Thirteen Ways of Looking at the Novel

Pulitzer Prize winner and bestselling novelist Jane Smiley celebrates the novel–and takes us on an exhilarating tour through one hundred of them–in this seductive and immensely rewarding literary tribute.

In her inimitable style–exuberant, candid, opinionated–Smiley explores the power of the novel, looking at its history and variety, its cultural impact, and just how it works its magic. She invites us behind the scenes of novel-writing, sharing her own habits and spilling the secrets of her craft. And she offers priceless advice to aspiring authors. As she works her way through one hundred novels–from classics such as the thousand-year-old Tale of Genji to recent fiction by Zadie Smith and Alice Munro–she infects us anew with the passion for reading that is the governing spirit of this gift to book lovers everywhere.

Jane Smiley is the Pulitzer Prize—winning author of more than ten novels as well as four works of nonfiction, including a critically acclaimed biography of Charles Dickens. She is the recipient of a Pulitzer Prize for her novel A Thousand Acres, and in 2001 she was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters. She lives in northern California.