Letters to a Young Novelist - by Mario Vargas Llosa (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

WINNER OF THE NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE

Mario Vargas Llosa condenses a lifetime of writing, reading, and thought into an essential manual for aspiring writers. Drawing on the stories and novels of writers from around the globe-Borges, Bierce, Céline, Cortázar, Faulkner, Kafka, Robbe-Grillet-he lays bare the inner workings of fiction, all the while urging young novelists not to lose touch with the elemental urge to create. Conversational, eloquent, and effortlessly erudite, this little book is destined to be read and re-read by young writers, old writers, would-be writers, and all those with a stake in the world of letters.

Review Quotes

"A fascinating commentary...distills [great works] brilliantly, revealing an architecture to their greatness." --The Washington Post Book World

"Ought to be dubbed the world's cheapest MFA...Not just a book for writers, but one for readers, too...And for those who want to do more than read, [it] will instruct, illuminate, and most important, inspire." --St. Petersburg Times

"[This book] will make you, if not a novelist, at least a subtler taster of novels." --San Antonio Express

"Less a collection of dictums on the craft of the novel than a tribute to its formal complexities and potential through his admiring comments on works by the likes of Flaubert and Cervantes." --The New York Times Book Review

About the Author

Mario Vargas Llosa was born in Peru in 1936. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature "for his cartography of structures of power and his trenchant images of the individual's resistance, revolt, and defeat." He also won the Miguel de Cervantes Prize, the Spanish-speaking world's most distinguished literary honor. His many works of fiction and nonfiction include The Feast of the Goat, In Praise of the Stepmother, and Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter, all published by FSG. He died in Lima at age 89 in 2025.