Comments on: Dear Diary,

By: Cindy

Cindy — Mon, 02 May 2011 20:50:52 +0000

“On Agate Hill” by Lee Smith. Loved it. Not YA, in my opinion. Takes place just after the U.S. Civil War.

By: Sarah

Sarah — Tue, 26 Apr 2011 19:53:54 +0000

Check out SCRAWL by Mark Shulman. (YA, but definitely not fluffy or boy-crazed)

By: Kurt Hartwig

Kurt Hartwig — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 20:13:40 +0000

I’d recommend two epistolary plays, A.R. Gurney’s LOVE LETTERS, and its more recent satire by Kira Obolensky and Bill Corbett, the dysfunctional HATE MAIL, also about “love.”

By: Laura

Laura — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 18:39:54 +0000

I actually love epistolary fiction. I very much enjoyed Erin O’Brien’s HARVEY AND ECK. And, of course, THE GUERNSEY LITERARY AND POTATO PEEL SOCIETY.

I was always under the impression there aren’t many epistolary novels being published currently because, for whatever reason, they are viewed as a hard sell.

By: Steve Masover

Steve Masover — Sat, 23 Apr 2011 16:51:10 +0000

Neil Gordon’s _The Company You Keep_ (2003) is a recent example that I liked a lot: a novel written as e-mails from several characters to a single character — essentially, telling a young woman what she never knew growing up about her fugitive (underground) radical parents. The novel was a NY Times Notable book, and I believe Robert Redford has a film based on the novel in development.

By: Angie

Angie — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 22:17:40 +0000

I don't read many books in this style, but I loved The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, a great example of a recent epistolary novel.

By: Lisa Marie

Lisa Marie — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 20:48:37 +0000

Epistolary books appealed to me as a young adult and teen – but then again, so did epic fantasy. For me, it was simply a matter of my tastes evolving as I became of my own identity. Letters and diaries are extremely attractive to young readers – blank slates – who want to project themselves onto imaginary characters and become “one” with those characters. At this particular developmental stage of my reading, I’m generally not a fan of any book written in first person.

By: Katie Carroll

Katie Carroll — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 19:45:06 +0000

I would recommend Stolen by Lucy Christopher. It’s a letter written by a kidnapped girl to her kidnapper.

By: Donn

Donn — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 18:39:48 +0000

I’ve always wondered about the Lovecraftian protaganists who keep up their letter-writing even in the face of annihilation – “The beast is nearly upon me, I can see its maw widening – such horrors within! It is grasping the very hand that holds this peeaaaaaargGghGH!”

Wow. If only Coleridge had been that uninterruptable at his work.

And on the idea of narrators sequestering themselves from the world – have you heard of Robert Shields? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Shields_(diarist)

Oh dear.

(‘seriezzles’?)

By: Tracy Jorgensen

Tracy Jorgensen — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 18:05:09 +0000

Have you considered Bram Stoker’s Dracula? It was written in epistolary format as the diaries of the various characters. Stoker indicated they were using shorthand to simplify the time involved in writing in journals. He even includes legitimate reasons for them to use and know shorthand.

Dracula is certainly no fluffy YA novel (though it has inspired some). It’s a classic.