Birnam Wood is the new novel by the New Zealand writer, Eleanor Catton, a literary author who crosses into mystery and suspense. Her previous novel, The Luminaries, was a brick of…
What I'm Reading
Book discussions with a focus on the writer's craft
Writers' Toolbox
Elements of craft discussed in this blog.
- Defining character through dialogue (2)
- Using the structures a character creates as a window into the character (2)
- Writing about a sibling relationship (2)
- Preparing for the extraordinary by evoking the mundane (1)
- Sustaining a core mystery (1)
- Changing the point of view to add emphasis (1)
- Witholding information to create a magnetic character (1)
- Using objects to create time markers in a fluid timeline (1)
- Staging a surprise ending (1)
- Using backstory to enhance the reader's empathy for a character (1)
- Avoiding sensationalism in a novel about the abuse of boundaries (1)
- Giving the reader more information than the protagonist has (1)
- Connecting different characters through the unifying element of shared disorder (1)
- Maintaining two narrative timelines (1)
- Making a character come alive through visual details (1)
- Rising action leading to a climactic scene (1)
- Retelling the Oedipus Myth in a gender-fluid and time-fluid story (1)
- Using a flat character to add momentum to a narrative (1)
- How extended dialogue can prepare for a moment of decision (1)
- Developing a strong narrator presence through tone (1)
- Balancing a novel's emotional terrain through character (1)
- Using plot to create false assumptions about what will happen. (1)
- Withholding the novel's intention (1)
- Creating a guide character (1)
- The long approach: Opening a novel with a sweeping introductory vision (1)
- Creating a shadowed life: the slow trickle of an unsettled past (1)
- Using an object to reveal and distinguish a character (1)
- Setting up a reversal (1)
- Using a first person voice to drive the narrative (1)
- Using a small space to build tension between two characters (1)
- Setting a performance within a novel: what it can achieve (1)
- Hiding the narrative design (1)
- Planting a seed of disorder within each character to grow into a believable chaos (1)
- Using mystery to define the limits of a character's experience (1)
- Using an image to show what the character is feeling (1)
- The Ticking Clock: Using the calendar to escalate tension (1)
- Building a novel around a single theme (1)
- Achieving transparency in scene and dialogue to reveal emotional turmoil (1)
- Fictionalizing an historic figure (1)
