What are the important elements for writing a 'novel-like story' that excites and interests readers?



When creating a story, it is important not only to have beautiful and well-thought-out sentences and structure, but also to have elements that surprise and excite the reader. In his book ``

How to Draw a Novel, '' author Martín Solares, who turned from an editor to a novelist, describes the characteristics of a ``novel-like story'' that captures the reader's interest. , and explains it by contrasting it with artistic literature.

Martín Solares on Creating Novelesque Excitement ‹ Literary Hub
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In English, there is an adjective called ``novelesque'', which is the word ` `novel '' with the suffix ``esque''. Novelesque has the meaning of ``a style of writing that is reminiscent of a novel,'' and in many cases, it refers to non-novels such as biographies and academic books that are written in a way that is easy to read and full of interest like a novel. It is used to contrast a literary novel with an artistic literary work.

In the latter half of the 20th century, writers such as Marcel Proust, Franz Kafka, and William Faulkner appeared who wrote novels with beautiful prose that was closer to poetry. According to Thomas Pavel, a professor emeritus and literary theorist at the University of Chicago, an attempt to imitate their great predecessors in the late 20th century has resulted in a plethora of 'absolutely boring books.' On the other hand, because adventure novels, which were popular to a certain extent at the time, were the only non-literary novelsque novels, people came to understand that novelesques were works of fiction that had their feet on the ground. says.



Mr. Solares emphasizes novelesque as an expression of surprise, adventure, and interesting anecdotes, far from boredom or distraction. According to Mr. Solares, American television programs in the early 21st century actively adopted novelesque in the original sense, that is, strategies of constant surprise and attracting the reader's interest. As a result, even novels that had tended toward literary or aesthetic loftiness returned to the adventure novel style novelesque of the 19th century, and novels with narrative appeal were born.

The important point of novelesque, Mr. Solares says, is not whether it is literary or not, but that it regularly provokes the ``burning question'' in the reader: ``What will happen next?''

According to Rafael Baroni, who studies the interests and emotions evoked by works of fiction, the tension felt when reading a novelesque story follows a well-crafted aim, and in that sense can be called a ``poetic effect.'' I can say it. Baroni characterizes novelesques as ``the tension builds when the reader has to wait to see how a plot will be resolved, and it is this waiting that creates the uncertainty that causes a violent reaction when the denouement is read.'' I have it.''



However, with regard to key elements such as surprise and question-inducing wait times, simply analyzing and mechanically imitating the systems of past attractive works will not necessarily work. Mr. Solares says that it is important to express your own work and then devise ways to skillfully use the characteristics of novelesque in your work.

in Note, Posted by log1e_dh