Popular Fiction vs. Literary Fiction

I was raised in the kind of family where the worst insult you could be given was to be accused or reading a Nora Roberts novel. Dickens, Thomas Hardy, Joseph Conrad - books that had stood the test of time - these were the only things acceptable as reading material. Though I never thought much about it, I guess it shouldn't have come as a surprise when I majored in English and learned to appreciate great literature for myself as I read Jane Austen and Faye Weldon and Salmon Rushdie and Proust. Reading Tom Clancy or John Grisholm was just something I never thought of doing.

But times change. I still tend to read mostly literary fiction, but I've ventured into popular fiction. Sometimes it's just as well written as any of the literary fiction I've read (Harry Potter, for instance). Oftentimes the plots are incredible and keep me turning page after page (The Murder Artist, by John Case), and sometimes the plot has a whole lotta potential and is hurt greatly by the quality of writing (Divergent, by Veronica Roth). I do love a good plot, but great characters and writing that flows are, in my opinion, necessary for any book to be great.

I do like reading about this "war" between genre fiction and literary fiction - between books that sell and books that get critical acclaim. The New Yorker article in the link below claims this divide no longer really exists. Do you think that's true? Judging by the first link below, written by a popular fiction author, I would say she doesn't agree. There seem to be hard feelings on both sides - the popular fiction authors feel they don't get respect, and the literary fiction writers seem to be mad at the public for not appreciating their work.
I think many books nowadays do a good job of combining the page turning quality of popular fiction with the greater themes of literary fiction.

For more on this topic:

Viewpoint of a popular fiction writer
http://www.elizabethlowell.com/popfiction.html

An overly simplistic definition
http://writerlyderv.wordpress.com/2010/08/06/literary-fiction-vs-popular-fiction/

http://ctwesting.com/2013/01/27/pop-fiction-vs-literary-fiction-diving-deeper/

From the New Yorker
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/books/2012/10/its-genre-fiction-not-that-theres-anything-wrong-with-it.html

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2010/dec/12/genre-versus-literary-fiction-edward-docx

http://www.publishingcrawl.com/2012/08/27/why-i-hate-the-term-literary-fiction/

Writing Advice from Nicholas Sparks

Years ago, I came across an earlier version of Nicholas Sparks' website and he had an interesting tale about how "The Notebook" came to be published. He told the story of how he sent out the book to a number of agents and the only one who got back to him was a new, young agent who had inherited a list of clients when another agent died. She liked his idea but basically wanted him to rework the entire structure of the book, which he did with her help. Eventually, it was finished, it sold for $1,000,000 and was made into the movie that we all either hate, love, or love to hate (or in my case, hate to love). I haven't actually read any of his books - and I have heard very mixed reviews on the subject - but I liked that he was so honest about the process with his readers.

I just recently went back to his website to see if I could find this article again. The website has been redone, and the article is still there. It's a great first-hand account of the experience one writer had in getting his first book published. On the new site, I also see he has developed a lot of useful content in his "advice for writers" section. There are tips on writing, plus a lot of information about the publishing industry. Check it out here: http://www.nicholassparks.com/for-writers/craft

I especially like his advice for analyzing books within the genre you're writing in. He says to read everything you can in the genre, good and bad, and ask yourself questions as you're reading, such as "How did the author build suspense," "How many characters are there? Was that too many, too few, or just right?" He provides a lot of questions like this that force you to think about how each book was written and what worked and didn't. I know when I'm reading, I get lost in the pleasure of reading and in the end I either liked the book or didn't, but I don't spend enough time thinking about why that is, or what the author did to make it successful or not.

Love him or hate him, you have to give Sparks credit for giving back to the community of writers and for encouraging others to be successful. While not quite a "rags to riches" story (he was a very successful rep for a pharmaceutical company), he is proof that an everyday joe can make it big as a novelist.