Good Reads

There are a lot of elements that make up good fiction. I think most of us can probably agree on the big blocks of that make up, but then it all comes down to personal preference. What tips the scale between acknowledging something as good writing, admiring it in a purely technical sense, and becoming emotionally gripped in the story, savoring it for rereads, being impacted by it. It could just be one part, one line, or the entire thing. Whatever it is that elevates that piece of writing, separates it from equally talented work – that block is specific to the reader. That’s what I think, anyway.

One example is probably – one reader likes a story because she connected with it b/c of her personal experience. Her friend on the other hand merely appreciates the author’s skill in telling it, but isn’t especially moved. Or maybe one reader loves great narrators, the ones that are downtrodden but still full of good-humor. Meanwhile another reader doesn’t care for the voice of the narrator, and so probably wasn’t very taken with the work. And so on.

I can’t say what my mystery block is, but I do know that in fiction, in good fiction that really just gets me, there is one component that my favorites all share. (This is more incidental than personal preference.) And that is, as I read and once I finish, I think, my god that was fanfuckingtastic, there is no way, absolutely no way that writer made that shit up. No way the writer just pulled it out of the air and imagined it. It’s gotta be real, it has to be the author’s personal experience, but fictionalized.

Here are two pieces I found while on my reading rounds that I’ve felt that way about:

A Field Guide to New England Fathers by Brian Hurley.
Sanger’s Grocery Store sold binoculars, bows and arrows, canoe paddles, and whittling knives. I pulled down one of each and shoved them at my mom. This was our new rule: she always had to check the price.

And one from my alma mater:

I’ve Been Looking by Anna Zucker.
The first time I lost her was in the flowers. I was eight and she was four, and we still lived in the Ukraine. We were playing hide-and-seek in a field of tall grass and wildflowers. It was our favorite game. But Lily was too good at it.

And usually when I find myself wondering how much of what I just read was true, how much of it was pure fiction, I also always think of two things:

1) My journalism profs always emphasized the importance of details, that the best articles were written by journalists who would interview again and again, etc. Example: “Metal to Bone, Day One: Click” by Anne Hull.

2) Two quotations: Truth is stranger than fiction. Fiction has to make sense.