Why do we tell stories, and does reality change just a little when they aren’t true?
Awake to both the subtly human and bitterly hysterical faces of contemporary life
Without the sense that the characters are living in a world that matters — in which there are consequences, futures, pasts — why should the stories themselves matter to their readers?
To make such critiques work in a novel, you should be equally as rigorous about your aesthetics as you are about your morals.