HOW TO WRITE AN AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL NOVEL

How To Write An Autobiographical Novel, Alexander Chee, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2018, 380 pp

 I have wanted to read this book ever since it was published. Now, thanks to The Tiny Book Club, I have. Because I had read with great pleasure Chee's 2016 novel, The Queen of the Night, I knew he was a wonderful writer. Now I know how he became one.

In a series of autobiographical essays, collected and revised, he tells a great deal of his life story, including his family background, his education, his writing teachers and his first forays into publishing. These essays just sing with story and humor and emotion. 

For me, both the boon and the conundrum coming from my reading the book, were how it caused me to examine my own approach to writing. I won't go into all the soul searching and changes Mr Chee put me through, because it was personal in a way I could only try to convey to my reading group members, one a published poet and the other a highly educated reader.

If you are a writer at any stage of becoming or growth, I highly recommend the book, not so much for learning the craft or the business of writing but for how to BE a writer. It is one of the best I have read and I have read plenty.

THE SUCCESSFUL NOVELIST

The Successful Novelist, David Morrell, Sourcebooks Inc, 2008, 281 pp

The subtitle of this book is "A Lifetime of Lessons About Writing and Publishing." David Morrell is the author of First Blood, (1972), the novel from which "Rambo" was made. I have never read any of his novels though he's written 19 of them, the most recent of which was published in 2007. In any case, he knows what he is talking about.

I read the book over several months. I am usually reading something about writing as a means of keeping me inspired and reminding myself that it is something one actually has to sit down and do. Morrell touches all the bases and his writing is fine. It moves along, is conversational and even covers a few facts I had not known before. For example, an author should buy up as many copies of any novel he wrote which is remaindered and sell them himself at readings and through his website.

The sections I liked best were at the beginning when he told his life story, how he became a novelist and then how he became successful. There is also a great chapter on how to focus your story. I will be suing this book in my continuing efforts to write some decent fiction.