In the last week, two works from a major writer have made their way into my life. I don’t want to be specific here because I decided when I began this blog that I wasn’t going to say bad things about books or movies . Anyway, in both works, the first 2/3 was given over to presenting an engaging but confusing plot. The reader had no idea what was going on and had trouble even keeping the characters and timeline straight. The last third was almost entirely exposition, with the writer, through various characters, explaining what had gone before. And it took all of that space/time to do it. Truly.
Sure the first two-thirds were exciting, if a tad frustrating, but the last third was static--much like the Christie novels where Poirot explains everything to the room full of suspects. It was almost humorous—“oh, you thought that, but really it was this.….”he wasn’t who you thought he was,” or “you thought she was dead but really it was…”
8 comments:
Nero Wolfe is a lot like that also. Sometimes it's impossible to figure anything out until the very end when your just as naive as the poor saps sitting in his office. For me it works because I enjoy the characters and the same goes for Christie. In the hands of lesser writers I'm more annoyed by this approach.
Okay, but those older writers did not create the muultiple POVs and chaos in the story that many thriller and suspense writers do today. You may not have known who did it, but you at least knew who died. Now there's so much smoke and mirrors, you are completely at sea till the long last third.
I like Wolfe and Christie also. But I always liked the Ellery Queens, especially the early ones where you come to a point and there's a page that tells you you have everything you need to solve the murder that Ellery will reveal in the next chapter. The cousins always played fair with the reader in those days.
But, here's the funny point, as hard as I tried and thought, I only solved one of the mysteries. But my reasons were entirely different from the authors.
Sometimes your solution probably was better than the author's. Imagine trying to be that clever 50 times. Playing fair was one of the rules, right?
Hate to say it, but the multiple POV trend is seriously starting to bug me. Too often, it seems like writers - especially newish ones - overreach their abilities and end up with a million characters that I can't keep track of. And it sounds like you're talking about an extended dance remix of the exposition 'parlor scene.' That always drives me completely nuts. There's a reason why the Christies and Stouts have stood the test of time - they didn't spend a third of the book explaining everything!
What bugs me most though is spending 50 pages or more having what went before it explained to me. It shouldn't be that complicated--at least not because the writer sent you down all these blind alleys.
It is lazy writing in a sense and it can let the story easily lapse into a bad "made for Lifetime" movie. Not that there's anything wrong with cheese, but it's unfair to the reader if the writer led to the expectation of something better.
Yes, it is probably easier to play your cards close to your vest to the end.
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