I had a great post about Fall all written. In my head. As I
was falling asleep. Can I remember it? Of course not. If I remember, I can
always use it for my post on the 30th. That doesn’t help at 11 pm the
night before my post is due.
So I’m going to free associate. Remember doing that in
creative writing class?
Falling leaves. Falling temperatures.
Yeppers, Fall is here.
But those thoughts weren't my first when I thought about falling. It was the TV show “Falling Skies.” When it came out three summers ago, I thought it was boring. Sorry, Steven Spielberg. But, apparently, it had a following. Hubs discovered the show this summer and we found back episodes on Amazon Prime. After those few episodes (the boring ones I remember), the show got better. Maybe I should have given the show more of a chance.
Not that TV execs gave “Firefly” such a chance. Fourteen episodes. That’s all. I guess Steven Spielberg has more clout than Joss Whedon. I know, past history. But Browncoats have long memories. (See what I mean about free association?)
Speaking of giving a TV show a chance, what about books? “They”
say, if an editor isn’t hooked within the first five pages (or sometimes the first
page) the manuscript will be rejected. I’ll give a book a little longer than
that. Case in point: I belonged to a book club and a friend raved so much about
Anne Tyler that I gave one of her books over fifty pages before giving up. My
friend kept encouraging me to give Tyler another chance. When I finally read The Accidental Tourist, I finally got
why my friend liked the books. I didn’t read another, but I did give the author
more of a chance than I usually do.
The way I see it, I have so many books on my Kindle—and so
many stories to write—I’m never going to get to them all. A book has to hook me
by the end of the second chapter (maybe a third) or I’ll move on to the next
book. I’ve been pleasantly surprised by books from unknown (to me) authors and
disappointed by some best-sellers. My theory is why waste time slogging through
a book that doesn’t appeal to me?
How about you? How much of a chance do you give a book?
Diane Burton blogs here on the 8th and 30th of each month and on Mondays on her own site:
