My month is winding down so I won't take up so much time
after this, but I happened to get a phone call yesterday from
a surgeon who writes medical thrillers. I'm wondering if
anybody has read his books. Birken is his name, last novel
Plague. He called me asking tips for giving an 8 hour class
on fiction writing that he's been asked to do for other
surgeons at a conference, because he hasn't done that before,
but the interesting thing was that he couldn't use anything
on literary fiction because he says that his audience would
never read anything that isn't plot driven; they want page
turners. I countered with the idea that a character-driven
novel could also be a page turner and that's what I strive
for, but I could tell it wasn't even a point worth continuing
because he was so sure that it would not work. He was not the
least bit egotistic or condescending--saying how literary was
a higher level, etc--but evidently it's clear cut to him that
people don't want to waste time on character development.
Now, I'm just wondering if everybody knows this but me, and
how clearly it comes across that a book is driven by one
means or another. I'm too bullheaded to go for the money and
change my style, but do people consciously shop for
plot-driven novels? Birken gets printed in paperback at
100,000 copies, and I can only assume there are many others
like him. Why don't I ever see anybody reading this type of
book, except for the occasional Robin Cook maybe? Also, how
does Dennis Lehane sell so many books if character-driven is
such a turn off? These are the questions I'm going to ask
when I die and go to heaven, of course, but if anybody has
any idea now, it would be interesting. This line between
commercial and literary is becoming increasingly murky and
interesting. I think I've been separated from normal people
too long. Not that I want to be normal, but do the surgeons
really need all that extra money? Probably, to pay the
insurance. Vicki
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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