How to Write an Autobiographical Novel

by Alexander Chee · read July 2, 2019

Review

Took me a bit of time to warm up to this one but I was definitely pulled in. I think my favourite essay was the one about keeping a rose garden, and the collection as a whole reignited my interest in writing.

If I do not answer the question "What is the novel about?" or "How is the novel going?", it is because my sense of a novel changes in the same way my knowledge of someone changes as I get to know them. You are looking for an answer you can rely on later, and so am I. But my answer will eventually be the entire book, and I do not want to give any of it away.

Julia Cooke © 2023