Day 404: The Importance of Variety

I noticed something lately that I never picked up on before, something that I think was always right in front of me, hiding in plain sight. It's always bittersweet when this happens. On the one hand, I must have improved in my writing in some aspect to figure it out, but on the other hand, how much else is hiding in plain sight that I might never see? Its a conundrum. Regardless, I'm happy to have had this thought because I think it's a crucial missing piece in a lot of what I read. What I noticed is that many writers seem to be stuck in a niche. While reading a piece from an amateur author I found online, it suddenly became obvious to me that the author had read very little outside of sci-fi, and that their work was based almost entirely on a small slice of the literary canon. This person seemed to realize something was off based on their comments about their own work, but couldn't figure out what was missing. It had a lot of the world and character building tropes you see in sci-fi, but lacked a thorough understanding of why people often use those tropes as shortcuts. I've found that the compromise between concept and character is often the greatest challenge in writing sci-fi, and this person didn't seem to realize that cutting corners on either one only works when it makes the overall picture prettier. I'm not just trying to rag on this poor stranger's work, in fact I thought it would be pretty decent if they fixed up those tropey rough edges. This is all to say that it got me thinking about the holes in my own reading list, and what I might do to shore them up.

It's hard to know what you don't know. That's why I think it's important to expose myself to lots of different styles, genres, and mediums so I can get a more wholistic picture of what makes a story work well. Intuitively I've known this for a long time, but I don't think I ever really thought about why exactly that is. Ever since I started this blog I've been making sure that my reading list includes a lot of variety. I've read classics and contemporary, the most speculative of genre fiction and the most hardcore literary, short and long, fast and slow, nonfiction and even the odd poem now and again. Still, I think there are a couple of genres I just don't get around to much. I'm gonna start a list here and try to include some in upcoming readings.

First off is romance. This genre just doesn't do it for me most of the time, but I don't think it's because I'm inherently uninterested. I've read a couple of stories with romance as a significant plot point (including this most recent book 'North Woods') and I actually thought it added a lot to the stories. The stakes are unique in romance, the payoff heartwarming (or tragically beautiful in many cases), plus there's a lot to be learned about human interaction. I think the main reason I don't read much romance is because a lot of it frankly just sucks. It suffers from the very problem I was talking about, where many romance authors seem to read and write little else outside their genre. I just haven't finished many of the romances I've started, but I think if I find a list of good romance novels, some classics to help me understand the origins of the genre, maybe I could incorporate some of the knowledge there into my own writing. I'm sure it can't hurt. I certainly haven't written much romance either, so maybe it would inspire me to include some in my stories as a plot point. It could add some needed variety into the slush pile of speculative and attempted literary fiction.

Next is horror, a genre that I enjoy watching on screen, but rarely end up reading or writing. There are horror elements I include, but much like that other writer I mentioned, I just pick and choose tropes without really understanding why they work. It probably reads as really clunky to anyone more familiar with horror stories. From what little I have read, I know that it's got heaps of suspense compared to other genres, and that the authors tend to have a wicked sort of creativity that I'd like to be able to claim myself. In particular, I think it would help me learn to create a sense of vulnerability, a crucial factor in generating fear for both character and reader. It's important in every genre to create meaningful stakes, but none more so than in horror, where the fear of death (or worse) should be ever present.

Finally, this isn't a genre so much as it is a trick I think I could pick up from other media like movies, TV, and video games. They all use music to add atmosphere, often to great effect. Obviously I can't have music playing while someone reads my work, but something I learned from both 'North Woods' and 'Don't Ask the Blind Guy for Directions' is that music can play a big part in literature too. Like any other sensation, it can be incorporated into the atmosphere to set the mood in a roundabout way. I think I can use it as a nice crutch to move further away from 'tell' and closer to 'show.' Only problem is how do you 'show' music? I'm not sure. I'll have to do some more research.

What genres would you like to incorporate into your own works? Do you have any big holes that you either can't stand, or maybe haven't even noticed? Let me know in the comments.

Thank you for reading,

Benjamin Hawley