Why are some books hard to warm up to? \ stacker news ~BooksAndArticles

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302 sats \ 11 comments \ @k00b 14 Jul BooksAndArticles

I’m a third through Vernor Vinge’s A Deepness in the Sky and it just warmed up. I didn’t have the same problem with the first book in the series, A fire upon the deep. The first book was so good I suppose that’s what motivated me to this point in the second.

I have my own thoughts on why there’s a difference between these books, but I’m wondering if there are certain rules of thumb that accelerate the desire to climb through a narrative.

Do any writers here know? If there are such rules of thumb, do writers abandon them as a challenge to themselves?

(I find unmotivated context loading the greatest hazard to my reading habit.)

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61 sats \ 1 reply \ @OT 14 Jul

Mandibles

I just couldn't get into it. Still it's probably worth revisiting at some point to see how much it compares with what's happening in the world now.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @k00b OP 14 Jul

I still haven't read Mandibles. I'll try to give it a shot after this series.

61 sats \ 0 replies \ @TotallyHumanWriter 14 Jul

Some books have great hooks and ideas that drive curiosity.

But a simple dead body and a whodunit? isn't enough on its own. All the normal writing rules apply. We need to care about the characters, to sense the conflict, to appreciate the descriptions, dialogue and prose.

As well as the momentum and pace of the plot, I think our mood as readers has a role to play.

If you've picked up the book 5 times during a stinkingly bad week or failed to get past 2 pages due to exhaustion, it can reduce motivation. Everyone is dofferent of course.

55 sats \ 3 replies \ @plebpoet 14 Jul

unmotivated context loading

by this, do you kinda mean too much context not enough action?

0 sats \ 2 replies \ @k00b OP 14 Jul

Not enough motivation. Not enough reason to load the context.

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @plebpoet 14 Jul

oh got it, you are the unmotivated

I don't know about rules of thumb. If you have established rules, then you are writing popular fiction, right?

Every book is essentially trying something that they hope will keep you engaged, or it should at least entertain the writer.

And I kinda think maybe you expect to be watching a film when you're reading a book?

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @k00b OP 14 Jul

And I kinda think maybe you expect to be watching a film when you're reading a book?

I expect to not be sent reading for reading's sake. I expect the writer to be able to trigger my attention, in the purpose of telling their story, like an instrument. I want to read without laboring over remembering details because, instead, the writer has motivated me to want to remember details. I expect good writing to be painless if pain can be avoided and pain is not the point.

10 sats \ 1 reply \ @Bell_curve 15 Jul

do you find more or less trouble with fiction vs non-fiction?

11 sats \ 0 replies \ @k00b OP 15 Jul

I expect it with nonfiction. I’m intolerant of it with fiction.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @rootmachine 15 Jul

I work with writers occasionally and I can tell you that usually the second and third book and so on come as market request, not necessarily as writer desire and that often those books get ghostwritten. It is rarely to have a writer giving all the best for next volumes unless the writer planned it from the beginning. I know both situations in real life and I can tell that the writer who write the next volumes as planned from the beginning is successful while the other is not. And guess what? There is a great amount of hate and paid negative reviews in the author world....

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @guerratotal 14 Jul

For me, something that is demotivating is, as they say, the lack of context and that hook in the first moments of reading.....!!