how to make a book analysis?

Question

not a example

Answer 1

Welcome, Jose, to Yahoo! Answers. I hope you receive the help you need from this site. Sometimes the answers are incredible.

I think, though, that you are gonna have to be more specific in your questions if you want us to provide answers that will meet your needs. (You can do this in the "details" section under the question itself.) For example, are you analyzing a novel or a biography or something else? Are you doing this for an English class, or for your own satisfaction, or for some other reason?

Dominatrix has given you some fairly good suggestions, if you are simply writing a book report. However, I am an English teacher, and I can tell you that no English teachers will want a chapter-by-chapter summary, or nearly this much information about the book.

Let's assume that you are writing a brief analysis of a current novel. What will a reader want you to do for him/her? People always say plot-character-setting-theme, but I think it depends on the novel. Setting may or may not be very important. Theme isn't important at all if it's just a good rip-roarin' read, like a mystery, adventure, or western. I think other readers ALWAYS want to know these three things about a novel:

(1) What's the conflict? You may want to tell when you first sense this in the novel (point of entrance), what really kicked it off (defining event), a few examples of what happened (sometimes called rising action, though I've never been sure why since it usually seems more like heading for a downfall than being on the uprise), and the point at which the main character makes a decision and there's no turning back (crisis; some folks call this climax). You probably do NOT want to tell how the story turns out, but if you do, be sure to label that part of your analysis with a "spoiler warning" (i.e., do not read any further if you're gonna read the novel).

(2) What's it like to read this novel? (Some folks would call this the author's style, but you don't have to go into deep literary analysis.) Is it fast-paced or slow and leisurely, great dialogue or detailed descriptions, etc. One of the things you want to do for sure is to pick out just aa few QUOTATIONS to give a sense of what the writing is like--not long, drawn-out ones, but good examples of dialogue or action or a point the author seems to be making.

(3) What's unusual about the novel that interested you? What makes this novel different from others? What did you personally find interesting? For example, I'm just now reading Salman Rushdie's Moor's Last Sigh. Here's what makes it interesting/unusual for me (I know you don't want an example, but it's the only way I can talk about this point of an analysis): (1) it deals with the Portuguese settlers in Bombay, India, and I had never even thought about the Portuguese settling in India; (2) the first part of the book deals with the main character's mother, grandmothers, and a great-grandmother and their influence on their families--not the men as much as these cranky women; and (3)--this is the bombshell-- SPOILER WARNING: the main character is ageing at twice the normal rate, in fact he was born four and a half months after conception, not nine. Now those are factors that make this an unusual and interesting novel.

Usually you will end up talking about characters as part of the conflict or what makes the story unusual. But not all of them; the main character probably, and just one or two of the minor characters to give a sample.

The MAIN POINT: Enjoy reading the novel! Make a few notes while you're reading (maybe stick-it notes), then write down what you would want to tell a friend who asks, "What was The Moor's Last Sigh [for example] really like?" Your friend might say, "Did you like it?" or "Was it a good book?" but that's not really what they want to hear. They want to know what it's like, so they can make up their own minds about whether to read it or not.

Good luck!

(Oh, and next time write your question so that it's a little easier to figure out what you really want to know, okay? )

(. . . and say an example, not a example . . .)

Answer 2

These are the simplest steps I could think of:

(1) Write an overall synopsis/plot of the book. It would help if you will include a little backstory about it.
(2) List the characters and write a description or background of each.
(3) Compose a by chapter summary.
(4) Discuss the recurring themes/motifs and their significance to the story.
(5) Relate the book to self and society and its implications, effects to them.
(6) Summarize everything.

Answer 3

So... how's school?