--- title: Fiction & Novel description: This topic examines the forms, history, and techniques of prose narrative. Learners will analyze structural elements like plot, characterization, and point of view to understand how novels and short stories construct meaning and engage readers. category: social-sciences subcategory: literature difficulty: beginner, intermediate, advanced url: /subject/fiction-and-novel --- # Fiction & Novel This topic examines the forms, history, and techniques of prose narrative. Learners will analyze structural elements like plot, characterization, and point of view to understand how novels and short stories construct meaning and engage readers. ## Available Resources 4 Books • 1 Websites ## Podcasts ### 1. The New Yorker Fiction **Author:** The New Yorker Authors published in The New Yorker read their own recently published short stories aloud, one per episode. Useful for hearing how contemporary literary short fiction is paced, voiced, and structured, straight from the writers themselves. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Language:** en-us | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://the-new-yorker-the-writers-voice-new-fiction-from-the-ne.simplecast.com **Tags:** short-fiction, literary-fiction, audio-readings, contemporary-literature, new-yorker ### 2. Lit Century **Author:** Sandra Newman and Catherine Nichols Host Catherine Nichols and guests choose one book for each year of the twentieth century (Nella Larsen's Passing, 1936, Jacqueline Susann's Valley of the Dolls, 1966; Mohandas Gandhi's Indian Home Rule, 1909) and talk about it in its historical and literary context. Tune in to find out what the 20th century was all about. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Language:** en | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://www.lithub.com **Tags:** 20th-century-literature, book-discussion, literary-history, author-interviews ## Books ### 1. 1984 **Author:** George Orwell George Orwell's 1949 novel following Winston Smith, a clerk rewriting history in a one-party state that controls citizens through surveillance, propaganda and Newspeak. Readers can analyse how the novel portrays totalitarian power, language and truth, and why its vocabulary shaped modern political debate. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid **Link:** https://www.amazon.com/1984-Signet-Classics-George-Orwell/dp/0451524934?tag=edmonddante07-20 **Tags:** dystopian-fiction, totalitarianism, twentieth-century-literature, english-novel, political-fiction ### 2. Aspects of the Novel **Author:** E. M. Forster Forster's 1927 Cambridge lectures on how novels work, organized around story, people, plot, fantasy, prophecy, pattern, and rhythm. Introduces the flat-versus-round character distinction and gives a vocabulary for discussing narrative structure critically. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid **Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/0140205578?tag=edmonddante07-20 **Tags:** books, humanities-social-sciences, literature ### 3. The Art of Fiction **Author:** David Lodge Fifty short essays, first published as newspaper columns, each examining one technique — point of view, interior monologue, unreliable narration, time-shift — through a passage from an English or American novel. Builds a working critical vocabulary. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid **Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/0099554240?tag=edmonddante07-20 **Tags:** books, humanities-social-sciences, literature ### 4. The Hero with a Thousand Faces **Author:** Joseph Campbell Campbell's 1949 comparative study of myth, arguing that hero stories across cultures follow one pattern he calls the monomyth: departure, initiation, return. The source of the structural template later adopted widely by novelists and screenwriters. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid **Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/0691017840?tag=edmonddante07-20 **Tags:** books, humanities-social-sciences, literature ## Websites ### 1. writersdigest.com WritersDigest.com is a comprehensive resource for writers, featuring craft articles, writing prompts, market guides, contests, and publishing tips to help aspiring and established authors improve their craft and get published. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://writersdigest.com **Tags:** websites, personal-development, communication --- *This content is part of Dantes.io - Your Treasure Map to Knowledge* *Curated by humans at Dantes.io. Personal study use welcome; republishing this curation requires permission (team@dantes.io).* View this page online: https://dantes.io/subject/fiction-and-novel