I wonder how this current worker shortage is squaring with the Ayn Rand crowd

[Whatthe_Firetruck]

22. I got through it with a trick.

Last edited Mon Jun 21, 2021, 08:37 PM - Edit history (1)

Just past the middle of the book is a speech from John Galt when he pops back out of the woodwork. It goes on for pages and pages, just an unrelating wall of talking by one person richmansplaining to his audience the way he thought everything worked (Actually imo this is 100% Rand talking, not her character).

So I took a paperclip and fastened all the pages of That Damn Speech together and read around it, just skipping it entirely. The story, if you can call it that, doesn't really suffer for the lack of it. It's a terrible book, wooden and poorly written, with the author's polemic stapled to the middle and deceptively coming out of the mouth of her MC. But at least with the paperclip method it's somewhat readable.

It taught me a lesson or two on how NOT to write fiction. 1) If you can skip a part of your manuscript without damaging the rest of your book, it doesn't need it and you should cut it. 2) If you have a long and complex block of info that does need to be conveyed, break it into little morsels that can be woven around the story's plot so the reader doesn't even notice you're doing it.