A good story, appropriate knowledge of grammar, good command over vocabulary, some sarcasm, some wisecracks, and probably a paper to scribble. This is what most of the young authors think while they get motivated to pen down a novel. It’s very common for people to think that their life has been really interesting and people would love to read their story. Be it the pranks they played, the fun they had, their sinking boats of relationships or any other exciting (or noteworthy) experiences in their life. Fascination starts ruling their heads by the very thought of their epical story being read by the nation. They think fame and money would follow next.
The driving force for following this path is success of other authors who earned huge name, fame, and money. The concept was introduced by Chetan Bhagat with his book ‘Five Point someone’ which not only turned out to be a national bestseller but was also yielded a blockbuster movie ‘3 idiots’ (Concept was largely changed though characters and incidents remained same). The legacy was further continued by numerous other authors. Some of them failed while some again reached pinnacles of success. Unfortunately we couldn’t see those who drowned and only the victorious knights were highlighted. This fortified the belief that these campus love-stories and young adult fiction is an all time ensured hit. And hence the flood of love stories came from all dimensions.
The quality kept on degrading and a larger number of similar books started surfacing with same girl-meet-boy plots. However a few like ‘I too had a love story’ became a legend and touched millions. This also affected the readership of India as these books were pretty cheap and if someone wanted to start reading novels, he was more probable to choose them. Due to this a large portion of Indian readers couldn’t ever taste classic and genuinely good fiction.
But still, those people who are thinking that young adult fiction is most popular genre and a book in this category will be a hit should check Flipkart’s top hundred bestseller list. This myth will be busted.
Generally, we see a number of books releasing every month and all by novice authors on the same concept of love. Owing to its popularity, many publishers have devoted themselves to publish only such stuff. Use of repetitive and non contextual sex and love-making scene is yet another common thing which is employed to make book spicier and attractive which only corrupts the reading experience. If this element is found missing, there have been cases when publishers demanded love-making scenes in books which is the saddest of all.
For writing a novel, not only we need a sustainable, unique and entertaining story, but creativity in writing is required as well. Lack of creativity and writing skills makes a good plot monotonous. Storytelling is a gift and not everyone gets it. It’s useless to enter this arena just for the sake of its perks.
To summarize, new authors should not get rolled by authors who have been successful in writing substandard fiction. They have to be more cautious of what they are writing and spend more time in research. If they are good, they will be surely recognized, sooner or later. Ruchita Misra’s ‘The ineligible Bachelors’ is the evidence that good romantic comedies are applauded, and the honourable genre of romantic comedy is very different from polluted pulp romances. However, if you want to write just another fictionalized autobiographical piece with same condemned elements, think again. You certainly have potential to do better than you imagine.
About the writer:
Harsh Agarwal, is the author of Life In A Nutshell and the founder editor of Fountain Pen Guild. He writes guest posts in various journals.
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