How To Write An Autobiographical Novel: Essays

Price: $18.99 - $9.99
(as of Jul 27, 2025 09:56:20 UTC – Details)


Named a Best Book of 2018 by New York Magazine, the Washington Post, Publisher’s Weekly, NPR, and Time, among many others, this essay collection from the author of The Queen of the Night explores how we form identities in life and in art.
As a novelist, Alexander Chee has been described as “masterful” by Roxane Gay, “incendiary” by the New York Times, and “brilliant” by the Washington Post. With his first collection of nonfiction, he’s sure to secure his place as one of the finest essayists of his generation as well.
How to Write an Autobiographical Novel is the author’s manifesto on the entangling of life, literature, and politics, and how the lessons learned from a life spent reading and writing fiction have changed him. In these essays, he grows from student to teacher, reader to writer, and reckons with his identities as a son, a gay man, a Korean American, an artist, an activist, a lover, and a friend. He examines some of the most formative experiences of his life and the nation’s history, including his father’s death, the AIDS crisis, 9/11, the jobs that supported his writing ​— ​Tarot-reading, bookselling, cater-waiting for William F. Buckley ​— ​the writing of his first novel, Edinburgh, and the election of Donald Trump.
By turns commanding, heartbreaking, and wry, How to Write an Autobiographical Novel asks questions about how we create ourselves in life and in art, and how to fight when our dearest truths are under attack.
Named a Best Book by: Time, Washington Post, Entertainment Weekly, NPR, Wired, Esquire, Buzzfeed, New York Public Library, Boston Globe, Paris Review, Mother Jones,The A.V. Club, Out Magazine, Book Riot, Electric Literature, PopSugar, The Rumpus, My Republica, Paste, Bitch, Library Journal, Flavorwire, Bustle, Christian Science Monitor, Shelf Awareness, Tor.com, Entertainment Cheat Sheet, Roads and Kingdoms, Chicago Public Library, Hyphen Magazine, Entropy Magazine, Chicago Review of Books, The Coil, iBooks, and Washington Independent Review of Books
Winner of the Publishing Triangle’s Randy Shilts Award for Gay Nonfiction * Recipient of the Lambda Literary Trustees’ Award *
Finalist for the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay * Finalist for a Lambda Literary Award for Gay Memoir/Biography

From the Publisher

Add to Cart

Add to Cart

Add to Cart

Add to Cart

Customer Reviews

4.2 out of 5 stars 276

4.5 out of 5 stars 734

3.7 out of 5 stars 1,220

4.5 out of 5 stars 110

Price

$12.79$12.79 $9.99$9.99 $13.59$13.59 $10.98$10.98

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Mariner Books
Publication date ‏ : ‎ April 17, 2018
Edition ‏ : ‎ First Edition
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Print length ‏ : ‎ 288 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1328764524
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1328764522
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 2.31 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.31 x 0.69 x 8 inches
Best Sellers Rank: #52,154 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) #103 in Fiction Writing Reference (Books) #170 in Essays (Books) #4,580 in LGBTQ+ Books
Customer Reviews: 4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 734 ratings var dpAcrHasRegisteredArcLinkClickAction; P.when(‘A’, ‘ready’).execute(function(A) { if (dpAcrHasRegisteredArcLinkClickAction !== true) { dpAcrHasRegisteredArcLinkClickAction = true; A.declarative( ‘acrLink-click-metrics’, ‘click’, { “allowLinkDefault”: true }, function (event) { if (window.ue) { ue.count(“acrLinkClickCount”, (ue.count(“acrLinkClickCount”) || 0) + 1); } } ); } }); P.when(‘A’, ‘cf’).execute(function(A) { A.declarative(‘acrStarsLink-click-metrics’, ‘click’, { “allowLinkDefault” : true }, function(event){ if(window.ue) { ue.count(“acrStarsLinkWithPopoverClickCount”, (ue.count(“acrStarsLinkWithPopoverClickCount”) || 0) + 1); } }); });