Chapter 734: A Few Words, Regarding Entertainment-Industry Novels

A few words, regarding entertainment-industry novels.

A few words, regarding entertainment-industry novels.

Recently, an old problem has appeared again, which is that many people have started to bash 【the book】, and it has even escalated to a question of attitude.

Every time I see the backend data for follow-up readership start to rise, the scolding always increases.

Yes, the scolding increases, yet the number of people following the read is rising.

Because they are impatient, complaining that I write too little and too slowly, so they scold; I understand all these mindsets.

But how should I put it, writing little and writing slowly is not because I have become passive or stopped taking this book seriously; rather, it is because I take it very seriously.

Many old readers know clearly that my books... are never long.

Never mind the readers, even authors in the circle will place bets, betting on whether I will write to one million 【words】, or one point two 【million】, feeling that exceeding 1.5 million is impossible.

I have no experience with long-form works, so the further I get, the more cautiously I will comb through the content; this is the first point. To put it simply, this is a matter of ability.

Second, the "big trope" of entertainment-industry novels is singular, which is copying literature/works.

Using the same trope for millions of words, while still wanting readers to Want to Watch and follow along, is actually very difficult.

But within a big trope, changing the use of small tropes and using different new writing styles and new tricks is possible.

It is just like writing songs; all entertainment-industry authors can write lyrics and can brag about how good or how popular a song is, but is that enough?

I think many people like to read this book because the song stages are a very big aspect.

But I can honestly say that I felt very relaxed writing various stages before, but now, I am getting more and more tired.

First, not all songs are suitable for designing a stage; some songs are very pleasant to listen to, but they might not have a good entry point to write about.

Second, having written so much, many methods have already been used; it is not as if I have an endless supply of postures to use.

Like when writing "As You Wish," I would review previous stages like "Dislocated Time and Space 54 Version" and think about how to write different aspects to bring about different shocks and emotions.

——This is very difficult.

But if I write it well, I will feel great, and the readers will also feel great.

How many song stages in this book are written well? I think there are many; if you don't believe me, you can pull up the table of contents to review, click into any one of them and read it again.

I have confidence that I can write well in the future, it will just be more tiring and slower.

Every time Zhou Jielun releases an album, he gets scolded for having exhausted his talent, even for those few albums of his that are now considered legendary.

Because everyone has seen you score a 90, if you give another 90, everyone is unsatisfied, and might even feel you are regressing.

I feel that every time I write a song, if you pick it out individually and compare it to most entertainment-industry novels, it is absolutely fucking capable of holding its own!

But it is precisely because it is in this book...

Alright, I started by talking about writing songs because there is less scolding when writing songs.

After finishing with songs, let's talk about writing movies.

Writing movies always brings a lot of scolding, because there is a lot of Drama to write, and I usually won't finish it in a day or two like I do with songs.

I said in a single-chapter post a long time ago that one very tiring point about entertainment-industry novels is that the readers' expectations are different.

Some people love to read about the release, some love to read about the subsequent reactions, some love to read about the money earned, and some love to read about deep analysis...

Now this is great: when they see content they like, they say "written well."

When they see something they don't like as much, they feel anxious waiting: "Truly filler."

When I was writing "Medicine God," the backend data rose all the way.

But the comments were full of scolding.

Recently I am writing "Let the Bullets Fly." Again, those routine talking points bashing my writing attitude.

I am actually very puzzled, because I write very hard.

Just like when Huo Yuan said that line "Let the bullets fly for a while longer," I thought for at least half an hour about where it would be most appropriate to use.

Finally, I built it upon the little girl's father saying, "You'll understand when you grow up."

Some readers said Huo Yuan's delivery of this line was Ox! It was so Ox to place it at this moment!

But his character setting is that of a literary giant, so it should have been that way.

Yet for something that should have been that way, I had to rack my brains to design it.

Because I am not at the level of a literary giant.

Moving on, still Huo Yuan, the reflection about Liuzi eating the starch noodles popped into his mind.

This part is where the movie Drama should be written in detail!

It is necessary to have these setups!

No matter how much I am scolded, I will not change it; it is meant to be read in this coherent way.

Otherwise, that final psychological activity of Huo Yuan would not hold up, and it would not achieve the best reading effect.

"He perhaps wanted to compensate for something."

"Huh, he sells starch noodles, so I might as well go support his business and eat a bowl of noodles!"

For this design, I also thought for half an hour.

Because I am shaping Huo Yuan.

A giant who likes to use simple, plain words, yet whose writing is very cruel and full of pain.

Copying a parallel-universe Yu Hua is simple; writing "Fucking written so amazingly, damn" is also simple.

But writing him watching a movie is not simple at all.

What I did might not count as very good, and surely there are people scolding "what kind of character are you shaping," but I have tried my best to do it.

Because I understand in my heart that movie Drama is something every entertainment-industry author can write, because it is just sitting right there.

The difference is not in the Drama, but in other things.

This is just like how everyone is writing lyrics; some people write stage designs well, and some write them poorly.

This is one of the fundamentals of whether entertainment-genre performance is good or bad!

The performance of our book is actually not bad; even with my updates being so lackluster, the 24-hour follow-read count has never dropped below ten thousand, and at its peak, it can reach eighteen thousand.

Yet the general environment for entertainment-genre novels is that hardly any books have an average subscription count breaking ten thousand, let alone follow-reads; having a few thousand is already quite good.

Among the entertainment-genre novels currently being serialized, mine is the one with the best performance, bar none.

Peers are ripping off my book, the kind that rips it off severely, easily managing to scrape together a "boutique" entertainment-genre performance, while the readers—my lords—complain in every chapter, "What kind of trash is this *This Star Really Wants to Retire*?"

If I really had an attitude problem, was truly slacking off, and was truly just cashing in, and yet I was still number one among serialized entertainment-genre novels... wouldn't that be too unfriendly to other peers? I even feel like you aren't scolding me...

But in reality, it still comes back to that: I am not.

Many comments are very demoralizing, but I can't help but read them, because occasionally, someone's comment is indeed very interesting.

In short, I will write this book as best as I can; I don't want to leave any regrets, because as I said before, I might not write entertainment-genre novels again, at least not in the next few years, and I will write out everything I have in my belly.

I am writing it with care, but you all don't need to read it with care; just pick the content you like to read.

It is actually very popular right now—to teach authors how to write books.

Regarding this, I actually think it's normal; after all, it's just expressing opinions.

However, the problem arises.

A popular book will have a large number of readers providing a hundred or even several hundred ways to write it.

Many of them are even mutually contradictory.

Some say this cannot be written! Some say write this extensively!

Who should the author listen to? What should be written?

Writing a book is not that easy, and the entertainment genre is not as relaxed as everyone thinks.

In any case, most of those who write in a relaxed manner see their performance getting worse and worse.

I still hope to leave no regrets.

(End of this chapter)