Long Live the Book: Jessica Pressman’s Bookishness
It opens a field of inquiry that stretches to the far corners of culture.
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Posts Tagged: literary fiction
The Fractures of Motherhood: Julia Fine’s The Upstairs House
Like Fine’s uniquely constructed book, being a mom is to be permanently fractured.
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Instantly Gritty: Talking with Jennifer Pashley
Jennifer Pashley discusses her new novel, THE WATCHER.
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The Rumpus interview with Jeremy P. Bushnell
Jeremy P. Bushnell discusses his new novel, The Insides, themes of consent, and designing a post-apocalyptic board game.
...moreWeekly Geekery
The plot thickens: literary fiction may not affect empathy after all. China’s solution to producing entrepreneurs? Science fiction. Kids of all races prefer black and Latinx teachers to whites. Science says: everything you learned about sexuality is wrong. Take back dinosaurs from the children!
...moreReading Emotions
There’s nothing that the book world likes to debate more than the differences between literary fiction and commercial or genre fiction. According to a new study published in Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity and the Arts, readers of literary fiction are better able to understand emotions as compared with readers of popular genre fiction, Electric Literature […]
...moreAll That We Could Do with This Emotion
Writing for the Guardian, novelist Val McDermid disputes the recent study which suggests that “literary” fiction readers are more empathetic than “genre” readers: There is no doubt that, historically, there was a valid distinction. Nobody would attempt to suggest that there is an equivalence between Agatha Christie and Virginia Woolf. (Let’s face it, Woolf couldn’t plot for toffee.) […]
...moreHow to Get Your Book Beach-Ready for Summer
Where are the crossroads between literary and commercial, and would you mind giving us directions? At Lit Hub, Brian Gresko spoke to novelist Miranda Beverly-Whittemore about new endings, labeling a book a beach read, and going “full lit”: Guess what? Your publisher wants to sell books.
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The Rumpus Interview with Brendan Jones
Brendan Jones talks about his debut novel, The Alaskan Laundry, living in Alaska, his time as a Wallace Stegner Fellow, and living and loving what you write.
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FUNNY WOMEN #137: Press Release for Zeitgeisty Book
Nothing will ever be ordinary again.
...moreTo Self-Publish or Not to Self-Publish
At the Guardian, Ros Barber explains why she believes self-publishing is not a valid alternative to traditional routes: Traditional publishing is the only way to go for someone who writes literary fiction. With genre fiction, self-publishing can turn you into a successful author (if you can build a platform, if you enjoy marketing and are […]
...moreDrinking Games for Literary Fiction
If reading literary fiction isn’t already an enthralling activity for you, why not try a drinking game to go along with it? McSweeney’s has a pretty good one, including such gems like drinking if there’s footnotes or an overdetermined car crash.
...moreThe Invisible Lower Class
Raymond Carver and other “Kmart realists” championed the working class in high-brow literary fiction. But has the realism of the 99% gone out of style? Electric Literature explores.
...moreRight on Time
The debate has typically been framed around whether it is ever appropriate for a writer to reference Seinfeld, Bright Eyes, or Facebook. What makes more sense is to talk about whether or not doing so is helpful for the specific project at hand. At Electric Literature, the arguments for and against timeless fiction.
...moreLiterary Fiction is Popular Fiction
Some authors feel insecure about writing genre fiction and consider literature a luxury brand. Genre fiction, after all, is supposed to be the goose that lays golden eggs and includes books people actually want to read—except that may not be true. Electric Literature takes the time to breakdown sales volume of literature and popular genres […]
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A Brief History of Pandering
Erasing women writers like Woolson carries immense implications. It creates an environment ripe for the continued marginalization and silencing of women’s voices today.
...moreLatest Salvo in Genre War
David Mitchell, author of Cloud Atlas and The Bone Clocks, has been nominated for both “literary” and “genre” awards, putting him in a somewhat unique position to comment on the ever-raging literary vs. genre war: “It’s convenient to have a science fiction and fantasy section, it’s convenient to have a mainstream literary fiction section, but these […]
...moreVehicles of Literary Inspiration
For the past century American writers and artists have been obsessed with that shimmering, sexy, liberating, lethal contraption known as the automobile…Is there a more potent metaphor for American restlessness, for the American hunger for status and sex, for the American tendency to wind up, broken and bloody, in a ditch? Driving a huge metal […]
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The Rumpus Interview with Jeremy Hawkins
Author Jeremy Hawkins discusses his debut novel, The Last Days of Video, the resurgence of the independent bookstore industry, and allowing nostalgia to have presence but not precedence in one’s life.
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The Sunday Rumpus Interview: Robin Black
“I wish I could manipulate time and space and whatever other dimensions necessary to publish my work once as a woman and then as a man – and compare the reactions.”
...moreBy Its Cover
Jennifer Weiner’s recent claim that a serious author photos indicate serious literature is submited to scientifically unsound empirical testing over at Slate. Comparing the head shots of “Women’s Lit” writers to those of “Literary Fiction” best-sellers, Eliza Berman discovers an unexpected trend in the process: the mysterious middle ground of the indecipherable author smirk.
...moreLit Fic Is Just Another Genre
Jane Austen wrote for money. She also made readers laugh. So why are her books considered literature rather than genre fiction? Clever marketing, claims Elizabeth Edmondson over at the Guardian. Despite many attempts to define “literary fiction” as something dry and bland, writers have historically written to entertain (and to sell their words)—the importance of […]
...moreNot All Genres are Created Equal
Science fiction has a hefty brilliance to contribute to the literary world, but people often scoff at it as light, genre fiction. The Atlantic explores why science fiction is just as, if not more, relevant than non-genre fiction. Science fiction, I’ve always felt, is part of that fantastical tradition. It’s a modern variant of it, for a world […]
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The Sunday Rumpus Essay: Literary Fiction’s Dilemma
If literary fiction offers an alternative to more mainstream “narratives of reassurance,” can the oft-cited moral experiment of Heinz’s Dilemma help us understand why such challenging work isn’t more popular?
...moreStop Reading New Fiction?
It has a provocative headline (“Literary fiction is boring!”), but J. Robert Lennon’s Salon piece about what writers should read is not nearly as simplistic or sensationalist as you might expect. Whether you agree with his conclusions or not, he does make some good points. For example: But a fiction writer ought to engage with other […]
...moreDzanc Wins
The 2011 Independent Book Awards (IPPYs) have been officially released and two Dzanc authors claimed gold and silver prizes for literary fiction. Hesh Kestin’s The Iron Will of Shoeshine Cats tied for gold and Steven Gillis’ The Consequence of Skating tied for the silver medal. Congratulations Dzanc Books!
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