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Blazinghand
United States25550 Posts
Good Writing in Science Fiction
So I mean for this to be a relatively long post, but I'm not sure where I'll run out of steam. Basically, I recently went on a spurt of science fiction reading and had a pretty good time. I consider sci fi to be one of my favorite genres, possibly my favorite. I like the ideas, I like the setting, I like learning new things and seeing thought experiments play out. At some point in the past week, though, I was horrified to discover I've become a connoisseur of science fiction novels. It's gotten to the point where I actually dislike some of the novels I read.
There are two big things that can go wrong with sci fi novels. Well, there are actually a lot of things that can go wrong with sci fi novels, but there are two big categories of troubled sci fi novels that I run into: novels with bad ideas and novels with bad writing. "Poorly written" seems like an obvious flaw for a story, and doubly so for a published novel, but poorly written sci fi is everywhere. In Slaughterhouse-Five, one of Vonnegut's characters complains similarly: "Jesus--if Kilgore Trout could only write!" Rosewater exclaimed. He had a point: Kilgore Trout's unpopularity was deserved. His prose was frightful. Only his ideas were good. And so it is in reality: there are authors with great ideas who can barely string their words together.
Rarer but more insidious is the author with terrible ideas who writes well. Such an author can string you along for several hundred pages before you realize you're reading an incredibly boring, incredibly well-written intergalactic snorefest. In a way, this is the worst-- because at least a Kilgore Troutian work could leave you with something valuable after you slogged your way through the words and reached the ideas inside. Empty prose, no matter how pretty, still encompasses nothing.
In the airport, I had an opportunity to pick up Spinward Fringe: Origins by Randolphe Lalonde. I recognized the author or the title from somewhere and I figured it would be a worthwhile read. With a rather long flight ahead and nothing on hand to read, I mowed through the book rather quickly. I found it almost lacking in both content and delivery. I will say that the basics of a space opera novel were all there-- an epic journey, powerful enemies, a tough little ship that's woefully overmatched by the Vindyne Corporation, and a crew of old friends thrown into new situations by a dangerous universe. What's there to hate? In terms of ideas, it was all old hat, remixing of existing sci-fi ideas. Ok, but not good on its own. What got me I guess was the writing. When it comes down to it, at the end of the novel, I still didn't know anything about Captain Valent's personality, or that of his first mate Oz. They're indistinct, uninteresting people. things just HAPPEN to Valent, he doesn't happen to them, he doesn't think, he's not unique. I don't know how he'd respond to anything new other than as a default protagonist. I can't write a fanfic on him because he's not real to me.
I contrast this with, say, The Mote in God's Eye by Niven and Pournelle. Unfair, I know, to compare to a Hugo winner, but whatever. The paragraph that introduces Bury tells me more about who he is, how he thinks, and how he'll act than the entirety of Origins told me about Valent. Although Admiral Kutuzov is a character who is on the sidelines for most of the novel, what few interactions he has with the main cast leave me with a deep impression of who he is, what he stands for, and what he believes in, long before there are any chapters from his perspective. Granted, I'm contrasting a first contact style novel with a space opera. Origins is more about the action, but in the end, I find the characters unrelatable. It's no Uplift Trilogy. I come away from it feeling like it was the plot of an expensive but not plot-oriented video game.
I certainly couldn't do better myself, but somehow I feel disappointed. Lalonde is certainly a better writer than me, and the fact that Spinward Fringe's universe isn't complex isn't a reason to dislike his book. When it comes down to it, though, I guess I just hoped for something that would at least take a risk and fail spectacularly, or succeed amazingly. Something less bland.
 
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I just started reading the Dune series (I know), so I am definitely not a connisseur of the sci fi genre. You make a lot of insightful points on bad writing/idea. Do you think it would be interesting to list some of what you consider bad writing vs good writing so that we can analyze the reasons for it? I guess it would be hard to compare the two so maybe just post what you would consider bad writing ie: paragraphs or sentences that irk you.
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Iain M. Bank's Culture series is amazing. Brilliant ideas, brilliant writing.
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who needs good writing when you have manifest destiny... IN SPACE
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Hyperion dedicates an entire few pages to your last paragraph lol
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On August 21 2013 18:26 Blazinghand wrote:
I was horrified to discover I've become a connoisseur of science fiction novels. It's gotten to the point where I actually dislike some of the novels I read. You don't have to a connoisseur to notice that your local steakhouse serves a better hamburger than McDonald's. It's not hard to notice that some SF novels are very bad.
I like to buy my science fiction at the used book store. It's cheaper, and it's also a lot of fun to browse the shelves of older books. But I've bought some very Troutian novels. The worst I have on my shelf is "I, Vampire" by Jody Scott. Here's the slogan on the front of the book:
Can a seven-hundred-year-old Transylvanian find true love with a revolutionary Rysemian fish-woman?
And from the back of the book:
+ Show Spoiler +Misunderstood vampire Sterling O'Blivion was working at a dance studio in Chicago when the Rysemian starships landed and things began to change for the better. For one thing, the aliens could take any form they chose, human or otherwise, and Sterling fell head over heels for the one called Benaroya, who was presently disguised as Virginia Woolf. For another, Sterling got a neat new job as chief spokesperson for the aliens' front operation selling the Famous Men's Sperm Kit.
After seven hundred years, Sterling had begun to think the joy was going out of life. Now she had the chance to turn into Mr. Spock, to dance with Abraham Lincoln, and to fall wildly and truly in love. It was just the sort of romp an aging vampire needed!
The writing inside is unfortunately truly terrible.
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If you want a well-written SF novel, why don't you try _A Time of Changes_ by Robert Silverberg?
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Baa?21242 Posts
I actually found The Mote in God's Eye kind of clunky in terms of prose. I got more used to it after ~100 pages or so, but it certainly felt jarring and kinda meh to me.
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On August 22 2013 11:30 Carnivorous Sheep wrote:
I actually found The Mote in God's Eye kind of clunky in terms of prose. I got more used to it after ~100 pages or so, but it certainly felt jarring and kinda meh to me.
also those guys are fascists, so there's that
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On August 22 2013 06:52 munchmunch wrote:Show nested quote +On August 21 2013 18:26 Blazinghand wrote:
I was horrified to discover I've become a connoisseur of science fiction novels. It's gotten to the point where I actually dislike some of the novels I read. You don't have to a connoisseur to notice that your local steakhouse serves a better hamburger than McDonald's. It's not hard to notice that some SF novels are very bad. I like to buy my science fiction at the used book store. It's cheaper, and it's also a lot of fun to browse the shelves of older books. But I've bought some very Troutian novels. The worst I have on my shelf is "I, Vampire" by Jody Scott. Here's the slogan on the front of the book: Show nested quote +Can a seven-hundred-year-old Transylvanian find true love with a revolutionary Rysemian fish-woman?
And from the back of the book: + Show Spoiler +Misunderstood vampire Sterling O'Blivion was working at a dance studio in Chicago when the Rysemian starships landed and things began to change for the better. For one thing, the aliens could take any form they chose, human or otherwise, and Sterling fell head over heels for the one called Benaroya, who was presently disguised as Virginia Woolf. For another, Sterling got a neat new job as chief spokesperson for the aliens' front operation selling the Famous Men's Sperm Kit.
After seven hundred years, Sterling had begun to think the joy was going out of life. Now she had the chance to turn into Mr. Spock, to dance with Abraham Lincoln, and to fall wildly and truly in love. It was just the sort of romp an aging vampire needed! The writing inside is unfortunately truly terrible.
Are you sure that book's not a parody? Or maybe it's just a book that's wacky for the sake of being wacky? It sounds like a lot of very successful but ridiculous sci-fi shows that don't take themselves too seriously (e.g. Doctor Who).
Anyways, I'm going to check it out stat. Sounds entertaining.
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EPT
