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Sandi_T t1_itgewdv wrote

Because depending on genre, the readers aren't reading a tragedy. If you give them one when they are reading a genre that's generally positive ultimately, you might squeak past... But you also may draw intense and intense wrath.

Character death (especially main character death) is something I avoid as completely as I can. It used to be that certain genres were safe from that, but some like fantasy have been invaded by character murderers to the point where I have to look almost every new series up before I dare read it.

The thing is, it's shocking at first but then you just stop caring. GoT made me so giving a crap, for example. I just start assuming everyone's going to die and stop caring about any of them. Then I lost interest and wander off to other books. Sometimes I lie to myself and say I'll go back, but I never do.

Like ASOIAF, for example; I've never read it because I couldn't have cared less about the characters by the end of the movies. I didn't even watch the last season at all.

If I wanted realistic war and death, I'd go find it. I have had enough personal tragedy, I don't need to borrow it from books.

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Ok_Ad_88 t1_itggl38 wrote

Death is part of life. If you have a story of war you should expect atleast some of those participating in said war to die. I find that a characters death can complete their arc. Ned stark was honorable and it costed him his life. You didn’t read ASOIAF because you didn’t like the deaths in the show, but the threat of death made the stakes more real. For example, I loved lord of the rings, but I watched the movies when I was a kid and I knew none of the main characters died, so when I read it later on the stakes were nonexistent. The characters were invincible and that was pretty boring knowing that from the start. War is tragic, and to remove tragedy from war is fantasy (lowercase f)

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Sandi_T t1_itgken3 wrote

Yeah, I understood the opinion that war has to be real all the time, everywhere, even in fantasy and Fantasy.

I don't agree, and it has long, long, long (since, you know, Lord of the Rings) been understood that you don't kill off meaningful characters in Fantasy. Because while you read Fantasy for realism, the overwhelming majority of people read Fantasy [sic] for fantasy [sic]. It has traditionally been a safe and welcoming genre for those seeking fantasy (and Fantasy) both, not just for those who want realism while being unsafe to those who want fantasy.

You should NOT have to expect to never read any books with war in them 'because it HAS TO BE realistic.' I will never agree with you on that, and for literally over a century, the Fantasy genre has not agreed with you, either.

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sept_douleurs t1_itgphym wrote

It’s fiction, it’s not “unsafe.” Get a grip.

If you want to read books where no main character dies, just don’t read books about war no matter what genre they are. Picking up a book about war and being shocked that major characters get killed in the story is like picking up a romance novel and being upset there’s a love story in it.

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Ok_Ad_88 t1_itgqzzf wrote

The fantasy genre doesn’t agree with me? What about Joe Abercrombie’s work? Stephen king? Brent weeks? Steven Erikson? Those are off the top of my head, but I’m sure there are plenty of others that I have yet to read.

You can say you disagree with me, but don’t say Fantasy disagrees with me. That is just ignorant. I wasn’t trying to have a win/lose argument, I was just stating my opinion on character deaths in fantasy

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Mangapear OP t1_itggaej wrote

That does make sense. Song of ice and fire is full of death and really hard to get into any character as a lot die.

Sometime I feel that there minor characters who live through a battle, even if no one likes them, bc the author does not want to risk alienating any readers. I ACOTAR there was some minor character who are generals and assholes would could easily have died in the battle and it would have been sad but not devastating or too destructive to the plot

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Sandi_T t1_ith64d3 wrote

Yeah. Fantasy is generally a positive-in-the-end genre. Some people here apparently think horror = fantasy, but people read horror for the horror, they don't say, "I want to read a horror book today, let's head for the fantasy section", lol.

I don't mind if writers do this if they find a way to acknowledge that they're not really writing within the typical norms of the genre. The good ones use blurbs from reporters and the like which give a strong indication of the deviation from genre norms.

The rest just seem to think they're being clever or innovative by hiding it.

You're exactly right that in most books there are those who can be killed off without completely destroying the narrative. Secondary and tertiary characters who are well built can still make you cry. (I know, I've both read it and written it).

Main character deaths just aren't done in certain genres. You don't write a romance and then kill off a main character or a main character's family/ best friend/ pet/ etc. It just isn't done because people are reading romance for positivity.

People read Fantasy by and large for escapism to a heroic world where things work out.

There's plenty of horror, suspense, etc. out there. And there are even sub-genres of "dark" Fantasy, but the normal convention for over a century is that those are 'horror-fantasy' (Frankenstein's Monster), not Fantasy [ps, with lots of painful-to-the-reader deaths, lols!].

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