Nobody Does It Better

Trapped by Genre?

Kent Bishop, here

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Paul Whybrow

Full Member
Jun 20, 2015
Cornwall, UK
Which writer's work do you eagerly anticipate reading, impatient for their new novel to be published?

It could be someone who writes a series of novels featuring the same characters, or an author who takes years to pen their new story, which finds itself shortlisted for major literary awards. You might be working your way through a writer's back catalogue, enthralled by their skills, while still taking glee from the occasional stinker of a title, that simply didn't work.

We've all got our favourite authors, and if some of them aren't highly regarded by the critics, who cares? If books are like food, why not have the occasional naughty treat?

My own list of got-to-read authors includes Walter Mosley, James Lee Burke, John Connolly, Michael Connelly, Barbara Kingsolver, Andrea Camilleri, Annie Dillard, Alice Hoffman, Dennis Lehane, Henning Mankell, Elizabeth Strout, Jo Nesbø, Justin Cartwright, Haruki Murakami, C. J. Sansom, Ann Patchett, Joe R. Lansdale, Don Winslow, Donald Ray Pollock and Jane Harper.

I read two hugely impressive debut novels in 2017, which whet my appetite for the second titles by Lars Mytting, and by Kim Zupan.

My list of authors that I seek out is based on those that I like. There are plenty of novelists whose books I admire, but don't particularly like. As an example of this, I recently re-read Virginia Woolf's To The Lighthouse, which was written in a complex way, with long sections devoted to streams of consciousness. Woolf was experimenting with the conventions of writing a novel, as part of the Modernist movement, but it doesn't make for easy reading.

Who floats your boat?

Which author makes you forget what you're doing, to read their story?

literature-read-reads-books-authors-authoring-hsc5157_low.jpg
 
Do I dare look at these links? Okay. I'll play.

Well look at that, not at thing to complain about. Now what am I going to type into the little white box?

Who floats your boat?

Umm....

Anne Rice used to. Jacqueline Carey. Heinlein. Donaldson. Alice Hoffman. I'm liking Leigh Bardugo and I do like Iain Banks or Iain M. Banks... I used to like Laurell K Hamilton... I have an odd sort of fondness for Lisa Kleypas. But mostly those first three.

...and Melanie Rawn ... what happened to her?

Which author makes you forget what you're doing, to read their story?


Not someone you've heard of ... stark, clean, writing ... with compelling situations ... beautiful prose without any flowers... characters you care about without an overdose of sentimentality ... I usually can be more articulate on this subject but ... good writing, good storytelling, and some art.
 
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Trapped by Genre?

Kent Bishop, here

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