Month: May 2016

articles, Uncategorized, Writing

Are Novellas on the rise?

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It was only last year that I noticed how novellas were rising to the fore-front of bookshops and media platforms. Last Year Penguin Random House released 80 Black Penguin Classics; poetry, novellas and short non-fiction from world class authors such as Jane Austen, Edgar Allen Poe and Charlotte Perkins-Gilman to name a few. If you searched for these small pieces on Instagram, you would find them left, right and centre. Book bloggers cannot help but share their love of these Penguin Classics; you would be surprised at how many already have the full collection. Not only on Instagram either, these novellas are also popping up on Pinterest too. After such success, Penguin Random House recently released a further 80 titles to sit next to their original collection. Although Penguin Random House seem to have started the rise of novellas in bookshops, there seems to be a lot more digital content regarding the subject than ever before. Goodreads has a book club called ‘The Novella Club,’ which has over 650 members. Although Wattpad supplies its audience with over 4,000 novellas, Wattpad also supplies novelettes too.

But why is it, that we have fallen in love with this art form? Well, straight away I can think of three reasons.

They are short – Obviously this comes with the term novella but think about what that opens up to you. Since they are short, they give you great satisfaction in a short space of time.If you want a good read that is deeper than a magazine but not as time consuming as a novel, then this type of prose is ideal for you. A novella can give you high quality literature, as a novel would do, however because it is shorter it can sometimes be more intense.

Great for commuters – Again because a novella is short it can be read on your commute to work or during your lunch break. This makes it ideal if you wish to read something gripping but only have an hour spare.

Product Values – One of the best advantages I feel, is the actual size and weight of a novella. It could be digital, so it takes up no space at all, or it could be a small A5 paperback, that fits neatly into your bag. When you think about people you see reading in public spaces, how big are their books? A lot of the time, I wonder where on earth do they store it. With the novella however, it is roughly half the size and even sometimes feels less bulky than your purse.

With so many advantages that the novella holds, it is surprising how underrated they used to be. Like I said, used to. With this form of prose cropping up more and more, now really is the best time to write a novella.

This post was originally published on Medium. Feel free to see what else I’ve been writing on Medium by clicking here.

articles, Uncategorized, Writing

Feminist Dystopias within Science Fiction

‘Only by considering dystopia as a warning can we as readers hope to escape such a dark future.’

This post will explore the depiction of feminist dystopias within the science fiction genre. Margaret Atwoods’ Oryx & Crake (2003), The Handmaid’s Tale (1986) and Marge Piercy’s Woman on the Edge of Time (1979) question whether a feminist dystopia will provoke change in contemporary society.

A utopia is an ideal place that could be described as a haven. It is created from people’s perspectives of what could warrant an ideal place. This includes ideal laws and politics, which result in a perfect society. A dystopia however, perceives the opposite of a utopia and could therefore include a place of oppression and inequality. In relation to a feminist dystopia, M. Keith Booker states in Woman on the Edge of a Genre: Feminist Dystopias of Marge Piercy that,

‘feminist visions of the future tended in general to show a dark turn in the 1980s, probably due to political reverses that damped the feminist optimism of the 1970s.’

Booker’s assumptions of why feminist writers had taken to writing dystopias instead of utopias proves to be a theme within critiques of the science fiction genre. Raffaella Baccolini in The Persistence of Hope in Dystopian Science Fiction states that the term utopia, has lost its value as ‘it has been conflated with materialist satisfaction and thus commodifed’ within society. Thus it is because critiques were noticing a turn from a feminist utopia towards dystopian fiction that the term feminist dystopia was created.

A feminist dystopia critiques contemporary society by extrapolating patriarchal ideologies in the future. Thus feminist writers display patriarchal societies as a dystopia by the oppression of women and the internalisation of patriarchal ideologies. Although this post focuses on this issue in relation to science fiction, there are many other genres that these texts suit. All of the texts display the qualities that can be found in speculative fiction. Oryx & Crake is post-apocalyptic, The society in The Handmaid’s Tale is a result of the assasination of the president and Woman on the Edge of Time debates how neurosurgery could lead to a dystopia. As the dystopian worlds have been extrapolated from contemporary society, the texts could also relate to fantasy and dystopian fiction. Anne Cranny-Francis in Feminist Fiction critiques the fantasy genre as a way of changing contemporary society. She states that,

‘the contradictions concealed by realist conventions are highlighted in fantasy literature, […] fantasy thereby shows the fragmentation of the real, revealing the real as a negotiation of conflicting discourses.’

This supports a feminist dystopia as a feminist dystopia critiques the flaws within the real so that the reader can negotiate other ideologies for society. Although Cranny-Francis is critiquing fantasy literature, her concept is still relevant to a feminist dystopia. Baccolini supports this by claiming that genres are ‘culturally constructed’ and ‘it is the science fiction genre that will able feminist criticism to deconstruct the genres that fit contemporary society’. Therefore with Atwood and Piercy critiquing contemporary society through science fiction, the readers are able to glimmer into a possible reality. Thus the readers reluctance to live in such a world will help change contemporary society.

This post was originally posted on my Medium account. To see what else I’ve posted click here.

articles, Uncategorized, Writing

Writer’s Block: Fact or Fiction

IMG_0850.JPGAll writers at one point on their literary journey will discover writer’s block. It might take moments to pass, it might take days but one thing everyone can agree on, is that it can be difficult to shift. It can feel like moving a boulder with your bare hands and the worst part? You can physically waste your days trying to move it. After being in this situation myself, I couldn’t help but question what writer’s block is and is it really there.

I reflected on when I would get writer’s block and how I felt about it. Yes, it was annoying but I just thought if I don’t know what to write about then what’s the point. Then there’s that advice:

‘you must write everyday to become a good writer.’

At times I felt like pulling my hair out when I read this in author’s interviews and writing books. How can you write everyday when you don’t know what to write about? I mean, hey, it’s not as if I didn’t want to write, I just could never find the right topic or the right beginning. When I looked again at my reaction to writing, I realised that saying, “I can’t, I have no inspiration,” or “If I write now it will just be rubbish,” was just a form of procrastinating my writing.

After much realisation, I wondered why I procrastinated so much when writing was something I loved. One word: doubt. I never believed that my writing would be good enough and didn’t dare put pen to paper. Until now.

Writing can give you a voice in ways that can be difficult to imagine. It can move people, change societal values and challenge your views of the world. All, may I add, from daring to start writing and expressing yourself. So my answer as to whether writer’s block is fact or fiction is simple. Writer’s block can feel like a real issue, stopping you from writing. However in reality, writer’s block is fiction. It only occurs when you doubt your own writing style or technique. Think about it, when does it occur with you? Next time you start to get a case of writer’s block, remind yourself of your talents and write through that block. How you ask?

Believe in the writer you know you are, that’s how.

Originally posted on medium.com , feel free to check out my account here