Why do you consider genre fiction to be bad?
How do you define genre fiction?
What do you find to be red flags of genre fiction?
What points must a book check off for you to stop considering it genre fiction and start considering it literary fiction that happens to fit into a certain genre?
People who publish genre fiction publish content and quantity, not quality. Aliens and time travel? 15 Novel Series? Written Accessibly?
SOLD
>15 Novel Series?
But if you like the novels, what's wrong with that? Why do you consider that a negative point? What do you consider quality?
There are a lot of subjective things you've left unanswered.
It's only bad if it doesn't aspire to be anything more than disposable entertainment, because there's too much competition in that area that outdoes it at every turn. Why should someone read a book that does nothing you can't get from a TV show, movie, or video game?
This can't be said about most things being published now, but books that don't strictly stick to genre fiction formulas are better because they're capable of providing unique experiences.
So at what point does a book stop being disposable entertainment start being something more? What is it beyond that state that you, personally, feel a book should aspire to be.
Because I'm sure you're aware that regardless of what the author of a book aspires his or her book to be, they still want it to entertain people.
My personal test: Am I thinking about unanswered questions at the end of it?
I find that most of what I'd consider literature makes me think, but not about the wider world or where things will go next or what now. If I start thinking about sequels, it's genre fiction. If I start feeling like I've just hit something massive, head first, at speed, and am now stuck trying to make sense of the impact, it's literature. If I throw the book across the room, it's just bad.
nothing wrong with it, its just a separate language from trad lit and i have little interest in learning it / question whether there is merit to it
for instance, film noir / hardboiled det novels have their own language, and in some sense are a "genre" fiction, but I hardly mind. This is because what they use the space/language in the work for is something inline with my own sentiment.
when I read high fantasy most of it seems like vapid escapism/wish fulfillment, which is not really to my taste so I've never had a desire to delve into the genre and decipher its language
People say it's pure escapism, only for entertainment purposes, of poor quality prose, so on. I'm fine with the first two. Bad prose is where I break off. To me a writer who is poor at writing prose is like a composer who is poor at writing melody. It is, at least, the first thing that a reader will notice about your work, and in some cases the thing that will define it.
THE AIM OF GENRE FICTION IS TO ORDER THINGS ONE AFTER ANOTHER IN AN ATTEMPT TO ELICIT STOCK EMOTIONS WHILE ALSO UTILIZING ITS GENRE'S CONVENTIONS
THE AIM OF LITERATURE IS AN IMAGINATIVE VISION OF HUMANITY, SOMETHING THAT WAS NOT PRESENT BEFORE IT.
CAN YOU SEE THE DIFFERENCE? THERE IS AWFUL "LITERARY FICTION" ITS AIM DOESN'T AUTOMATICALLY MAKE IT SUCCESSFUL. BUT NOR DOES A "GOOD" GENRE BOOK AUTOMATICALLY VAULT IT INTO THE CATEGORY OF LITERATURE
THERE ARE "LITERARY" GENRE BOOKS THAT FOCUS MORE ON THE LATTER AND ARE USUALLY IDENTIFIED AS SUCH SO THE WHOLE CONFUSION AND DEBATE IS NEEDLESS
Generally it has simpler themes, flatter characters and inferior prose
A lot of the hate you see on here is just people being pretentious because it's fun though
That's because you read crap fantasy instead of good fantasy.
The main difference is that you don't read crappy novels from the 19th century or pretentious pomo novels while you do read bad fantasy simply because it's contemporary.
Genre fiction is good if it has good prose and a great story like Neuromancer.
>>>>not debating everything
Also nice pasta you made there famalam
But Neuromancer has neither. The prose is awful and the story reads like a shitty action movie.
>But Neuromancer has neither. The prose is awful and the story reads like a shitty action movie.
Third party chiming in to say I agree with this. Only genre fiction I like is PKD and I'm the first person to admit his prose is nothing special.
in the short story form genre fiction relies on plot threads versus hiding/revealing/describing some dramatic or melodramatic concern. pure plot/drama can be combined here but it's less common and when it happens the stories are usually longer, the more it's hybridized the more space is needed.
it's more muddled in the novel. most literature is genrelike in plot structure, at least partially. the test would be which direction it's weighted towards, what it has more of. also more 'nonplot' options in a novel versus shortform, more 'social criticism' or application of philosophy to social scenes/conditions. anything can be thrown in really. an agatha christie novel is all plot, brothers karamazov isn't.
Vance, Wolfe, Tolkien, Peake, Dunsany, Edison and Borges all have pretty good prose.
id go farther than this and say PKD's prose is worse than the average genre writer's. he uses a ton of words to get across very little. the ideas and situations are interesting though, also the overall structure, his stuff tends to be worth finishing, it's just kind of shitty along the way.
is neuromancer worth reading, i couldn't get past more than five or so pages of its prose, it seemed on the annoying-tier of 'bad' versus the bland/too-many-words tier
>But Neuromancer has neither. The prose is awful and the story reads like a shitty action movie.
No it doesn't. At least not compared to the monumental shitheap that is sci-fi in general.
I don't think its worth it. It was a novelty 30 years ago, but, and I'm saying this with a straight face, playing Shadowrun games will give you a better cyberpunk experience.
Ghost in the Shell from 1995 is the best cyberpunk and Neuromancer feels like it was completely ran over by time.
I don't think I've ever read a science fiction novel with prose worse than Neuromancer.
Sure, Dick and company are bad at it, but they at least form sentences which make sense. Neuromancer is complicated to read because its stupid and because it is full of nonsensical word salads. Dry and boring is preferable to the crap that is Neuromancer.
>Dry and boring is preferable to the crap that is Neuromancer.
Kill yourself.
Chiming in to say that I also dropped Neuromancer fairly quickly. Holy shit was it painful. I've been wanting to try again for a while because so many people love it. Finishing it would allow me to argue about it if nothing else.