by PBS
A Time poll of 125 writers picked War and Peace as the third-best book of any type ever written; Tolstoy also took the top spot, with Anna Karenina. It’s no surprise that a work this rich has been adapted for the stage and screen on multiple occasions. Audrey Hepburn and Henry Fonda starred in a 1956 film. In 1966 and 1967, a Russian version was released in an effort to foster patriotism; it took the same length of time to make the movie as it did for Tolstoy to write the novel—six years. A 15-hour miniseries debuted on BBC in 1972, followed by a shorter version in 2016. Josh Groban starred on Broadway as Pierre Bezukhov in Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812, a musical based on a short segment of the novel; it was nominated for 12 Tony Awards. Nevertheless, nothing compares to the novel, which is, as one critic noted, like reading “life itself.”
Front cover art for Watchers, first published in 1987.
Dean Koontz has sold 450 million copies of his work.
A letter from Koontz to a fan named Jim, sent in April 1989.
96
WATCHERS
Dean Koontz · 1987
Everyone we know will die. This hard truth drives Watchers (1987), much as it drives Travis Cornell, the protagonist of Dean Koontz’s suspenseful, supernatural thriller. Having this knowledge doesn’t make it easier to accept, of course, or lessen the grief that comes when we lose a loved one. As a former Delta Force operative, Travis must also cope with having directly caused death, grief, and despair.
One day while hiking in a canyon near his house, 36-year-old Travis stumbles across two creatures, one of whom appears to be stalking and trying to kill the other. The victim, a golden retriever, befriends Travis, who takes the dog home and names him Einstein after he discovers the stray dog’s tremendous intelligence. The other creature, known as the Outsider, with the deformed body of a baboon and ferocious jaws, slinks off. Later, Travis and Einstein together rescue Nora Devon from a sexual predator. Nora is a 30-year-old recluse with terrible self-esteem, but her relationships with Travis and Einstein help her experience the world in a new way.
The tight plot also includes an assassin, hired by an unknown entity to wipe out the scientists who worked in the top-secret lab where Einstein and the Outsider were created. But while tracking his prey, the assassin decides to try to kidnap and ransom Einstein. The Outsider wants to get rid of Einstein as well, a case of sibling rivalry gone terribly, terribly wrong.
Born in 1945 in Pennsylvania, Koontz grew up in an abusive household, with an alcoholic gambler for a father. As a senior at Shippensburg State College (now Shippensburg University), he won a fiction contest sponsored by Atlantic Monthly. In college he met his now-wife, Gerda, and converted from Protestantism to Catholicism, in part because the religion offers both morality and mystery. A few years after college, Gerda made an offer to support the family while Koontz built up his writing career; by the end of that period, she had quit her job to run the business of her husband’s creative empire. To date, he’s sold 450 million copies of such novels as Lightning (1988), Intensity (1995), and Odd Thomas (2003), the first in a series of books about a short-order cook who can communicate with the dead.
Watchers and its genetically enhanced creatures call to mind another work about a dangerous monster born in the name of science: Frankenstein. Like Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel, Koontz’s work explores two sides of scientific endeavor: on the one hand, Einstein is dazzlingly smart and loyal, a superior model of canine. He represents beneficial progress like penicillin, the birth-control pill, and countless other life-changing inventions. On the other hand, the same lab that created Einstein also unleashed the rampaging Outsider, a reminder of the dark side of progress. After all, scientists are responsible for destructive technologies like nuclear weapons and napalm too. These starkly contrasting potential applications of scientific inquiry raise important questions about the relationship between morality and the pursuit of knowledge.
Koontz’s book also explores a less heady but no less powerful subject: the proverbial bond between man and his best friend, even if the best friend in this case happens to be a cross between Lassie and E.T., as one early review described Einstein. Travis meets Einstein at a very depressed time in his life, and their friendship becomes a source of joy and light, even as they must avoid being killed or kidnapped. Nora too discovers the redeeming power of connection. Amid the page-turning scenes, this thriller manages to highlight the fact that the fleetingness of our relationships, whether with animals or fellow humans, makes them all the sweeter. We need to hold close those closest to us while we can.
“There Are Better Ways to Starve to Death”
WRITERS ON WRITING
THESE QUOTES about writing express a range of attitudes and advice, from the specific to the general, from the purpose of art to the trouble with adverbs. They might make you chuckle or squirm, or they might make you put fingers to keyboard to see what happens.
ON WRITING
I do not over-intellectualize the production process. I try to keep it simple: Tell the damned story.
—Tom Clancy
The road to hell is paved with adverbs.
—Stephen King
Good fiction is made of what is real, and reality is difficult to come by.
—Ralph Ellison
Write to please just one person. If you open a window and make love to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia.
—Kurt Vonnegut
Writing is not an exercise in excision, it’s a journey into sound.
—E. B. White
A work that aspires, however humbly, to the condition of art should carry its justification in every line. And art itself may be defined as a single-minded attempt to render the highest kind of justice to the visible universe, by bringing to light the truth, manifold and one, underlying its every aspect.
—Joseph Conrad
Talent is insignificant. I know a lot of talented ruins. Beyond talent lie all the usual words: discipline, love, luck, but most of all, endurance.
—James Baldwin
Any novel is hopeful in that it presupposes a reader. It is, actually, a hopeful act just to write anything, really, because you’re assuming that someone will be around to [read] it.
—Margaret Atwood
Write what you know: your own interests, feelings, beliefs, friends, family and even pets will be your raw materials when you start writing. Develop a fondness for solitude if you can, because writing is one of the loneliest professions in the world!
—J. K. Rowling
ON BEING A WRITER
Don’t romanticise your “vocation.” You can either write good sentences or you can’t. There is no “writer’s lifestyle.” All that matters is what you leave on the page.
—Zadie Smith
Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout of some painful illness. One would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven on by some demon whom one can neither resist nor understand.
—George Orwell
James Baldwin writing notes to himself in his New York apartment, photographed in 1951. He said that endurance was one of the most important qualities in a writer.
If there is a magic in story writing, and I am convinced there is, no one has ever been able to reduce it to a recipe that can be passed from one person to another. The formula seems to lie solely in the aching urge of the writer to convey something he feels important to the reader. If the writer has that urge, he may sometimes but by no means always find the way to do it.
—John Steinbeck
Write without pay until somebody offers pay; if nobody offers within three years, sawing wood is what you were intended for.
—Mark Twain
As a writer you should not judge. You should understand.
—Ernest Hemingway
If [writers] have any role at all, I think it’s the role of optimism, not blind or stupid optimism, but the kind which is meaningful, one that is rather close to that notion of the world wh
ich is not perfect, but which can be improved. In other words, we don’t just sit and hope that things will work out; we have a role to play to make that come about. That seems to me to be the reason for the existence of the writer.
—Chinua Achebe
If you’re going to be a writer you have to be one of the great ones.… After all, there are better ways to starve to death.
—Gabriel García Márquez
I know how to write forever. I don’t think I could have happily stayed here in the world if I did not have a way of thinking about it, which is what writing is for me.
—Toni Morrison
If my doctor told me I had only six months to live, I wouldn’t brood. I’d type a little faster.
—Isaac Asimov
The Great Hunt, the second book in The Wheel of Time series, was published in 1990 by Tor.
Author Robert Jordan completed 11 books in the series before his death in 2007. Brandon Sanderson picked up the series, following Jordan’s comprehensive notes, and wrote the volumes 12–14.
Art from a preview booklet for Eye of the World.
97
THE WHEEL OF TIME SERIES
Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson · 1990–2013
There’s something so satisfying about falling into the first book of a fantasy series, knowing that the reading experience will continue through thousands of pages, stretch across multiple volumes, and feature hundreds of characters maneuvering through intricate plots. Robert Jordan understood this particular literary pleasure, as fans have noted, and announced his intentions to go both deep and broad in the opening lines of his novel The Eye of the World (1990): “The Wheel of Time turns, and Ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again.… There are neither beginnings nor endings to the turning of the Wheel of Time.” It’s the kind of series that makes you want to clear your calendar and hunker down.
From this beginning unspools an ornately textured universe. The overarching plot of the books concerns various attempts to destroy the Dark One, the archenemy of the Creator. The Creator fashioned the cosmos and the Wheel of Time, which has seven spokes representing different ages of history. Divided into male and female halves, the so-called One Power turns the Wheel. At one point, the Wheel created the Dragon, an amazing force of Light. The Dark One eventually gets neutralized, destroying civilization in the process. But a prophecy predicts that the Dark One will escape—and only the Dragon Reborn can prevent evil from taking over. The novels detail the journeys and experiences of a group of young people with various talents and abilities, one of whom may be the Dragon Reborn.
In creating his mythology, Jordan collaged various religions and folkloric traditions. The bending, circular nature of time nods to concepts in Hinduism, while the series’ emphasis on duality harks back to Judeo-Christian tradition and the common cultural archetype of good versus evil. The books also play with time in the sense that the setting seems to both echo our past and predict our future. Like A Song of Ice and Fire (1996–present), another similarly impressive fantasy series, the books don’t hew to any historical timeline but their own.
When Jordan died in 2007, he left behind comprehensive notes concerning what he imagined would be the final volume of the series. Fantasy writer Brandon Sanderson accepted the challenge of shaping those notes into a cohesive story. He transformed what was supposed to be the 12th volume into three more novels, bringing the total number of Wheel of Time books to 14. Sanderson was selected in part for a eulogy he wrote upon Jordan’s premature death, in which he described the importance of Jordan’s work in Sanderson’s youth, meaningfully summarizing the feelings of millions of readers.
James Oliver Rigney Jr. adopted the pen name Robert Jordan while working on a series of fantasy novels based on the character of Conan the Barbarian in the 1980s. He was born in 1948, grew up in Charleston, South Carolina, and served multiple tours as a helicopter gunner during the Vietnam War. Jordan’s wife, Harriet McDougal, was an influential editor in the world of fantasy and science fiction, working on books like Ender’s Game (1985) as well as her husband’s Wheel of Time series. McDougal will serve as a producer on the upcoming television series based on the books.
In its massive scope and intricate detail, the Wheel of Time series offers something for every reader: elaborate mythologies, controversial depictions of gender roles, ferocious magical battles. Characters drawn from all walks of life lend Jordan’s civilization a verisimilitude, even as they have jobs like Truthspeaker and Empress. And the Chosen One appealingly toggles between accepting his destiny and rebelling against it. Fate and free will, larger-than-life battles, ecstasy, agony, victory, defeat. All of it, and more, is right here.
The first edition jacket for Where the Red Fern Grows, published in 1961.
The back of the same jacket, featuring a photo of author Wilson Rawls.
A 2016 paperback cover from Yearling.
98
WHERE THE RED FERN GROWS
Wilson Rawls · 1961
Few readers forget where they were when they finished Where the Red Fern Grows (1961), so moving is the book’s climax. The quintessential tale of a boy and his two dogs is a coming-of-age classic, widely taught and firmly fixed in the hearts of millions of readers.
Woodrow Wilson Rawls was open about his novel’s many autobiographical elements. He was born in 1913 and grew up poor in rural Oklahoma, where he loved to roam and explore with his dog. In the absence of any local schools, Rawls’s mother taught him to read and write. When he stumbled upon The Call of the Wild (1903) as a child, Rawls fantasized about writing his own dog-and-boy story, but his parents couldn’t afford to buy paper or pencils. The Great Depression forced his family out of Oklahoma and into the west, and they settled in New Mexico after their car broke down there. Rawls left home as an adolescent to earn money. He started writing while working in construction throughout the Americas, but he was embarrassed by his grammatical and punctuation errors. On the eve of his wedding, he burned his manuscripts, so ashamed was he of his failure to get anything published. When his wife discovered what he’d done, she encouraged him to rewrite the lost novels. Where the Red Fern Grows took three weeks.
Growing up in the Ozark Mountains, 10-year-old Billy really wants a dog. With no extra money to spare in his family, he must toil and save. Some two years later, he is delighted when he finally picks up his two coonhound pups, walking the long way into town. That night, while bedding down in a cave, they hear a mountain lion roar. The dogs sound back. Billy names them Old Dan and Little Ann. He starts training the dogs to catch raccoons, and they become skilled hunters and Billy’s constant loyal companions. But he also sees the dogs’ protective, even violent natures.
The book extols delayed gratification, responsibility, and hard work. Simply wanting the dogs doesn’t mean Billy will get them; he needs to find and perform odd jobs, set the money aside, and travel to pick them up. Receiving the dogs after such a long wait makes their arrival all the more precious—the adult Billy narrates the novel, and his understanding of the pleasures of anticipation lends this lesson its weight. Young Billy completely dedicates himself to his dogs and their training, showing how much he appreciates the fruits of his efforts and how willing he is to continue working hard to achieve the results he wants. Rawls underscores the importance of perseverance, a particular American characteristic he witnessed as a child in the Depression, when giving up simply wasn’t an option.
Perhaps more significant than its emphasis on tenacity, Where the Red Fern Grows features a fair amount of death. Troublemaker Rubin Pritchard, a neighbor just two years older than Billy, falls on his own ax after trying to attack Billy’s dogs. While Billy is deeply affected by the death, Rubin’s family betrays little emotion upon learning about the accident. As adults living hard lives themselves, they understand the fact of mortality in a way that Billy does not. The graphic nature of Rubi
n’s end prepares readers for the death of the dogs. Shocking as it may be to anyone who expected a happy ending, the dogs’ demise helps ground the book in realism. Like Old Yeller (1956), it’s a weeper of a classic—an exemplar of the dog-dies genre that inspired Gordon Korman’s contemporary middle-grade novel No More Dead Dogs (2000). Nature is dangerous, these books remind us, and we are all heading toward an inescapable fate.
Rawls narrated the 1974 movie, drawing on speaking skills he’d honed over the years in schools. He published just one more novel, Summer of Monkeys (1976), before his death in 1984. But he motivated thousands of kids with stories about his childhood, emphasizing how he himself persevered in his goal of becoming a writer despite little formal education, and encouraging his listeners to follow their dreams. His simple, plainspoken style, in person and on the page, inculcates timeless, essential values.
A 2001 paperback cover of White Teeth.