The other day I was thinking about how certain novels have a big part to play in developing our writing, and wanted to share my personal list with you (including specific lessons they teach about craft).
I invite you to pick and choose, discover other titles of your choice that fulfil the same ‘writing lesson,’ and hopefully offer me some recommendations too! After all, reading should be first and foremost a joy; not a means to an end. By the end of this article you will:
- Be more aware of how to develop the minutiae of craft through reading fiction.
- Be able to apply it the next time you read something new.
Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
Say What?
The life and times of the original desperate housewife in 19th century France.
How Can It Improve Your Writing?
- Improves your description of the natural world.
- Reveals how a character’s ‘fatal flaw’ can guide a narrative.
Have you ever noticed the way colour is applied in an Impressionist painting? The way each stroke builds the emotions and essence of a place or person?
Flaubert is a master of this in writing, especially when it comes to descriptions of the Normandy countryside. He shows how to paint finer shades of meaning from the natural world, build a complex ‘impression’ of it and how to place characters within this context.
Also, with every crisis Emma Bovary encounters being essentially of her own making, Flaubert reveals how you don’t have to struggle thinking of plot ideas. Simply develop your characters well and let their personalities and desires guide what happens next.
I’m Not Scared by Niccolò Ammaniti
Say What?
Wheat-scorched Italian countryside. Playing out with friends to discover innocence-shattering secrets.
How Can It Improve Your Writing?
- Demonstrates a beautifully simple style.
- Shows how to expertly write about the adult world from a child’s perspective.
Some prose reads like an overstuffed Edwardian hat: brimming with lace, frills and a furry creature long since deceased.
Ammaniti’s writing is the total opposite, the Coco Chanel of prose. Both his language and plot are boyish, elegant and chic in the earthiest way possible. There are numerous coming of age novels, but this I find the most subtle and authentic of all.
Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel
Say What?
A Mexican love story involving food, magic realism and a whole lot of patience.
How Can It Improve Your Writing?
- Demonstrates how to connect with the senses and how to use your character’s world to express them.
Protagonist Tita has to wait years to finally be with Pedro, and the only way she can express her love is through cooking. This no doubt demonstrates how to use the senses effectively in our writing.
Sometimes when we’re describing something we forget the whole of the five sense ‘palette,’ unaware that we can make better use of it and even expand upon it.
Expressing the senses through a character’s world lies not only in the realms of Magic realism; whether it be cooking as in Tita’s case, the setting or even everyday objects. To offer an example, I once wrote a sentence expressing a melancholic Parisian afternoon:
When I walk out; the light bright out, a saxophone is a weeping willow on the bridge.
Here I allowed my emotions to express themselves without ‘telling’ the reader explicitly. The sound of a saxophone is reminiscent of Blues music and ‘weeping willow’ conjures images of ‘sadness,’ ‘tears,’ and being ‘hunched over.’
Salem’s Lot by Steven King
Say What?
A modern day Dracula in a small Maine town.
How Can It Improve Your Writing?
- Shows how to be the best ‘pantser’ on earth.
- Indicates how to handle a large cast of characters.
Stephen King admits that in a literary sense he’s not the best writer. But there’s a reason why he’s so popular. He knows how to tell a cracking good story and has a jolly good time doing it (went all 1940s there for some reason).
In other words he’s the ultimate ‘pantser.’ Often we become so rigid in plotting, we forget to just enjoy ourselves and go with the ride. This book (like pretty much any Stephen King novel) also teaches us how to successfully handle a large cast of characters and how their individual stories eventually entwine to become one.
Not an easy feat. So take a plane to Maine, get lost in a cellar and take some tips from the master storyteller.
The Call of the Wild by Jack London
Say What?
The Wild West of the Yukon gold rush (from the perspective of a St. Bernard-Scotch Collie mix).
How Can It Improve Your Writing?
- Allows you to explore other possibilities in point of view.
Humans? Pff…boring. How about a dog, or a toothpick, or a toaster? I bet they have stories of their own to tell and interesting ones at that.
Aside from the fact that The Call of the Wild is such a wonderful take on evolution in reverse, it opened my eyes to the fact that I could write as anybody and anything I wanted.
The Black Cloud by Fred Hoyle
Say What?
Stuffy British scientists resolving an ‘end of the world’ problem.
How Can It Improve Your Writing?
- Shows you how to be creative with the visual side of storytelling.
The Black Cloud is a science fiction novel filled with diagrams that give context to the scientists’ discoveries.
While not appropriate to every story, as a visual/kinaesthetic learner I always appreciate this extra information often used in the world of science fiction and fantasy.
But what if you could use it outside of these genres? How could your writing be designed physically on the page? How could you go beyond the limitations you’ve given yourself in terms of how a story is told?
Any Ernest Hemingway
How Can It Improve Your Writing?
- Teaches you to write with journalistic straightforwardness and detachment.
I was going to suggest The Old Man and the Sea but in fact any Hemingway would be just fine.
With his background in journalism, his style feels very much like reporting and because of this is always slightly detached from his characters (exaggerated even further by his frequent use of third-person objective POV).
You may feel this style doesn’t suit you. All the same, I feel that practising different styles and point of views is useful in discovering who we are as writers. Plus it’s fun trying on different author hats!
Adverbs by Daniel Handler
Say What?
A collection of witty short stories each taking an adverb as its title.
How Can It Improve Your Writing?
- Shows you how to effectively write humour.
Daniel Handler is ‘hands’ down my favourite author of all time, and many of you would better recognise him by his pseudonym ‘Lemony Snicket’ from the A Series of Unfortunate Events books.
Teetering on the edge of the dark and macabre, Handler’s writing is filled with irony. No one has taught me to write humorously better than him and I find myself sounding like him when I’m not writing prose.
By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept by Elizabeth Smart
Say What?
Outpourings from a poet in a peculiar position.
How Can It Improve Your Writing?
- Teaches you to write prose that abounds with poetic luxuriance.
Mistress to the married poet George Barker, this prose poem was influenced by their singular relationship, in which Smart bore several children.
I love poetry but the thought of reading a whole prose poem a mere 134 pages may be off-putting to some. But have a go, even if you don’t read the whole thing.
It goes down easier than a creamy whisky and I promise that the next time you write, your metaphors and similes will be the top of the class.
The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters
Say What?
Post-war Downtown Abbey gone wrong.
How Can It Improve Your Writing?
- Shows you how to build tension slowly.
I must confess that I’ve not completely finished this book but what it’s already taught me about craft needed to be mentioned.
It’s really a ghost story. This however is not apparent until well into the novel in which there’s a kind of genre shift from social/class drama to Gothic fiction.
It happens so slowly and imperceptibly that with a careful writer’s eye, you see how masterly Waters stays in control of the narrative.
* * *
I hope you benefit from this list and please offer your own suggestions using the same format in this post. I look forward to your words of wisdom.
Until next time,
Sophie X
You can certainly see your skills in the work you write. The arena hopes for more passionate writers such as you who aren’t afraid to mention how they believe. All the time go after your heart.
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