I'm tired of dystopia. And post-apocalyptic mumbo jumbo. I get it - the future sucks. And it's dirty. And toothless hobos wear toasters on their heads while hunting scavenging "survivors" who eat cold cans of pork 'n beans with their weathered fingers while zzzzzzzzzzzzz.
What's next for fiction in 2011? I'd like to make a suggestion to the writers of future books: Please use punctuation. Seriously. This rambling, stream of consciousness writing is bullshit. I need commas and quotation marks when I'm reading dialog. Kerouac used this lazy method in On the Road and we got tired of it on page 14. It's not cool or novel or interesting. It's laziness. Look, writing dialog ain't easy. That's why when someone actually does it right we celebrate him/her.
Another thing: plot is good. Even a simple plot like going to the store to buy a loaf of bread is a hell of a lot more interesting than Stephen King's last book which is riddled with gore and rape for the obvious sake of being gorey and rapey. At this point, Mr. King, or as you like to be called, Uncle Stevie, you're creeping us out. And not in a good way.
As a reader I'm at a point in my life where I don't have time to waste on shitty fiction. I'm not afraid to quit a book. My time is precious. That's the good thing about my Kindle - it tells me what percentage of the book I have read so far. So my new rule is 25%. If I'm not being entertained after 25% I'm out. None of this "Give it a chance" crap. If a book is "good" it should be "good" at the beginning, the middle, and the end.
So let's recap:
- Grammar and punctuation is required
- Have a point
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