truths (like magic), it's hard to talk about "correctness", because there are no facts the author is getting wrong. I had issues like that about the DaVinci Code, for instance, where I just didn't find the characters at all believable the way they were put together.

[green-knight.livejournal.com]

Rather than 'believability' I would call it 'internal consistency,' because you're covering a lot of ground with that word.

Whether plot elements are believable depends on the genre etc (in a comedy you can have coincidences that won't fly in a more serious story, at the start of a book you can get away with a lot, when it comes to the resolution, not so much); and each genre has conventions - what you state outright as possible at the start of a book, however ludicrous it might sound, does not get questioned. (Whether that be dragons or the idea that hard-nosed, workaholic businessmen make good life partners.)

In some- but not all - genres there's a question of whether the character is believable - whether you could meet such a person in the street - but again, readers are willing to accept a lot if the portrayal is consistent and the character stays true to themselves throughout. (If the setting is the real world, the characters have to be more consistent with reality than dragons need to be.)

I would say that in SF, you *can* get things wrong the moment you can't get there from here. A thriving city in a desert needs to get water and food from *somewhere*. Invent what you like, but you need to show that it _could_ work. Magic is fine, but if you can make water out of sand, your character had better attempt that trick when she finds herself in the middle of a desert with nothing to drink.

[heleninwales.livejournal.com]

That's an interesting essay, but I would suggest that it's possible to be more objective than she claims. Beyond what she calls correctness are things like: is the language fluent and are there vivid descriptions of character and setting? Is there some originality in the language, for example in the similes and metaphors used, or is it full of hackneyed, over-used phrases? (Language can be grammatically correct, but full of boring cliches.) Is there a good balance between narrative summary (telling) and dramatised scenes (showing)? I would say that these features are pretty much independent of genre.

I also agree with shriker_tam that believability comes into it a lot, whether it's lit fic, fantasy, romance or whatever.

[sallymn.livejournal.com]

Is there some originality in the language, for example in the similes and metaphors used, or is it full of hackneyed, over-used phrases? (Language can be grammatically correct, but full of boring cliches.) I'd agree with this (adding the sad rider that as usual it's always much easier to explain where something is bad than when and why it's good...)

[green-knight.livejournal.com]

I think those things fall under 'style' because while you can evaluate the mechanical aspects, and most readers will struggle more with incorrect writing and enjoy it less, the plain language -> lively use of metaphors can be invigorating or offputting (and well and badly done) - but some readers don't mind headhopping, sentences that go 'and then and then and then' - while others *do*.

So you can be objective/descriptive without making predictions about enjoyability or quality of the book.

[growlycub.livejournal.com]

What you describe would fall under 'style' for me and is also very subjective. I usually don't notice prose unless it's in a negative way aka something bugs me about it, whereas others notice it when it works really well for them. Terms like 'vivid descriptions' and 'originality in the language' are highly subjective as far as I'm concerned.