A good book is a good book.
For me, reading or writing only in one genre is a little bookist.
One of my favorite writers is Michael Crichton, especially the middle years. I've always liked his ability to write across the genres. Take Disclosure (not the movie, please). It's part family drama, legal thriller, company espionage, with a sprinkling of sci-tech all meshed together to create a book that's impossible (at least for me) to put down. I loved that he did the research and I all I have to do is read the story.
In the mid-ninties, I was in a online crit group where we sent out writing challenges every week and you had to choose two to write. It was ac
tually great practice and a fantastic way 
to sample other genres of writing that may have frightened you before. During that time, I experimented with Sci-fi--three astronaunts crash on a planet that is controlled by a society that's created bat-like robots called Dankfa, Fantasy--characters climb off of tapestry hanging in a castle under an eclipse. Dystopian--a society ruled by the Blondes. Flash fiction-a fairy tattoo leads her elderly to her final destination.These are just some of my experimentations. Are they publishable? Probably not. But those forrays into other genres opened up doors I hadn't expected to come upon. And lessons I learned with these experiations definietly imploved my writing.
And isn't opening new doors or windows what writing is about?
So today I leave you with a challenge. Pick door and tell us what's behind it. And I have a little surprise for the winner. Best of luck. I can't wait your entires. Inspirs you, me, and all of our loyals readers.
Margie, I think your contest is too scary for us! Stepping out of your comfort zone is tough.
ReplyDeleteI have had an image of a fairy poking a unicorn in my head for years though. Maybe I'll write it someday!
Oh, boy.
ReplyDeleteI am so tired.
Make that a fairy poking a unicorn in the NOSE with a finger.
I'm afraid I may have created a whole other image there.
LOL
I just wanted a paragraph or two...LOL...I was doped up when I wrote this. An hour later I had two teeth pulled--hence the bad spelling and missing word or two. My daughter asked if I remembered that I couldn't finish a sentence this morning. I don't remember much before about 3:00 this afternoon. Good meds :)
ReplyDeletearen't dental meds the *best*? Margie, I like your idea of a contest... how about this:
ReplyDeleteIt's hard to take yourself seriously when your entire life is one big cliche. How did my cliche begin? I was conceived by the light of the dashboard in my sperm-donor's 1989 Chevette to the music of Meatloaf. That's right, you guessed it, my parental units were making out to "Paradise by the Dashboard Lights" and instead of true paradise they got...me.
They never got married. Let's face it, when you've been dating ten minutes and pregnancy hits it doesn't guarantee love. But every birthday I get a card filled with cash and every month my mom gets a nice, fat check to buy me clothes and food. The fact that she spends most of the cash on her own clothes or her current boyfriend's bills doesn't seem to bother her.
Back to Kristi - I have no idea what this is. So far it's a rather long shortish story that doesn't really go anywhere.