figuring out how fiction works

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Brilliant beginnings I: Of Mice and Men
which is a thriller according to its blurb on my copy
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Liza Costello
I'm not writing a novel
But I am writing a bit of one
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Liza Costello
4
On the fearsome art of paragraphing
Sometimes I do this exercise in my class, where I take one of the books on our reading list and flip through it with eyes closed, landing my finger on a…
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Liza Costello
On the pleasure of dread
My second novel Crookedwood began on some level, years ago, when I passed a signpost for a place called Crookedwood. That may sound like a bad writing…
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Liza Costello
Bad guys and slippery language in Rebecca
A lot has been written about the novel Rebecca, most of which, to be honest, I probably haven’t read. I do know it’s well acknowledged that Max de…
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Liza Costello
If it's not plausible, it didn't happen
A few years ago, I attended a Poetry Ireland event at which the poet Don Patterson spoke. Someone asked what he thought of themed collections, noting…
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Liza Costello
3
Chekhov's long knives
never mind his gun for now
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Liza Costello
1
Poe's coffin
Initially, I thought I’d begin this post with a brief summary of the life of Edgar Allan Poe, who lived and died within the first half of the nineteenth…
 • 
Liza Costello
figuring out how fiction works
figuring out how fiction works
On the art and craft of writing fiction via close readings of good novels (and the occasional film)
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figuring out how fiction works

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