Week Two: Appeal Factors

Oftentimes, when I recommend a title, I'm asked "So, what's it about?" The temptation is to give a rundown of the plot while attempting to avoid spoilers (with varying degrees of success), but Neal Wyatt's article on Appeal Factors gave me a new perspective on how to describe the books I read. In fact, I found some common characteristics of the books that I most enjoy most:

• My favorite stories tend to have ensemble casts of strong, quirky characters. I don't have to like all of the characters as long as they are meaty and their actions build from character development (and not just the cardboard cutout of an archetype). Characters are my number-one priority in a story - if I can't find anything interesting about them, I just don't care about the story, no matter how many other buttons that story hits.
• I tend to enjoy the slow-building long story-arc of a series, but I definitely like a sense of forward momentum in my reading experience - in other words, something that builds slow but reads fast.
• I also like detailed settings, genre mash-ups, at least some humor in the writing. And one other thing: I'm always up for fiction that explores psychology or social issues through genre (especially through zombies - can't get enough of 'em!).

So, after thinking and pondering and reflecting on appeal factors, here's the run-down on two of my recent favorite reads based on Wyatt's seven basic appeal factors:

World War Z by Max Brooks

• Pacing:        Short chapters and multiple changes of perspective and setting keep the reading pace moving quickly, although the full picture of the plot is slower to develop.
• Characterization & Setting:        Although the jump between different characters might be unappealing to some readers, each character packs a punch – there’s no weakly developed or cardboard cut-out characters, despite how briefly they may feature in the narrative. Because of the jump between characters, there are corresponding jumps in setting – this story follows the effects of the zombie war across the globe – which is almost refreshing in the reading, because as soon as the horror creeps up on you in a certain character’s story, the reader is whisked off to another war-zone with fresh new terrors.
• Story Line:        The format is a series of realistic-style interviews with survivors of the zombie war that raise questions in the reader about morality and perception in a variety of survival situations. It’s definitely horrific in parts, so I’d call it part of the Horror or Supernatural Suspense genres, but it’s also a post-zombie apocolypse, which seems these days to be almost its own sub-genre.
• Language, Tone, & Detail:        The language and tone of the book are sober and matter-of-fact but the sprinkling of action scenes are hair-raising and adreneline charged. It’s certainly detail-heavy: any time one of the narrating characters is vague, the interviewer draws them back out to flesh out their story.
• Learning/Experiencing:        I dearly hope that I never experience anything similar to the events in this story!

 

Redshirts: A Novel with Three Codas by John Scalzi

• Pacing:        I remember this as a fairly quick read, both in how I expereinced it, and how quickly the plot moved forward.
• Characterization:        The main cadre of characters are warm and share a sense of comraderie almost from their first introduction. The background characters are sometimes a bit cardboard-ish, but that plays into the story in a delicious twist.
• Story Line & Setting:        For any fans of the Star Trek universe – the story parodies the “redshirt” trope wherein the lowest-ranking (and inevitably red-uniform-wearing) crew members on any planet-side mission would invariably be killed off in dramatic fashion. The setting is an intergalactic-travelling spaceship and the story follows a group of redshirts as they uncover the conspiracy behind the high-mortality rate of their fellow crewmates, tipping their worldview right on its ear.
• Language & Tone:        John Scalzi has a wickedly sharp sense of humor, which plays out beautifully both in the parody inherent in the plot and in the character’s snappy dialog. The tone is light, despite a fairly high body count, but moments of pathos are well-deserved in the narrative and propel the plot forward.
• Detail & Learning/Experiencing:        While the story was not heavy on setting details, the slow reveal of the tightly woven conspiracy plot was like journeying with Alice down the rabbit-hole and an enjoyable experience in itself.