Wonderful Small Books

                      Does size matters?

             The classification of book as novel, novella, novelette and short story is not an easy job. Reviewers/Editors/Critiques classify randomly and seldom bother to follow international standard. Some literary guild had been doing the exercise but they also do not have universal acceptance. 

              If we say that the novella is written with a satirical, moral or educational nature and purpose, it would be a gross generalization and the very object of the author could be defeated by such blatant categorization. Or a story may even have the ingredient of a novel like multiple characters, sub-plots, conflicts and twists, and all novels are also ultimately a story.

              "The Science Fiction" and "Fantasy Writers of America" specifies word lengths for each category of its Nebula award categories: Novel over 40,000 words, Novella 17,500 to 40,000 words, Novelette 7,500 to 17,500 words, Short Story under 7,500 words.

             How the words would be counted, is also not defined. There are different opinions and "different word counting programs may give varying results, depending on the text segmentation rule details, and on whether words outside the main text (such as footnotes, endnotes, or hidden text) are counted. But the behavior of most major word processing applications is broadly similar" as endorsed by Wiki.

           A reader, however remains unaffected by such jugglery and is straightforward in judging the true value of the books. Some, such books which are though small in word count, but have influenced the life or thought process of millions of people are listed here. If by chance we have over passed any of them earlier this is the high time to pick it now.

1. Jonathan Livingstone Seagull by Richard Bach is a book that teaches self -perfection, how to be true to yourself and keep working on love. It is motivational, life changing book, if taken seriously.

2. Notes from the Underground by Fyodor Dostoyevsky is a book from which many theories of Philosophies have emerged and also a paradigm shift in many existing philosophies has occurred. The description of mental state when one enjoys sufferings and conscious inertia makes this book as a masterpiece.

3.  The Little Prince by Antoine De Saint-Exupery is most-read, most-translated book of the world. The book has been tagged in the category of "Children's Book" would sure leave every mature wondering about the strangeness and logistics of the adult world.

4. Who moved my cheese? By Spencer Johnson would change how you perceive the changes that are taking place in your life. It is written like a fable which has maximum appeal for the human psyche.

5. Self-reliance by R.W. Emerson  is a book of essay. You may have to re-read to grasp the depiction of self worth by trusting your own self.

6. The old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway can be put at the top of the list, if this matters at all. There are very few books in the world that would touch your heart and mind both equally. Moreover who would not honor the struggle of old man and also would feel honored in doing so.

             This list would grow if you can add few books of your choice in the comments.

   

Modern Masters of English Literature

          Modern masters of English Literature

“He dug so deeply into her sentiments that in search of interest he found love, ... once more in the youthful superstition that poverty was the servitude of love.”-- One Hundred Years of Solitude By Gabriel Garcia Marquez .

The secret of happiness is not doing what we like but in liking what we do.” ― J.M. Coetzee

There are many more. These are first two names that come to my mind.  They have written books that influence our life. The thoughts and desires stacked in sub-conscious mind pop up and some conclusions are drawn when prejudices are shredded.

The Magic Realism of Márquez is captivating. We live in the town of Mocondo when reading his book “One hundred years of solitude”, and become a friend of Florentino Ariza while reading “Love in the Time of Cholera”. The academic debate to categorize his work as Realism, Magical realism, surrealism or Magical surrealism could be endless. For a non-literature reader it is fantasy and he would call it as  Simply Fantabulous. It was his childhood dream to write about his town but to weave a story like that surpasses many realms of human existential consciousness.

In the end when Aureliano deciphers parchments Marquez writes

“It was the history of the family, written by Melquiades, down to the most trivial details, one hundred years ahead of time. He had written it in Sanskrit, which was his mother tongue.”

It shows the eastern inclination of author where it is believed that Valmiki wrote the great epic of Ramayana in Sanskrit before birth of Rama.

His books are criticized for promiscuity and incestuous relations of his characters. Death, violence and revolutions have always promoted promiscuity and incestuous relations in the society. Author simply narrates multi-faceted human behavior in an interesting way.

Similarly “Disgrace” by Coetzee tells how a  human emotion of attraction and its exhibition scares the society to condemn and thrust disgrace on a noble man.

In “Life and times of Michael K “ Coetzee enters into the mind of a simpleton who is deformed and acts dumb.

It is not strange to find such characters in every society, but it needs exceptional talent to identify them and find a philosophy in their behavior. That is how immortal books are written by Grand Masters.

When authors become a celebrity the society is cruel to them. They are also required to pay a price like any other celebrity in the field of Politics, Cinema and sports which are more or less skills. I think the public should be kind to painters, authors, scientist and sculptors who are differently molded and are creative . Both the modern masters have inspired authors to write in their own unique style  and explore one of your own from  infinite  dimensions of literary styles.

Are some Indian authors in the queue?

Break Your Glass-Ceiling

                          How to Choose What to Read Next ?

Reading books is like climbing the stairs of multi story building when lift is out of order and you live on the top floor. You have to break a glass ceiling at every floor to enhance your vision and joy of being closer to your destination.

I reviewed my reading habits. I found that after every certain spell of time I lost interest in one genre and shifted to another. When saturation of one genre came something happened which broke the glass ceiling and I could rise to another level of understanding.

Here are books or authors at each level:

1.Comics—

2.Enid Blyton- Famous five series

3.Alice in wonderland, Alibaba, Arabian Tales, Sindbad, Marco Polo, Panchtantra, Little Prince, Gulliver’s Travels etc.

                                       1.  GLASS-CEILING

4.Romance books and love story--Mills and Boon (Mostly Girls)

5.Sci-fi fiction, Horror for boys, though it could be vice versa or both.

                                         2. GLASS-CEILING

6. Matured romantic books—Gone with the wind, Thorn bird, Sidney Sheldon,

7. Suspense and crime thrillers—James Hadley Chase, Robert Ludlum, John Grisham, Mario Puzo

                                          3. GLASS-CEILING

8. Books based on facts- Ken Follett, Irving Wallace, Wilbur Smith, Arthur Halley, James Clavell

9. Banned books —Lady Chatterley’s lover, Lolita, Nancy Friday, Anonymous

                                     4. GLASS-CEILING

10.Fiction with philosophy—Ayn Rand, Paulo Coelho, David Brown, Khaled Hosseini, Murakami, Aldus Huxley, George, Orwell. Saul Bellow  

11. Autobiographies—Benjamin Franklin,  Albert Einstein, Mahatma Gandhi,

                                        5. GLASS-CEILING

           
12.  Classical Books—Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Shakespeare,   Jane Austin, Pearl Buck, Earnest Hemmingway, Somersaught Maugham, Bertrand Russel

13. Text books of Philosophy, Psychology, and History to understand literature.   

                                       6. GLASS-CEILING

14. Philosophical or Psychological Fiction—Robert M. Pirsig, Jostein Gaarder, Mark Haddon, J.M.Coetzee, Gabriel Garcia Marquezss,

15. Self-improvement Books-- Malcolm Gladwell, Robin Sharma, Rhonda Byrne

                                     7. GLASS-CEILING

16. Philosophical Fiction- Jean Paul Sartre, Albert Camus, Friedrich Nietzsche, Kafka, Hermann Hess,  

 17. Supernatural and spiritual literature- Harold Kushner, Dalai Lama, Swami Rama, Swami Yogananda, Richard Bach, Elizabeth Gilbert, Mitch Albom.


This list cannot be exhaustive. It is just to give you an idea how things change with the passage of time. If they have not changed for you since long then you are stuck at a glass ceiling and this is high time for you to pick up your next genre.

An Author, Salesman and artisanal Publisher

                                   When Author is also a Salesman

If you born as an author you are not far from being a salesman and artisanal Publishers.

In ancient time (only a few decade back) an author was only an author. He had a desire to share his dreams and views with others. He seldom bothered about commerce of his books.

Sophia Tolstaya wife of Leo Tolstoy took care of financial aspects of her husband’s work. She was also a copyist for Leo Tolstoy and wrote his great work “War and Peace” seven times from beginning to end.

Most of the authors now say that writing a book is only 20% component of the project. Rests 80% is getting it published and make it reach in the hands of a reader.

By the time your script is rejected by good number of publisher and Google is unable to provide you with a fresh list, you would start losing faith in your writing skill. The second good story that had germinated while writing your debut would be worst hit. You would be tempted to shelve that in a corner of mind for time being.

While waiting for more rejections you would contemplate an e-book and self published paperback. It may take a long time to comprehend the mechanism and mathematics of self published book. The only satisfaction you may draw is that your book saw the light of the day. It would not stir the literary world, as it would not reach in the hands of elite whose opinion matters in literary world.

Some authors write specific genre for specific clientele. Others want to ride the wave and write something that would sale. The idea is not the book but money is the ideal. They are always a winner. Anyone who knows how to surf a tide is winner. He may not be an author but he is winner of the game of which you are also a participant.

Even if you have written a book on “old age” publishers note would come requesting some youth material in it, because youth is the potential buyer. Publishing has become tough day by day. Publishers invest money expecting some returns. He does all the labor to establish you as a writer and when by chance if you are successful, you reap all the benefits of fame popularity and money.

I would suggest to all those who are reading this article “WRITE A BOOK”. Anyone can write at least one good book in his life. You have learnt your lessons of life and faced ups and downs, just sit on key board and pen (?) them down. That is the minimum you can do to make yourself immortal and preserve memories in the heart of your offspring.

Other related post

 Hoax of Self-Publishing

© Vipin Behari Goyal