wmartin@brl-smoke.ARPA (Will Martin ) (01/28/86)
There has been some critcal comment on the networks about the writing style, romance-nvel-style sex scenes, etc., in Auel's books, especially the latest one (Mammoth Hunters). In the light of this discussion, I thought I'd post an extract from an article about her that appeared in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Monday, Jan. 27, 1986 (pg E1): "When Auel sat down in 1977 to write a short story about a prehistoric woman, she got caught up in her research. In the end, she found herself with a huge manuscript, enough for six books. Then she reread it, she says, 'and it was awful. I realized I had to learn how to write.' So she taught herself." I would guess that some of the posters who have criticized the style would say that she didn't do that great a job... :-) Actually, the criticisms I have seen are not surprising if the above is taken into account. They seemed to center on too much fluff or padding, and that is what you have when you start off with a "huge manuscript" as described. You need really ruthless editing to pare such stuff down to pure lean meat, and I suppose the "giant-novel" trends we have seen so much of have reduced the publishers' interest in such trimming. Regards, Will