I have thoughts.
They’re very wise and worldly thoughts.
About books.
And genre.
Specifically reading voraciously in your genre.
I’ve been thinking about this for a while, like I do most things I blog about, and how so many of the romantasies I read this year (and tried to read) felt like they were the same story. I’m not going to name names; but so many of the books I read followed the same plot, the same type of characters, and the same plot twists and plot devices. They felt like reassembled versions of Fourth Wing or ACOTAR.
Now, this isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Tropes don’t make a book a bad read. I love a well-placed, narratively appropriate one-bed trope or a forced proximity or an arranged marriage or a love interest with a dangerous reputation. However, when a book doesn’t surprise me at all, when it doesn’t defy my expectations at any twist or turn, that’s when I get bored.
I don’t know how many other people do this, but when I read, I unconsciously map out how I think the story is going to go. The tropes I foresee. How scenes are going to end. How the plot will unfold. I don’t know if I do this because I’m an author at heart, or if it’s a human brain/psychology thing. I read a lot of high fantasy and romantasy, so I’ve read the same tropes and archetypes over and over and over.
And there is only so many times I can read the same plot device before I’m rolling my eyes.
So many books this year felt like Fourth Wing. Before that, it was ACORTAR, and before that it was Throne of Glass, and before that it was The Hunger Games, and before that it was Twilight.
If you want to write, you need to read more than just the popular books. When you read a lot, you see repetitive tropes and devices. You can subvert them. You can pull the rug out from under readers’ feet. You can write a book that keeps readers on their toes. If you read widely, and use all of it in your creative tank, then your book won’t read just This Book or That Book.
Because I don’t like picking up a new book, getting 10% in, and asking, “Have I read this before?” I don’t want readers to feel that way about my books, either.
I know there is a certain percentage of readers who will feel that way about my books no matter what and there’s nothing I can do about it. Is what it is.
But, when a book feels exactly like every other book I’ve read, it’s not fun to read. It’s not engaging. It’s not worthwhile – it’s not worth my time. That’s not to say the book isn’t bad, but it’s just not enough for me right now.
There is a book I read this year that I thought about DNFing so many times. There was nothing wrong with it – it was well-written, the story was well-paced, the characters were likable enough, but it never did anything I wasn’t expecting. It followed the plot formula that I’d unconsciously built in my head.
I’m not going to tell you what book it was. A lot of people read this book and loved it. Had I not read the same plot/love interest/twist ten times over, I’d also really like it.
When you read a lot in your genre, you can subvert the expectations. You will know how far is too far to bend those expectations. You can pull threads of other genres into your genre while maintaining the heart of the genre. When you know what’s been done a thousand times, you can avoid those tropes or twist them into a new version of themselves.
That’s why they say read, read, read.
Beatrice B. Morgan 