Carolyn Parkhurst, acclaimed author of The Dogs of Babel and Lost and Found, took students on a talking tour of her craft as she explained, in detail, her approach to fiction writing.
"Setting up the stories is getting your characters in the right kind of trouble," she said.Parkhurst starts off by writing one page every day and finding inspiration in both the ordinary and extraordinary, be it a dream or a square egg maker.
Parkhurst then does her research, and a lot of it.
"In fiction you have to get the details right so you don't distract your reader. The role of research is ... filling in the flesh on the skeleton," she said.
The Dogs of Babel chronicled a widower's attempts to learn the truth about his wife's mysterious death by teaching his dog, the only witness, to talk. Lost and Found told the stories of seven reality show contestants on a worldwide quest.
While many critics had good things to say about her first two books, Parkhurst's reviewers were not all fans of her work.
"With fiction sometimes it's hard to separate material from author and not take it personally... What's most important for me is that I am engaged by the material when I am writing a book," she said.
Parkhurst is currently working on her third novel and plans to spend two weeks at an artist colony to focus on it. She is also working on a children's book inspired by her two young children- Cooking with Henry and Ellie Bellie.
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