Today would be a good day to continue my long-defunct series on why I give certain grades to the novels I read. I believe I'm up to 'B' now. Since I just gave a wonderful novel a grade of 'B' rather than what it would have scored had it ended better, maybe it's a good day to reflect on 'B' novels in general.
It's funny, because in movies a B-movie would be regarded as at once a failure and a success. B-movies fall into that one and only awesome category of "so bad it's good." It isn't quite so in my literary estimation. 'B' books are ones that are brilliantly written in some way or another but fall just shy of perfection.
'B' is for 'but.' In other words, "this book is amazing, but...." For instance, Paul Bowles's novel The Sheltering Sky is a beautiful depiction of the philosophy of life and fate, but I've often felt there was a missed opportunity with the character of Tunner. I feel like he just disappears from the novel, and while I know that was Bowles's intention, I was left unsatisfied. Remember, these grades are highly personal, so though I can step back and examine Bowles's motivations for the choices he made in the story, I still have a nagging feeling there could have been a different choice that would have been more satisfying.
That doesn't even mean I wouldn't give an 'A' grade to a book where something is left wholly unexplained. I think The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides is extremely brilliant, and it gets a hearty 'A' even though there is a feeling that the reader (and the collective narrator) will never truly understand what led these girls to their decisions. It's underlying, and the reader can infer, but I didn't finish the book feeling in any way dissatisfied with the events within.
'B' is for 'box.' Because the books that earn a 'B' grade go in a box. They don't go on my bookshelf because that's reserved for 'A' books, books on writing, journals, writing files, and miscellaneous items. The 'B' books go in a box because for some reason I can't let them go but I may not know why. Maybe, like Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar, I will slowly realize it meant more to me than I originally thought.
'B' is, then, for 'back again.' These are the books that seem to fester somewhere in the back of my mind, and it may be because they have flaws that I wish to examine. Very few books are presented perfectly, and any author worth her salt would say there is always room for revision, even eighty-five years down the line (though not revision from some prescriptive bullshit editors who co-wrote a certain 'on writing' book). These also may be the books that truly inspire, because where there are flaws there are opportunities for new writers to examine the other possiblities, what could have happened had the story taken the other fork in the road. Tunner becomes a new character, with a new name, but his story is carried forward. Tunner is 'back again.'
In the book I just finished, 1Q84, one of the main characters (Tengo) is a writer. He ghost-writes a novel with a seventeen-year-old girl and then decides to continue the story in his own new novel, fleshing out the world the seventeen-year-old presented and putting new characters into it. Tengo must have felt the original novel fell short of something, or at least that there was opportunity for exploration. Is there a good 'B'-word for 'exploration'?
Yes. 'B' is for 'beyond.' Beyond these characters and this particular story there is room to build. 'B' is also for 'building.' The story, like the mansion from Rose Red, isn't finished and may keep 'building' itself if only in the imaginations of those who have entered.
Showing posts with label Aesthetics for Grades. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Aesthetics for Grades. Show all posts
Thursday, May 17, 2012
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
C Grades
The widest category of all. I would conjecture seventy-or-so percent of all books fall into a 'C' category. And you know, it's not even really about mediocrity. I mean, it is, on one level, but it's also about 'c'ompare and 'c'ontrast.
'C'omparing one book to another is something one of my former professors hated. I guess he's right if you take the point of view of yet another professor (though I dropped the second's class after one appalling day) that no two authors can tell the same story unless they plagiarize. During college, I read for professor #1's class One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez and The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende. It is very, very difficult not to 'c'ompare these two novels. They both deal with generations of a particular family in South America, and both are magical realism. The bad thing is, Garcia Marquez's book is a pioneer of the genre. Allende's book, while good at times itself, doesn't revolutionize the genre and, furthermore, didn't really wow me otherwise, either. Allende of course would cite Garcia Marquez as one of her influences, and sometimes it's hard to shake the ghost of that influence. I give Allende credit for telling the story only she could tell - but in the wake of Solitude it's just not that special.
'C'ontrasting, to me, is the heart of literary criticism. How does one book contrast to another? How, to follow the idea of professor #2, did each author bring his own aesthetic to his particular telling of the old story? According to Stephen King, there are something like nineteen archetypes for stories, and I believe there are others who would argue that down to about six. Maybe those archetypes correspond to the six major emotions: disgust (or hate), happiness, sadness, fear, anger, and surprise (boy, four of those are terrible emotions and surprise is a coin toss - so we have a one-in-six chance of experiencing happiness in this world?). Anyway, how can a new novel make a reader respond with one of these emotions in a new way? This is how new novels 'c'ontrast to other novels.
And the unfortunate thing about Allende, for me, is that she didn't make me respond to these emotions in a new way. You know, thinking it through, I think the most important emotion may be surprise. I want to be surprised at how a book makes me feel. I think when I give a book a grade of 'C', it's because it failed to surprise me in any way, good or bad. Failing books surprise me in a bad way, by either confusing or insulting me. Passing books surprise me in a good way, by focusing on the subject in a way I wouldn't have previously thought to do so. 'C' or 'low-pass' books just make me go, "Oh, yeah, I guess."
One book that surprised me in a good way is Lauren Slater's Lying. It's a memoir. But guess what she does? She lies. The important part, though, is that she admits that for a long, long time, she believed everything she recounts to have been the truth and was shocked to learn it was all false. Because of my own obsession with false memories, I found this book to be a refreshing take on how we perceive the world, what 'the truth' means, and what makes us who we are. Abe Akira's short story Peaches does something similar, although many fiction anthologies include his story because the narrator isn't sure how to sort the truth from the fiction.
When I was in grad school, I had to take a memoir class and it ended up being incredibly enlightening. On one of the first days, our professor stood at the chalkboard and had us come up with categories memoirs often go in, i.e. stories of illness, stories of childhood trauma, stories of divorce, etc. What we discovered was there are very few original stories, even in real life. And even though each person's story, as tired as the subject matter is, should be riveting because it's so personal, it just plain isn't always that interesting.
I have a hard time giving 'C' grades to any story about the Holocaust. I know I should, but it just seems like such a monumental amount of anger, fear, and sadness it's hard to not be surprised at every turn. I'm also afraid of reinforcing what my students said about the events of the Holocaust not being all that bad. But, isn't every story of anger, fear, and sadness monumental? I don't know, but I'm able give 'C' grades out like 'c'andy as long as it's not about the Holocaust.
'C' is for 'C'ommonplace. How fast did I read it? How much did I remember? Why wasn't I more engaged? Who would I recommend this book to? If the answers are fast, because nothing was new, no one and everyone, then I know it's a 'C' book. It's a shrug-of-the-shoulders. It's a see-for-yourself. It's an I-could-do-better. I guess they're as good as any other way to pass the time.
'C'omparing one book to another is something one of my former professors hated. I guess he's right if you take the point of view of yet another professor (though I dropped the second's class after one appalling day) that no two authors can tell the same story unless they plagiarize. During college, I read for professor #1's class One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez and The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende. It is very, very difficult not to 'c'ompare these two novels. They both deal with generations of a particular family in South America, and both are magical realism. The bad thing is, Garcia Marquez's book is a pioneer of the genre. Allende's book, while good at times itself, doesn't revolutionize the genre and, furthermore, didn't really wow me otherwise, either. Allende of course would cite Garcia Marquez as one of her influences, and sometimes it's hard to shake the ghost of that influence. I give Allende credit for telling the story only she could tell - but in the wake of Solitude it's just not that special.
'C'ontrasting, to me, is the heart of literary criticism. How does one book contrast to another? How, to follow the idea of professor #2, did each author bring his own aesthetic to his particular telling of the old story? According to Stephen King, there are something like nineteen archetypes for stories, and I believe there are others who would argue that down to about six. Maybe those archetypes correspond to the six major emotions: disgust (or hate), happiness, sadness, fear, anger, and surprise (boy, four of those are terrible emotions and surprise is a coin toss - so we have a one-in-six chance of experiencing happiness in this world?). Anyway, how can a new novel make a reader respond with one of these emotions in a new way? This is how new novels 'c'ontrast to other novels.
And the unfortunate thing about Allende, for me, is that she didn't make me respond to these emotions in a new way. You know, thinking it through, I think the most important emotion may be surprise. I want to be surprised at how a book makes me feel. I think when I give a book a grade of 'C', it's because it failed to surprise me in any way, good or bad. Failing books surprise me in a bad way, by either confusing or insulting me. Passing books surprise me in a good way, by focusing on the subject in a way I wouldn't have previously thought to do so. 'C' or 'low-pass' books just make me go, "Oh, yeah, I guess."
One book that surprised me in a good way is Lauren Slater's Lying. It's a memoir. But guess what she does? She lies. The important part, though, is that she admits that for a long, long time, she believed everything she recounts to have been the truth and was shocked to learn it was all false. Because of my own obsession with false memories, I found this book to be a refreshing take on how we perceive the world, what 'the truth' means, and what makes us who we are. Abe Akira's short story Peaches does something similar, although many fiction anthologies include his story because the narrator isn't sure how to sort the truth from the fiction.
When I was in grad school, I had to take a memoir class and it ended up being incredibly enlightening. On one of the first days, our professor stood at the chalkboard and had us come up with categories memoirs often go in, i.e. stories of illness, stories of childhood trauma, stories of divorce, etc. What we discovered was there are very few original stories, even in real life. And even though each person's story, as tired as the subject matter is, should be riveting because it's so personal, it just plain isn't always that interesting.
I have a hard time giving 'C' grades to any story about the Holocaust. I know I should, but it just seems like such a monumental amount of anger, fear, and sadness it's hard to not be surprised at every turn. I'm also afraid of reinforcing what my students said about the events of the Holocaust not being all that bad. But, isn't every story of anger, fear, and sadness monumental? I don't know, but I'm able give 'C' grades out like 'c'andy as long as it's not about the Holocaust.
'C' is for 'C'ommonplace. How fast did I read it? How much did I remember? Why wasn't I more engaged? Who would I recommend this book to? If the answers are fast, because nothing was new, no one and everyone, then I know it's a 'C' book. It's a shrug-of-the-shoulders. It's a see-for-yourself. It's an I-could-do-better. I guess they're as good as any other way to pass the time.
Thursday, November 25, 2010
D Grades
Continuing in the analysis of why I give certain grades to books I read. This installment will concentrate on 'D' grades.
'D' is for 'D'amn I wasted my time. For the most part. You know, I think it's very hard for any story or novel to earn a 'D' or 'F' from me. Both grades basically mean the author failed at the very basics of storytelling. I think, as giving 'A' grades is, that failing grades are a good deal visceral. No, I take that back. 'F' grades are not visceral because I can usually pinpoint a reason why they fail outright. 'D' grades are different.
Well, I guess 'D' is for 'D'ifferent, then. A story I would give a 'D' grade to is John Barth's On with the Story. One reason is because I pretty much universally hate John Barth's writing. But there is a reason. It's a deeply personal reason, though, which is why it wouldn't get the grade of 'F.' Remember, I try to separate my emotions from my reasoning. The reason for Barth's failing is that he uses meta-fiction, but uses it in such a patronizing and atagonizing way that I feel insulted everytime his authorial voice interjects.
You see, Barth likes to tell readers how beneath his ability of thinking the readers must be. I mean that, literally. He will intereject to say things like, "I know you probably aren't following the story so I'll explain things again...." Except the characters are just talking on an airplane so what's so fucking complicated? If you wanted to make a statement about the world in general and were afraid your readers wouldn't get it through metaphor, why didn't you write an essay? Don't fucking give me an essay in the middle of the story.
I hate John Barth.
But the narration and story itself aren't unreadable. It's just so frustratingly condescending that I can barely force myself through it.
The opposite can be true, too, though. A novel could (and none come to mind) be so beautifully written but so confusingly subtle or disorganized that it becomes unreadable between the beautiful parts. This is a visceral reaction because I want to like it but just plain can't. Maybe The Sound and the Fury. I know, that's like blasphemy to say I hate that book, but nonetheless, I do. The idea is brilliant but I just...don't...have the patience for it. However, I love As I Lay Dying, which is equally as strange and disjointed but Addie's chapter in the middle just plain brings everything together in a way I don't remember Sound ever being able to do.
So 'F' grades are a colder "This just didn't work" than 'D' grades. 'D' grades are for that novel, the title of I can't remember, where these alien vampire things lived in a cave in, like, France or Germany or somewhere and all I really remember is the final shotgun scene because the writing was just so awful. It was like a fourth grader wrote it.
Let me explain something where I will sound condescending but tough luck. I can spot an amateur (read, a skilled writer) from a mile and many editors away. I make a distinction between skilled and talented and even gifted writers. I won't go into complete detail in this post but will someday. But just know that I really believe in a difference between writers who are good at employing a technique and writers who don't need techniques because they have style. In the novel above, the author kept trying to employ techniques like exposition in dialogue and suspenseful narration and descriptive setting. And what it came out sounding like was that kind of "Pow! Zing! Bam!" kind of writing and it wasn't done masterfully, like he was imitating a comic book. It was done because he thought those techniques were cool and how real writers write and he'd be a real writer the more he used them.
Well, no, not if it's obvious. I was, cruelly, laughing out loud and some of the awful writing. My visceral reaction was pity. In grad school, there weren't enough poetry, fiction, or non-fiction workshops for any student to concentrate in one area so we all crossed paths into different genres. I remember being so angry at some of my fellow students who were poets forced into fiction workshop. I wasn't angry they were in my genre but more that they were trying to write how they thought fiction sounded instead of just writing poetry in prose form. I was angry at myself for this very same thing when I was in non-fiction classes because I convinced myself non-fiction had to sound different than fiction. What came out in both instances was forced and unnatural-sounding writing because it wasn't the voice of the author on the page. Obviously. It was, instead, bad imitation.
I think that may be what earns most 'D' books/stories their grades. For the most part something about them is bad imitation. Barth's stories so badly want to imitate an essay but do it so poorly he comes off condescending. The vampire novel wanted to sound like a "serious" author but came off sounding like a child. I wanted to sound like a "true" story but came off sounding like I was lying to myself. And I was. And the vampire novelist was, and John Barth was. Lying to themselves, that is.
I guess, then, 'D' is for 'D'eception.
'D' is for 'D'amn I wasted my time. For the most part. You know, I think it's very hard for any story or novel to earn a 'D' or 'F' from me. Both grades basically mean the author failed at the very basics of storytelling. I think, as giving 'A' grades is, that failing grades are a good deal visceral. No, I take that back. 'F' grades are not visceral because I can usually pinpoint a reason why they fail outright. 'D' grades are different.
Well, I guess 'D' is for 'D'ifferent, then. A story I would give a 'D' grade to is John Barth's On with the Story. One reason is because I pretty much universally hate John Barth's writing. But there is a reason. It's a deeply personal reason, though, which is why it wouldn't get the grade of 'F.' Remember, I try to separate my emotions from my reasoning. The reason for Barth's failing is that he uses meta-fiction, but uses it in such a patronizing and atagonizing way that I feel insulted everytime his authorial voice interjects.
You see, Barth likes to tell readers how beneath his ability of thinking the readers must be. I mean that, literally. He will intereject to say things like, "I know you probably aren't following the story so I'll explain things again...." Except the characters are just talking on an airplane so what's so fucking complicated? If you wanted to make a statement about the world in general and were afraid your readers wouldn't get it through metaphor, why didn't you write an essay? Don't fucking give me an essay in the middle of the story.
I hate John Barth.
But the narration and story itself aren't unreadable. It's just so frustratingly condescending that I can barely force myself through it.
The opposite can be true, too, though. A novel could (and none come to mind) be so beautifully written but so confusingly subtle or disorganized that it becomes unreadable between the beautiful parts. This is a visceral reaction because I want to like it but just plain can't. Maybe The Sound and the Fury. I know, that's like blasphemy to say I hate that book, but nonetheless, I do. The idea is brilliant but I just...don't...have the patience for it. However, I love As I Lay Dying, which is equally as strange and disjointed but Addie's chapter in the middle just plain brings everything together in a way I don't remember Sound ever being able to do.
So 'F' grades are a colder "This just didn't work" than 'D' grades. 'D' grades are for that novel, the title of I can't remember, where these alien vampire things lived in a cave in, like, France or Germany or somewhere and all I really remember is the final shotgun scene because the writing was just so awful. It was like a fourth grader wrote it.
Let me explain something where I will sound condescending but tough luck. I can spot an amateur (read, a skilled writer) from a mile and many editors away. I make a distinction between skilled and talented and even gifted writers. I won't go into complete detail in this post but will someday. But just know that I really believe in a difference between writers who are good at employing a technique and writers who don't need techniques because they have style. In the novel above, the author kept trying to employ techniques like exposition in dialogue and suspenseful narration and descriptive setting. And what it came out sounding like was that kind of "Pow! Zing! Bam!" kind of writing and it wasn't done masterfully, like he was imitating a comic book. It was done because he thought those techniques were cool and how real writers write and he'd be a real writer the more he used them.
Well, no, not if it's obvious. I was, cruelly, laughing out loud and some of the awful writing. My visceral reaction was pity. In grad school, there weren't enough poetry, fiction, or non-fiction workshops for any student to concentrate in one area so we all crossed paths into different genres. I remember being so angry at some of my fellow students who were poets forced into fiction workshop. I wasn't angry they were in my genre but more that they were trying to write how they thought fiction sounded instead of just writing poetry in prose form. I was angry at myself for this very same thing when I was in non-fiction classes because I convinced myself non-fiction had to sound different than fiction. What came out in both instances was forced and unnatural-sounding writing because it wasn't the voice of the author on the page. Obviously. It was, instead, bad imitation.
I think that may be what earns most 'D' books/stories their grades. For the most part something about them is bad imitation. Barth's stories so badly want to imitate an essay but do it so poorly he comes off condescending. The vampire novel wanted to sound like a "serious" author but came off sounding like a child. I wanted to sound like a "true" story but came off sounding like I was lying to myself. And I was. And the vampire novelist was, and John Barth was. Lying to themselves, that is.
I guess, then, 'D' is for 'D'eception.
Friday, November 5, 2010
Grades - Beginning with 'F'
This is an explanation of why I give certian grades to the books I read. I give them grades on the classic academic scale, A - F. For the most part, the grades are purely visceral, as they should be for anyone building a bookshelf. We can't help what we like, what we respond to. But I do think a good number of us have some idea of why we like certain books and can explain why we would recommend them to others.
There are books I would recommend to everyone because I love them, unconditionally. There are books I would recommend to serious readers, because they seem to be representative of a certain genre, time period, or philosophy. There are books I would recommend only if it sounds like another person might enjoy it more than I did. Then there are books I wouldn't recommend at all. Those are split into the two failing categories (though in my day, a 'D' grade was passing at BGSU - I know this personally).
In the words of Heidi Klum, "Let's...start the show."
'F' Grades -
'F' is for 'Fucking Unreadable." There have been many books in my life I've abandoned because they were boring. In the past few years I have begun to force myself to try my damnedest to get through those books in which I can at least see value for other readers. Usually, if I can see that value, I propel myself through them as though I'm swimming against a raging river and feel an incredible sense of accomplishment when I make it to shore. What I end up giving those books is normally a 'C' because I can see the value of these books for others to read. It won't always be an uphill battle for every reader to get through Fahrenheit 451. Christ, was it ever for me.
'F' is for Film Noir by Peter Straub. About three years ago, I took a few months to read The Story and Its Writer: Fifth Edition. It contains about 120 short stories if I'm remembering correctly, and Straub's story is one of them. It's structure is based on the idea of an old film reel that has worn through in places. Sounds intriguing, right? You know, it could have been a really excellent idea. And Straub co-wrote one of my other favorie King novels, The Talisman. Damn I love that book...even before The Dark Tower that's the book that inspired my art. Had Film Noir been a little easier to follow I think it would have been brilliant. It could have been done - many authors write linear stories with giant gaps in time/narrative. Sometimes you don't need to know what went on in between, you know? But Film Noir is just a bunch of scenes that are loosely strung together and too confusing to follow. I hated it. I eventually stopped reading.
Novels or stories that outright fail in my opinion are those I think very, very few readers could enjoy. I count among my strengths the ability to follow a story and, more importantly, the ability to make leaps of logic. This is a talent, let me tell you. I don't have many talents but that's one of 'em (along with reading upside down, writing upside down, writing backward, being able to write legibly with my left hand, and writing in general). Anyway, if I can't even follow your story and I come to the point where I am no longer willing to try...you fail. Outright.
I would, however, give Brave New World a 'D'. Maybe even a 'C'. Here's the reasoning: I couldn't get through it but it was obviously because of my extreme bias against dystopian fiction. I despise dystopian fiction. The book itself is readable. I can see how it made it into print and even why others enjoy it. But it was threatening to suck my life away by being the kind of book I truly hate. I ran screaming from 1984 for the same reason. I'm just not a scientific elitist / government conspiracy type of gal (even when it turns out okay in the end).
'F' is also for The Grapes of 'F'ucking Wrath (copyright me). Except, not. I'd give it a 'D'. The theme and story are wonderful. But the narration...the narration, man! Keep 'f'ucking dialect out of narration. I felt like I was decoding the entire novel. You know what, no. 'F'. I can't read it. I got a migraine reading it (I am not lying at all). It just took forever to reread entire paragraphs where Tom Joad was puttin' a 'apostrophe' on the end of every effin' word and they were goin' and movin' and shakin' and let me tell you, it was worse than that. Oh...especially when there would be actual dialogue like: 'Momma said we was goin', Daddy,' a grinnin' Tom said (not an actual line). 'F'.
It's great when an author has an ear for dialogue and language. But if using authentic speech patterns makes it so difficult for even advanced readers to decipher your narrative, it's not worth said authenticity. Use it sparingly instead so it will actually make an impact. You can't show off when no one is looking.
So, an 'F' book isn't one that is simply boring or one that I, personally, don't care for. It's one I don't think anyone could care for. It would be too frustrating or too confusing for any reader. I can only think of two or three in my life I'd give this grade to, anyway.
There are books I would recommend to everyone because I love them, unconditionally. There are books I would recommend to serious readers, because they seem to be representative of a certain genre, time period, or philosophy. There are books I would recommend only if it sounds like another person might enjoy it more than I did. Then there are books I wouldn't recommend at all. Those are split into the two failing categories (though in my day, a 'D' grade was passing at BGSU - I know this personally).
In the words of Heidi Klum, "Let's...start the show."
'F' Grades -
'F' is for 'Fucking Unreadable." There have been many books in my life I've abandoned because they were boring. In the past few years I have begun to force myself to try my damnedest to get through those books in which I can at least see value for other readers. Usually, if I can see that value, I propel myself through them as though I'm swimming against a raging river and feel an incredible sense of accomplishment when I make it to shore. What I end up giving those books is normally a 'C' because I can see the value of these books for others to read. It won't always be an uphill battle for every reader to get through Fahrenheit 451. Christ, was it ever for me.
'F' is for Film Noir by Peter Straub. About three years ago, I took a few months to read The Story and Its Writer: Fifth Edition. It contains about 120 short stories if I'm remembering correctly, and Straub's story is one of them. It's structure is based on the idea of an old film reel that has worn through in places. Sounds intriguing, right? You know, it could have been a really excellent idea. And Straub co-wrote one of my other favorie King novels, The Talisman. Damn I love that book...even before The Dark Tower that's the book that inspired my art. Had Film Noir been a little easier to follow I think it would have been brilliant. It could have been done - many authors write linear stories with giant gaps in time/narrative. Sometimes you don't need to know what went on in between, you know? But Film Noir is just a bunch of scenes that are loosely strung together and too confusing to follow. I hated it. I eventually stopped reading.
Novels or stories that outright fail in my opinion are those I think very, very few readers could enjoy. I count among my strengths the ability to follow a story and, more importantly, the ability to make leaps of logic. This is a talent, let me tell you. I don't have many talents but that's one of 'em (along with reading upside down, writing upside down, writing backward, being able to write legibly with my left hand, and writing in general). Anyway, if I can't even follow your story and I come to the point where I am no longer willing to try...you fail. Outright.
I would, however, give Brave New World a 'D'. Maybe even a 'C'. Here's the reasoning: I couldn't get through it but it was obviously because of my extreme bias against dystopian fiction. I despise dystopian fiction. The book itself is readable. I can see how it made it into print and even why others enjoy it. But it was threatening to suck my life away by being the kind of book I truly hate. I ran screaming from 1984 for the same reason. I'm just not a scientific elitist / government conspiracy type of gal (even when it turns out okay in the end).
'F' is also for The Grapes of 'F'ucking Wrath (copyright me). Except, not. I'd give it a 'D'. The theme and story are wonderful. But the narration...the narration, man! Keep 'f'ucking dialect out of narration. I felt like I was decoding the entire novel. You know what, no. 'F'. I can't read it. I got a migraine reading it (I am not lying at all). It just took forever to reread entire paragraphs where Tom Joad was puttin' a 'apostrophe' on the end of every effin' word and they were goin' and movin' and shakin' and let me tell you, it was worse than that. Oh...especially when there would be actual dialogue like: 'Momma said we was goin', Daddy,' a grinnin' Tom said (not an actual line). 'F'.
It's great when an author has an ear for dialogue and language. But if using authentic speech patterns makes it so difficult for even advanced readers to decipher your narrative, it's not worth said authenticity. Use it sparingly instead so it will actually make an impact. You can't show off when no one is looking.
So, an 'F' book isn't one that is simply boring or one that I, personally, don't care for. It's one I don't think anyone could care for. It would be too frustrating or too confusing for any reader. I can only think of two or three in my life I'd give this grade to, anyway.
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