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Picador
August 2009
On Sale: July 21, 2009
288 pages ISBN: 0312428472 EAN: 9780312428471 Hardcover
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Non-Fiction
In the tradition of E. M. Forster's Aspects of the Novel
and Milan Kundera's The Art of the Novel, How Fiction Works
is a scintillating study of the magic of fiction--an
analysis of its main elements and a celebration of its
lasting power. Here one of the most prominent and stylish
critics of our time looks into the machinery of
storytelling to ask some fundamental questions: What do we
mean when we say we "know" a fictional character? What
constitutes a telling detail? When is a metaphor
successful? Is Realism realistic? Why do some literary
conventions become dated while others stay fresh?
James Wood ranges widely, from Homer to Make Way for
Ducklings, from the Bible to John le Carré, and his book is
both a study of the techniques of fiction-making and an
alternative history of the novel. Playful and profound, How
Fiction Works will be enlightening to writers, readers, and
anyone else interested in what happens on the page.
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