Tardily seeking advice

[pameladean]

Well, maybe I've made up my mind and am only looking for validation.

I'm part of a group reading at Wiscon. The rest of them (David Levine, Seanan McGuire, Sarah Monette, and Cat Valente, it's at four pm on Saturday, do come, because they are all amazing writers!) very kindly let me in even though they had enough people already, but this means that everybody's time is quite limited.

What I would like to do is to read the (new) prologue to the Shrunken version of the Amazing Expanding and Shrinking Novel. It's a letter, in Ruth's voice, so it's fun to read and, I think, funny; it also gives a bit of an idea of what her half of the book is like. However, it contains a tremendous wealth of spoilers for the Secret Country trilogy. I don't want to upset people, but those books have been out since 1989 and were reissued at the beginning of this century, so I'm not sure who all hasn't read them who still wants to.

I am very short of other material because I do not write things that move quickly. I've been through the Amazing Book and also through the partially-written Liavek novel, and even with cuts, there isn't anything else that really has good narrative movement to it.

How upset would you be, o my readers (readers of this LJ, I mean; there's no need for you to have read any of my books) if you were read a prologue like that at a convention? I am going to use a few seconds of my allotted time to provide a warning; how disgruntled would you be at thinking you'd better leave for twelve minutes and come back to hear the rest of the reading?

Pamela

Comments

[sillylilly-bird.livejournal.com]

Considering how long they've been available, I, personally, wouldn't feel the need to leave. Fortunately [?], I have trouble remembering/distinguishing all of the material I read, so it wouldn't ruin anything for me either. Even if I did manage to remember "spoilers", it's interesting finding out how you get the story from point A to point B.
Anyway, I think a spoiler warning at the beginning of your time is certainly fair warning and it'd be kinda selfish to be disgruntled at spoilers because the material has been available for over 20 years. Seriously.

[vgqn.livejournal.com]

+1

Tell people to think of them as teasers rather than spoilers. They may learn something, but they won't really know how it came to be. I guess that's the same thing sillylilly said about finding out how you get from point A to point B.

Sorry I'm not going to be there! I have an MG conference starting on Tuesday, and I just couldn't face the idea of back to back conferences. (Well, we'll be going to Baycon, but commuting from home, so it doesn't really count.)

[pameladean]

I don't blame you a bit, though I'll be sorry not to see you.

I like the process of discovery more than its outcome myself.

P.

[pameladean]

That's kind of my feeling. I did actually have Citizen Kane spoiled by the Peanuts strip that gave it away, but it didn't actually ruin the movie for me, so I have a hard time seeing such things as tragedies. But not everybody reacts to such things in the same way.

P.

[aedifica]

I'm having a very mixed reaction:

I'd love to hear you read Ruth's letter.
I am spoiler-averse, and therefore sensitive of possible spoilers for others.
I have no problem with leaving a reading for a while, but I don't always come back.

So I think on average I'm entirely neutral on the subject? But I'm looking forward to your reading, whatever it ends up being. (Whether or not it ends up being something I've heard or read before.)

[pameladean]

The reading by no means contains ALL the spoilers. There would still be a lot of surprises to anybody reading the trilogy. These are mostly, though NOT entirely, meta-level spoilers.

If it were just my reading I would figure people could go and not come back, but there are four other people to consider. I think most of their fans would come back, but it makes me nervous.

P.

[3rdragon]

Can you ask to be last on the schedule? Because then if people leave for spoilers, they don't need to come back.

Or is reading order highly politicized?

[thomasyan.livejournal.com]

last on the schedule

I was going to ask this, too.

Pamela, I look forward to seeing you again. I haven't had a chance to check what is going on in that time slot, but your reading is definitely something I am interested in!

[bemused-leftist.livejournal.com]

I agree. I don't worry about hearing spoilers, but if I did leave for whatever reason, I probably wouldn't come back. So it seems unfair to the other panelists to perhaps chase away some of their audience.

Last on the schedule seems like a good solution.

[karenkay.livejournal.com]

I think reading the prologue is brilliant, particularly with the limited time. Discrete things (IMHO) go over better because they have their own beginning, middle, and end--so often, readings leave you hanging unpleasantly or they start so abruptly, it takes me the whole reading to figure out what's going on.

[pameladean]

Yes, I have had all these experiences. Starting with the beginning, when it's short, works so much better.

P.

[noveldevice.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't mind at all, personally.

[pameladean]

I wish you were coming, then. 8-)

P.

[shalanna.livejournal.com]

I think you're okay. When I go to readings, what I want to hear is something funny and something entertaining that I can follow--without too many twists and turns. I won't even remember most of it a few minutes later, so it wouldn't matter if I heard a spoiler. But then I really don't mind spoilers; I read for reasons other than just to be surprised at what happens. (Sometimes a spoiler can intrigue me so that I want to pick the whole book up.) As long as it's a brief, funny excerpt that can stand alone, it's cool!

[pameladean]

I too have an amazingly bad memory for stuff I have heard (as opposed to read myself), but some people have an amazingly good one.

P.

[huladavid.livejournal.com]

Considering that I went about six months without reading any reviews or listening to anything about _The Sixth Sense_ just so I could go in cold when the movie finally came out on video, I wouldn't have ANY problem with your proposal.

[huladavid.livejournal.com]

You could also read it like a heavily redacted FBI document...

[pameladean]

*splort* That would be amusing to me, but unfortunately probably not to anybody else.

[dsgood.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't mind in the least.

[pameladean]

Thanks. I like votes in this column. 8-)

P.

[shweta-narayan.livejournal.com]

fwiw I read the trilogy AFTER reading Eve's paper about it, and it didn't diminish my joy in the books at all -- so you could say that yes, there are spoilers but it's not an easily spoilerred series?

[pameladean]

I had forgot that, if I knew it! That's how I wanted things to be, but you never know how well that kind of intention will work out.

P.

[davidgoldfarb.livejournal.com]

Is this paper online somewhere? Sounds interesting.

[shweta-narayan.livejournal.com]

There's a version of it on the Interstitial Arts Foundation site, if I remember correctly; less technical than the version I read, but (and?) more accessible. I'd look, but I'm on a limited internet connection at the moment -- searching the site on Eve Sweetser should get it though :)

[finnyb.livejournal.com]

I, personally, would love to be read such a prologue at a con!

[pameladean]

You come too, then!

P.

[finnyb.livejournal.com]

I wish I could. Unfortunately, I'm up in Calgary, Canada, and such travel just isn't in the cards at the moment.

[calicortina.livejournal.com]

I'll just say I'm incredibly jealous because I won't get to hear Ruth's letter (!!!) but I personally wouldn't be bothered if I hadn't yet read The Secret Country trilogy and heard this...

[pameladean]

Well, with luck at least you'll get to read it yourself when the book comes out.

If it gets cut, I can always post it.

P.

[csecooney.livejournal.com]

I, for one, would love it. And you know what? I WILL love it too, because I will be there!!!

...Then again, I'm the sort of person who also adores spoilers. I read Robin Hobb's Fool Trilogy BEFORE I read the Assassin Trilogy, which came first, and actually liked it better that way. So hearing you read something with spoilers will most likely make me go and buy all your previous books to see what, exactly, I just had spoiled.

[pameladean]

Eeeee! That will be lovely!

I can read the second chapter and spoil The Dubious Hills, too!

Well, maybe not. It's too long.

P.

[csecooney.livejournal.com]

I'm up for it if you are! Who CARES about the next group of panelists pummeling at the door? Let 'em eat Con Suite pretzels!

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

I think first of all there's a good chance that a lot of your fans will be there--already read the trilogy. Then there are those who regard some spoilers as tantalizing. The few who are totally averse get the few seconds of warning, and can leave, but don't let them stop you. I am very sure it would be a small part of the gathering--if any.

[sueschus.livejournal.com]

Read it. For some it may not spoil, but inspire to read again. (Oh! I forgot that - I want to read it again.)

[jinian.livejournal.com]

OMG YES PLEASE

If there's a spoiler warning I think that is quite sufficient, and many people will be oh so happy to hear from Ruth.

Also, would you like to go to lunch or dinner at some point during the con? I try to drag individual people or maaaybe two at a time away to have quieter mealtime as an antidote to the con overload, and I think you'd be an excellent person to talk to.

[dichroic.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't mind, but then as an inveterate rereader and even end-peeker I don't mind spoilers anyway.

But you did say this is a prologue, right? As in, something at the very beginning of the book. So to me, they wouldn't be spoilers at all for the new book, and as you say, the old one has been out a long time - and for any new readers captured by your reading, the fun is going to be seeing how things got to that point.

[faithhopetricks.livejournal.com]

I'd LOVE it, frankly, altho spoilers don't bug me as badly as they seem to do other people - I agree that since the books have been out for a while, and especially if you give a warning, the pleasure of hearing the prologue would far outweigh anything else. Also, "knowing" various details or plot twists isn't the same experience as reading a whole book.

[papersky.livejournal.com]

I don't go to readings except of whole short stories or things I've already read, because hearing a bit of something tends to mess up the pacing of the whole thing for me. However, if I hadn't realised this and I'd never heard of you but I wanted to hear Cat or David or etc, and what you read had spoilers, I would be put off. I wouldn't be enticed to read the earlier spoiled books, and I would find the spoiler-laden prologue that assumed I had read the others offputting for the new book.

It's not people who haven't read them who still want to, it's people who have never heard of them but would love them if they did.

[pameladean]

Well, it doesn't assume you have read the other books. It assumes that you haven't, and will need some information to read this book. It's not unlike Ruth's letter at the beginning of Whim.

This is yet another hazard of group readings, though, I can see, since different writers are going to read different kinds of things.

P.

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

I think that spoiler-avoidance can be carried to extremes. I think that not reading something new because it contains spoilers for books published more than 20 years ago is edging into "extremes" territory.

My younger daughter reads romances, and when she is considering buying a book, she reads the ending, because she doesn't want to read a book if she might not like how it ends! While this is probably unusually far down at the other end of the scale from "no spoilers, ever," I doubt that she is unique. Since there are folks all along that scale, I think that if you preface it with the warning, you're playing completely fair.

[careswen.livejournal.com]

In general, I despise spoilers. But I also attend events where I know they might happen. I'm grateful when people work around them when possible/reasonable, but I don't get pissy otherwise. I think that, with fair warning, you've given plenty of due consideration.

[lenora-rose.livejournal.com]

From someone who can't make Wiscon but oh wishes...

I'm not *terribly* spoiler averse, but I can be a little for new work. Yet, even when I am, I consider there to be a statute of limitations on spoilers. I wouldn't be bothered by the fact that it spoiled older books of yours; I'd be offended if you read a spoileriffic scene from the middle of the current book, but the opening is just fine.

I tend not to read the sample chapters at the end of paperbacks for what papersky, above, describes as pacing reasons, but pacing is a whole different thing from spoiler-like information.

For a number of reasons, that pacing thing hasn't put me off readings. I tend to remember spoken words fairly well, but the change in medium seems to smooth a lot of the pacing problems by filing it in a different part of the brain.

In it something is. Clearly, many thanks for the information.

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