I just finished reading the sixth “sword” book in Fred Saberhagen’s so-called Ardneh Sequence. Actually, it’s my second time through the series.
The reason I even started re-reading these books is because my dad sent them to me, along with a ton of other old books that I had forgotten about. It was a Spring Cleaning maneuver on his part, but I was glad to have them. I love books, and I love owning books.
As I read through the first three books, collected as The Complete Book of Swords, I was struck by how juvenile the writing style felt to me. I remembered really loving the story as a middle schooler, but now the whole thing feels a little sloppy to me. I still really enjoy the plot and story behind these books, but the writing style really isn’t on par with, say, William Gibson. Not that they’re comparable.
The second set of books, collected as The Lost Swords: The First Triad was a better read, especially the third book, “Stonecutter’s Story”. They got better as I went along, which either means that Saberhagen became a better writer as he was writing these books (certainly plausible) or I became more comfortable with his style.
The whole time I’ve been thinking about what it means to write “Young Adult” fiction. I don’t know if the Adnreh Sequence was meant to be read by teenage boys, but it definitely works better for them. Do you think it’s harder to write fiction for teens than it is for adults? Does an author have to be specifically concerned about the mindset, needs, and average education of this demographic to write for them? Or, could Young Adult be a catch-all for not-so-great writing that adults find boring but kids are too inexperienced to find fault with?
I suspect that it goes both ways. And I’m not saying there isn’t really terrible writing geared to adults, or that all Young Adult fiction is crap. But every time I go back to read some of the books I have that is aimed at teenagers, I find the writing to be a little shallow.
At any rate, I’m on to the Second Triad this evening. Happily so.
Filed under: books, ardneh, fiction, saberhagen, swords, young adult
