You Might Hate My Novel if...

TimK — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 22:53:42 -0700

Now that the expanded, edited version of the first 4 episodes of The Conscience of Abe’s Turn is almost ready to be posted…

(And yes, I realize I said it would be done over a month ago. I’ve learned so much from the process, however. The first lesson: Editing your first novel-length work will take 5 times as long as you think it will.)

Whereas: Just about every great story has had those who hated it, frequently with great passion. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Godfather, Firefly and Gilmore Girls, all had and still have their detractors. No great work of fiction or non-fiction has ever failed to piss off a few million people, because every great work must say something. And as soon as you say something, you please the few people who “get” it, and you piss off everybody else.

Therefore: I knew I was onto something special, when I started getting angry emails from people I’d never met, roundly criticizing me for writing something so stupid, so unrealistic as The Conscience of Abe’s Turn.

In the spirit of the great works of literary, film, and television history, you might hate The Conscience of Abe’s Turn if…

You might hate Abe’s Turn if you were sad when Bones’s Sealy Booth got shot.
You might hate Abe’s Turn if you thought Robert Heinlein’s The Moon is a Harsh Mistress was ridiculously implausible, because it could never happen.
You might hate Abe’s Turn if you can’t read Kathy Reichs, because her fiction is too violent.
You might hate Abe’s Turn if you thought Gilmore Girls was stupid, because talking fast is not funny.
You might hate Abe’s Turn if you still think The Godfather glorifies organized crime.
You might hate Abe’s Turn if you think Prison Break glorifies convicted felons.
You might hate Abe’s Turn if you can’t stand Firefly, because it’s un-American.
You might hate Abe’s Turn if you think Penn & Teller’s Bullshit lives up to its name and is dangerous for America.
You might hate Abe’s Turn if you called the IRS, heard a recorded message referring to you as a “customer,” and felt fuzzy inside, as if that not at all insulted your intelligence.
You might hate Abe’s Turn if you think there’s a global climate crisis, or that organic foods are more expensive because they’re good for the environment.
You might hate Abe’s Turn if you think there was too much sex, in the city.
You might hate Abe’s Turn if you think The Fountainhead is a classic, but Ayn Rand was a political nut.
You might hate Abe’s Turn if you consider yourself one of the religious right.
You might hate Abe’s Turn if you are a liberal atheist.
You might hate Abe’s Turn if you think the War on Drugs is good for America.
You might hate Abe’s Turn if you think gun control is good for America.

Basically, Abe’s Turn is for only those who understand the first-season Dr. Brennan, and who like Kathy Reichs’s Dr. Brennan even more, who agree that Sealy Booth is one of the villains of the story, who sympathize with Vito and Michael Corleone, and with Mal Reynolds and Simon Tam, who actually believed Lauren Graham felt the feelings that Lorelai Gilmore did, who walked away from Firefly and The Moon is a Harsh Mistress feeling that those universes actually came alive with fondness and wonder.

Abe’s Turn involves feelings and desires, profanity and sex, because it’s a story about people as they are in the real world. But Abe’s Turn is also a story about government corruption in the line of duty, and it therefore involves violence and lying and unethical behavior, because those are the results of politics. I’m not saying that you have to believe in conspiracy theories in order to “get” Abe’s Turn. You might be able to understand it if you simply say of 9/11, “Yeah, well, the government might have known about it. Give 20 or 30 more years, to be sure we’ve heard the whole truth.”

If that offends you… Sorry. I guess this story just isn’t for you.

[Update: If this story is for you, click here to pre-register for a chance to get a free copy.]

-TimK

The Conscience of Abe’s Turn - You Might Hate My Novel if... - Comments

You Might Hate My Novel if...