This week: Escapism vs. Realism Edited by: Kit of House Lannister  
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Escapism vs. realism... which do you prefer, and why? Dark and gritty stories are great, but there's something to be said for getting away from it all...
This week's Action/Adventure Newsletter is about the joy and wonder written worlds can offer.
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What is it that you love about reading? What sparked that initial interest in the stories you enjoyed as a child, and later as an adult? I was an only child for the first 15 years of my life. Even then, I was a bit of an introvert with a big imagination, and books to me were portals into other worlds filled with magic and wonder. I adored those tales where someone somehow ends up in a realm quite different to the one we are born into, having all manner of adventures and making all kinds of friends along the way. I liked other books too – the ones about characters at boarding schools, for example, and during my horsey phase I read a wide variety of stories about those noble animals – but the saving-other-worlds novels were the ones that tended to earn a special place in my heart. That’s why I find it a shame that I can find few novels of that kind that are written specifically for adults.
There are plenty of fantasy/action/adventure novels written for adults, of course. They're different, though. What I liked about the novels I read as a child is that sure, there were tense moments and situations, but the joy and wonder that ran throughout were key to the story, and there was the friendship, and the happy ending, and the entire experience made you feel good. There appears to be this sense amongst authors that if you’re writing for an older audience your work needs to be darker, grittier. It needs to have an edge. A sense of realism. That makes it difficult to find books that I can snuggle up with like I used to.
Sure, I can read works written for a younger audience. I do! I love the Harry Potter novels, for example. Books written for younger readers naturally have themes that resonate with those readers, however, and as someone who’s been there and done that it would be nice to have characters that are a little older. I’m no longer in high school. I no longer live with my parents. I am no longer going through that hormonal teenage stuff anymore, thank goodness. There must surely be a market for those who want a book written with an adult audience in mind, that still has that wonder and that feel-good factor and the payoff of a happy ending?
I don’t want shock and horror, torture and gore, and that sense that it’s no good getting attached to characters because they can die at any moment. I don't want a writer to subvert my expectations. Or, I don’t want that all the time. I’ve enjoyed A Song of Ice and Fire, but the world that we live in is harsh enough as it is. Sometimes I simply want to escape to somewhere better!
If I want realism I’ll check out the news. Or I can look around me, because where I live isn’t all roses and sunshine. Everywhere you look these days are messages about how our future looks grim, how there’s a whole lot of suffering ahead, and if I don’t get away from that darkness at least some of the time I’ll end up a stressed and unhappy human being, which is something I’d rather avoid.
I don’t judge people who prefer those darker works. Who love that touch of realism. Each to their own. It just so happens that I’m mostly about the escapism. It served me well as a child, and it has yet to let me down.
What do you think, dear reader? What do you prefer?
Kit of House Lannister
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Action/Adventure: October 20, 2021 Issue [#11037]
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