Am I the only person in this forum....

@Ice Queen

Amen.

 

I'm not writing fantasy. I have never even read a fantasy-novel My current novel is a romantic one, in modern time. I'm not sure if to call it romance or...drama, with a romantic touch.

 

Personally I love fantasy. I read it in order to get away from my daily life here on earth. I would prefer to be somewhere new and exciting. I am currently writing a real-world story but all the others I have tried have been fantasy and haven't worked out very well. Our world is a lovely place! But in my opinion, only in some places. I prefer to be in places with few or no people at all. For instance: graveyards. That is my form of get away or fantasy. The real world is beautiful but life can be terrible and normally, real-world stories tend to be the same. The character's life starts out bad or good then gets worse then by the end its better. unless it's a series and then their life is a roller coaster.

 

I love writing Fantasy because I can pretty much do anything I want (while making it somewhat believable) and It's just fun to write I love using my imagination. I was writing a fantasy novel, but I've put it on hold now and switched over to a coming of age/comedy/romance kind of book. So no, you're not the only one that's not writing fantasy.

 

Nope.avi

Just don't pull a Virgina Woolf while you're on this trend, Mrs. Dalloway was a pain to read.

Writing is a form of expression. It's bigotry if you say any other way of expression behind non-fiction is complete folly- even if it is. Yes, it's in a fake world with fake people and fake scenarios. Everything is fictitious - true, that's why we call it fiction. Once you get caught up in these details, you're completely missing the point of the story.

In short: Deal with it.

 

I love reading fiction set in the real world (I feel like I've read more "literary" fiction than fantasy overall), and I actually don't have too much patience reading fantasy. It's easy for me to get fed up with it and put it down. But I do *write* 99 Fantasy to a tiny proportion of stuff set in the real world. Because for me, reading real world stuff is escapism and the fantasy is just setting down what seems normal to me.

 

I don't write fantasy! I specialise in action and thriller novels, set most definitely in the real world.
I think one of the reasons fantasy is so popular with authors is that it has very few restrictions and you can use just your imagination to explain things, rather than having to research.

 

I write anything, and I mean that more or less literally. Right now I'm working on a fantasy story, a steampunk story, a sci-fi story, a horror story and a sci-fi crime noir comedy. (think Blade Runner meets Monthy Python meets Casablanca.) Some of these are in early development, of course.

 

I don't think so. Any of the explanations for fantasy that rely on the idea that the authors of such are somehow lazy (generally made by an author who doesn't write fantasy, the implication being they are more diligent) is ultimately self-serving and, in my view, baseless.

 

And I'd say CH878 has a point and that you are being rather presumptuous.
He is not calling fantasy writers lazy; he is stating that there are less limitations on the creative liberty of fantasy writers - it has a non-extant threshold for entry.

I'm a fantasy writer. I would agree with him.

 

IMO fantasy and sci-fi are ripe for analogies. Are metaphors cheating? I mean, if I say my love is a hot fire, isn't that cheating because love can't burn a piece of paper? I suppose it's not quite as fake as a giant, but frankly--love isn't fire and it isn't hot either. So, it's basically all make believe.

Fantasy usually feeds off a history of imagined beings--there was a reason why these beings infected the imaginations of the cultures who invented them. They reflect some aspect of that culture's reality, which is transfigured into their mythology or folk lore so that it can be explored or communicated with. I find that interesting. I also find it interesting how the fantastical creations of previous cultures can still mean something to modern readers.

Sci fi seems, IMO, like a creation of new folk lore. The monsters of sci fi don't have the history and legends to enrich them, but they might be better able to reflect the contemporary reality.

I can see how it might seem a little like cheating reality. Some times it seems like magic isn't real if it's being thrown around like bullets in Harry Potter, or this world is devoid of mysterious beings and monsters, just because they aren't as obvious as the ones in sci fi novels.

 

No, he didn't say that. He said one of the "reasons" people choose fantasy is that they can just imagine "rather than having to research." You see the causal connection in the statement he made? The fact that you don't have to research is why you write fantasy? I disagree. And I disagree that you don't have to research, for that matter.

 

I think the draw of fantasy is the ability to create. Take the average man, strip him of all his everyday hang ups, pull out his sterling qualities and make him a hero. Not that average Joe can't be a hero in normal, everyday life, but fantasy has that strange quality of being able to take the spirit of a thing and stick it out the outside for all to see.

The life of the imagination is the essence of fantasy. Taking a fight between brothers about which side of the room belongs to whom and turning it into a border dispute between warlords. I think the movie about author J.M Barrie, Finding Neverland, illustrates the idea beautifully.
Describing my aunt as a pixie of a lady may be much truer to her real nature than calling her simply the short blonde lady with a gamine smile. There is more magic in a woodland meadow than we allow ourselves to see. More heroism in a single act of selflessness than the constraints of this world allow and, consequently, more evil in an act of greed than can be seen on the outside.
For me, that is the heart of fantasy and what makes it so appealing.

Do some writers do a better job than others...yep. Every barrel has a bottom and there will always be somebody willing to scrape it. Same with realistic fiction and the authors of non-fiction books who say, "Isn't there enough real-life drama, aren't there enough real-life stories to tell? Why do you feel that you've got to make something up?"

 

Writing Fantasy and Sci fi doesn't take any less research than other fiction. I've read some fantasy and sci fi that probably took toooooons of research. Right now I'm reading a fantasy novel called Of Blood and Honey, set in Ireland during the 1970s during the Irish/English conflict. It definitely took research.

 

This is exactly right.

 

Yes I do.

Fantasy Writers do not HAVE to do the research - that does not mean such writers never do.

 

Nicely written! I feel the same way.

 

Well, no writer HAS to do the research. They only do it if they want the reader to believe them.
If I'm having a battle I might want to read up on strategy, or sailing a ship, or using a sword, or how far a man can walk in a day.

 

Yes. A fantasy writer may well have to research more than a writer who writes a story taking place in the present day. It all depends on the story and what the story requires.

 

Which could be nothing at all.
See Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Screw being realistic, plausible, or even comprehensible - this is fantasy, just in case you forgot.

 

It could also be nothing at all for non-fantasy. The point is a poor one. It is entirely dependent on the story itself, not what genre it is in.

 

So you agree fantasy and all other stores stories can be written without requiring any research on the author's part. Therefore you agree with me. Thank you.

 

^ I just don't understand what that whole little thing was about.

 

My perspective on the genre vs. literary fiction wars is that neither side should win. Or rather, literary fiction should embrace the best aspects of genre fiction if those aspects prove valuable. The abolition of genre walls would be good (though, there would always be low quality pulp novels that should be treated as such - and no, actually, genre fiction does produce more bad novel because it's easier to get a novel published as a pulp writer than as a literary writer).

Some of the best literary novels of this past century have had elements of the fantastic - take Faulkner's As I Lay Dying, for instance. Now, in regards to LOTR knockoffs and the like, I agree, I wouldn't really spend much time on them.

 

Where is that /facepalm icon?

Last attempt: a point was made that one reason fantasy writers choose that genre is that they don't have to research. This is bollocks on two counts, the first being that fantasy writers may well have to research and the second being that researching or not researching is entirely dependent on the story itself.