hots_towel
Minstrel
TL;DR: If an author uses too much research to enhance their story, will they come off to their readers as learned or pretentious?
Any fiction writer (especially one who writes in a specific setting) will tell you that "writing fiction is research." Do your research of whatever subjects that your WIP will touch on, and then apply that knowledge to your work to make it feel more alive. Well, I've been doing my research for a while now (still have a lot to do), but it wasn't until recently that I came in contact with a book where the author really did do a lot of research for their book, and wanted to make sure that their readers knew it.
that book was none other than "A Game of Thrones" by ol' GeRRMy. Anyone who's read it knows that the book at times can border an encyclopedia of the middle ages (exaggerating of course). By that I mean, as I read it, and I noticed the little bits of trivia about Medieval Europe were thrown in quite often to make the world feel more "real." Though me personally, I just found myself rolling my eyes.
I know it wasn't Martin's intentions, but I couldn't help but feel like he was just looking for cookie points from historians every time he did something to that effect. However, I can't say my criticism for Martin is all that fair. I read "World War Z" which also required loads of research to make the story feel real, and it didn't have the same effect on me at all. If I had to guess, It's probably because whenever something gets batsh*t insane hype, i tend to set unrealistic standards for whether or not I'll like it.
anyway, thats enough rambling. I hope no one feels like I'm attacking Martin, but that was one of the things that irked me about his book, and got me wondering about my own WIP. On the topic of including your research into your story, do you say "more is better" or "simple yet within reason" is better?
Any fiction writer (especially one who writes in a specific setting) will tell you that "writing fiction is research." Do your research of whatever subjects that your WIP will touch on, and then apply that knowledge to your work to make it feel more alive. Well, I've been doing my research for a while now (still have a lot to do), but it wasn't until recently that I came in contact with a book where the author really did do a lot of research for their book, and wanted to make sure that their readers knew it.
that book was none other than "A Game of Thrones" by ol' GeRRMy. Anyone who's read it knows that the book at times can border an encyclopedia of the middle ages (exaggerating of course). By that I mean, as I read it, and I noticed the little bits of trivia about Medieval Europe were thrown in quite often to make the world feel more "real." Though me personally, I just found myself rolling my eyes.
I know it wasn't Martin's intentions, but I couldn't help but feel like he was just looking for cookie points from historians every time he did something to that effect. However, I can't say my criticism for Martin is all that fair. I read "World War Z" which also required loads of research to make the story feel real, and it didn't have the same effect on me at all. If I had to guess, It's probably because whenever something gets batsh*t insane hype, i tend to set unrealistic standards for whether or not I'll like it.
anyway, thats enough rambling. I hope no one feels like I'm attacking Martin, but that was one of the things that irked me about his book, and got me wondering about my own WIP. On the topic of including your research into your story, do you say "more is better" or "simple yet within reason" is better?