I'm not necessarily going to be discussing a single book in this book review post, but I am going to be addressing a topic that I think is interesting based on a book I recently read and reviewed on GoodReads. Since I'm in Colorado now, I have access to a series of books that weren't at the Arlington/DC libraries. Now, over the past five years I had read this series two times, and I'm starting my third time through. It's a paranormal-ish romance series, and like I said, I'm reading it for the third time. The concept is one that I enjoy despite how horribly it portrays human nature (or perhaps because it helps portray the racism, bigotry, and idiocy of current society in a way that is "safe" and might potentially get through to those of us who somehow can't quite connect the dots between things our current political landscape is allowing and things that happen in genocides), where humans have been kept as scientific subjects by a corporation working on "super soldiers"/medical improvements and been genetically enhanced in some way but the public found out, the people are rescued, and now the government is trying to figure out how to cover their butts since they were a major funder of the research. So now the former test-subjects have been given some/full autonomy while remaining US citizens and have their own places to live, but of course hate groups happen and say that these people don't have a right to exist. You can imagine what happens next, especially since these are romance. ;)
Stories/series like this have always been compelling to me. I started with Lora Leigh's Breeds series and then catapulted off into similar but slightly different series'. And many of them were well-written. Lora Leigh's writing is great (though it has grown a lot since the first book of the Breeds), and Cynthia Eden is no slough either. However, this series that I'm re-reading now, is a little different. Laurann Dohner's New Species series is one I used as a template for the explanation above. I enjoy the concept. And like I've mentioned a few times, this isn't my first rodeo through her books. But her writing technique...leaves something to be desired. I think I noticed that in the first and second read-throughs, but it is more apparent now than I remember it being. Of course, writing and the response to writing is highly subjective (which is why many of the math people I know state they like math more), but there are still some objective ways to tell if a story is well written. For example, using passive voice isn't the greatest strategy for a novel. It sort of creates a disconnect between the character and what they are feeling/doing. Stating that "this occurrence made me feel terrified" is vastly different than stating "this occurrence terrified me." One is choppy and one is not. One "tells" the reader and one "shows" the reader. Do you remember which one your fifth grade composition teacher liked more? Because I do. Another example is dialogue and the use of contractions. Dialogue is super important for novels that have a lot of talking, and most romance novels have a lot of talking. But in modern times, contractions (i.e., isn't instead of is not, couldn't instead of could not, it's instead of it is, etc.,) are used frequently in speech. As such, dialogue in books that has sparse contractions doesn't read as smoothly. It doesn't mimic speech as we hear it in our every day lives and so it doesn't "sound" as good when we read it (even when we're not reading aloud). Contractions are so important that not including them can sometimes even change the intonation of characters for me, which can change the meaning of what they say. And if that changed meaning doesn't jive with what's happening in the story? Well, that means I have to stop, go back, re-read, and as a reader that's frustrating. But somehow, despite the examples above being prevalent in the New Species series, I'm reading it for the third time in 5 years! And you know what? Even though I'm really noticing these writing issues, I'm not going to stop. I want to keep reading. I'm almost compelled to keep reading. Now, my personal opinion is that Laurann Dohner has crafted a world and characters well and because those are more important to me in terms of whether I like a book, I'll keep reading because of them. Which is great. But here's my conundrum. I like to leave reviews and ratings that are helpful to other people. I usually rate/write reviews on Goodreads. But how do I quantify books that aren't technically well-written but I keep coming back to? Many people don't read the actual reviews, so even if I go through and explain that a higher rating is because I've re-read the book so many times people may not know that's why I'm giving it four out of five stars. And if they trust my judgement and go only off my rating but see all the issues with the writing and stop, does that mean I've "failed" them with my review? My personal opinion is that I'm going to give it a high rating because something about that book/series is good enough that I came back for more, but I'm not the only reviewer out there. What's your opinion on this? Would you give a high rating to a book you've re-read multiple times even if the writing technique is bad? Or do you base your ratings mostly on technique and don't care if you've read it multiple times if the writings bad? What do you wish other reviewers would do? Let me know in the comments! Happy Reading!
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AuthorThe author is a librarian who reads "too much" (is there such a thing?) and talks just as much. As an aspiring author she gets bogged down by grammar rules when she just wants to forget them to make a sentence flow, but never seems to be able to. She appreciates thoughtful comments and constructive criticism, but internet trolls beware, she's read enough fantasy novels to know how to defeat the monsters. Archives
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