# Zack's initial letter

From: zack hall 
Date: Wed, 09 Sep 1998 10:19:51 -0400
Subject: comments

First off, I really disagree with a lot of your reviews.  Michael Crichton,
whose books are more like movie scripts than novels, rates higher than
Philip K. Dick?  What's up with that?  I'm just kind of curious, and I
don't mean this to be insulting, but do you just not like books that are
very complex, or books where you actually have to think about what the
author is trying to say?  I can't believe that you think William Gibson's
books aren't well written, although I do think his latest stuff (like
Idoru, if you've read that) isn't all that hot.  But to say that someone
who, routinely, comes up with great lines like, "It had all the sinister
fruitiness of Hitler youth propaganda" ("The Gernsback Continuum") can't
write is just wrong.  You really owe it to yourself to go back and check
his stuff out again.
Philip K. Dick's written better books than Man in the High Castle; check
out Radio Free Albemuth, which I think is the best.  When you read some of
his stuff, remember that he was basically eating dog food for a lot of his
life, and trying to write quickly just to survive.

# My response:

From d_ingram Wed Sep  9 15:50:40 1998
Subject: Re:  comments

Thanks for the note.  As I try to explain in my review
pages, I do not judge books based on literary merit.  I rate Crichton
higher than Dick because Crichton makes me want to turn the page more.
Yeah, it's pulp.  But pulp can be good.

Is Gibson well-written?  IT is debatable, but beside the point.
Tolstoy's "The Brothers Karamazov" is also well-written, but I
doubt I would enjoy it as much as a tear through Crichton's
quickie novel-du-jour.

And so we come to the ultimate limitation of a numeric grading system.
Clearly, Dick's work is better than Crichton's on some level.  And
I try to reflect my realization of that fact to a small extent in my
reviews (maybe not in the Dick review...I don't recall...but I make
a habit of this).  But my numbers are based on how much I liked to
read the book.  You should read the sourgrapes.html page for more
on this theme...yours obviously isn't the first such note I've received.

Thanks,
Doug

# Zack's response:

From: zack hall 
Date: Wed, 09 Sep 1998 21:50:39 -0400
Subject: me again

Hey, it's Zack again.  If I sounded snippy before, and I guess I did, I'm
sorry.  I don't mean to be a jerk, and liking different stuff than I do
certainly isn't a personal flaw.  Here's the thing:  I think you'd agree
with me when I say that the most important thing, the thing that makes or
breaks any work of fiction, is story.  Nobody wants to read something
that's boring.  The tricky thing is deciding what makes a story good; and
this might sound wierd, but I'm not convinced that good plot is enough.
The best definition of what a good piece of fiction does (I think)comes
from John Gardner (who wrote, among other things, Grendel)is that it should
create a continuous dream in the reader's mind--it sucks you in, totally
and completely, into its own universe.  You're willing to play by the
author's rules, which is where terms important to SF like "suspension of
disbelief" and "sense of wonder" come into play.

I'll confess that the only Crichton I've read is the dinosaur stuff and
part of Sphere, but his stuff doesn't do that for me.  It only diverts my
attention from the "real world" for awhile, because I might look at some of
the stuff that's going on and say, "that's a neat idea," but it doesn't
trap me.  Other things, besides good plot, that help create a fictional
dream in the reader's mind are 1. Character 2. Language/Style (I'll throw
ability to realize setting, etc. in here for simplicity) and 3. Themes.

Character is crucially important, because if you don't identify with and
care about the books characters, you won't like the book.  I didn't care
about the characters in Jurassic Park; I was kind of interested to see how
they would get out of various sticky situations, but I didn't really care
about THEM.  When somebody died, it didn't make me sad; if Chrichton really
was a good writer, it would have.  I did care about the characters in Man
in the High Castle; there's so much pathos in Philip K. Dick's works
because he really cares about his characters.  He's obsessed with them; he
works and reworks their problems over and over again, which is why
sometimes they're not drawn as strongly as they should be (Phil definitely
has his flaws), but I always cares what happens, and I always hope the good
guys win.  When Frank Fink's wife leaves him, my thought runs something
like, "what a . . ." You get the idea.  Style is also important, for
obvious reasons--it helps solidify the dream, making everything seem more
real.  It helps add shades and layers of meaning, and it's also allows the
writer to accurately communicate to the reader. If someone can't write
well, it doesn't matter what kind of nifty plot idea he/she comes up with;
I won't enjoy it, in part because I like description and accurate
metaphors, etc., and in part because I'll be saying to myself, "I can't
believe they wrote such a goofy sentence" and not paying attention to
what's going on.  Finally, themes are also important because they, in a
sense, make everything that's going on better and more worthwhile.  They
are a natural outgrowth of good fiction because fiction imitates reality
(in one way or another); real people come to conclusions about themselves
and the universe becuase of real experiences, either things that have
happened to them or things that they have witnessed, and characters should,
too.  Real people grapple with questions, and so should characters in
books; as a result of the action around them, questions arise and, if the
author's any good, some kind of answer is provided at least obliquely.

Obviously, the best novels have all of these things.  Apart from that, it's
really hard to establish a continuum.  Personally, I would rank plot as
such (especially in the sense of the cool idea plot) around the middle or
near the bottom, with Character and Themes at the top.  This, of course,
isn't to say that the other qualities can be totally absent, or bad; just
that they're less important and definitely not self-sufficient.  My thing
is, I think it's entirely possible to write a story about, say, a trip to
the zoo, in which nothing particularly wonderful or cool happens, and have
it be a good, enjoyable story (as long as, of course, there's some kind of
conflict.)

So that's my manifesto I guess; it may or may not makes sense, though I
hope it does.  I hope this doesn't fall outside the scope of a reviews
page; if it does, then you obviously don't have to do anything with it.
I'm glad that you do have this thing; as we learn constantly in college (in
case you can't tell from my address I go to Haverford (it's near
Philadelphia)).  I do agree with you on some points; Simmons' Hyperion
stuff is awesome.  His other stuff I don't like so much, especially his
short stories (although the proto-Hyperion story "The Death of the
Centaur," or something along those lines, from Prayers to Broken Stones is
really good).  I think that's becuase he's such a novelist, and he only
really writes well when he's writing novel-lenght stories.  Have you read
the last one, Rise of Endymion, yet?  I was kind of disapointed.  Even
though it's a huge book, Simmons throws out so many ideas and characters
that he just can't deal with them properly.  I would have like much more De
Soya stuff, but there wasn't time for it too happen.  He comes up with so
many interesting things that he doesn't really explain, and it's kind of
annoying.  Maybe he's setting himself up for another sequel; there are
definitely enough loose ends.

About Gibson again; of course it's debatable, because we're dealing with
judgements that aren't really hardwired to any kind of universal standard.
But the plot of, say, Neuromancer, is intriguing--it may be a little
complicated, but it's not all that hard to figure out what's going on--and
the characters are pretty well drawn, especially Case.  They're not the
best, but they're pretty good.  Gibson really does a good job of
constructing the dream I talked about earlier; Neuromancer feels like its
own world, it's really THERE.  Not liking Gibson is certainly valid, but I
don't know.  I don't think you can really call his (I hate to use this
word, but nothing else comes to mind) artistry into question.  Of course
that's only my opinion.

Another of my favorite SF writers whom you don't really seem to like is
Gene Wolfe.  Maybe this is along your own Philip K. Dick lines, but I
actually haven't read anything you reviewed.  If you want to read some
quality Gene Wolfe, read his short stories.  I know for sure that The
Island of Doctor Death and Other Stories and Other Stories is still in
print, and it's excellent; so is The Fifth Head of Cerberus, a collection
of three linked novellas, on both counts; Endangered Species is out of
print, but you can probably get it used--every used bookstore I've ever
been in has had his stuff.  Some of his stuff is crap, but a lot of it is
very good.  It can also be pretty demanding, but I think it's good for
stories to make their readers work a little.

I actually have to be somewhere pretty soon, so I think I'll end this thing
now.  Looking back on the main body of my letter, I'm not sure whether I
actually argued to your assertion, that you're looking for a page turner.
To me, reading a book should be a little more than just an entertainment
alternative, something to do instead of watching t.v.  If you disagree
that's fine, I'm certainly not the arbiter of proper fictional purpose
(gee, that sounded goofy), but if that's the case then I really think you
can't, in all fairness, rank one book lower than others becuase of some
"literary" defect, i.e. it's not well-written, while ranking other books
high for being entertaining pulp.  That strikes me as kind of a double
standard.

Finally, this's just an idea--maybe you should get rid of numerical
rankings.  I think some people, myself included, see books they like and
admire with low numbers next to them, and it feels like you're insulting
the book, even though all you're trying to do is assess its relative
merits.  Their first reaction is to be pissed off and yell at somebody, and
the internet makes that pretty easy.  I think if you just let the reviews
stand by themselves it would be better; then people could simply read them
and respond to them without having to worry about the justice of rankings,
which are always fairly arbitrary anyway.

Thanks for listening, write back or don't or whatever.  Sorry again if I
was snide, I'm sure you're a dedicated person, or I wouldn't bother writing
this.

Zack

# My closing response:

From d_ingram Thu Sep 10 05:14:16 1998
Subject: Re:  me again

Thanks for the note.  I'll include your letter among the featured ones
in my mail bag.  In defense of the numerical ratings, you're right that
I get the occasional snipe (which is why there's a "Sour Grapes" page
with advice for the scorned).  However, before I had them, I got far
more letters of the kind "What are your favorite books?  I can't tell
by just reading your reviews!"

So for those people who like to see rankings, I include the numbers.
Anyone who judges whether or not they should read a book (or, worse,
whether a book is worth reading) by simply looking at the number I
give it...well, I guess they deserve what they get.  You're right that
judging books based on a combination of "literary merit" and its
status as "mind candy" is rather hypocritical.  I freely admit that
up front so at least everyone knows my biases.

Throw into the mix the fact that my tastes slowly evolve over time
and that my mood (or external circumstances, like being on vacation
or being in a hospital waiting room) also affects my review...well,
let's just say that I don't pretend to be a final arbiter of any
kind.  Just some guy who's telling you what he thinks about some
books.  I hope that tone comes across in the review page.

Regards,
Doug