Customer Reviews

How to Read Novels Like a Professor: A Jaunty Exploration of the World's Favorite Literary Form

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I am still on the fence about this book. Having read his prior guide, "How to Read Literature...", I was looking very forward to this work as well. Having finished, I am not exactly sure where I stand. To be honest, I was looking forward to something a bit more similar to his first book. This guide has a roughly similar idea, but it really did not do anything for me as far as learning how to read a novel. It was more of a study in novel history, styles, and techniques. It did offer some wonderful insight in why authors do what they do, the choices they make, and experiments they take. The problem is that Foster did not offer much in how to interpret this. It was like a study in the various ways writers craft their technique and how it differs between them (and time). Which leads me to the next thing...

This book, perhaps, should have been titled, "How to Craft Novels Like a Writer", or some other similar idea. There is a lot in here for an aspiring writer, examples of different techniques, character studies, writing styles, plot, theme, and so forth. I got much more out of this book on a writing level than on a reading level. He even references his creative writing classes several times as examples. All of the examples used to try and illustrate how to `read' a passage was much better used as a writing guideline / example. So, in other words, the book makes a great guide for aspiring writers and for those who want some history and aspects of the novel as a form of lit. If you are looking for something as straightforward as his first book, this does not come close. I know some people had an issue with his `cookie-cutter' approach in his first work, but that is exactly why it is now being used in the classroom by many teachers, including myself. It offered some very straight forward approaches in how to look at, scrutinize, and analyze literature. It is also not as exciting or as humorous as his first work either; this book comes off a bit more dry at parts. I found myself skimming and skipping through a few areas. Don't get me wrong, this is a good book and it offered some really great information, but when compared to "How to Read Lit..." it is average at best. Three stars on a reading level, four, if not five, on a study in writing & technique.

As a high school English teacher with two small children, I rarely get a chance to read a book for pleasure--let alone finish one. Amazingly, I read both of Foster's guides this summer. Each was a palatable presentation of issues surrounding literature in general and the novel in particular. He has a clear "voice" allowing me to imagine being back at a university lecture again--one of my favorite places to be! While other texts may seem more "scholaraly" (i.e. "dry"), Foster has a really accessible style for high school students, undergrads, and the interested public at large.

As a high school English teacher, I thoroughly enjoyed Foster's How to Read Literature Like a Professor. Our school's AP program uses the book and I've shared select chapters with my underclassmen. I picked up How to Read Novels Like a Professor with high hopes that I would be able to use it in my classroom. Like many sequels, this book does not live up to the promise of its predecessor.

My first concern as a classroom teacher is that my students have not yet encountered a majority of the texts Foster references. The reader who needs a book titled How to Read Novels like a Professor is unlikely to be fluent in Joyce. Foster relies on examples to clarify his points, but the use of oblique references to texts his potential readers are unfamiliar with undermines the clarity of his text. Joyce and Faulkner may act as common ground for those of us with degrees in literature, for those still in training Salinger and Twain would be more effective.

I appreciate Foster's wit and voice, but that is because I know the material he is discussing well enough to differentiate between zingers and revelations. The voice that makes his work approachable to me, is the same voice that would utterly confuse my students. In my experience, high school readers take flip comments literally when they are not fluent in the subject matter. While I may chuckle at Foster's humor or find his comments unnecessarily distracting, my students would be lost.

The chapters in this book lack the tight focus of How to Read Literature; Foster wanders aimlessly at times as though the purpose of the chapter is to fill space. Had the book been shorter and the focus tighter, this would have been a better book.

I loved Professor Foster's How to Read Literature Like a Professor: A Lively and Entertaining Guide to Reading Between the Lines, but this second installment feels more like a sequel than a standalone guide. The chapters here read like "leftovers" for what he didn't cover in the previous work. For instance, an entire chapter is dedicated to the literary importance of chapter breaks in reading novels--not exactly groundbreaking stuff.

Further, the information in the book could be presented in about 30 pages. The information is presented in the first paragraph of each chapter, propped up with about 9 pages of fluff and discussion of specific novels, then summarized in the concluding paragraph. Highlighting the key points and skipping the fluff, I made it through this book in about two hours.

Do yourself a favor and pick up How to Read Literature Like a Professor: A Lively and Entertaining Guide to Reading Between the Lines if you really want to learn a thing or two about reading literature.

Thomas C Foster's previous book How to Read Literature Like a Professor changed my view of books. Therefore, I looked forward to his second book, How to Read NOVELS Like a Professor. The second book is pretty good, but does not measure up to the first.

The first half of the book was great. Foster discusses what readers can learn from a book's first pages, the ways authors use emblems to define characters, and how a character's desires are also revealing.

Foster lost me in the second half. My big complaint is that he focuses on experimental literature and esoteric literary theory that do not interest me. The book slogs to a finish and I was glad to put it down.

Foster stresses that there is no single interpretation of any work. OK - here's my opinion: as a reader, I served my sentence by reading Joyce, Beckett, and others while in school. I appreciate that they were immensely talented and that they extended our ideas of what counts as literature. But I don't want to read them - ever. For me, part of what defines greatness in a novel is that I want to read it.

In the end, a readers' enjoyment of this book will vary in direct proportion to how much he or she enjoys experimental literature and the various ideas about literary criticism that have arisen in the last 50 years. (Foster, of course, would say that my opinion reveals more about me than it does about literature - and he'd be right).

Having learned more from T.C.Foster about reading literature than anyone,(How to Read Literature like a Professor), I find he does not disapoint in his approach to novels as he again points out key elements to look (or listen) for in a text. While some chapters are a little discursive, his urban-folksy skaz dispels any pedantic intimidation one might fear from such a work. Although his many allusions to classic novels may cause guilt for all the novels one should have read but havn't, this book is a must have for any aspiring serious reader.

"When they had read it, they rejoiced over its encouragement." -- Acts 15:31 (NKJV)

I read a lot of novels, being especially drawn to those with unusual structures, exquisite character developments, and continually surprising plots. Among the people I know best, novels are rarely read. This means that I don't have anyone to talk to about basic decisions that novelists make. As a result, I felt like someone who bumped into a friendly professor of English at a cocktail party who wanted to share his views with me in a down-to-earth way. The trip was interesting, but not deeply insightful. If you know a lot about novels or write them, this book may well feel light weight to you.

I was drawn to the book based on having liked the more thoughtful book, How to Read Literature like a Professor. I didn't find the two works to be of equal value to me. One difference is that "Novelist" doesn't actually discuss very many novels. As a result, I didn't get many ideas for unread novels to enjoy.

I did pick up one point as a reader that I very much appreciate: Pay attention to the flower imagery in novels. That's a point that had totally passed me by in the past. I immediately grasped new ideas from the next novel I read. As a person who loves flowers, I had tended to relate to those sections in terms of appearance and scent . . . rather than anything more abstract.

This book was a real pleasure to read. Thomas C. Foster takes you behind the literary scenes and asks you to consider the stylistic and structural decisions made by authors. What if the story was told from a different point of view or with a different tone?

Presentation is dissected here. How a story is told is examined and the more you learn, the more you want to go on to the next book and enjoy it more deeply with your newfound tools and techniques.

I would imagine that the target audience for this book would probably be booklovers- but I think this book could engage any casual reader and get them excited as well. For most people it will probably be like throwing gasoline on a flame.

This book has helped to broaden my appreciation of other books, amplified the pleasure I get from reading, intensified the meaning, value and effect of many books for me. A must read for people who like to read and want to get greater joy out of a habit that is already a great joy. A great book, gleefully informative and fun.

I'm only 2/3 of the way through the book so I'm not conversant with the last few chapters. However, I intend to finish it, and I must say I'm enjoying this very much, and not just as a serious reader of novels, but as an aspiring writer. Foster gives me a lot of new considerations and since he's not telling me how to write, or giving me writing lessons, I can just enjoy his very readable style and gather what insights come my way. I don't think his levity is a handicap. I've read a number of academic dissections of fiction, and I had to yawn my way through most of them. What Foster points out as characteristics of a good novel are subjects of great interest to any writer wannabe, of which there seems to be plenty, judging from the many "How-to" books in publication today. His suggestion that the first page CAN reveal "18 things" about the book, and his delineation of same, can only make for a better reader or writer. And while his coverage of POV is not exhaustive, I did find it helpful. We need more books of this tenor, not fewer. I've also read Francine Prose's excellent book on reading suggestions for a writer, and enjoyed it, but I don't think it takes anything away from Foster's book. With literacy so much threatened today, a book this instructive and enjoyable should be applauded. And it is well to remember that his target audience is composed of readers, not writers, but since good reading encourages good writing, I would consider it a welcome addition to a writer's library.
(PS I've now finished the book, and I still enjoyed it. I defy anyone to read this book and not learn something from it. Anyone who can make that claim should be writing their own book of this type. Very few readers or writers would come up with all of the insights and perspectives the author has on a wide variety of fiction. Still a good read, but not if you're impatient and just seek a magic formula for writing block-buster novels.)

Two stars for the conversational tone and for the occasional humorous bits, but truth be told, this book drove me crazy. I expected a "How To" (as the title explicitly suggests). Instead, it was an agonizing, self-important collection of mini literary analyses. In each chapter, Foster makes a blanket, generalized statement, and then spends the next ten pages listing various novels which utilize said statement. I've read most of the literature he discusses, but in a few cases he actually gives away the premise -- or worse, the climax! -- of some books I'd been wanting to read. Infuriating.

Not only that, but who cares? I don't want to read a bunch of novel-specific mini essays -- I already have enough of those to grade. This is not at all what it purports to be. A lengthy list of everything Foster has ever read, sure; an instruction manual it is not.