Anyway, I've been chatting with some friends about what's next...not for Rowling (which everyone is asking and I think is the wrong question) but for US...the readers and potential writers. What will be the next big thing to capture our hearts and imaginations?
And I thought...it's probably going to be another YA book. The reasons are complex and of course, we're looking for another YA book that can appeal to adults. The thing is that we can all relate to the teenager within. I also have always been partial to the "Everyman" story in which a person who has no idea they are extraordinary gets launched into amazing events. I even find it thrilling when they have some link buried in their past, rather than being in the right place at the right time.
I've been stagnating lately and ready for a new idea, so after reading the final volume in the Harry Potter series I began to wonder if I could even get close. I looked back at what I wrote as a teenager for inspiration, because I was closer to the audience then. I'm 30 now, so my teenage years were all before I'd even heard of "The Boy Who Lived" but of course, as much as I loved those stories it is also true that the things that happen in them are collections of age-old ideas put together in a wonderful new way. Indeed, two of the stories I dug up from old files involve girls discovering that they are witches and having to stop the bad witches from taking over the world and it's non-witch population. Sigh....I'm not saying they're brilliant or anything. At the moment, they're childish, but they're my children and I'm trying to think how to make them grow up without being accused of ripping off Harry Potter.
And it's hard, because it doesn't take much to remind people of Harry Potter for two reasons:
1. It's so gosh darn popular. It's in the forefront of everyone's minds right now. It could even be that what we need most is distance (timewise) from the craze.
2. It covers so many separate ideas that it's very difficult not to bring a theme, an event, a bit of plot, or a mythical element into many books -- especially fantasy books. For an example, I'm working on a book that involves winged aliens and so I invented a mid-air sport for them to play...not on broomsticks but with their own wings. Nevertheless, my commenters (apologetically, at least) said it reminded them of Quiddich.
So what do we do now, as writers? How do we find new ways to bring to life classic themes in new fantasy stories to ensnare the imagination of the next generation? How can our witches not be seen as part of "The Hidden Magical World" and how can our schools for young magic-makers not become "Hogwarts?"
I haven't come up with any answers, and if I did know what the new craze would be, I'd show everyone after I wrote it rather than telling anyone about it now .
One thing I've taken from it is that the YA audience is capable of handling more complex storylines than what (little) of the genre I was familiar with beforehand.
The great thing is that a whole lot of young people are now readers who otherwise might not have been, hopefully inspiring a larger new generation of writers and larger new generation of readers as they come of age.
Right now my thinking is I'll never see something like the Harry Potter craze again in my lifetime.
There are so many opportunities to hear interpretations of Harry Potter that even the most (insert appropriate criticism here) reader can not fail to get the point.
LOTR has expereinced this the same way. Back when it was ghettoized to SF/F readers only it was not uncommon for people to say "I don't like that book because of XYZ" and the comment to go unanswered/challenged.
Now however, while people may still not like LOTR they can't say that with out having a detailed response as to what it is exactly they dislike and why said beliefs will not change with another reading.
In my opinion the YA audience isn't strictly YA but rather people who simply want the easy reading with decent plot lines that this genre offers. in YA stories generally the writing is santized and until Potter generally bland and uncomplicated.
HP has done one good thing if nothing else as dee_boonci said. Letting stories grow up. Even if you will still have to start your story with sugar and spice you can bring in snips, snails and puppy dog tails without offending people.
I don't know that the fact that HP was YA has anything to do with what the "next craze will be." I doubt whatever it is, that it will be another fantasy. It certainly won't be anything that I write, sooo--I dunno.
To answer the question, if I'm able, I'd say you can mimic the world if you do it from a different perspective. Look at the OSC Ender's books. He has a line that follow Ender, and another that follow his friends.
I've thought about this a bit. Any modern world where you have wizards, you might have a need to train them. This can either be done through apprenticeships or a school. Sure, its been done. It was done before Rowling. You can do it again if you change perspective. Imagine Harry Potter from the teacher's perspective. Or even Dumbledore's. You look, you have a student that has gone through a lot and has to go through a lot in the future, and your MC has to put him through it.
Or see it from the friends' POV. Like Potter from Hermione's POV. Imagine that. She is so different from him and sees things from POV's that Harry can't or won't.
Or, look at it from Draco's view. Have the enemy tell us the story.
That's what I've got so far. You can do it if you change perspective. I think it'd be interesting to see a wizarding school in the US. How would it work.
Either way, we'll have to have something that captivated Christine's attention so we see her around more. It's been good to see you posting
Then, from some unexpected direction, the "next big thing" will come. We won't necessarily recognize it when it gets here. Could anybody here have expected Harry Potter to be big as it was?
(I first saw the first one, I think, while I was traveling, where a bookstore had a display. That meant Scholastic was putting the big push behind it, but did that mean it would be big? Also I was a little surprised to see an overt fantasy put out by Scholastic---not exactly a beacon in the field.)
I've wondered what Rowling herself will do for an encore. "Harry Potter Eight" seems out of the question. Further dumpster diving into the world she's created? Some entirely new work without connection to her great success?
I learned this from Stephen King. He read THE LORD OF THE RINGS, was blown away by it, wanted to write something similar -- a vast epic -- but decided to wait because he knew it was going to be derivative. He waited and waited, and eventually his subconscious gave him THE DARK TOWER.
In fact, there's a huge lesson to be learned from Stephen King's story. It's his stories that ushered in the big "horror boom" of the 1980's. And how many half-ass horror novels and movies did we get? Too damn many. Perhaps the only two writers of that group who went on to do anything really great were Clive Barker and Robert McCammon.
So my advice to all writers who love Harry Potter and want to write something that power is to do everything you can NOT to write anything like Harry Potter. Don't be derivative!
And in terms of what's going to capture the collective imagination of readers . . . well, it's anyone's guess. Back in 1975, did anyone think Stephen King -- i.e., horror fiction -- was going to have the success he did in the 1980's? In 1995, did anyone think J. K. Rowling -- i.e., children's fantasy -- was going to have the success she in the 2000's?
I'll wager that the NEXT BIG THING will be completely unexpected and unplanned.
As for the next big craze to wash over our small world; think about Pokemon and how that went, it was everywhere, it died down but it's still there. The same'll happen to Harry Potter, it'll die down eventually but remain there, everyone will know it, but not many will talk about it. The same also has happened with Lord of The Rings.
Whoever or whatever the next big craze is, it'll probably won't happen for a few years to come, maybe around 2012/2013? Just a guess, but when it does it'll hit just as much as HP has done and any of the predecessors of the big craze market.
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I plan on being the next BIG thing!
Nice perspective, Leigh! I was actually thinking of saying, "I'm working on it right now." But while my WiP stars children, I don't think it's truly a YA story. (Of course, I still think I remember Rowling say Potter wasn't meant to be YA in the beginning, once.)
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My point is that those of us who happen to like YA fantasy (okay, guilty as charged) should not feel like we can't write it anymore because we would simply be ripping of JK Rowling. Write what you love.
Its a good point, however, I began writing a series of novels for young girls about three young sisters who have magical powers. I stopped becuase I could hear people saying I was ripping off Charmed. The fact is, they would be nothing like that, but the moment people heard 'three sisters' and 'magic', I'm sure Charmed would enter their minds. Hence I haven't gotten past the first couple of chapters so I can see how people would be put off writing anything that remotely resembled Harry Potter.
Its wrong, but I guess that's how it is.
[This message has been edited by darklight (edited July 28, 2007).]
I think Wren found my point -- I've always written scifi and fantasy. It's what I love. Harry Potter would have appealed to me even if it hadn't managed to burst through to the mainstream population. Witches and hidden magical worlds aren't new and are something I wrote about as a child. In fact, they were a favorite part of my childhood.
Oh well....I still think it's true that the best thing would be to table the fantasy ideas that are too much like Harry Potter until I'm older.
[This message has been edited by franc li (edited July 30, 2007).]
I'd be more concerned with my Own voice; am I copying or is this coming from me? Not so much concerned with what others will think. I've read many, many books that clearly influence my ideas -- that can't be helped. To me the underlying theme is most important, and I can manipulate the trappings to make it mine.
Harry Potter is popular, well told, and also a series of movies.
Still, I've been thinking this week that in a way, Harry Potter may have opened my eyes to some possibilities I dismissed a long time ago because they were childish. I started writing wish fulfillment stories but gave them up for more sophisticated things. The truth is, though, I miss writing them and Harry Potter proves that people want to read them, too.
Someone emailed Miss Snark (a literary agent that used to run a blog, for those that don't know) with a problem. The problem was that she was working really hard on a manuscript then a new book came out with a similar idea and plotline. She asked if she should just throw it out, radically rewrite it, or finish it and realize that her version was unique, even if it might remind others of the first book.
The answer was to finish it and send it out. Yours might be better, or it will have unique angles.
So, if your WIP looks like Charmed, wonderful. Keep writing it. The idea of three witch sisters wasn't new with Charmed. I think Shakespeare wrote something like that.
And besides, Charmed has been off the air long enough that I doubt you'll have problems. And was it on the WB, or UPN? You think a good enough chunk of people watched those networks for this to matter?
Anyway, that's my opinion.
I think the key is to just face that you'll never be writing a truly 100% original story. Some points will be copied from past works. Characters will be similar. A lot of what you'll write will have been touched upon by other writers. It's the unique mix of these elements that you can imagine, along with your own unique voice as a writer, that will set you apart. There is nothing terribly unique about 99.9% of fiction, and the 0.1% that is truly original will either have other problems with it (crap characters in an original plot, etc) or it will start a whole new line of derivative works. Take Cyberpunk, for example. If we're going to say that Cyberpunk as a genre truly started with William Gibson and we ignore the influence Phillip K. Dick and a host of others had, then just about every cyberpunk novel published in the past 25 odd years is derivative. Doesn't stop a fair few of them from being excellent.
My current problem, writing in the wake of Harrp Potter, is that after immersing myself in this universe very thoroughly for over a week (a brief Harry Potter tour of London, the last two movies and the final three books in 6 days) my soul cries out to write something similar. I know that this is a passing feeling, that the stuff I truly write is not aimed at the YA market, and that I don't know if I could sustain an epic series like this without losing myself somewhere in the middle. I still feel this burning desire to write my own series like this, and all of the ideas I come up with are so very Potterish. I hope it receeds soon so I can get back to work, and I hope that this latest idea I got (that I particularly enjoy) won't disappear with my receeding Potterish feelings.
Jayson Merryfield
As for the next big thing, which I was surprised no one here mentioned in the slightest: The Golden Compass. The trilogy by Phillip Pullman is set in a slightly different England and to me has more magic and intrigue and mature themes than I've seen in the Potter books. I can only hope that the new movie of The golden Compass will be good enough to reel the Potter-generation kids and adults to (in my opinion) a better series.
We can only hope that in the post-Potter world we live in now is willing to accept new writers such as ourselves to possibly become the next big thing. We can hope and we can wish, but as long as we do our best, we can be happy with what we've done.
Harry Potter made millions of people came out for the next book, go ga-ga over JK Rowling. In terms of scope, The Golden Compass will not approach that level of interest. It will be big for a few years while the movies come out, and McDonalds will have Lyra figures and Alethiometers in their Happy Meals, and then it'll fade while the next fad rises. A true phenomenon like Harry Potter is still a ways off, and like more than a few people have said, will likely come from some direction no one was expecting.
Jayson Merryfield
I remember reading the trilogy and thinking, 'if I crossed out the large sections of text that have nothing to do with the story AT ALL, this trilogy would just be one novel'.
I hated the ending of the trilogy, I thought he forced it when it could have had the happier ending.
I hated the continual bashing of God and religion. Feel free to do it if you want, but you cut out a large section of your readership. And it wasn't just a bashing of man's interpretation of religion, it was a bashing of God himself.
The redeeming feature was that I absolutely fell in love with the characters. They were well developed and caught me. In fact, we ended up naming our son after Will, one of the main characters.
But I got to thinking...and started wondering...maybe this got filmed right 'round now because it happens to involve a boy wizard attending a wizard's school...