How to Write Like Tolstoy

What made Norman Mailer change from first person to third? Which authors borrowed plots and characters from people they knew? Why did Turgenev envy Tolstoy, and what does that say about how fiction writers create characters? Richard Cohen takes readers on an enchanting journey into the minds, techniques, concerns, tricks and flaws of the world's greatest writers. He reveals how literary legends such as Eliot, Dickens, Woolf, Amis, King and Morrison grappled with problems, questioned themselves and occasionally changed their minds to dramatic effect as they created the stories we love. Playful, profound and brimming with insights, How to Write Like Tolstoy is a charming guide to the writer's craft, disclosing the fascinating stories behind the finest novels we've ever known. Includes revealing insights from the literary lives of Vladimir Nabokov, Fay Weldon, Samuel Beckett, George Orwell, J. D. Salinger, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Mark Twain, Kate Atkinson, Philip Roth, Emily Brontë, Ali Smith, Franz Kafka, Ernest Hemingway, James Joyce, Agatha Christie and many more.