Writers Who Read
LIVE! #28
LIVE! #28
7 February 2021
Red Pill
by Hari Kunzru
by Hari Kunzru
Agenda
- Why We're Here
- Literary Forensics
- - What do I bring?
- - What do I feel?
- - What do I notice?
- - What do I study?
- Next Month's Reading & Study
Why We're Here
We Writers want to improve our craft
by Reading like a Writer
through Literary Forensics training
we learn from each other
Roundtable Rules
Always refer back to the book
We practice active listening & serendipity
Every feeling and observation is valid...
but not every conclusion
Always refer back to the book
Today's author: Hari Kunzru
- Philisophy major at University of Warwick, Coventry, UK
- Journalist
- Wired UK, Time Out, The Guardian, The Daily Telegraph
- Author of 7 novels
- 1st novel, The Impressionist (2003), £1 Million advance
- Fellow
- American Academy in Berlin (6 mo)
- Podcast producer: Into the Zone
- See episodes: "Never Mind the Stasi" & "When We Were Cyber"
What do I feel?
What in the book elicited that feeling?
Every feeling and observation is valid...
but every conclusion should be questioned
We practice serendipity
- nothing is too crazy
Always refer back to the book
What do I notice?
- • Language and Grammar
- • Context
- • Point of view
- • Character & character development
- • Pacing
- • Horizontal structure
- • Layering of themes
- • Overall effect
Red Pill - Stats
Marketing: Political Fiction, Dystopian Fiction, Literary Fiction
Genre: Realistic Present-Day Arch-Plot Long-Form
Word count: 83,301
Print Pages: 304
Reading Level: 8th-9th grade
POV: Unnamed Narrator
Publish date: September 1, 2020
Publisher: Knopf
Sold By: Knopf
Audio book narration: Hari Kunzru
Recognition: NYT's top 100 of 2020, NPR's Best Books of 2020
Writers Who Read: Coming Up
March 7: Interior Chinatown - Charles Yu (USA, 2020)
April 4: Apeirogon - Colum McCann (Ireland, 2020)
May 2: The Lying Life of Adults - Elena Ferrante
(Italy, trans. 2020 by Ann Goldstein)
June 6: The Vanishing Half - Brit Bennett (USA, 2020)