How much of what we’re told is true reality (not as redundant as it sounds)? Where is the line between speculation and evidence? In writing and living, where is the line between fiction and nonfiction? In light of Miley’s ongoing shenanigans, Justin Beiber’s arrest, and other events making tweens everywhere swoon for obviously altered images, I’ve gathered a few novels that will make you think about what separates reality from fiction and how writers toe that line to create riveting characters and story lines. They’re as good as the tabloids with a little more substance.
1. Into the Wild, Jon Krakauer (biography)
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1845.Into_the_Wild
You may be familiar with the story of Christopher McCandless (if you’re not you can go read the bio in the link above) and his complete rejection of the material world. The kicker with this story is that we can only know what Krakauer, the author, could uncover about the young man’s four month journey and, more interestingly, what made him do it. Fact or fiction, this book makes you think. And, for that, it’s one book worth reading and re-reading.
2. Lies we Tell Ourselves, Robin Talley (historical fiction)
No cover art available.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15828079-lies-we-tell-ourselves?from_search=true
This book has yet to be published, so by definition it’s still fictitious, but the story is perfectly suited for this post and it’s on my “To Read” list. Set in the late 1950s amidst segregation, two girls of different races discover they’re more alike than they originally thought. History and tradition are important, but it takes education and courage to stand up to those precedents when they’ve become outdated. Once again, it makes the reader think about their circumstances, and realize that what is “reality” may not be “true.”
3.Ghost on Black Mountain, Ann Hite (regional fiction)
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/10387018-ghost-on-black-mountain
Ann Hite is a regionalist writer of Appalachia, if you believe in regionalism. Her novels and short stories (one, “Wiggle Room,” is featured in our publication Stonepile Writers Anthology Vol. 3) are all centered in mountain communities and draw on the culture, tradition, folk-lore, and even dialects of a region whose influence on the people is as strong as the people’s influence on the land. This novel may be hard to relate to if you’re not from the south, but, whether or not your roots took hold in red clay, the fantastic beauty in Hite’s language is the real deal, which is enough to make you believe in ghosts.
I could go on for days, but other honorable mentions who weave fantasy with reality include:
Running With Scissors, Augusten Burroughs (memoir/humor)
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/242006.Running_with_Scissors
Like Water for Chocolate, Laura Esquivel (fantastic realism)
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6952.Like_Water_for_Chocolate?from_search=true
Beloved, Toni Morrison (post-modernist fiction)
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6149.Beloved?from_search=true