literature Archives - Page 38 of 58 - Home For Fiction

literature

Review of Interpreter of Maladies

October 8, 2019

book, fiction, India, Indian, literature, review

Interpreter of Maladies, by Jhumpa Lahiri, is a collection of short stories all featuring characters from the Indian subcontinent. However, this is only the tip of the proverbial iceberg.

Ultimately, Interpreter of Maladies is a story about humanity; what it means to be a stranger in a strange land or – more subtly – a stranger in your own soul.

Indeed, what Lahiri’s prose reveals is not the differences between the cultures of India and Britain or the Unites States. After all, most of the characters are Indian expats in the West. Rather, the true focus is the uncanny, outright disturbing degree of similarity between people with vastly different backgrounds.

(more…)

Review of Killing Commendatore by Haruki Murakami

September 20, 2019

Book Review, Criticism

book, fiction, Gothic, Japan, literary fiction, literature, Murakami, review

As I might have mentioned before, I am a fan of Japanese literature. I’m really drawn to the minimalist, abstract, sometimes absurd and sometimes mundane style of many Japanese authors. Haruki Murakami is such an author, but when I began reading his Killing Commendatore I would never expect that a review of Killing Commendatore would include the tag “Gothic”.

As a typical Murakami book, it’s not quite simple to put it into a prefabricated shape. It’s many things, and yet it isn’t. It has a beginning and an ending, and yet it doesn’t. It’s one of those novels that you’ll either love or hate. The good news is, fans of Haruki Murakami will most definitely love it.

Review of Killing Commendatore — The (Gothic) conflict between natural and unnatural, real and unreal, becomes literally true in *Killing Commendatore*

(more…)

Irony in Fiction Writing: a How-To Guide

September 15, 2019

Fiction Writing Tips, Writing

art, fiction, irony, literature, writing

Most people understand what irony is – whether they can always recognize it when they see it, is another subject altogether. Or, actually… it isn’t. This is precisely our topic today, only from a writer’s perspective: How to successfully include irony in your fiction, in a way that you can help the audience understand it.

Having said that, there’s a limit to what an author can do to help their audience. Some people won’t get it no matter what you do. Irony, in particular, is harder to get than a simple explanation of how something works or why.

The reason, as we’ll see in more detail below, is that irony heavily relies on cultural background information. And irony in fiction is an even more complicated matter, as it might overlap with other non-literal meanings and symbolical elements.

(more…)