Book Alchemy
The Secret Library Podcast
#92 :: How to Thrill Your Reader | Ben Percy
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#92 :: How to Thrill Your Reader | Ben Percy

Ben Percy began Writing With a Love of (Fictional) Wooly Underpants I knew I had to have Ben Percy on the show because I kept mentioning his book, Thrill Me, and it's argument that genre fiction and literary fiction have a lot to learn from each other. Ben and I talk about how he began to study writing with a great love of fantasy and science fiction only to be told he wasn't allowed to write either in his degree program. As he studied literary fiction, he fell in love with character development and wanted more from the people he read about in books. But he still wanted to read about adventures and exciting things happening in his stories. So a thought began to grow: what if the best parts of genre fiction – the wooly underpants and the chases and the racing plot– were combined with the best parts of literary fiction – the love of language and the deeply developed characters? Ben has spent his writing life since trying to find out how to write from the best parts of all fiction. This conversation was equal parts hilarious and inspiring, an ideal combination in my mind. Also, Ben has one of the greatest voices for podcasting I have yet encountered. It's a true shame that he didn't enjoy recording the audio version of one of his books... enjoy this voice on this show - you may not get it anywhere else... happy listening.


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Book Alchemy
The Secret Library Podcast
Most people believe that books are created in cabins all alone, where authors pound away on some manner of keyboard. Then they hand this masterpiece off to a publisher and it feels very much like it goes down a tube and comes out the other side as a book. By speaking to authors and other book lovers, I'm diving into the mystery that is the book world today.