The current state of fantasy literature

[CarlZog]

So the question was, "Is fantasy literature going down the toilet?"

I don't think so. Any creative media can seem to be going through a slump if you take a short enough view.

"Things were better in the old days," is the common lament, with "...before everything was commercialized" often tacked on.

The simple problem, I suspect, is that most bad stuff fades from our memory (and our bookshelves), while good stuff sticks around. In 10 years, the Fifth Sorceress will likely be forgotten like thousands of other bad books published in every genre every year. The Gor books several people mentioned only scratch the surface of bad fantasy published in the '60s and '70s. God knows I read my share of it growing up!

A friend of mine has an old summer house in New England that's been in the family for nearly a hundred years. Scattered on the bookshelves in one corner of the library are piles of lightweight summer "trash" reading from the first couple decades of the 1900s. These are titles that have never been reprinted or archived in any library. The authors are unknown. You'd have a very hard time finding other copies of this stuff if you wanted to, but you wouldn't want to. It's mostly bad writing; shallow stories designed to meet public appetites of the time. And it's been forgotten. I like thumbing through them when I visit, and occasionally reading them, because they remind me that the publishing business has always been driven by commercial expectations, which aren't necessarily the best predictors of lasting literature.

I'm certainly no expert on the history of fantasy literature, but I know Tolkien didn't invent "Once upon a time..." Stories of fantastic creatures, brave knights and cunning wizards are nothing new to this century or the last. And neither are bad writers or profit-seeking publishers.

I think there are some great fantasy books being written and published these days -- books we may still be reading and talking about 50 years from now. The rest of them will be forgotten and any trends they may represent will only be preserved by academics and collectors writing history books. Similarly, few of the "pulps" from the first half of this century are still widely circulated or read, but there are plenty of books still being written that analyze the pulp industry and the pop culture phenomenon they represented.

Carl

 

[mmadsen]

Perhaps I'm old before my time, but I find that it really doesn't matter what the "latest and greatest" new fantasy series is when I still haven't read a fraction of the wonderful, time-tested genre classics out there.

As far as the state of the fantasy-lit market goes, I'm just [peeved] that Howard, ERB, etc. go out of print -- at all, let alone regularly.

 

[takyris]

Actually, I thought that you were saying that publishers had arbitrarily decided to switch to multibook series for no particuar reason, when it's clearly not the case. Fantasy fans have voted with their dollars. If they wanted more standalone books, they'd buy them.

Yup. No argument there. My point was that the ratio of standalones to series, which used to be relatively balanced, is now skewed toward series -- to the point where, to paraphrase what you said earlier, authors are writing first novels that don't stand on their own at all. I like all of the first Star Wars movies, but I also like the fact that you can watch the first one on its own and not feel like there's a gigantic cliffhanger.

Or, on the opposite end of the spectrum, I dislike Terry Goodkind's writing, but at least he made some effort to provide a bit of closure at the end of his first book.

Well, maybe for fantasy fiction. Tons and tons of standalone SF novels come out every month. And as for it being some sort of fad that's run it's course...well, if it hasn't burned out over the course of 25 years, I don't think it's really a fad, do you?

Based on your earlier post, I was holding things to fantasy. That's where my points were aimed. Yeah, SF is relatively balanced right now -- some popular series, but not so many that it's any harder to get a standalone published than a new series.

As for fad-dom, I wasn't arguing that big fat fantasy has suddenly appeared on the scene -- just that it's now working to the exlusion of standalone fantasy novels, instead of as an equally enjoyable complementary form.

The Universe, above, says as much. And I'm the same way. I prefer a nice long series to sink my teeth into. And I'll keep buying Jordan's books, even though I'm not very happy with his work right now.

Interesting. I suppose this is an "agree to disagree" area. I like both, and would be sad to see standalones, loosely connected books set in the same world, or directly connected fantasy series monopolize the fantasy market.

A big problem you face, as a writer, is that it is much easier to produce a manuscript for submission than it was 25 years ago, when computers weren't in most homes, and word processors and typewriters were expensive. Which stinks, but there it is.

Entirely different thread.

But yeah. Very very much. I've got multiple pro short story sales, but I'm still nowhere near published enough to distinguish myself in the Great American Slush Pile. And while it's relatively easy to weed out the "I read Terry Goodkind/Robert Jordan and nothing else and now want to write my own novel" person who didn't even spellcheck his beautiful art, there are a lot of simply mediocre wannabes out there clogging up the submission process. (For all I know, I might very well be one of them. I mean, no wannabe thinks that he's one of the wannabes, and I don't think I'm one of the wannabes, which means, logically, that I could very well be one of them. And isn't THAT depressing?)

But yes. A different problem, and one that does stink. But from the publishing web pages, the author contract stories, and so forth, I do see a lot of "if you're writing fantasy, you should aim for a series" advice. This change-of-ratio isn't just something I'm making up -- they weren't always saying that. Series fantasy has gone from "sure, we're good with that" to "that's really pretty much all we're interested in (although, as noted, we aren't going to pass up greatness if we see it)" over the past decade or so.

 

[Joshua Randall]

This is a fascinating thread. I just have two things to say before revering to lurker mode.

(1) Some books that are considered great, in any genre, were written haphazardly or in fits and starts. My favorite example: Doestoyevsky's Crime and Punishment. If you ponder this too much, it will make your head explode.

(2) Marketers and marketing departments are not useless. Good ones can help guide a company into investing its resources wisely -- whether the company sells books or widgets or professional services.

 

[jester47]

I have come to loathe serial (as in series of books) fantasy. I have not read any Jordan, or Martin however I do have plans to try- that way I can dis them all the better. But since I have not read them, I cant really say anything at this juncture.

I also hate big long fantasy novels that are not self contained. I am of the firm belief that the better writer can WRITE LESS and get MORE STORY into the book than the others. One project that I fantasise about is ripping off Wheel of Time but doing it in a thousand pages. Who is going to get read more? Me or Jordan? Its S. Morgenstern Vs. William Goldman all over again. (both are the same guy, but if you understand what Goldman is saying in the Princess Bride you understand that really great stories can be contained in very long and boring books.)

I am a big fan however of linked short stories and shared worlds. Ala Conan, Fafhrd and The Grey Mouser, The structure Dennis McKiernan employs (I recently finished dragondoom (and well, that was when I realised that the only really good book of his was Eye of the Hunter all the other books seem to exist to answer questions about the background) Peter S. Beagle is my hero when it comes to the fight against the series mania. The Last Unicorn is self contained. Giant Bones is a series of short stories that take place in the world of The Inkeeper's Song. Still both of those are kept corralled. Which brings me to what I think is the greatest fantasy book of all time-

The Hobbit. Heres why-

The story is epic in scope. It CAN stand alone, one does not have to go and read the lord of the rings to completely enjoy it. It is amasingly influential, more so I would say than LotR. And it is quite readable. None of the criticisms that bog down the Lord of the Rings really aply to it, and it is open and enjoyable for all ages. and guess what? Its only 300 some odd pages long. Its a standard novel length. Sure we get more of tolkiens vision in LotR, but the Hobbit is the grand daddy of them all. The Last Unicorn makes for a close second IMO, but thats just my O.

I think that in general, big epics should be contained in about a thousand pages, adventure should fit into a third of that. If its longer than that, you need to find better ways of telling the story. Then support your world with short stories, poems, songs etc. You will be much more appreciated. Oh, and Tolkein published using his own name and did not have to borrow one from a Hemmingway novel (For Whom the Bell Tolls) like Mr. James Oliver Rigney, Jr.

The reason I think (I was told this) that the Jordanology is becoming more and more prevalent is that people use these books to fill time. While they are riding the bus, waiting in a waiting room, and in those small mooments where you really are not doing anything. Thus a bigger book and ongoing story the more economical the purchase. Basicly a soap opera in book form. The Three Musketeers were published with the same thing in mind. These were long serials published over days and years. Basicly with Rigney (Jordan) you are getting more at once.

Ok that should feed the thread for a while...

Aaron.

 

[jester47]

Perhaps I'm old before my time, but I find that it really doesn't matter what the "latest and greatest" new fantasy series is when I still haven't read a fraction of the wonderful, time-tested genre classics out there.

As far as the state of the fantasy-lit market goes, I'm just [peeved] that Howard, ERB, etc. go out of print -- at all, let alone regularly.

Me too to both counts. Conan should be back in for a while now with the new Hardbacks and DELREY paperbacks with BAEN doing the rest. But could someone please get a decent 1 volume edition reminiscent of the White Wolf editions of the Lankhmar stories? Thank you. Fantasy Masterworks, while providing the service does it in a bare bones no fun sort of way, and getting them can be difficult.

Aaron.

 

[jester47]

Actually now that I just thought about it- I don't think there are all that many single volume works out there that are just really Last Unicorn/Hobbit good. Everything else is a series or was a series of some sort at one time...

Also, to further my point, taking a look at scifi (which if you are not really careful is just cleverly disguised fantasy, don't get me started...) Dune was great. As it became more of a Series, it got worse. Enders game was great, but same thing. As it progressed into "sequals" it became less and less of a good thing. Neuromancer was the same way...

What does this tell us? That when you have a good novel that there is a market for followups, but that those followups are typically not as good as the first. However, it seems to be that the short story is a great way to tie up loose ends and also introduce the novel in the first place. Take Neuromancer- We have Burning Chrome that had two short stories (or was it 3) that had to deal with the novel. Take Eye of the Hunter- Before that we had Tales of Mithgar, which had two or three "preamble" stories. And then there is the Inkeepers Tale which has Giant Bones, a series of concurrent stories set in the same world. So it seems that (at least what I would like to see) is the advent of the "Advent Collection" "Novel" "Concurrence Collection" "Wrap Up Collection" format to writing fantasy stories rather than huge serials. This would not necessarily mean that you had to have one novel, but rather you could have several, but dont make them "rounds in a clip" so to speak. Use old characters in new situations, or use completely different characters. I think this would be far more apprciated and still would generate the volume that the publishers are looking for.

I am really finished this time.

Aaron

 

[buzz]

Which brings me to what I think is the greatest fantasy book of all time-

The Hobbit.

No argument here.

I think that in general, big epics should be contained in about a thousand pages, adventure should fit into a third of that.

IMHO, a story should take as long as it needs to take... which seems to be the real problem here, i.e., the need to stretch any given story idea into a multi-volume epic. It's not that there aren't stories that work well as multi-volume epics, it's just that there aren't nearly as many as there are ones that don't.

As for where to place the blame...

I think that media industries generally tend to be reactionary, i.e., they don't drive the market so much as react to it. If the fantasty lit market is being flooded with multi-volume epics, it may very well be, as others have said, becasue that's what people want to buy, and who are publishers to challenge this? Eventually, people will get sick of them (as the mediocrity reaches critical mass), and the pendulum will swing the other way.

I once heard an anecdote that David Eddings, seeing that his first novel wasn't selling very well, said to himself, "I bet if I write one of those multi-volume fantasy epics, I'd sell some books." Voila! The Belgariad was born, Eddings got rich, and your truly was forced to read his work by my at-the-time girlfriend. Now, *there's* a story that could have been told in a single short novel... and said manuscript then thrown in an incinerator.*

*A wholly subjective opinion, as I now realize.

 

[janos]

I once heard an anecdote that David Eddings, seeing that his first novel wasn't selling very well, said to himself, "I bet if I write one of those multi-volume fantasy epics, I'd sell some books." Voila! The Belgariad was born, Eddings got rich, and your truly was forced to read his work by my at-the-time girlfriend. Now, *there's* a story that could have been told in a single short novel... and said manuscript then thrown in an incinerator.*

*A wholly subjective opinion, as I now realize.

Although interestingly enough all the 5 Belgariad together is still somewhat less then a single Jordan book, one and a half at the very outside. I just found that I breezed through them.

Hmmm. I was going to post a response to "there haven't been any really great standalone fantasy novels recently" but I've been racking my brain and desperately searching my bookshelves...but all I see is series. Almost all the fantasy books I have read in the last two or three years have been part of series. I'm desperately trying to remember a single standalone that I've read and enjoyed since the Hobbit and Last Unicorn (never get tired of running into other people that like that one). Incidentally one of my favourite authors (Mercedes Lackey) has refused to write any more books in her popular series, citing burnout I believe - not interested in writing any more in that series despite the market pressures.

Ah. Gemmel. I've got to agree with earlier posters - I realy enjoy his books. Plus he writes standalone books - even going so far as to kill off some of his heros after just one book if that suits the story.Yep I think those are the only single books I've read and enjoyed for a bit.

"People are using books to fill in time...such as in ques and on busses" (Sorry - not quite together with this quoting thing yet so I'll just paraphrase)

It's true,though I think a lot of people always did. I know it's when I do most of my reading as I don't really have as much time to devote to just sitting down with a book as I would like.

However I don't think to myself 'well I need something to fill my time, this author is writting a lot of words in big ole books so that will give me the best page per £1 ratio so I'll read him'. I want to fill my time with reading good books that I enjoy. In fact I'd ideally like to fill my time with small standalone books that I can actually carry around in a pocket, but that's by the by.

Ummm I'm going to stop before I ramble right on over the cliff edge. If I look at this in the cold light of day and see nothing but pointless meandering, then you have my appologies.

 

[MerricB]

I greatly enjoyed "The Golden Key", by Roberson, Elliott and Rawn, but that's a few years ago now.

Guy Gavriel Kay occasionally writes stand-alone novels as well, though his last was a 2-book series.

Cheers!