Suspend Your Disbelief

Posts Tagged ‘Celeste Ng’

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"She is not a complete master of a house, so that comes over in her writing, too."

by Celeste Ng

You have probably heard by now that V. S. Naipaul issued a broad-handed diss to women writers, claiming no female writer could be his equal: He felt that women writers were “quite different”. He said: “I read a piece of writing and within a paragraph or two I know whether it is by a woman or not. I think [it is] unequal to me.” The author, who was born in Trinidad, said this was because of women’s “sentimentality, the narrow view of the world”. “And inevitably for a woman, she is not a complete master of a house, so that […]


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Kindle-proof your manuscript

by Celeste Ng

Okay, so maybe you are a confirmed Kindle-hater. And you’re also a writer. You’ve sworn to yourself that you will never, ever, allow your words to be displayed on a Kindle. But as a writer, you don’t always have control over the format of your book. What to do? At The Millions, Garth Risk Hallberg offers 7 ways to “Kindle-proof” your manuscript. For example: Play With Text, Typeface, and White Space eReaders currently use two approaches to rendering text. One is quasi-photographic, but the Kindle’s remains the more battery-efficient method of imposing a standard typeface. This makes the effects of […]


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Reading Bad: why writers should read "bad" books

by Celeste Ng

Most writers agree that in order to write, you must also read. Author Allison Winn Scotch raised this point in a recent blog post titled just that: I think being a successful writer means reading your peers and learning from them too – I can’t tell you how much reading authors whom I admire has helped me up my game. Additionally, I think it’s hard to get into a literary state of mind without, well, being literary. And Pulitzer Prize-winner Jennifer Egan agreed, saying in an interview (via): My advice is so basic. Number one: Read. I feel like it’s […]


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Poetry bomber

by Celeste Ng

Ever hear of knitbombing? Well, now, there’s poetry bombing. Galleycat reports: Miami artist Agustina Woodgate illustrated the art of “poetry bombing,” sewing snippets of poems into thrift store clothes. Here’s a video: Poetry is so well suited for this, but can you imagine fiction bombing? Little snippets of short stories or knockout lines from novels hidden… anywhere?


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The secret lives of literary characters

by Celeste Ng

I have a theory that in 50 years, or maybe even 20, scholars will be studying a new form of fiction that’s just beginning now. It’s not exactly narrative, nor is it strictly prose. In fact, some of it isn’t even stories. But it involves imagining the secret details of characters’ lives, articulating their thoughts and fears, developing their voices and diction and tone. Unlike typical fanfiction, this new mode of storytelling often use social media or other unconventional means, as if the characters themselves were real people living in and interacting in our world. For lack of a better […]


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Readings as patronage events?

by Celeste Ng

Should author readings be free? That’s what the New York Times wondered recently in a story about indie bookstores that charge admission for author events. Bookstores, including some of the most prominent around the country, have begun selling tickets or requiring a book purchase of customers who attend author readings and signings, a practice once considered unthinkable. “There’s no one right now who’s not considering it,” said Sarah McNally, the owner of McNally Jackson Books in the SoHo neighborhood of Manhattan. “The entire independent bookstore model is based on selling books, but that model is changing because so many book […]


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How far can book promotions go?

by Celeste Ng

My friends who are literary agents have told me about the many ways authors try to catch their attention: packages of cookies sent with their manuscripts; queries tucked into oven mitts shaped like sunflowers (of all things). But this might be the ultimate guerrilla book promotion: faking a kidnapping to promote your book. Yes. Mark Davis, a thriller writer, did just that. Reports the News Advance of Lynchburg, Virginia: His main character, Perno Morris, is a failed novelist who has grown weary (and, perhaps, been pushed over the edge of sanity) by a discouraging series of rejections by publishers. So […]


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Unbound: a Kickstarter for books

by Celeste Ng

Unbound allows authors to pitch book ideas and interested readers to fund those books. Says the site: Unbound is a new way of connecting with writers. Most of the writers on our site will be well known, others will appear here for the first time. What’s different is that instead of waiting for them to publish their work, Unbound allows you to listen to their ideas for what they’d like to write before they even start. If you like their idea, you can pledge to support it. If we hit the target number of supporters, the author can go ahead […]


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Does YA fiction lead to dark thoughts, or do dark thoughts lead to YA fiction?

by Celeste Ng

Which came first, the moody teen, or the YA fiction that moody teens often gravitate towards? Linda Holmes of NPR responds to a recent Wall Street Journal editorial that criticized YA fiction for being “too dark”: I’m more intrigued by the aspirational nature of the quaint but sad idea that teenagers, if you don’t give them The Hunger Games, can be effectively surrounded by images of joy and beauty. While the WSJ piece refers to the YA fiction view of the world as a funhouse mirror, I fear that what’s distorted is the vision of being a teenager that suggests […]




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