literalab

I just wrote a review of Umberto Eco’s The Prague Cemetery and one area that I thought could have been (but wasn’t) most interesting in the book was the constant interplay between fiction and fact, with secret services paying informants for documents copied from the pages of novels to capture conspirators likewise acting out the […]

In the 21st century it is impossible to write the kind of melodramatic historical adventure novels made famous in 19th century France by the likes of Alexandre Dumas and Eugene Sue. It would be hopelessly archaic, a ridiculous undertaking, unless perhaps you add a few postmodernist touches, such as ambiguous multiple narration and piles upon […]