Is There Any Point in Trying to Make YA and NA Novels Good?

As always, if an argument is tedious, you have the option of walking away.

But if you continue to say things I disagree with, I don't think I'm going to stop disagreeing because you say, "no, just no."

Writers can get better at reaching their intended audience. They can learn to more effectively produce certain responses from some people, and probably learn to more effectively reach a larger group of people.

Writers can also get worse at reaching their intended audience. There are several examples of writers whose first books were very successful and whose later books didn't do nearly as well. The later books may have had better technique, but they didn't have the magic of the first book - who knows why?

And a character can be simultaneously flat, superficial, and memorable. A character can reach some readers and not others. Description can be rich to some readers and boring to others. Unnecessary back story could be taken out, or it could be left in as characterization or setting development or just as an enjoyable passage, and some people will enjoy it.

And, in terms of being tedious? You say, again, "Just because some people see a piece differently than others doesn't mean there aren't elements which one finds in common in books generally judged as well written"... but I have to ask, again, what you think these elements are.

Are you suggesting that the right amount of back story is a universal, non-subjective element of books you'd label well-written? Because, of course, the appropriate amount of back story is going to vary widely from genre to genre, reader to reader, and writing style to writing style. So I can't see it as being universal or non-subjective. The same goes for the other elements you've mentioned in this post.

Possibly the problem is that you're thinking there's only one style of good writing? If we're comparing Bronte to EL James, we're comparing a novel that's generally classed as "literary", today, with a novel that's generally classed as "popular romance/erotica". EL James writes crappy literary novels - Bronte writes crappy popular romance/erotica. Luckily, neither one of them is trying to write in the other's genre, so no worries. Trying to compare them makes no sense. They're different tools for different jobs. You wouldn't compare a sonnet to free-verse using the same standards, would you?

PS - In terms of Bleeding Edge - The Guardian says, "Thomas Pynchon's multi-genre novel has momentous concerns but loses itself in glib in-jokes and pop-culture references" - doesn't sound like they're appreciating his genius to the same degree you did. (http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/sep/28/bleeding-edge-thomas-pynchon-review) The New York Times says it's "a scattershot work that is, by turns, entertaining and wearisome, energetic and hokey, delightfully evocative and cheaply sensational; dead-on in its conjuring of zeitgeist-y atmospherics, but often slow-footed and ham-handed in its orchestration of social details." (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/11/books/bleeding-edge-a-9-11-novel-by-thomas-pynchon.html) And, of course, there are other critics who agree with your admiration of the work.

Look at that. Different readers have different reactions. Things are subjective. And those differing responses are coming from people within the same target audience, I imagine. So imagine how much less effective the story might have seemed to readers from a different group.

Fiction is subjective. Quality is subjective. If you have a list of elements of fiction that are not subjective - well, I'd really like to see that. Have I mentioned that before?

 

You admit a writer can get better, then you try to dismiss it as merely matching a target audience better.

So fine, divide your criteria for better writing into genre specific writing skills. You still end up with identifiable writing skills.

No, that's nonsense.

If a handful of scientists deny global warming, that doesn't mean the evidence is no more than opinion.

 

Again, you are having a hard time separating writing skill from subjective preference. Both exist and both are different things. That a bunch of teenyboppers like bubblegum music doesn't make said music the equivalent of mastering the classics. One is popularity, one is skill. They may overlap or not, but they are not the same thing and each has quantifiable elements.

 

I was only commenting on the couple pages I read while waiting for the pizza. My son, an avid Pynchon fan, said he couldn't get into this book but his friend raved about it so it's still sitting on my son's bookshelf.

So here we have a writer with proven skill whose latest work has mixed reviews and is not as popular as his past work. That would be skilled writing that wasn't a commercial success (except I'm pretty sure it was a commercial success). How do a couple disappointed reviewers fit into your commercial success model of 'good' writing? Bleeding Edge made #6 on the NYT's Best Seller list.

Are the critics wrong? Or is this a writer with skill that critics had issues with?

Pynchon has incredible writing skill. You continue to conflate elements of skill with elements of popular/commercial success.

Which supports my assertion that skilled writing and popularity are two separate measures of a book. Surely Pynchon did not suddenly lose his writing skills.

 

Is this the same old genre fiction vs literary fiction debate? Because I see that going nowhere good.

As a reader and writer of YA I would like to clarify that we deserve respect as a genre. I think that many who do not know or understand the genre believe we are all Stephanie Meyer wannabes that have no understanding of the intracicies of writing that the adult audience requires. And to that I say you are being judgemental about a subject without having the understanding to back it up.

I am misquoting here, but a literary agent I watched in an interview said that the difference between YA and adult fiction is that in YA you have to have a plot that engages the reader and never lets go. Because teens don't have the desire to go off on long literary tangents and give deep symbolism to every rock and blade of grass. They want a story that engages them so strongly that before they realize it it's six hours later.

Now I know that this is a generalization and does not apply to all teens, but yes, as an overall guide to YA it is what writers like me strive to accomplish.

But does that mean that YA novels are not as 'good' or 'worthwile' as literary fiction? That is pure subjective supposition.

For example Shakespeare, arguably the most famous writer of all time. Beloved by millions. I can't stand his work. Why does it take a convoluted paragraph of symbolism and verse to say something simple? Why do I have to spend half an hour to read and pick through one page? Sorry, I just can't do it.

So maybe to some that makes me an inferrior writer, but to me 'good' writing is the ability to take symbols on a page and forge an emotional connection to the reader through it. Whether that connection is made through verse, the perfection of 'rules' or through some other strange alchemy, if that connection exists, then that is all that can be asked of a writer.

 

After watching the back and forth. Good and bad are up to the observer, effectively taking it out of the creator's (writer) hands. In and of itself the story in neutral, the observer is the one projecting their approval or prejudice upon it. We use the biases we have developed to form an opinion one way or another.

Success seems to be in a large part, to latch onto a popular or sympathetic subject. More or less skill is not at the forefront as long as you do the 'popular thing'. It all boils down to a brain dead audience will gravitate to what it finds familiar and safe. Though there are exceptions to this rule, but rare. So get in touch with the pop-culture scene and you don't have to try all that hard.

 

I've been to lots of book festivals, and heard lots of authors reading their own books. I think the organisers of the festivals do their best to sign authors who read well out loud on stage, as well as do wonderful writing. So many of them have been mesmerising, and I've gone out and bought book on the strength of their performance.

But yes, there have been a couple of duds as well. The worst are bloody poets! They put on that sonorous 'poetry' voice and start intoning. I want to scream at them. JUST USE YOUR REGULAR VOICE!!!! Before remembering I left the children on the stove yet again, and beating a hasty exit from the premises. Ack ack ack....

 

A few audiobooks are read by the author. Of the audiobooks I've listened to, when an author reads their book in its entirety, it's always been good.

 

Good and bad as in, I liked/didn't like it, are still a separate quality from well/poorly written.

 

Not from my POV in this discussion.

Since I'm writing a YA novel myself, I certainly don't equate YA with poor writing skills that follow a formula which appeals to a certain audience. I want my book to be well written. And despite some claims to the contrary, I believe there is a skill set a writer can master to become a good writer no matter the genre.

I'm writing YA because I like reading YA. But I also like reading good work and while I might slog through a book like Obsidian to learn what elements in it are attracting readers, I don't come away saying I want to emulate that writer.

Both Twilight and Obsidian could have benefitted from a good critique group.

 

Thank you for this post! I think your quote in bold probably sums it up. Teens want a story that doesn't let go. I like that. And I suspect you're probably right, as well. Perhaps that's what most genre writing is about, actually. Memorable characters worked into a plot that steams along, and probably comes to the kind of conclusion the reader has come to expect from the genre. No big surprises, just an entertaining journey.

This, of course, requires good writing, doesn't it? By good writing, I don't mean flowery and poetic and abstractly meaningful, I mean writing that knows exactly what it's doing. It takes a lot of skill to keep a reader panting for more, rather than drifting away or getting confused or bored. My own take on this thread is that a writer who wants to appeal to younger readers should work hard at building good writing skills, so they can pull off a great story.

Shallow characters, dimwitted settings, banal dialogue, repeated words and phrases that are there because the author is too lazy to think up any other words and phrases (rather than for emphasis) ...these won't do a YA piece of fiction any good, will they? I'm always nervous when writers want to 'start' by writing a children's book or a YA book, not because it's their preferred genre, but because they think it will be easier to write than an adult book. I maintain that good children's books and good YA books are just as hard to write as any other kind of book. They require the special skills you mentioned.

Poor old Shakespeare! His work is taken so out of context these days. He wrote plays, not novels, and his works were meant to be seen, not read. For starters. The phrases and words he used are archaic as hell. He lived and wrote over 500 years ago—but his audience at the time were just ordinary people. And they loved him. Humanity hasn't really changed, but words and attitudes certainly have. It doesn't make him less worthy, but possibly more difficult and less universally appealing as a writer today. I got 'in' to Shakespeare when I started seeing his plays performed. They really come to life then.

 

Okay. Seriously, though.

What do you mean when you say a book is well or poorly written? If you're refusing to answer this question for some reason, can you at least openly refuse (and maybe explain your refusal) rather than just pretending I haven't asked the question?

It's ridiculous for us to continue talking about this when you won't even define your terms. If by "well-written" you mean "legible font", then, fine. But if you mean something else, you need to explain yourself.

What criteria or attributes or whatever make a book well-written?

 

I have read both series in their entirety as well as 50 shades of Grey (wrong genre, but it goes with my point) and I have come to this conclusion, yes we should strive to write the best we can. We should put our best work out there because not to do so should feel to the individual writer like cheating on a test. You may get the grade, but there will always be a part of you that knows you were better than that.

However, that is for the writer in us. To the reader, if you connect to them, they will forgive you much. Like any real life relationship, if the reader's feeling are involved, they are willing to put up with a lot before they call it quits.

So, after reading these series and thinking on them, I believe that they accomplished their goals, they connected to the reader. Was it the best writing? Probably not, and in the end we can debate for hours if it is good or bad or right or wrong that these books became so popular. We can criticize them and mock them and ignore the reason why they worked.

They worked because they touched on some emotion within the reader and formed a bond. A bond that may not be perfect, but maybe is all the more real for it.

 

I think you're still not understanding - I don't really believe in "good" or "bad" writing. I believe in writing that achieves the goals of the author or doesn't achieve the goals of the author. Assuming an author's goal was commercial success, and assuming the book succeeded on its own, rather than by piggybacking on the fame of the author, then a book that achieves commercial success is good because it has achieved its author's goals.

The critics are neither right nor wrong. They're irrelevant. They can say how the book worked for them, but that's all. If someone else has the same taste as the reviewer, then the 'verdict' of the review will help that person find an enjoyable book.

No, I think this book was fairly popular - as you said, it was a best seller. But at least two people who are well-respected enough to be professional reviewers for prestigious journals feel that this book was glib and lost itself, was scattershot, sometimes wearisome, hokey and cheaply sensational and often slow-footed and ham-handed. I agree that "Pynchon did not suddenly lose his writing skills" so how do you explain the fact that at least two highly respected critics thought so little of his work, while other respected critics found it much more worthwhile?

(But, wait, I've fallen into the trap again. Please don't answer that question. Instead, please tell me what are the objective attributes of "good" writing?)

 

So the question is ...HOW does a writer create this emotional bond with a reader?

If you say your character 'feels sad and humiliated' is that going to have the same emotional impact as letting the reader watch your character breaking down and sobbing her heart out on a bus—after experiencing a vivid flashback of the lover she's just lost—while other passengers stare at her, and a few actually start laughing and pointing?

@BayView - Knowing how (and when) to manipulate a reader's emotions is one of the objective attributes of 'good writing.' For what my opinion is worth.

 

Maybe this is the source of the disagreement. Because writing is not a science. You know that. But you seem to be trying to pretend that it is.

If it were a science, we'd probably be able to come up with a list of objective attributes of "good" writing. But we apparently can't come up with that list, or even give examples of the sort of thing that would be on that list. So... not a science.

 

I haven't read all the posts but this one reminds of something I heard someone say and I think applies well to the topic.

A person was talking about music. Boy bands in particular. He said. "This is the backstreet boys(it was a video, it went to a clip) I don't like this. It is pure bubble gum but there is nothing wrong with that. There is a place in this world for bubblegum."

I think that quote says my opinion on th topic quite well.


But since I am here. @ the opening post.

It is a tricky position. In a sense. I personally think it is easy. You say what you think needs to be said and let them take from it what they will. If the problem is a style problem, then they should notice that and value that. I don't think this is a style problem. Mid-Paragraph POV shift is not a style as much as an error.

It is an error with a clear drop in quality I think. I think voicing that is good thing to do. I am a poor reader. I have read things that did that and not even noticed. So in those cases it didn't bother me. I have re-read those things since I became a writer and now they do bother me.

But I don't think they bother me because I know they are errors. I think it is the reverse. I know they are errors because they bother me. You can connect so much deeper to a character when you do this right.

So, while others may be enjoying the material. It is enjoying it "inspite" of the things you noticed. Not because of them. So I, as an optmistic like to imagine how much more people would enjoy them if they didn't have those things working against them but kept the style they liked.

I mean, we can argue style/quality all day but at the end of the day, we have rules of grammar or accepted quality in writing. So I think there is a bar. In my opinion.

 

Sure, showing instead of telling is one way. I am not arguing against the loose set of guidelines that we writers are given to memorize.

Show don't tell
Active vs Passive voice
beats vs dialogue tags
proper use of adverbs
proper use of POV
proper use of tense
...etc...

But what I am saying is that some writers can mess up on these and still connect to the reader. Maybe it is in the character voice, maybe its in the conflicts the character has to face, or maybe it is some weird combination of art and skill that defies words. How do you quantify art?

I walked through an art museum once and some of the paintings were beautiful, so clear and complex that it almost looked like a photograph. Then there were those that looked like a five year old had a field day with a box of colored pencils.

Just because one artist uses structure and another doesn't does not mean that either one is not art. They just appeal to different audiences for different reasons.

So yes, the aforementioned guidelines are a good start, they are tools and we the artists. We can use them or not use them as we see fit and in the end we are the ones who have to stand by our creation and defend its validity to the world.

If in the end we chose to not use a certain tool, do you think your average viewer would know? Or care? Perhaps the critics would tsk and tell us that it's a sloppy disgrace, but as long as there were still people enjoying it, flaws and all, then why stand in judgement of it?

 

I'm not really arguing with you, because what you say about the variety of approaches to writing is certainly valid. However, my question still remains. You've maintained (correctly) that successful writers create an emotional bond with their readers 'somehow.' So how does this 'somehow' work? What did these writers do to make this bond happen? That's what I'm hoping writers take on board from this discussion. Creative writing may not be 'science,' but it certainly can be studied, and a writer can learn how to make their story better.

If you take that emotional bond for granted and don't understand how to create it, you could miss and hit the wall. You feeling an emotional bond with your own characters and getting your readers to feel the same way takes effort and expertise. Just telling a reader they ought to feel a certain way doesn't necessarily make it happen.

I'm trying to keep @Catrin Lewis 's original post in mind. She was wondering if she should bother to help another writer create a better YA story. I'd say yes. The notion that YA fiction doesn't have to be carefully crafted because it's just for teenagers who don't know any better, is warped by the few writers who seem to have done just that. The vast majority of successful books (YA and otherwise) have authors who have worked their socks off to get where they are, and while their writing may not appeal to everybody, it's not mistake-ridden either.

Grammatical mistakes and clunky writing techniques may get overlooked if the premise or 'bond' within the story is strong enough, but they don't help the cause.

As Catrin pointed out, the story she was critiquing had promise, but the mistakes detracted from the result to the point that she couldn't keep her mind on the story. We have only the author's word for the fact that her 'other' betas loved it. If that's actually the case, more power to her arm. She'll be a successful published author in no time at all, and Catrin can slink off into a corner, tail between legs, feeling extremely foolish for having tried to help.

 

He explains it better than I ever could if you have half an hour to spare.

 

I think I have an answer! Not sure if it is to one of the questions but all the same an answer. Because I think you are right. Art is hard to judge because quality is often viewed as that bonding and emotional bounding is not exactly something you can dissect.

I think two words can so so much here. Or two phrases.

In-spite of,
Because of.

Take the moment of you looking at art.

A piece that everyone around you hates. It might have valid problems if you think of art theory, just as we have writing rules. Sometimes you might like it in spite of those faults or because of those faults.

Because when you stop and think about it. Faults help art. If you took writing theory or art theory and boiled them down to pure numbers. Then there is no change. It is stagnet. Sometimes a change, even a bad one(by the numbers) is a welcomes breathe of fresh air.

I guess this is all just a fancy way of me talking about style and taste without using those terms.

Then again. I agree with you, or at the very least I don't disagree. I just had something to add.

 

While there are virtually no rules which need to be applied across all pieces of writing, that doesn't mean that pieces of writing can't be objectively improved.
For example often a piece of writing can be improved by making things less ambiguous. Sometimes there might be reasons for the ambiguity, but normally in the workshop if I have to read a sentence three times before I can understand it, that wasn't what the author intended.

Then there's crutch words - words which don't add anything to the meaning of a sentence. There aren't any words I'd universally classify as a crutch- they'll be situations where "basically" does add some useful nuance or voice. But if even the author can't explain what it adds, then cutting it will make the sentence stronger.

Things like crutch words, excessive filters etc, are going to be more jarring to writers than the average YA reader, because many writers have trained themselves to look out for such things in their own writing.

If a paragraph has enough going for it in terms of subject matter, an average YA reader is going to classify it as engaging - a couple of pointless adverbs might make the paragraph read a little bit worse, but the effect is going to be so minor that it doesn't push it into being a bad paragraph.
Some writers might read the same paragraph and see those adverbs and be jarred from the story - what was the author thinking? This is so shoddy.
I'd say in this case it means that the paragraph is good because the intended audience finds it engaging, but that doesn't mean it can't be better.
It's worth striving to make your writing as good as possible. Yes there's subjective elements which mean some people find it good or bad regardless, but there'll also be a potential audience on the borderline, for whom tighter writing will make the difference.

 

I think the chief concern I have about over-concentration on writing "skill" or rule-following is that it makes it harder to concentrate on what actually matters to readers. This was a hard lesson for me to learn - I'd see my books, that I knew were written with a closer attention to the traditional idea of "good" writing, being out-sold by books that weren't as well-written, according to my understanding at the time. It was really frustrating - possibly the same frustration that's driving GingerCoffee with whatever her current YA reading is. How could people read my book, which was" well written", and another book, which was "poorly written", and prefer the poorly written one?

I had to really look at the books that were being preferred and try to figure out what they had that mine didn't. My readership had made their preferences known, so it didn't make sense to keep clinging to my ideas of what makes a good book. Good writing is writing that appeals to its audience and engages them, so... what made the other books good where mine weren't as good?

Now, writing is a hobby for me. Part of the hobby is playing the game, trying to sell lots of books and make lots of money. But the other part is enjoying what I write and being pleased with my results. So, for example, when I looked at successful romance novels and found that a lot of them had over-the-top alphahole heroes, I had to accept that this is something that appeals to a large audience in that genre. But I can't stand it, myself, so I don't include that characterization in my writing, even though I might sell more books if I did. But at least I know about the preference, and I respect my audience enough to not assume that they're stupid or don't know good writing just because they enjoy reading about a certain type of character I don't like.

I see so many writers who are satisfied with their current writing practice (the old "it works for me" line, without really looking at what "works" means); so many writers who are happy to blame bad luck for their poor sales or claim that it's impossible for a new writer to get an agent or a contract with a publisher, or any of the other writing excuses. I think it's really important for writers to look not only at their current work critically, and also look critically at their preconceived ideas about their writing, or about writing in general.

It sucks to spend a lot of time and effort on learning rules, and then see that the rules may not be as important as you thought. But it sucks even more to ignore reality and keep trying to succeed in a way that reality suggests is unlikely to be effective.

 

Random thought that may have been offered in some form: it would be silly to try to apply too many of the same principles of "good painting" to, say, Monet and Hopper and Jack Kirby and Renoir.

 

Well, I agree.

But I don't think there's one "right" answer to how and when to manipulate emotions. That's going to be subjective, right? What is effectively manipulative for a teenage boy may not be effective for an adult woman. What's effective for a small child certainly won't be the same as what's effective for an adult.

A given author may be very effective at evoking emotion in one audience, but not in another audience. This is one of the reasons why it's important to have diversity in authorship, right? Someone whose experiences and writing focuses on, say, living life as a young black man in the inner city will likely have a much greater understanding of how to reach other young black men. But that author may not be very effective at reaching society matrons. etc.