Some like it...
Oct. 21st, 2010 08:44 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
threemonkeysTook a break from my hermit-like existence yesterday to go shopping. I dropped into the local Dymocks to have a chat to the owner. During a chat about short story collections (like most book retailers, he finds them hard to sell), he directed my attention to the latest Brandon Sanderson effort. It is the first volume in a new fantasy series. I did a quick calculation and this first volume alone weighs in at roughly half a million words. It is huge. The store owner was really looking forward to reading it. His comment "I like a big book".
There wasn't any innuendo intended, he genuinely likes to read long books. He certainly isn't alone in that. Now I'm wondering just what inspires that impulse. Is it that a really large book allows lots of little detail about the world to be included? Is it because it allows for a very complex extended plot? (Given the genre, I hardly think so). Or is is simply a value for money calculation? Is the large size in some way seen as getting more book for your money?
There was another puzzle. See, I'm not averse to large books myself. I asked him about Neal Stephenson's Anathem, which I had enjoyed a great deal. His reply "I read the first 4 or 5 pages but couldn't get into it". I wonder, if the basic "back cover" premise of a book is interesting enough to start reading it, how do you then judge a 900 page book by the first 4 or 5 pages?
There wasn't any innuendo intended, he genuinely likes to read long books. He certainly isn't alone in that. Now I'm wondering just what inspires that impulse. Is it that a really large book allows lots of little detail about the world to be included? Is it because it allows for a very complex extended plot? (Given the genre, I hardly think so). Or is is simply a value for money calculation? Is the large size in some way seen as getting more book for your money?
There was another puzzle. See, I'm not averse to large books myself. I asked him about Neal Stephenson's Anathem, which I had enjoyed a great deal. His reply "I read the first 4 or 5 pages but couldn't get into it". I wonder, if the basic "back cover" premise of a book is interesting enough to start reading it, how do you then judge a 900 page book by the first 4 or 5 pages?