black
grey
blue
red
brown
white

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

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
Also, I have to assume that readers are sophisticated enough to know that not every person in a community is the same, and so there are many people who would not force an abortion just because a fetus is female.
AKHIL SHARMA

Assume Community Female Many Person Reader Same Sophisticated
The babies have old souls and the old souls have to shrink to become little babies.
AKHIL SHARMA

Baby Become Little Old Soul Shrink
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
Why do people always think hurting others is all right, as long as they hurt themselves as well?
AKHIL SHARMA

Always Hurt Long Themselves Thinking Well
Novels should be judged rigorously. Either a book works or it doesn’t. The fact that something is true in the real world should not lend authority to it in fiction.
AKHIL SHARMA

Authority Book Fact Fiction Novel Real Something True World Writing
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
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
If anybody reads an Indian newspaper, all these things are obvious, and so I am not breaking news. All I am doing is representing my community as it actually is.
AKHIL SHARMA

Abortion Breaking Community News Newspaper Obvious People Read
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
It is hard to write about physically difficult things without causing the reader to disengage.
AKHIL SHARMA

Causing Difficult Disengage Physical Reader Writing
The little babies are missing their families from their past lives.
AKHIL SHARMA

Baby Family Life Memories Missing Past
It is hard to create a first-person narrator that can be a child and yet is able to take in enough information for the narrative to be legible to the reader.
AKHIL SHARMA

Able Child Children Create Enough First Information Legible Narrator
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 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
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
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
Exposition suggests a great trust in the reader, and this expression of trust makes a book feel tender.
AKHIL SHARMA

Book Exposition Expression Feel Reader Suggest Tender Trust
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
For me, a memoir is nonfiction and nonfiction has to be absolutely true.
AKHIL SHARMA

Absolute True
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
Sandeep Jauhar gives us an insider’s look at the medical profession and also a dramatic account of the psychological challenges of early adulthood.
AKHIL SHARMA

Account Challenge Dramatic Look Medical Person Profession Psychological
When someone gets a success, and we, too, have done good work and sometimes even better work than the person who has just triumphed, we wonder: Why did success pass me by?
AKHIL SHARMA

Better Done Good Person Sometimes Success Wonder Work
Seven years into writing a novel, I started to lose my mind.
AKHIL SHARMA

Lose Mind Novel Seven Started Writing Year
My parents are deeply pious Hindus.
AKHIL SHARMA

Deeply Hindus Parent Pious
I realized that he was writing about good people doing good things. This did not match my experience of life and so I found my sentences stretching and becoming less plain.
AKHIL SHARMA

Experience Good Less People Plain Realized Sentence Stretch Thing
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

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.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Akhil Sharma Quotes