Thrown Off Balance: Talking with Malinda McCollum
Malinda McCollum discusses her debut story collection, THE SURPRISING PLACE.
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Posts Tagged: unlikable characters
The Rumpus Book Club Chat with Julie Buntin
Julie Buntin discusses her debut novel, Marlena, the writers and books that influenced it, tackling addiction with compassion, and the magic of teenage girls.
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The Rumpus Interview with Karolina Waclawiak
Karolina Waclawiak discusses her latest book, The Invaders, the dark side of human nature, and what it really means to be a “beach read”.
...moreA Fictionalized Betrayal
This was my first experience of being fictionalized. I still recall the yellow-white flash of queasiness, the mortification: a sense of powerlessness and an utter lack of recourse. What if a writer friend—or, worse, relative—of yours turned you into one of his characters, maybe in an unflattering way? Over at the Paris Review, Michelle Huneven […]
...moreFictional Characters Are Not Your Friends
Critics who fault a character’s unlikability cannot necessarily be faulted. They are merely expressing a wider cultural malaise with all things unpleasant, all things that dare to breach the norm of social acceptability. In a cheekily titled BuzzFeed Books essay, “Not Here to Make Friends,” our essays editor Roxane Gay talks about the knotty issue of […]
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