"Novel Ideas: Contemporary Writers Share the Creative Process" is a thought-provoking guide for aspiring novelists that uses the experiences of popular contemporary authors to illustrate the daily challenges of the creative process. Twenty-three in-depth interviews show first-hand how the process works-- and how it can take over an author's life. Interviews include A. Manette Ansay, Michael Chabon, Wally Lamb, Valerie Martin and Sena Jeter Naslund. Reading these interviews, the would-be novelist feels as if he or she is having a conversation with a mentor. The book also combines chapters on the creative process, novel structure, discipline, and drafting.
After introductory chapters on the elements of fiction, the process of revision, and endurance writing come interviews with 23 contemporary novelists. These interviews, some of which originally appeared in a journal called Other Voices, address the differences between writing short stories and novels, the various ways in which a novel evolves, the internal and external obstacles for the novelist, and often--as in Valerie Martin on Mary Reilly and Sena Jeter Naslund on Ahab's Wife--the writing of a specific fictional work.
Throughout the book are discussions about how novels are born ("Somebody starts talking in my head," says Dorothy Allison) and how the real world feeds the fictional one. For many authors, the relationship between what happens in life and what happens on the page is a spiritual one. "I have a somewhat mystical belief that if you have a novel in mind," says Lee Smith, "everything you see and read and hear somehow contributes to it, if you're paying attention." "I've got my radar up," says Wally Lamb, "and I'm walking around in life looking for stuff that resonates, vibrates." Others are more predatory: "You go around like a vulture," says Patricia Henley, "stealing these things."
Though many of the authors interviewed here claim not to know at first whether they are embarking on a novel or a short story, Michael Chabon sees a strong distinction. "A short story is a commando operation." he says. "You have to get in quickly, set your charges, and get out, leaving the reader to be caught up in the blast." Not so the novel, which he likens to a full-out war, "always begun in the highest enthusiasm, with full confidence of right, and of the certainty of it all being over by Christmas. Two years later you're in the trenches and the mud, with defeat a real possibility, doubting everything, in particular the wisdom of the commanding general." --Jane Steinberg
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About Writing Literary Fiction:
In NOVEL IDEAS, twenty-three literary novelists interviewed by the authors share their writing experiences. They reveal how their novels developed or "gathered," the relative importance of characters versus plot, whether or not they knew the ending before they wrote it, and the extent to which they used an outline or simply started writing without knowing what their characters were going to do. There is good stuff here for anyone curious about the literary fiction writing process, but don't expect to... more info
Invaluable:
There are many works that seek to compile interviews with writers, but none I have found approach them from this unique angle. Rather than have the authors muse over a variety of topics and soliciting the same stock responses, Margaret-Love Denman and Barbara Shoup--like all good writers--have a singular, distinct focus: inquiring into the artistic process of some of America's finest artists. The answers they receive are therefore both focused, informative, and encouraging to anyone who is curious about the... more info
One of the best books a novelist could ever own!:
This is an incredibly real, wonderful book about the craft of novel writing featuring interviews with many different writers. I had published 3 novels with a major publisher and won a national award, and then became quite stuck;I couldn't finish anything in good enough form. This book helped immensely; every problem I faced artistically was discussed by one novelist or another. I felt as if I were sitting around a round table of peers and friends, talking through difficulties in the craft and celebrating... more info
a must-have for any writer:
What a breath of fresh air in a market that is flooded with books that offer formulas for writing and getting published! Instead, Novel Ideas offers the reader real life experiences of those who have gone before them and lived to tell. Those of us struggling with the writing life will find solace in the words of those interviewed and guidance in the chapter text itself. It was like having the modern version of the Algonquin roundtable at my fingertips!
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