Alan Moore’s Advice to Young Writers: Read Terrible Books
For an aspiring writer, reading bad books helps to shape your unique style.
Seeing someone who “made it” as a published author, filmmaker, or artist of any consumable media whose work is objectively awful should be a liberating feeling. It shows that even if a movie script or a novel is a real steamer, with luck and the alignment of heavenly bodies on its side, even it can see the light of day. Maybe even gain a cult following.
But should writers and other artists waste their time consuming bad content when there’s so much good stuff out there? Fiction and comics legend Alan Moore seems to think so.
Alan dispenses advice to aspiring and published writers alike with his series from BBC Maestro
“…a genuinely helpful reaction to a piece of work that you’re reading is: ‘Jesus Christ, I could write this shit.’” -Alan Moore
I worked at a large chain bookstore for many years, and thus had access to limitless stinkers, right at my fingertips. I’m not proud of this, but I took time during breaks and lunches to (unethically) read many “sample chapters” of these works in the breakroom.
On some occasions, this would lead to me reading an entire book over the course of a couple of days to sate my curiosity without having to build a massive library of shitty books. It was a fringe benefit of having to wear an apron and get yelled at when we ran out of toilet paper.
It was a very humorous, sometimes stupifying, and ultimately rewarding experience. I’ll justify it by reminding myself that they paid me minimum wage to be a manager.
Yes, I know that makes me a sucker. I love books though. And I learned a ton about what not to do in my writing.
How does reading a bad book improve my writing? Why not just read good books instead?
I’m not making a case against enriching literary experiences here. Far from it.
But there are some things to think about when it comes to the quality of your book selections.
- Reading is a form of entertainment. You may not always want to challenge yourself too much during leisure time or have to jot down words to look up when you’re done reading. Sometimes you just want a ripping good yarn, the book equivalent of a popcorn flick. And that’s ok.
- A good book’s secrets are obscured, and intentionally hard to discern. A master storyteller transports you in a way that seems effortless. You blink, and suddenly you’re standing in their head, seeing the ghosts they’ve conjured up in their imagination. But what if you just can’t crack the code of what makes it so good? Your tastes will be further refined having read it, and you’ll gain some insights through osmosis, but ultimately unless you’re good at literary analysis, or the book is well known enough to have discussions online, you may be left glowing while scratching your head as to how the author did it.
- People are better at expressing what they don’t like about something, as opposed to what they do like. That includes fiction, where cliche tropes and bad writing stick out to you. Coming from a retail background, I dealt with a lot of customer satisfaction surveys and customer comments. What struck me was how often people could recall in minute detail what they hated about their experience, but when they left a positive comment it was often lacking in specifics.
- Watch others fail and make mistakes, so you don’t have to make as many yourself. It's pretty simple. After reading one of these ‘bad’ books (a subjective opinion, though there’s some consensus to be sure) you should note what you didn’t like, what gave you a sour face, what made you roll your eyes, what made you groan. Everything you don’t want your own readers to do. You may even find a fleck of gold, something the writer of the bad book did well. They did get published after all.
Here are some common elements found in “bad books” that authors should avoid
- Passive characters. These are characters that just float through the book without much agency as various events happen to them. Sometimes an author will put tons of love and thought into a character that’s ultimately unnecessary and weighing down the book.
- Tons of unnecessary detail and flowery prose. Don’t worry, I’m not attacking you. I think every writer goes through the “writery” phase. I’ve been accused, rightfully so, of excessive verbosity in my writing. It distracts from the important central elements, a balance of the reader’s emotional connection to the characters and their needs, sparsely poetic description, sufficient narration, and having enough restraint to reach for a 5 dollar word when a 50 dollar word pops in your head.
- Too many adverbs, especially in dialogue tags. Yes, I realize the first word I wrote after adverb was indeed an adverb. That’s because they’re necessary for clear writing. They’re a tool in the toolbox, but one too heavily (gah, there we go again) relied on. Adverbs are too convenient, sometimes appear lazy and repetitive, and can even be condescending to the reader that can figure out the tone in which things are said based on the context.
- An uninteresting protagonist, or a plot where nothing really happens. This sounds like an obvious one, but there are so many writers who invest hours and hours inventing the minutiae of their worlds, the complex interplay between factions, the way life cycle of the local subspecies of ants, etc. Rich detail is great, but only when anchored and supported by fully realized characters and a plot where things happen, often unexpectedly. Surprise is the payoff to your reader, and if there’s a lot of detail to chew on but no surprise, you’re basically giving them hard tack.
Science fiction author Octavia Butler became deadset on her career choice after watching a terrible B movie on television.
Nothing ignites that spark inside quite like realizing you’re better than someone else who made it, even if you’re 12 years old. She saw a genre that had become dominated by the same predictable plotlines and 2-dimensional characters, and it set her mind on fire with ways to turn it upside down.
I’m sure she had read a lot of great books and watched some good sci-fi, but it was that awful film and its flawed script that set her off.
In short, watching bad movies and reading bad books is fun, and you don’t have to feel bad about walking out halfway through. But the most valuable thing about consuming bad art is it shows you what to avoid when making your own.
It’ll turn those hazy concepts about what you want to avoid into much more concrete, recognizable pitfalls that’ll seem obvious once properly integrated into your work.
