![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Aug. 12th, 2008 01:00 pmI've got to stop reading collections of "Never before published stories by $Famous_Author_Name!" Usually, their nothing more than works written early in the author's career that weren't polished enough to sell without $Famous_Name attached, and thus are mostly mediocre with a few gems here and there. However, sometimes there was a reason it wasn't previously published.
I've been avoiding the whole Orson Scott Card furor because while I find his attitudes and politics objectionable, they didn't particularly influence the books of his I like. If I should ever lose my copies of them I will have to do without since I don't want to contribute any further money to the man, but the books themselves are blameless. Same goes for Piers Anthony; I'm seriously disturbed by some of the things that appear to go on in his head and will therefore try to avoid contributing to his having enough money to act any of them out in real life, but that doesn't lessen his stories that don't involve such things. (although the passage of time certainly has)
On the other hand, there are stories like the one I just read which connect such an attitude to an authors main body of work. Such stories do actually ruin their respective series for me. After reading such a tale I can no longer read the preceding stories without thinking about the fact that the author thought of $Character as the sort of person who would willingly do that. (or think that,/I>, or whatever)
I suppose this is an argument in favor of authors who don't let settings run on too long. I know that (in an only tangentially related case) I lost most of my respect for and interest in L. E. Modesitt's Saga of Recluce when he added in a spaceship in one of the prequels.
I've been avoiding the whole Orson Scott Card furor because while I find his attitudes and politics objectionable, they didn't particularly influence the books of his I like. If I should ever lose my copies of them I will have to do without since I don't want to contribute any further money to the man, but the books themselves are blameless. Same goes for Piers Anthony; I'm seriously disturbed by some of the things that appear to go on in his head and will therefore try to avoid contributing to his having enough money to act any of them out in real life, but that doesn't lessen his stories that don't involve such things. (although the passage of time certainly has)
On the other hand, there are stories like the one I just read which connect such an attitude to an authors main body of work. Such stories do actually ruin their respective series for me. After reading such a tale I can no longer read the preceding stories without thinking about the fact that the author thought of $Character as the sort of person who would willingly do that. (or think that,/I>, or whatever)
I suppose this is an argument in favor of authors who don't let settings run on too long. I know that (in an only tangentially related case) I lost most of my respect for and interest in L. E. Modesitt's Saga of Recluce when he added in a spaceship in one of the prequels.
