One thing I’ve been trying to do with my writing (since I’ve started pretty much) is to combine my two loves: the characterization and heartfelt humanity of really good literature and the high flying explosive plots of pulpy fantasy and science fiction. To me these are like the yin and yang of a good book- the action becomes more intense because you care about the characters, you care about the characters because they’re well drawn out. It makes the work more emotional and has a bigger impact when the stakes are raised.
Meloncholy is a key aspect to this, I think. Meloncholy and Nostalgia. You need complex relations between characters and an emotional oomph, and these two kind of intertwine and push the emotional envolope.
I watched Year of the Dog a few days ago (which is, by the by, not a comedy of any sort) and was impressed by the way it handled the main characters mental break down and then the restructuring of her personality. The death of a character in this had weight (even though the character was a dog), and it caused so much emotional stress and grief that it completely transformed and changed the main character.
This is important. The characters do not live in a vacuum. When someone close dies or is hurt, the main character needs to feel it. Like a punch to the stomach. When you combine this with meloncholy (the desire for the past to awaken something in someone…) and nostalgia (the awakening of the past and the longing for a self that is gone) you get a powerful punch that can be leveraged in moments of crises (rising action).
Just some thoughts.
No literary navel-gazing, please…doesn’t pay the rent.
I think you misunderstood…
Not literary navel gazing- have you ever read Delany’s Nova?
Hmmm…introspection was the wrong word for the title…
Anyway, I was thinking of works like Douglas Coupland, Kazuo Ishiguro, Haruki Murakami, etc etc. Where the main character’s interaction with other characters can create a powerful, emotional resonance. I was talking more about how this could be leveraged in an action novel to up the stakes and give more of a thrill and an emotional layering.
I’m trying to think of books that do both…Nova comes to mind, but it’s over 30 years old.
Patricia Briggs- her werewolf books are a perfect example of this. The third book also shows a danger- of going too far in one direction and making it too much of an emotional mess, without actual cause for it in the plot.
That’s why I said ying and yang- the emotional context needs to be logical according to the plot…the plot needs the emotional context to heighten the drama