Louis’s Comments (group member since Jun 25, 2012)

Louis’s comments from the Q&A with Glenn Cheney group.

I read Coming Into the Country for a modern Western history class and loved it. I own Annals of the Former World; the size intimidates me but I fully expect to be entranced by it too. I read Didion's Where I Come From for a California history class and liked it quite a bit. Not sure if I've read any Lapham or Hoagland.

One of my favorite nonfiction works was written by a novelist, Son of the Morning Star by Evan Connell. He uses a stream of consciousness approach to Custer and the Little Bighorn that ends up being a solid history of the Indian Wars and Native-white relations in the West. It probably doesn't dovetail too well with your writing but I found it quite entertaining.

I have discovered over the years that something I enjoy will take time to get through because I have to allow for my flights of the imagination while reading. Sometimes they even lead to stopping to write down a quote or an idea in my journal. Bad writing (if the idea for the book was sound) can also be helpful; the book I just finished yesterday is a good example. It took me two months to finish in spite of the subject matter being of interest to me. At a certain point I started to read as an editor, thinking about anecdotes that slowed down the narrative or felt like unnecessary diversions. That kind of thinking can only help my own writing.

Re: your sentences. Did you read writers like Hemingway who write short sentences? Do you have any literary references that guided you by example? I trust you didn't read much Faulkner and his long sentences full of diversions.

Thanks for the advice. I don't have kids so I think I can set my writing time for the evening (I have getting up early issues that I seem unable to deal with). Actually, the weekend is the time I could do a lot more writing.

Your reference to Gettysburg made me think of one of my favorite historical novels, The Killer Angels. Although Shaara's book is definitely fiction it still has the feel of a well-researched book. I appreciate your sending me the free section of your book on Thanksgiving; I enjoyed it quite a bit and is a big reason I wanted to participate in your discussions here.

So I take it that's why you became a writer?

How did you get to the point where you could write "all day, every day?" I have to plan my writing around my regular day job and at times it seems hopeless to think I can do it all. Thanks.

A lot of my reading tends to be genre fiction but I believe plenty of genre novels can be literary fiction as well. Three of my favorite novels are Lonesome Dove, The Killer Angels and Little Big Man. Each could be called a genre work: western, war, comic/western. How strict a boundary do you see between genre and literary fiction? What do you see as good fiction? I don't have the most highbrow tastes and I'm curious about this. Louis

Glenn, I was a history major in college, so most of my nonfiction reading usually deals with the past. Do you view history as a branch of nonfiction? If so, do you try to bring your voice into it the same way you would a more current form of nonfiction? Louis

OK, but you can talk about it if you need to do so.