LIVE! #29
7 March 2021
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: Charles Yu
- Short Stories
- Problems for Self-Study, Third Class Superhero
- Previous Novel
- How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe (2010)
- TV writing
- HBO's Westworld (1st season)
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
2nd Person Present Tense:
CAVEAT SCRIPTOR
. . . very, very few authors have succeeded
Honorable Mentions
Frames of Reference
Interior Chinatown - Stats
- Marketing: Historical Chinese Fiction, Historical Fantasy Fiction, Historical Asian Fiction
- Genre: Fantasy Present-Day Arch-Plot Screenplay-Form
- Word count: 39,662
- Print Pages: 289
- Reading Level: 7th grade
- POV: 2nd Person, Present !!!
- Publish date: January 28, 2020
- Publisher: Pantheon Books
- Sold By: Penguin Random House
- Audio book narration: Joel de la Fuente
- Prizes: 2020 National Book Award - Fiction
- NYT Best-seller
Writers Who Read: Coming Up
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)