Over an extraordinary twenty-year career, Jane Smiley has written all kinds of novels: mystery, comedy, historical fiction, epic. 鈥淚s there anything Jane Smiley cannot do?鈥?raves Time magazine. But in the wake of 9/11, Smiley faltered in her hitherto unflagging impulse to write and decided to approach novels from a different angle: she read one hundred of them, from classics such as the thousand-year-old Tale of Genji to recent fiction by Zadie Smith, Nicholson Baker, and Alice Munro. Smiley explores鈥揳s no novelist has before her鈥搕he unparalleled intimacy of reading, why a novel succeeds (or doesn鈥檛), and how the novel has changed over time. She describes a novelist as 鈥渞ight on the cusp between someone who knows everything and someone who knows nothing,鈥?yet whose 鈥渏ob and ambition is to develop a theory of how it feels to be alive.鈥?In her inimitable style鈥揺xuberant, candid, opinionated鈥揝miley invites us behind the scenes of novel-writing, sharing her own habits and spilling the secrets of her craft. She walks us step-by-step through the publication of her most recent novel, Good Faith, and, in two vital chapters on how to write 鈥渁 novel of your own,鈥?offers priceless advice to aspiring authors. And in an exhilarating conclusion, Smiley considers individually the one hundred books she read, from Don Quixote to Lolita to Atonement, presenting her own insights and often controversial opinions. In its scope and gleeful eclecticism, her reading list is one of the most compelling鈥揳nd surprising鈥揺ver assembled. And in an exhilarating conclusion, Smiley considers individually the one hundred books she read, from Don Quixote to Lolita to Atonement, presenting her own insights and often controversial opinions. In its scope and gleeful eclecticism, her reading list is one of the most compelling鈥揳nd surprising鈥揺ver assembled. --Publisher.