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Seven years into writing a novel, I started to lose my mind.

Akhil Sharma

I need to tell the things that are important but which don’t make sense in terms of the narrative, things that would destroy symmetry or narrative pace. This is my personal belief about what it means to write nonfiction.
AKHIL SHARMA

Important Mean Narrative Need Sense Thing Writing
While a dramatized scene is a way of proving and guaranteeing an emotional experience for the reader, exposition assumes that the reader is sophisticated and can see the universal.
AKHIL SHARMA

Dramatixed Emotional Experience Guarantee Proving Reader Scene Sophisticated Universal Way
I tend to think that we are all pretty much alike. We all feel despair. We all have problems with relationships.
AKHIL SHARMA

Alike Much People Pretty Thinking Unique
There are also so many emotional aspects to money – feelings of inadequacy, feelings of security. I am not sure if there needs to be more about money in fiction, but the absence of this aspect can make a story feel somehow frictionless and unreal.
AKHIL SHARMA

Aspect Emotional Feeling Fiction How Inadequacy Money Security Unreal
Certainly the details of our life are unique. Spending time thinking of how I am different from someone else, however, does not tend to be very productive.
AKHIL SHARMA

Certainly Detail Different How Life Someone Spend Think Thinking Unique
As a human being living one’s life, one is more open to relief when there is rain or the expectation of rain. That readiness for hope gets manifested in my stories and that of many other Indian writers.
AKHIL SHARMA

Being Expectation Human Life Living More Open Rain relief
For me, a lot of the humor comes not from innocence but from characters trying to figure out how to get what they need. I don’t try to be funny, but am relieved when an opportunity comes up for humor.
AKHIL SHARMA

Character Come Figure Humor Innocence Opportunity Trying
Money is part of how we move through the world, what stores and restaurants we go into, whether we take a train to the airport or a taxi. Describing characters living in the real world requires describing them engaging with money.
AKHIL SHARMA

Character Info Money Moving Part Real Restaurant World
I can guide them to books that will serve as role models. Largely, though, one learns to write almost like developing muscle memory, and this requires years of effort.
AKHIL SHARMA

Book Develop Effect Guide Large Memory Model Muscle Require Role
I can’t have composite characters. I can’t attribute dialogue to someone based simply on my memory and not based on notes taken at the time that the words were spoken.
AKHIL SHARMA

Attribute Based Character Composite Dialogue Memories Note Simply Spoken Taken Word
We all become afraid. We all look at others and think these other people are more fortunate than us.
AKHIL SHARMA

Afraid Become Fortunate Other People Think
It’s easy when you grow up in fear to act out of fear. I don’t want to embrace that fear; I prefer to be kind.
AKHIL SHARMA

Act Be Kind Fear Grow Up Out Want
As a teacher, I can help my students see what is working and not working. I can show them certain solutions.
AKHIL SHARMA

Book Help Memories Student Teacher Working
The tears loosen their memories so they can slide away. They cry at the life they have lost, and then they cry at everything they’ll forget.
AKHIL SHARMA

Away Cry Everything Forget Loose Lost Memory Slide Tear
It is hard to write about physically difficult things without causing the reader to disengage.
AKHIL SHARMA

Causing Difficult Disengage Physical Reader Writing
The monsoon is such a dominant part of Indian life that it is hard to overstate its importance.
AKHIL SHARMA

Country Different Dominant Importance Indian Life Monsoon Rain Such

Seven years into writing a novel, I started to lose my mind.

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Seven years into writing a novel, I started to lose my mind.

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