I’m writing this post as an amendment to the first. The comments I’ve gotten on the other suggest I didn’t communicate my point clearly. I apologize for that. Writing’s all about proper communication, and I seem to have failed in that regard.
My use of the word “fantasy” was a little confusing. I was not at all suggesting there be no cross-genre work. In fact, when I used the term “fantasy” I wasn’t referring to the genre at all.
I was trying to make a point about suspension of disbelief.
Facts help you ground your readers. They set the parameters for your story. In science fiction, or any genre in which the real world plays a large role, people will expect to find shared knowledge.
They’ll expect that the speed of light is the cosmic speed-limit, and that you can’t go backwards through time, and that if the sun died we’d all die too.
Does this mean that you have to give them what they expect? Absolutely not. But, trying to get your reader to believe something they know to be false is on your shoulders, not theirs.
What does that mean? It means you have to give them reasons to take your word for it. Any time you differ from what people know to be real you have to explain yourself (and no, that doesn’t mean you state, “This is different from what we knew in the 21st century because...”).
Fiction is all about suspension of disbelief. You can’t get away from it. You’re asking a stranger to accept what you say, to believe in your lies.
You have to make them feel secure, get their subconscious to nod and smile and say, “Yes, yes, I see, yes.”
But if they hit something in your story that makes their brain stumbled, makes them say, “Pft, no way,” it’s over. Sure, some people will keep reading. Some won’t. And for those who do, they’ll have a more critical eye turned on your work. They’ll be counting strikes against you. Maybe not consciously, but a reader can only be jarred out of a story so many times before they decide it’s not worth the effort.
What I’m trying to say is: Don’t give them a reason to put your story down.
I’ve had people tell me, “Well, if it’s a good story, factual problems won’t matter,” as if there is some difference between a good story and its content. No, a good story is good because it grabs you and doesn’t let you go. Everything works in harmony in a good story: the plot, the characters, the prose, the setting, and the events.
So, when there are clear scientific and factual errors--basic errors, ones that are obvious and easy to find--the audience notices. Some people are forgiving, some not so much. There’s a lot of fiction out there, so much that’s it’s impossible to consume it all in a life time. Time is precious, and most people dole theirs out judiciously. If there is something wrong with your story they don’t owe you a second more. If you fail to keep their attention they’ll move on.
Factual errors are like bad prose or boring characters, they give people reasons not to read what you’ve spent long hours putting together for them.
As I said before, everyone is bound to make mistakes. No one can be expected to know everything, and slip-ups will happen.
But there is a difference between a mistake and getting something wrong because you don’t care enough to get it right.
I’m advocating for research. Enough to let your audience know you care about them, that you don’t expect they’ll just gobble up whatever you say, that you love your work enough to do it right.
That you respect their intelligence.
That’s what I was trying to say with the last post. That the author is always responsible for explaining the universe he or she has created. If there are differences between current, accepted knowledge and your world, you are responsible for making the audience believe. If you differ on the basics of the real world, it better be purposeful, and you should explain it to your audience. Otherwise they might just think you have no idea what you’re talking about and move on.
It might sound harsh, but it’s true. Put on your reader hat and think about how selective you are. How much time do you give a story? How many times can your brain say, “Yeah, right,” before you stop reading?
Fact is, fiction is bull. It is. Writers are snake-oil salesmen, the lot of us. And if you tell someone that Advil cures tonsillitis they won’t buy your Grogork potion that cures cancer. Get it?
Ok, hope I made myself a little clearer. Thanks for sticking with me, ya’ll.
~Marina
Rejections with goal of 100: 29
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