Catalog Search Results
Author
Publisher
Greenwood Press
Pub. Date
1995.
Language
English
Description
This study analyzes all of Clark's fiction including her most recent, Let Me Call You Sweetheart, and places her fiction in the context of its genre. For ease of use by the reader, each chapter is devoted to a single novel and is subdivided into sections on narrative strategies (plot, time, and setting), thematic development, character development, and alternative perspectives on the novel. This study helps the reader to understand the deeper and...
Author
Publisher
Greenwood Press
Pub. Date
1996.
Language
English
Description
The first woman to win the Hugo Award (given annually by the World Science Fiction convention) and the Nebula Award (given annually by the Science Fiction Writers of America), Anne McCaffrey has invented many worlds of science fiction. Her series The Dragonriders of Pern has become one of the most widely read in science fiction history. This is the first complete critical study of her work. It examines all of her novels to date, both individual and...
Author
Publisher
Greenwood Press
Pub. Date
1996.
Lexile measure
1360L
Language
English
Description
Anne Rice's fame rests on her supernatural tales, but she is far more than a horror novelist. She goes beyond the genre by changing the classic horror stories into myths, fairy tales, and nightmares in order to explore philosophical questions of life, death, evil, and the meaning of existence. This is the most up-to-date analysis of her work and includes individual chapters on each of her vampire, mummy, and witch novels, including Memnoch the Devil...
Author
Publisher
Greenwood Press
Pub. Date
1996.
Lexile measure
1330L
Language
English
Description
Although best known for The Thorn Birds, a blockbuster family saga set in her native Australia, Colleen McCullough is a versatile novelist who has written in a variety of genres. This is the first full-length examination of her work. It highlights her versatility and her refusal to be confined to any one genre or type of writing, even though that refusal has lost her part of the wide readership she gained with The Thorn Birds. DeMarr discusses, analyzes,...
Author
Publisher
Greenwood Press
Pub. Date
1996.
Lexile measure
1400L
Language
English
Description
One of the most prolific and popular contemporary novelists, Dean Koontz has captivated both young and mature readers alike. This critical companion examines his mature fiction, including his most popular recent novels, Watchers, Lightning, and Dark Rivers of the Heart. Its intention is to provide both conventional and alternative readings so that students and readers who love Koontz's fiction can develop their critical skills. Other novels examined...
Author
Publisher
Greenwood Press
Pub. Date
1996.
Lexile measure
1310L
Language
English
Description
Provides an examination of nine historical novels by writer James A. Michener, published between 1949 and 1995, and includes biographical information about the author, an overview of his fictional works, and a bibliography.
Author
Publisher
Greenwood Press
Pub. Date
1996.
Language
English
Description
Until now, popular novelist James Clavell has not been recognized for his literary achievements and his contributions to cross-cultural understanding. This critical study seeks to rectify that omission. It shows how Clavell's depiction of cross-cultural encounters of Westerners with the Far East paves the way for modern multicultural studies. His novels about culture clash help Western readers see with Eastern eyes by taking them into the minds and...
Author
Publisher
Greenwood Press
Pub. Date
1996.
Language
English
Description
No one who has read Pat Conroy's novels of family wounds and healing can fail to be moved by their emotional appeal. But Conroy is also a major contemporary American novelist who follows in the tradition of Southern fiction established by William Faulkner and Thomas Wolfe. This companion is the first book-length study of his work. It explores the recurring motifs in his fiction and his special writing talents as a prose stylist of uncommon distinction....
Author
Publisher
Greenwood Press
Pub. Date
1996.
Language
English
Description
Like Arthur Conan Doyle before him, best-selling novelist Robin Cook has turned from the practice of medicine to that of writing popular suspense fiction. Widely recognized as the "Master of the Medical Thriller," Cook uses the medium of the popular novel to address a range of social issues: environmental pollution, gender inequality in the workplace, the risks inherent in the common practice of secrecy in science research, and above all, the ramifications...
Author
Publisher
Greenwood Press
Pub. Date
1996.
Language
English
Description
This is the first critical work on Stephen King to examine his most recent novels, Dolores Claiborne, Insomnia, and Rose Madder, and to analyze the many threads of his fiction in a way that is accessible to young adults and general readers. It is designed to help the reader understand the carefully organized narrative structure of his novels, the relation of his fiction to the horror and science fiction genres and to each other, character development,...
Author
Publisher
Greenwood Press
Pub. Date
1996.
Lexile measure
1440L
Language
English
Description
Edgar Award-winning writer Tony Hillerman has earned a reputation as a Grand Master of the popular mystery. This is the first full-length examination of his work. One of the most successful contemporary American writers, Hillerman has made his stories of Native American detectives instrumental to understanding modern American life. Through the creation of his Navajo detective characters and his treatment of the problems of order and identity in modern...
Author
Publisher
Greenwood Press
Pub. Date
1997.
Lexile measure
1300L
Language
English
Description
Contains detailed analyses of nine novels by author Arthur C. Clarke, written between 1973 and 1997, and includes information about Clarke's life, as well as a discussion of how his work fits into the science fiction genre.
Author
Publisher
Greenwood Press
Pub. Date
1997.
Lexile measure
1290L
Language
English
Description
This is the first full-length study to include Vidal's most recent novels and the first designed to meet the needs of the general reader as well as students of contemporary literature. It includes discussions of Lincoln, Empire, Hollywood, and Live from Golgotha, as well as his earlier novels. Baker and Gibson show that while Vidal's novels are tremendously entertaining, they are also serious examinations of a recurring theme - the decline of the...
Author
Publisher
Greenwood Press
Pub. Date
1997.
Lexile measure
1290L
Language
English
Description
Following a biographical chapter that focuses on Grisham's childhood in Arkansas, his education, political career, and development as a writer, Pringle examines the legal thriller, its antecedents, and Grisham's contribution to the genre. An individual chapter is devoted to analysis of each of his novels. Each chapter synopsizes the novel, discusses its reception by critics, and features sections on plot and character development, social/historical...
Author
Publisher
Greenwood Press
Pub. Date
1997.
Lexile measure
1400L
Language
English
Description
There's more than meets the eye in the fiction of the master of the espionage thriller, Robert Ludlum. In a study that examines in depth seventeen of Ludlum's novels, including the latest, The Apocalypse Watch (1995), Macdonald uncovers the serious themes running through the novels: the role of the individual in preserving democracy, the value of competing voices, the failure of educational institutions to preserve ideals, the temptations of power,...
Author
Publisher
Greenwood Press
Pub. Date
1998.
Lexile measure
1520L
Language
English
Description
"Each novel is discussed in a separate chapter and includes sections on plot development, character development, narrative structure, literary devices, setting, and major themes. Each chapter also includes an alternative critical reading from which to approach the novel to help readers see the novel in a different light. A complete bibliography of Tan's writings, writings about her work, and a list of reviews of each novel completes the work. This...
Author
Publisher
Greenwood Press
Pub. Date
1998.
Lexile measure
1170L
Language
English
Description
One of America's most noted contemporary novelists, John Irving has created a body of fiction of extraordinary range, moving with ease from romance to fairytale to thriller. Although his fiction follows in the tradition of the great 19th-century world novelists, he is a quintessential American writer - his novels are laced with broad humor, farce, and absurd situations. He does not hesitate to tackle the troubling issues that have faced our nation...
Author
Publisher
Greenwood Press
Pub. Date
1998.
Lexile measure
1320L
Language
English
Description
A biographical chapter is enriched by an exclusive interview granted by Angelou, and a chapter on genre discusses Angelou's work in the context of the tradition of American and African American autobiography. A chapter is devoted to each of the five volumes of her serial autobiography - I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1970), Gather Together in My Name (1974), Singin and Swingin and Gettin' Merry Like Christmas (1976). The Heart of a Woman (1981),...
Author
Publisher
Greenwood Press
Pub. Date
1998.
Lexile measure
1160L
Language
English
Description
Winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1993, Toni Morrison is among our most distinguished contemporary novelists. Morrison describes herself as a "black woman novelist," and all her novels deal with African American characters and communities. Exploring the entire cycle of human life in a spiritual context, her novels are also universal in their depiction of families, especially mothers and their children. This study analyzes in turn each of...