Member-only story
When will it be time to fictionalise COVID-19?
How soon is too soon to set novels in the new normal?
The world has changed. Maybe forever. At the very least, for the foreseeable future. We are living in a lost year, spending our time in universal limbo while a plague rages around us. A quick Google search of “coronavirus” draws approximately 2.4 billion results; “COVID-19,” 3.6 billion. People are writing about what we’re experiencing — they’re writing a lot. Yet some reviewers are already refusing to consider fiction based on what we’re all going through.
It’s too soon, many say. Too early to turn shelter in place into a snowed-in style romance between roommates. Too early for gritty medical dramas and family angst and for putting into words the fantasy and reality of this mundane dystopia.
Yet it isn’t too soon for think pieces and opinion columns, for narrative journalism about everyday heroes, and for every mouth with a Twitter handle to share their thoughts and feelings, hopes and dreams.
Why are fiction writers held to a higher standard than everyone else? Why is a puff piece behind a paywall okay, but a novel on Amazon isn’t?
