Re: RARA-AVIS: Realism and Reality
Mark Sullivan (ANONYMEINC@webtv.net)
Wed, 12 Aug 1998 02:48:12 -0400 (EDT)
Along with Bill Hagen, I agree with James Doherty's pact idea,
where a
writer must satisfy certain criteria in order to satisfy the
reader.
This is particularly true in genre fiction. No matter how much
I claim
to search for something new in a mystery, I would be
severely
disappointed if certain criteria were not met, particularly the
fairness
doctrine, where the author must be fair with clues. I seldom
solve the
mystery in any given book, usually don't even try, but I would
be very
mad if I felt I couldn't have if I had tried. On the other
hand, I
always find amusing, particularly in a first person novel, that
moment
when the narrator begins to withhold the results of the
investigation.
This entails such a shift from overwhelming the reader with
specifics to
hiding behind vague generalities that the moment it occurs can
usually
be narrowed down to one sentence, something like this, "I
checked out a
hunch and found out I was right."
Mark
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