Agitation Versus Storytelling

As you write, ask yourself why you’re writing what you’re writing.  Are you trying to tell a good story?  Are you trying to evoke an emotion?  Are you trying to advocate for something?  The answer to these questions will help steer your story, as well as your audience.  But whatever the answer is, understand who you’re writing to and how your work will be perceived.

I know an author that is an awesome humor and memoir writer.  His life has been quite extraordinary, and he can put a spin on them that both humanizes him and makes his audience laugh.  There are a few underlying messages in a few of his stories, but nothing that’s too “in your face.”  They complement the stories but they don’t hit you over the head with what they’re saying.

Unfortunately, this person was not interested in sticking with humor and wanted to try his hand at science fiction.  Great!  I like to tell stories across a lot of varying genres as well.  However, instead of focusing mainly on story, he decided he had to fill in just about every page with some kind of heavy-handed woke preaching.  And when I say heavy-handed, I mean hit-you-over-the-head-with-it the way the all-female Ghostbusters or The Handmaid’s Tale did(maybe more).  Nothing fits seamlessly into the story.

Now maybe agitating for your view of the world is something you want to do.  Good for you…but understand the limitations that will put on both your story and its reach.  Folks who enjoy that kind of sermonizing may also enjoy science fiction, but the demographics don’t overlap as much as those who just enjoy science fiction, or who just enjoy sermonizing.  And when your reach is limited, don’t get pissed that no one understands you.

I went into writing to tell good stories.  Sometimes there is a larger societal point to be made, but it has to be organic to the story as opposed to the thrust of it.  What I suspect with this writer is that science fiction is outside of his comfort zone, so the preachiness that is subtle in his memoirs is all he’s really got in sci-fi.  That makes the story, to me, unbearable.

If you want to preach, preach.  If you want to tell a good story, tell a good story.  Don’t try to do both, especially in genres you are unfamiliar with but that you think sound cool  It doesn’t often work out well.