Understanding novels : a lively exploration of literary form and technique

'The approach is zestful and exhilarating. The style engages in a dialogue with the reader' Derek Neale, Creative Writing Tutor, The Open University Understanding Novels is a lively and entertaining guide to analysing literary form to make everyday reading more enriching, satisfying and fun. Bestselling literature author, Thomas C. Foster, writes in an informal and engaging style to show how a novel's structure - point of view, narrative voice, chapter construction, character `emblems' and even the first sentence, serve to create meaning and form the special literary language of the novel. The way the story is told is as important as the story being told and influences how readers will respond. If readers are going to hold the life and death of novels in their hands, they should probably find out more about them. . . For book lovers and literature buffs who want to get more insight, more understanding, and more pleasure from their reading - this is an excellent, non-academic guide, featuring an impressive array of modern and classic literature examples. Preface: Novel possibilities, or all animals aren't pigs? -- Introduction: Once upon a time : a short, chaotic, and entirely idiosyncratic history of the novel -- Pickup lines and open(ing) seductions or, why novels have first pages -- You can't breathe where the air is clear -- Who's in charge here? -- Never trust a narrator with a speaking part -- A still, small voice (or a great, galumphing one) -- Men (and women) made out of words, or, My pip ain't like your pip -- When very bad people happen to good novels -- Wrinkles in time, or Chapters just might matter -- Everywhere is just one place -- Clarissa's flowers -- Met-him-pike-hoses -- Life sentences -- Drowning in the stream of consciousness -- The light on Daisy's dock -- Fiction about fiction -- Source codes and recycle bins -- Interlude: Read with your ears -- Improbabilities : foundlings and magi, colonels and boy wizards -- What's the big idea -- or even the small one? -- Who broke my novel? -- Untidy endings -- History in the novel/the novel in history -- Conspiracy theory -- Conclusion: The never-ending journey. A lively and entertaining guide to understanding and dissecting novels to make everyday reading more enriching, satisfying and fun. Understanding Novels shows how a novel's structure - point of view, narrative voice, chapter construction, character emblems create meaning and form the special literary language of the novel.