The relationship between writers and readers is an odd one. The writer sits in a garret (or on the top of Mount Parnassus, depending on your point of view) and labors to create a work of lasting value. If it’s good enough and all the stars align, the readers let the work of an author’s imagination into their own and reward the author with praise, treasure and enough allegiance to read writer’s next story, as long as the author keeps the the writer-reader contract. What, you thought what I just described was the writer-reader contract? Au contrair, mes amis! That is merely the description. The writer-reader contract is an old and long one that is modified only as literature evolves. One of the basic tenets of this implied agreement is that, however complex the plot or intricate the fictional universe in the story is, the author knows everything that is going on in the story and can explain how this imaginary world makes sense. For example: Like most of the reading planet, I adored J. K. Rowling’s fantastic Harry Potter series. It’s a mammoth accomplishment and a brilliantly planned series. Elements of the entire saga start appearing immediately although their…
My sister, the educator, was grousing this week about an interesting blog post (sorry to say, not one of mine) on the question of whether Middle Grade and Young Adult books have gotten too “dark” for their target audience. The post’s author made an eloquent argument to justify the current “serious” themes but Sis’s response was “There has to be a happy [book], every now and then. Well, that surprised me because my sister dear has never shied away from kids’ books with dramatic stories and tragic elements. She’s the one who turned me on to Harry Potter and The Graveyard Book (great stories that both start out with murders) and as a teenager, she devoured every Judy Blume YA story-with-a-taboo as soon as it came out. So I had to ask: “What’s the problem? You like dark.” “Of course I do” she said. “But every story pushed at kids right now right now is all about dark issues. It’s dystopias and addiction and depression and death. Every once in a while, people need to laugh too, you know?” “Well, yeah” I replied. “But didn’t the books you loved best as a kid usually bring on the tears?” (I wasn’t ready to concede.)…