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Had to defend a fantasy book nobody in my club liked last night
We were hashing out The Sword of Kaigen at our monthly meetup at the Downtown Brew cafe. Almost everyone said the pacing was too slow and the magic system felt confusing. I sat there listening for like 20 minutes before I finally spoke up. I told them the whole point is that the mother's quiet struggle is the real story, not the big battle at the end. There are maybe 12 of us in the group and I think I got 2 people to nod along. Am I the only one who thinks people miss the emotional core of a book when they get hung up on the action scenes?
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felix4885d ago
Did you try telling them it's like appreciating the foundation work on a house instead of just the new paint job?
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lee_barnes705d ago
...on the other hand, maybe they just didn't like the book and that's okay. I get that the mom's story is supposed to be the heart of it, but if I'm sitting there waiting for something to happen for 300 pages, I'm probably going to check out too. Not every slow book is deep, sometimes it's just slow. You can't make people care about a character's quiet inner life if the plot isn't giving them a reason to stick around.
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