Peg Herring's Blog - Posts Tagged "bad-plots"
Bad, Bad Books
Since taking up this writing thing, I am asked about once a year to judge contests. I'm in that process now, and it causes me to wonder, "Who in the world published these people?"
We keep hearing about the gazillions of submissions agents and publishers receive each week, and I don't doubt that. The computer has made it easy to put down a collection of words and call it a novel. But oh. my. goodness. I can't have any sympathy for professionals who can't separate the chaff I'm being forced to read from anything even close to wheat. And yet, somebody published that chaff.
Ridiculous plots. Characters so stereotypical as to be funny, but not meant to be. Gratuitous scenes of sex and violence so childish I could almost hear the author say to him/herself, "Now what else can I do to this character to stretch out the book?" Bad guys so over the top that they should have Snidely Whiplash mustaches they can stroke while they deliver their lines.
If the competition for publishing space is so fierce, then why is so much bad writing being published?
We keep hearing about the gazillions of submissions agents and publishers receive each week, and I don't doubt that. The computer has made it easy to put down a collection of words and call it a novel. But oh. my. goodness. I can't have any sympathy for professionals who can't separate the chaff I'm being forced to read from anything even close to wheat. And yet, somebody published that chaff.
Ridiculous plots. Characters so stereotypical as to be funny, but not meant to be. Gratuitous scenes of sex and violence so childish I could almost hear the author say to him/herself, "Now what else can I do to this character to stretch out the book?" Bad guys so over the top that they should have Snidely Whiplash mustaches they can stroke while they deliver their lines.
If the competition for publishing space is so fierce, then why is so much bad writing being published?
