Hollywood vs. New York: What's the Disconnect?

After reading Donna's excellent review on the motion picture Gravity on Friday, I started pondering some of the paradoxes of the publishing industry vs. the motion picture industry when it comes to audience tastes.

And this led me to a question if there's really a difference in tastes and a difference in audience expectations between the Hollywood motion picture industry and the New York (Big 5 traditional) publishing industry, or if the difference is merely a perception.

What's the New York perception?

The perception by the big publishing houses seems to be that science fiction and romance don't work together. That science fiction romance is doomed to fail because the science fiction readers and the romance readers are two entirely different groups, and therefore the genre has a very limited "niche" audience. (Those few books that do succeed in getting a contract from the Big 5 then seem to face a very difficult marketing quandary--should they be packaged and marketed as SF or Romance?)

How did I formulate these perceptions?

Actually, they came right from the horse's mouth, so to speak. These are the paraphrased words of New York editors I've gleaned from retreats, editor panels, judged contest entries, publisher spotlights, and yes, even rejection letters, for the past three years.

And unfortunately these perceptions--or very possibly misperceptions--are creating their own reality. Because if editors don't buy books because they contain both science fiction and romance, then readers can't read them. And if readers can't read them, then it's true that they'll have a limited audience. The perception creates the reality.

Now let's look at Hollywood.

When a motion picture is made, the audience dynamics are taken into consideration. Generally, couples or families are going to go see films together so when it comes to science fiction, the films are formulated to include elements that will appeal to a wider audience. That element is usually romance.

• Star Wars was a sweeping Sci-Fi (or Science Fantasy, if you prefer) adventure with an iconic romance--Han and Leia.

• Avatar was unabashedly a Sci-Fi Romance--and an alien romance at that--and became one of the biggest blockbusters of all time.

• Oblivion had at it's heart a romance that spanned decades and the fall of civilization, and even overcame a so-called "memory-wipe."

• Battleship was a SFR between a ne'er-do-well Naval officer and an Admiral's daughter. Yes, there was a lot of action and explosions and alien battles in between, but the story started and ended with the romance.

• The re-imagined Star Trek franchise has strong elements of romance, most notably between Spock and Uhura.

• Contact featured a romance between a scientist and a clerical leader who discovered their beliefs were more alike than different via their experiences--the film simply wouldn't have had the same punch without the romance.

• Serenity, the motion-picture adaption of the cult TV favorite Firefly, played heavily on the Captain Mal/Inara romantic elements.

These are only a few of the SF with R offerings of the past couple of decades, so where does the New York perception arise that science fiction and romance don't work together, when they clearly make for some enormous audiences and huge successes in Hollywood?

Is it because we read books as individuals instead of as couples or families, so the tastes of the individual must be catered to without thought to their significant other or family members?

If so, then how did the perception that individual readers will reject either the science fiction or the romance in SFR originate, especially when it's so popular and so widely accepted, and even sought after, on screen?

Why are New York and Hollywood light years apart in this respect?

What are your thoughts on why New York isn't keen on SFR? Do you believe the reading and viewing audiences are two different groups or that they expect different things in a book than they expect in a motion picture? Do you believe the perception in New York arises from the failure of SFR books in the past to find a substantial audience? Or do you think it's rooted in other factors? We'd love to hear your opinions.

GRAVITY SOARS

Gravity—the force that attracts a body toward the center of the earth, or toward any other physical body having mass. (Oxford American Dictionary, Pocket ed., 2008)

By now unless you yourself have been circling the Earth at high altitude, you’ve heard the buzz about Alfonso Cuaron’s triumphant space adventure film GRAVITY.

   

Even if you have only a passing interest in the movies, you’ve heard the techies rave about how the special effects will change the way films will be made from now on.  You’ve read the critics’ glowing reports of Sandra Bullock’s incredible performance in the role of Dr. Ryan Stone, a medical engineer on the International Space Station forced to tap hidden reserves of strength when disaster threatens to leave her marooned alone in space.

I’m here to tell you it’s all true.  What you’ve heard is not hype.  Run, do not walk, to your nearest multiplex and see this film.  See it on the biggest screen you can find, in 3D if you can possibly tolerate it.  No fan of science fiction, no follower of the space program, no dreamer of that day, no matter how distant, when humankind will escape the bonds of this planet and fly free among the stars, can wait to see this film on DVD.  You would truly do yourself, and your imagination, a disservice to miss it.

As many films as I have seen, I’m not a student of the technical aspects of filmmaking.  Beyond a few basic principles, I don’t really care how the directors and the cinematographers, the editors and the special effects crew make their movie magic.  I just want that magic to appear seamless and, most of all, real.  In this day of colossal special effects, we most often simply suspend belief in the theater as huge monsters trash cities with abandon, superheroes perform death-defying feats, things blow up with regularity and even the stupidest movies involve phenomenal amounts of destruction and mayhem.

What Cuaron has done is both more difficult and so different as to be in an entirely separate category.  He has set his cinematic story in a real environment, one with rigorous demands of lighting, physicality, set “geography”, choreography, even sound.  In other words, he has had to recreate the very strict limitations of space for his players.  And make it look real to his audience.  That he succeeds—brilliantly, spectacularly, in ways that make your jaw drop—is nothing short of a miracle.

For now, Cuaron is not talking about how he did it.  Good for him.  Let other filmmakers guess how he had Medical Engineer Stone (Bullock) and Astronaut Matt Kowalski (George Clooney) first floating, then tumbling and spinning out of control in weightless space.  Let jealous rivals lose sleep over how objects swam around Bullock in the cabin just as they would in space, and when she cried, how the tears simply balled up at her eyelashes and floated off into the air in front of her.  Let cinematographers everywhere wonder how he got that hard-edged, diamonds-against-velvet light so familiar to all of us from NASA photos throughout his film.  I only know Cuaron’s audience, of which I was a part, was riveted.

If GRAVITY had had only the game-changing special effects to offer, it might have ended up as one of those cult movies film school students watch over and over as inspiration.  Or as a favorite at SF cons.  But this is one of those rare films born out of the emotional heart of the story, with a strongly written backbone and the excellent acting skills of both Clooney and Bullock to carry that story along.

The tale goes that Alfonso Cuaron’s son Jonas had written a script called DESIERTO, about someone lost in the desert.  The director liked its themes of desolation, loss and the struggle for survival against great odds.  But what better place to play out those themes than the great “desert” of space?  He and Jonas wrote the script for GRAVITY together, and as all good writers should, piled on the dangers for their hapless first-time-in-space heroine.

Clooney’s Kowalski is everything we’ve been conditioned to believe an astronaut should be—wise-cracking, calm, competent, brave, self-sacrificing.  His steady voice is Stone’s anchor in the chaos of the crisis that envelops them in seconds and throws her into panic.

But it is Bullock’s Dr. Ryan Stone who is the emotional focus of the story and the heroine of the piece.  She has lost her tether to Earth long before debris from a fractured satellite rips the space station apart and makes her fight for survival imperative.  Her journey back to life within herself is just as fascinating as the literal trek she must make to get back to Earth.  Bullock and the Cuarons have taken care to give us that emotional story; the special effects are only there to make the story believable.  In a good film, that is the way it is supposed to work.

GRAVITY opened to the biggest box office in history ($55.6 million), a tribute to the advance buzz on the film and the popularity of its stars.  But an interesting footnote to that piece of news is that its audience skewed notably older. Entertainment Weekly reports audiences the first weekend were 59 percent above the age of 35, 54 percent male, 46 percent female.  That could, again, be due to the drawing power of its stars, but reports also showed better numbers on the second day of the weekend than the first, meaning word of mouth was at play.

New York, are you listening?

Cheers, Donna

Pippa's Journal 9th October 2013

First, an apology. I've been AWOL from Spacefreighters for the last few weeks for one reason or another, mostly because I just couldn't come up with anything of interest, but also because I've been on a campaign to GET ALL THE THINGS DONE. Something about the approach of winter and year's end always triggers a sudden urge to finish things. To have them done. With writing, that rarely happens, because I always have several stories at various stages in the writing process. I have things from a folder of vague ideas up to completed manuscripts that need to go for submission or, in the case of two of them, that are waiting for the long process of publication to begin. I have four projects I really wanted out the door by the end of 2013, but had to trim that back to two as other things took over. Basically my schedule and my mind are a mess, but I am making SOME progress...

Mission Success!

Keir came third in the Paranormal/Time Travel/Futuristic category of the Heart of Denver RWA Aspen Gold contest! Woo hoo! This will probably be the last contest Keir is eligible for due to the copyright date, so it was good to finish on a high. And I have to say, the Aspen contest has been one of the best run I've entered. The very wonderful contest coordinator Janet Baltz kept us all updated about the process, sent us all invites to the award ceremony (damn, but I wish I could have gone!), and notified us of the results. And my fellow contestants were one of the friendliest bunch of authors I've ever had the pleasure to be in contact with.:) I'm now waiting on the EPIC results - I entered my scifi romance short Terms & Conditions Apply.And that's it for 2013 contests. In December entry should open for the GCC RWA Silken Sands Self Published Star Awards - T&CA came second last year, and I'm hoping to enter my short Imprint from the Tales from the SFR Brigade anthology.

My decopunk superhero romance Darkfall went out to beta readers at the end of last week - so far I've had three report back, and the overall verdict seems hopeful. They liked it! There are a couple of plot issues to fix - both things that had been niggling at me so not a complete surprise, but both solvable. In the meantime I'm working to finish my second story in the Venus Ascendant collection to go with T&CA. This one has reached novella length already, but along with two other short stories in progress also tied to the VA universe, it looks like I might be able to do a print collection of them in the not too distant future! These will all be self published works since the original idea belongs to the talented Misa Buckley.

Happenings

After some discussions and brainstorming between the SFR Brigade group admins, we're attempting to bring the much neglected SFR Brigade blog back to life. Kyndra Hatch has volunteered to be Blog Post Coordinator with the idea of getting regular posts by Brigaders going up on the blog. At the moment, Laurel Kriegler has volunteered to do a fortnightly Book Recommendation post on alternate Thursdays - these will not be reviews, but recommendations for SFR titles (not necessarily books by Brigaders) and some writing advice books. This is all still in the brainstorming phase, but I would like Brigaders to be aware that the blog is there to be used. We do have guidelines in the right hand side bar about the posting of promotional stuff, but really it's open to anything SFR related. Even if only a fifth of the Brigade's members offered to do a post each, we'd have one for every week of the year without committing anyone to more than one post a year. Please speak to Kyndra if you're interested in posting but are unsure how to go about it.

Next week, I'm doing TWO cover reveals, one on my own blog for Brigader Amy Laurens and her spec fic/fantasty anthology To Dust. The other will be for Butterman (Time) Travel, Inc. with a post on what time I'd like to travel to and why. Should be fun! I'll also have a post up over at Romancing the Genres on the 18th October - Superstition, Magic, and being a Teenage Witch. Bet you never knew that about me! There's also an If You Like Event being coordinated by Heather Massey of The Galaxy Express, where some of us will be taking big name SFR and PNR books, films, and TV series, and recommending some comparable SFR titles for your consideration. I have a list going up on the 22nd of my favourite films and TV shows, and what books I think you'd like that are similar. Charlee Alden will have a couple of lists going up on the 20th and the 23rd. And on the 21st I have a post on what started me writing over at the Indies R Us site.

The Sci-Fi Romance Quarterly is coming! The "go-to digital magazine for your minimum quarterly requirement of robots, aliens, clockworks, hyperspaces, hearts and romance!" Sounds exciting!

Ping Pong

Donna, loved your two part post on SFR, and it certainly opened up discussion. I think the big issue continues to be getting noticed - but also that our readers have as diverse a taste as the range of diversity that the genre can encompass. How the heck can we pull it all together?! Marketing and labelling - being able to get readers to where the books they want to read - seems to be the biggest problem. And clearly self-published works still have a stigma attached to them no matter how hard some of us try to ensure only good quality works are put out there. Sigh.

Fitting All the Pieces on the Stage

Today we'd like to welcome author C. E. Kilgore to Spacefreighters Lounge with a guest post on world building. What techniques does C.E. use to help craft fascinating settings? Read on...

World building is a very important and dear subject to both my books and my heart. I love it. It’s one of the reasons I write primarily Science Fiction / Space Opera. It gives me more flexibility with my world building and gives me a larger playing field. I feel like a kid with Legos, sometimes, and it makes me smile every time I begin putting my world down on paper, inviting the readers into my playroom.

Every fictional book ever written has at least some small form of world building. As the author presents their story through the eyes and actions of their characters, they are building a world for you to experience as you read the book. Some authors excel at this naturally. Others struggle. For most, it just take a little practice, a little experience and knowing how to bring all the little pieces together.

World building is a short phrase that includes a lot of parts. For many new authors, it can feel daunting or confusing. I have found it’s easiest to think of it more like a movie or a play.

The most obvious part is the scenery – the world(s) in which the characters live. What does it look like? Does it have special plants or animals? Is it a lush forest or an expansive desert? Or is it in the far reaches of space, riding through the stars on a spaceship?

That setting, that piece, is the large backdrop – like a scene painting for a movie or stage play.

Once you have that larger backdrop sorted, you can start adding in your props – the smaller world building details that help your universe come to life. This is where it can get a little sticky. Too many details, and your audience will have trouble seeing the actors. Too few and the audience will have trouble imagining what’s really going on or believing that your characters are as real as fictional people can be.

Props include things like sounds, smells, objects, colors, weather, history and language. Yes, history. A world, even fictional, is not a stagnant section that exists out of time. A fully built world will have a sense of history – of events and things that have come before to influence the present circumstance and environment your characters exist it. A world is also not stuck in one moment in time – a world is ever evolving, ever changing. Moving forward, giving your characters momentum, goals and dreams.

World building can be very fun, and it isn’t just for books, movies or plays. Some do it for games, others do it for role playing, and some do it every day right in the real world they live in. Chances are, you’ve been world building since you were a kid and created a fortress out of books for your action figures or set up a doll house. Writing a world is simply taking that same imaginative creation process and translating it to written words.

You can get an idea for my style of world building by downloading the first book in my series, Ghost In The Machine, for Free. Http://www.cekilgore.com/ghost.php

This world building is carried throughout the series, each book building on the structure built in previous books and always progressing as the story does.

Blurb

Hankarron Eros has loved Tara since she had pigtails, but fear of losing their friendship leads him to keep his heart's desires locked away. When the truth about his family is exposed and leaves him grasping to hold onto his ship, his crew and his sanity, words are spoken that can't be taken back and the presence he had grown so used to having at a convenient reach is gone.

Tara Flint has never denied her heart's attraction to the floppy-haired, brown-eyed Hankarron, even if he can be a stupid limik sometimes. Her strong will falters as she is forced to decide between a promise she made to her father, a boy she has loved since she had pigtails and the possibility of finding out what her life might be like without the presence of Hankarron always by her side.

They say that the stories of our time will one day be traced into the stars to help guide others home. Fate strings intertwine with skipping stones across the stars of the universe, pulling it forward and writing new lines in the night sky as the Corwint Central Agent saga continues to lead Ethan, Orynn and Jarren towards a collision that holds the power to change everything.

Author Links:
facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cekilgore
twitter: https://twitter.com/ce_kilgore
website: http://www.cekilgore.com
blog: http://www.TracingTheStars.com
Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6572080.
C_E_Kilgore Amazon Author page: http://www.amazon.com/C.E.-Kilgore/e/B009Z4QKMO/

Author bio:
C.E. Kilgore (1981 - ) has always had a love of romantic stories and science fiction. Although active in the writing community during her undergraduate studies, she chose to focus on her love of history and culture. Graduating with an HBA in History and a BA in Cultural Anthropology, she puts a deep emphasis on creating characters and environments within her writing that are full of both culture and history. The relationship development between characters and the worlds they live in is also an important aspect of her stories. Sarcasm, comedy, hidden "modern" references and subtle hints at underlined universal meanings are common within her writing style, but there is always plenty of action and a darker side lurking just around the corner.

Thanks to C.E. for stopping by for a visit today! You can find her books at the following links:

Book Links for book 3: 
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00FBG6S2W
Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/359523

Free Book 1: 
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B009UFHA0O
Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/248899 

Now for the big bonus! C.E. Kilgore is giving away 1 grand prize of a $25 Amazon or Nook gift certificate and 2 second place prizes of $10 gift certificates via Rafflecopter. Enter below. And thanks for visiting Spacefreighters Lounge.


a Rafflecopter giveaway