Hey, guys, I'm always reading and trying to figure out why I like or dislike something.
One aspect that is rarely mentioned is the feeling of wonder, and I think it helps books entertain, and it might be an important element in genre fiction. By wonder, I mean the feeling of stepping in a completely different world that feels real and solid enough that you could almost imagine. Not only a different world, but one that incites awe and imagination.
The other day I read a YA novel, and the first chapter had 0 plot, a little character development (but it was a side character), and no suspense, and yet it was interesting. What did it have? Wonder. It was describing this alternate reality in an urban fantasy setting. It was interesting. I'm reading Harry Potter for my son. Book 4 gets to the Goblet of Fire only at 20%. Before that, there's some intrigue, some set up, and wonder, wonder, wonder. It gets boring, though, I don't what the editor was doing when they allowed a Quidditch world cup match described blow by blow. My son made me skip it. Anyways, for those who've read it, when it describes the camp grounds, the teams, the mascots, it's not advancing the plot, it's not really developing character, and it's not creating suspense. It's just wonder.
You could call it world building I guess, but I don't think it's just about building a world, but the feeling that it creates. Maybe I'm talking about world building, but it's not just having solid details about this world, but a sense of wow, I guess. If it were descriptions of outfits, descriptions of scenery, I would skip. I'm one of those people who skips descriptions. Descriptions can be world building. Perhaps descriptions with a feeling of wonder are wonder. I'm not sure. And I think it's not just children's and YA, although, yes, children's lit touch a lot on wonder. My favorite sci-fi author is still Asimov, and hell yeah, there's a great sense of wonder about the universes of the books, and the social theories often involved in the stories and novels. It's just something that perhaps stimulates thought and imagination.
Anyway, back to my point. I think it's mainly fantasy and sci-fi that have that, but I can see it in other genres as well. I don't read them so my examples are going to be poor. The bestseller Da Vinci Code creates a sense of wonder with its conspiracy theories. I think the thriller The Firm (sorry, I only watched the movie) has a sense of wonder (with fear, more like dread, maybe, but it has it). Horror books have dread (let's think of it as negative wonder).
So my theory is that this feeling of wonder is part of what makes people love to read books. And it's better than movies, because it's immersive, right? You can engage all the senses.
My question though, is for romance, cozy mystery, and perhaps action/thrillers with straight-up running away from bad guys.
I don't read romance. I guess if it creates a separate universe it could have a feeling of wonder. I can see how it might play out in a billionaire romance, for example, when the protagonist experiences a different universe for the first time.
I've read Jane Austen. I love her writing, but I don't think it has any wonder. For us, now, thinking about those times, maybe, but at the time it was more like a realistic depiction of small town life, with the unrealistic happy endings, sure, but focused on realism. Northanger Abbey, her first novel, is a parody, and I think she makes fun of the protagonist's sense of wonder, cause it all falls flat. In fact, I think the lack of wonder is a quality that literary fiction has, and why Jane Austen's writing is sometimes on the brink, even though it's romance.
I've also read Agatha Christie. Not sure that there's wonder there. There are solid characters, and like Austen, a sense of small town society, so there is solid, realistic world building, but I don't think there's much wonder. So perhaps in her case the suspense and the characters are enough.
Anyways, I would like some opinions. Do you agree that wonder is important for genre books? Is it only present/important in speculative fiction, though? Cause we have it in sci-fi, horror, fantasy, etc.
Do romances have that feeling of wonder or do they pull it off with something else?
What about thrillers and mysteries?
Or is is it that all books should incite a feeling of being immersed in a different universe, (even if it's similar to our own), and what I'm describing as wonder is the immersive experience which can happen in any genre?
Or maybe I'm rambling like a lunatic. I'd love to hear other people's opinions on the topic.