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Consider This
Moments in My Writing Life after Which Everything Was Different
271 pages
A gritty, generous masterclass in storytelling delivered from a barstool by a literary provocateur.
What it feels like
Reading this book feels like pulling up a chair next to a seasoned, slightly dangerous mentor at a dive bar. It moves at a brisk, conversational clip, blending punchy, minimalist prose with wild anecdotes from book tours and writing workshops. The mood is intimate and gritty, stripping away the romanticized veneer of the writing life to reveal the sweat, rules, and rule-breaking underneath. It is less a traditional textbook and more a generous, wry transmission of hard-won secrets from the trenches of transgressive fiction. Aspiring authors and fans of unconventional storytelling will devour its practical advice, finding themselves both entertained by the chaotic memoir elements and deeply inspired by its underlying reverence for the craft of fiction.
- Mood
- intimate
- gritty
- reflective
- anecdotal
- Tone
- conversational
- blunt
- generous
- wry
- unconventional
- Pace
- brisk
- Themes
- the craft of storytelling · the writer's life · finding artistic voice · the intersection of life and art · creative community
- The writing
- Punchy, minimalist, and conversational, utilizing the very same rhythmic, rule-breaking techniques he teaches.
- The arc
- Moves from gritty, chaotic anecdotes of a writer's early struggles to a generous, hard-won appreciation for the power of storytelling.
- Who it's for
- Aspiring writers and fans of transgressive fiction who want practical, no-nonsense craft advice mixed with wild literary anecdotes.
Content notes
- profanity
- frank discussions of violence and trauma
- substance use references
About the book
"In this spellbinding blend of memoir and insight, bestselling author Chuck Palahniuk shares stories and generous advice on what makes writing powerful and what makes for powerful writing. With advice grounded in years of careful study and a keenly observed life, Palahniuk combines practical advice and concrete examples from beloved classics, his own books, and a "kitchen-table MFA" culled from an evolving circle of beloved authors and artists, with anecdotes, postcards from the road, and much more. Clear-eyed, sensitive, illuminating, and knowledgeable, Consider This is Palahniuk's love letter to stories and storytellers, booksellers and books themselves"--
Description from Open Library.
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