ON MESSAGE
Social media messaging is part of everyday life – so using it gives a very contemporary edge to your epistolary writing. Novelist L.C. North looks at writing mixed media in fiction
L.C. North
The use of mixed media in novels isn’t new. Even a hundred and thirty years ago, Bram Stoker wrote an epistolary novel in Dracula, including ships logs, journal entries and newspaper clippings to heighten the impact of the story. But in recent years, the use of mixed media in fiction has been on the rise. Taylor Jenkins Reid had phenomenal success with Daisy Jones & The Six – an entire novel told through interview transcripts. Beth O’Leary used the ingenious form of Post-it note messages in The Flatshare, and who can forget Jane Hallet’s The Appeal – another novel told exclusively through emails, texts and voice notes where the reader is asked to piece together evidence and solve a murder.