Minstrel Fiction

Good news! The arm has healed enough that I am no longer hunting and pecking. Yes, my arm aches a bit at the end of a work day, but it’s so good to be typing for real again, I hardly even care.

(Go, go gadget fingers!)

During my hiatus, I’ve been thinking a lot about styles of fiction. I’ve been reading “The Sense of An Ending,” by Julian Barnes, and it falls into a sub-genre that I call couldn’t-possibly-be fiction. That is to say, it’s so convincingly told that I often find myself checking the cover again to see if perhaps I missed the part where it says “memoir.” I felt the same way about “Middlesex.”

This is in contrast to books I internally categorize as minstrel fiction. I used to be really into these types of stories, particularly the ones by Tom Robins, who is a master of this sub-genre. Theses stories are fantastical and fun. They often have inanimate objects with opinions, and waitresses on great journeys. My absolute favorite was “Jitterbug Perfume.”

Minstrel fiction still holds a big ‘ol place in my heart because the stories always seem to me like tales you might hear around a camp fire, stories like my family tells. They always have a solid objective. They’ll make you laugh. They are not subtle. In fact, at least when my family tells them, they are often exaggerated to make a point. (Why be accurate when you can be passionate?)

Couldn’t-possibly-be fiction still only holds a sliver of my heart. Its abiding characteristics are an undeniable realism, comical self awareness, and the feeling of complete honesty. These are not stories told around a camp fire so much as they are glimpses into what it means to be human. They make you laugh AND cry. They are usually written with impeccable prose, but often have no obvious point and tend to ramble. These are the books I read because I feel I should. And I do usually enjoy them, just not as much as their fantastical counterparts.

And that’s the part I’ve been going around on in my head. If these couldn’t-possibly-be fiction books are so great, why do I fall so much harder for the minstrel fiction? It’s a style thing, right? I like a good yarn. Nothing wrong with that, but there is a line. I don’t usually care for bodice ripping (which is about 180 from couldn’t-possibly-be fiction on this little internal spectrum of mine), but I do love a good Jack Reacher novel now and then. So I guess I fall in the middle.

The reason I’ve been contemplating all this is that I’m nearing the end of a draft of my novel. (Sweet.) I know I’ll have at least one more pass to make on it after this, but it’s feeling good. Good enough that I might even let some trusted folks read it soon. It’s a yarn, no doubt, but I also hope to tell it with grace and style. That is to say, I want the prose to be beautiful, but I also want it to be a page turner. Am I asking too much? I don’t think so. The million dollar question is: Can I pull it off?