Let’s pick up on our plunge into Ben Lerner’s excellent Transcription. In this first section of the story (first of three), the as yet unnamed protagonist arrives in Providence, Rhode Island where he went to school some twenty years before and where he met his wife, Mia, and studied with Thomas, his mentor. As I mentioned, he’s returning to Providence, a place redolent with memory, to interview an elderly Thomas. The night of his arrival, he intends to go to Thomas’ house and

Today, let’s examine a new book, Ben Lerner’s 2026 novel, Transcription. Mr. Lerner is the acclaimed author of three previous novels and several books of poetry. Transcription is written in first person, simple past tense although the first person narrator is a different character in the story’s third section which indicates the work of the implied author. There are three distinct sections to the book. I’ll say more about this but today I want to compare the story’s beginning

Today, let’s look at the conclusion of Michael Ondaatje’s Warlight and make our own meaning of this fine story. In the chapter entitled “The Astral Plough,” we return to Nathaniel’s narration, along with a time leap to 1949, when he was working at the Archives. This short chapter ends with two italicized sentences, the first a question addressed to his mother: “What did you do that was so terrible?” and an apparent answer from his deceased mother: “My sins are various.” I bel

As promised, let’s look at the penultimate section of Michael Ondaatje’s Warlight, entitled “The Boy on the Roof.” Up to this point, the story has been churning along in fine fashion, using the perspective of Nathaniel Williams to carry us to Nathaniel’s mother, Rose’s death. Nathaniel asks his deceased mother to tell him about the man “you lied to me about.” (and this implies that he’s aware and has accepted that she did lie to him about her past). The new section begins wit

Hello. I have returned from NYC where I attended a conference focused on marketing rather than writing a novel. I learned a lot and am happy to be back. Let’s jump into Michael Ondaatje’s Warlight. The next chapter of the book is entitled “In the Archives” and has to do with Nathaniel’s work in the Foreign Office in 1959. He continues to look for information regarding his now-deceased mother and her wartime activities but finds little. Although he describes being estranged fr

Hello. My apologies but I am not posting this week. I am in New York City at a writer's conference, trying to get my new novel published. I'm learning a lot but it's taken up my time for other things. I'll return next week with more on Warlight. I hope everyone is well. Till then.

The second section of Michael Ondaatje’s Warlight is entitled Inheritance. What has been inherited, you ask? Let’s continue, searching for answers. It begins: “In November of 1959, when I was twenty-eight, after some years of what had felt like wildness, I bought a home for myself in a Suffolk village that could be reached by a few hours train-ride from London.” A short digression on craft. Mr. Ondaatje lets we the readers know when and where we are in a direct and masterly w

At the same time that Nathaniel, the narrator/protagonist of Michael Ondaatje’s Warlight, is having sex with Agnes in otherwise abandoned buildings, the Darter, a family regular since the disappearance of Nathaniel’s parents, involves Nathaniel and his sister, Rachel, in nightly boat trips to smuggle greyhounds into Britain for dog races. Nathaniel enjoys it. Woof! “That first magical summer of my life we smuggled more than forty-five dogs a week at the height of the racing s

The overall theme of Michael Ondaatje’s Warlight, seems to be how the past effects the present, or, to put it another way, how our experiences make us who we are. One of the experiences the narrator Nathaniel reflects on in the story is his relationships with women. He undergoes the disappearance of his mother, Rose, just before his sexual awakening. Coincidence, you ask? As our old friend Don Juan said, there are no coincidences—especially in fiction. (He didn’t say that las

An important question to ponder in reading Warlight by Michael Ondaatje is, just what kind of story is it? Fiction or memoir? If it’s fiction there should be elements of traditional story structure therein—a dramatic question, an inciting incident, beginning, middle, and end, climax and resolution. Is it a memoir? “A memoir is a factual, narrative nonfiction account written from the author’s personal perspective. Derived from the French word mémoire (meaning "memory"), it foc

This week, dear friends, a new story, Michael Ondaatje’s 2018 Warlight. Like Ondaatje’s The English Patient, this novel is set in the aftermath of WWII. In fact, one reviewer said that Warlight is like the B-side of English Patient—this was meant as praise, meaning that Warlight explores similar themes but is not as overtly romantic; in a sense, quieter and more restrained. (There are no planes in Warlight. There are boats—barges and leaky fishing craft). The title refers to

As we approach the end of our stroll through Yang Shuang-zi’s Taiwan Travelogue, it would be good to give further consideration to the intriguing preface and several afterwords, known collectively and formally as paratext. Our friend A.I. says, “Paratext refers to the elements surrounding a text—such as covers, titles, prefaces, and footnotes—that frame, promote, and help readers interpret it. Coined by Gérard Genette, this "threshold" material, including design and formattin

Two-thirds of the way through Yang Shuang-zi’s Taiwan Travelogue, a shift occurs, a shift in both plot and tone. As I mentioned last week, the novel’s protagonist Aoyama, asks her Taiwanese interpreter, Chi-chan, to accompany her to Japan where they will live together and Chi-chan can pursue her interest in translation. However, Chi-chan refuses and says that Aoyama has a “blind spot.” The two women continue to travel through Taiwan but, looking back from the vantage point of

In Yang Shuang-zi’s Taiwan Travelogue, the story continues in a somewhat playful tone through the middle section of the book. The narrator. Aoyama, describes a chaste infatuation with her interpreter/companion, Chi-chan, who remains inscrutable. Around page 174, after learning that Chi-chan faces an unhappy arranged marriage with an older man who will expect her to do nothing more than produce sons, Aoyama asks her to come to Japan with her, where they will live together, and

I want to say a big thank you to those posting five-star reviews on Amazon for my books, The Hour of Parade and The Puppet's Tattered Clothes. Your kind remarks are appreciated. I am currently revising The Hour of Parade and hope to re-publish it. Thanks again. (I am smiling inwardly. At you.).

The middle part of Yang Shuang-zi’s Taiwan Travelogue shows a slow escalation of the themes introduced during and after the book’s inciting incident. Aoyama is increasingly attracted to O-san, and vice versa—seemingly, although this is put into question later. After all, it’s all presented through Aoyama’s perspective. And there’s a strong sense of Aoyama being outraged by the racism shown to the Taiwanese by the Japanese, although, again, this is later re-contextualized. The

Last time, in a first discussion of Yang Shuang-zi’s novel Taiwan Travelogue , I mentioned that the book’s form conveys information about and is congruent with, the story. It was only a day later that a man came up to me on the street, tears in his eyes, and said, “But what did you mean by that?” Alarmed by random encounters, I hurried away, but ever since, his question has nagged me, and I will attempt to explain. In a story about things not being what they seem, the novel’s

This week, a new and very interesting book, dear friends, Yang Shuang-zi’s 2020 novel, Taiwan Travelogue. Originally published in Taiwan, this book has been short-listed for the 2026 International Booker Prize and was translated to English by Lin King in 2024. What the heck is very interesting about this novel? you say. Well, on the surface, it appears to be a reprint of an old travel book about a Japanese woman visiting Taiwan in the late 1930s. The publisher has taken pai

This just in— The Wax Child did not make the cut for the International Booker Prize short list. Oh, oh, the wax child isn’t going to like that. The Wax Child by Olga Ravn is a story set in historic time—early 17 th century Denmark. However, there is no statement of this in the beginning of the text. Of course, due to a phenomenon we have previously noted, the reader who comes to this book no doubt has some preconceptions that may include the story’s historic setting. Indee

Last time, I proposed discussing the effect of utilizing an inanimate narrator in Olga Ravn’s The Wax Child . Here goes: This is not the first story to have an inanimate narrator. Orhan Pamuk’s My Name Is Red features narration by the color red; a fig tree does the job in Elif Shafak's The Island of Missing Trees . (‘Kay, a tree is alive, but you get the idea). Indeed, we could say that many novels feature an omniscient narrator with no identifying information provided abou