what's a good book?

The way I interpret a 'good book' is when that said book traps you inside its depths while you enjoy every moment of being confined. You become the characters, you feel with the characters and you sympathise with them. It takes you on an adventure, yes, that you never want to end. I suppose one could say that they view a good book as a sort of life experience.

A good book is a book that is not bad, as simple as that.

To extend that, is a book that grabs you and murmur lullabies into your ear and all the lyrics rhymes and never gets off-key.

There are some very good books that circle round and come back to the starting point, usually with a new perspective. I don't think there's any direct correlation between a good read and the distance between starting and ending points.

Judg said:

There are some very good books that circle round and come back to the starting point, usually with a new perspective. I don't think there's any direct correlation between a good read and the distance between starting and ending points.

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That's interesting. Are there any good examples of this off the top of your head?

If I get depressed because its over, it's a good book.

Mela said:

I think a good book takes the reader on an adventure, in which the ending is far different from the beginning; that is to say, people have ventured from where they began, taken a plunge, done something dramatic and unexpected so that you are, indeed, light years from where you began, which is what I constantly strive for.

What do you all think?

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... we all write differently and have different preferences when it comes to reading. So the answer to this will vary. For me, I think that the endings of books should be predictable in some sence of the term. Not that you should be able to guess what is going to happen, but you shouldn't be overly surprised by the outcome in view of the characters' traits and personality and a number of other stuff. And this is true even if the characters undergo a major upheaval, midway through. That doesn't sound too sensible, but somehow or other it is.

SoloArtist said:

That's interesting. Are there any good examples of this off the top of your head?

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I was afraid you'd ask this. I was thinking of 19th century Romanticism, where they quite consciously (often) aimed at a circular plot, under the influence of the new fascination with Eastern culture.

Off the top of my head, and keeping in mind that I am far from my home library, LOTR comes to mind. We start in the Shire, we end in the Shire. The Shire has changed, but is soon put to rights, reverting to much the same thing as it was before. Frodo, on the other hand, can no longer truly go home. He has changed too much, and it is precisely his homecoming that makes it clear how much he had to sacrifice.

Of course, the homecoming could be centered on circumstances, not a place. You could have a story, for instance, that starts with someone in a marriage, or in the army, or in a course of studies, or whatever, and have them entering a similar set of circumstances at the end, leading us to reflect on how this time will be different, or maybe that it won't. No SFF examples springing to mind on this one, but I'll give it a think.

Or if I'm really lucky, some of the exceptionally well-read people around here like Shweta *cough, cough* will come breezing in with fifteen different examples published in the last decade alone.

Judg, maybe there are (many?) good examples of what you're saying, but I think LotR fits in quite well with the OP's definition of a sort of huge adventure where light years have been traveled along the way, especially wrt the characters themselves.

I would think the kind of thing you're suggesting is more common, if anywhere, in literary works where the character tries something or experiences something that doesn't involve too many big explosions, but then comes back where she started and approaches the old life with a new perspective. That is a more subtle read, though. But even in those cases, the character probably considers or processes a lot.

'A Christmas Carol' is something like this, although Scrooge still goes through one heck of a ride first. I think he's still traveled light years as a character.

I'm not sure how many good genre novels don't take their major character(s) on a huge journey of one type or another, though.

LoTR? But they asked about GOOD books.

"The Hunger Games" takes the character on a massive physical and emotional journey but ends up in the same place (at home and extremely disillusioned with the world).

"Good Omens" takes a ton of characters on an exciting journey and they all end up back where they started before the inciting incident (the three MCs want to preserve the status quo, so there ya go). I think the only major change is one secondary character's life becomes slightly less wretched.

Then there's Alice in Wonderland and the Wizard of Oz. More of the same. I mean, people generally end up a little bit wiser and braver than before they left, but lots of good books take them back home again

Mela said:

I don't know where to post this, so because I'm a fantasy writer I'll post it here:

I'm in the midst right now (Saturday night, in front of the Christmas tree, little drink at the table next to me) of nailing down the ending of my WIP, referenced below, and it occurred to me that I'm finishing off at a place that is light years away from where the book started.

Which got me to thinking: I think a good book takes the reader on an adventure, in which the ending is far different from the beginning; that is to say, people have ventured from where they began, taken a plunge, done something dramatic and unexpected so that you are, indeed, light years from where you began, which is what I constantly strive for.

What do you all think?

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I guess it depends on how we parse this out. The part in bold still fits in with a story like Alice in Wonderland or The Wizard of Oz in that the characters go on a major journey. Some of the other things the OP said, though, suggest ending up in a different place.

SoloArtist said:

I guess it depends on how we parse this out. The part in bold still fits in with a story like Alice in Wonderland or The Wizard of Oz in that the characters go on a major journey. Some of the other things the OP said, though, suggest ending up in a different place.

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AIW/WOO end exactly where they started, though. Alice/Dorothy are still goofy girls who live boring lives with their families. They haven't really even done that much personal growth, despite the long adventures they've been on. All novels involve a journey of some sort (physical, emotional, psychological, whatever), and some journeys are larger than others. But I would disagree with the OP in that there are plenty of good books in which the protagonist ends up back where she began.