Ask best-selling author J. Robert Lennon how he feels about the novel’s fall in popularity and he’ll say he couldn’t care less about it.

“I do think you should read contemporary fiction ,” he said. “Some of it’s superb, but I think the vast majority of human striving is garbage and you know 95 percent of the books published are not going to be very good.”

He said people read more than ever, but not necessarily novels. One of his boys spends a lot of time on Reddit and Bandcamp and the other plays video games, yet it doesn’t bother him.

“My kids are good readers, they’re good writers too,” he said. “But reading is not their go-to way of consuming ideas about people.”

Lennon, who is teaching graduate students at Syracuse University this semester, spoke Wednesday afternoon at the Gifford Auditorium as the first writer in the Spring 2014 Raymond Carver reading series. The event included a student-produced Q&A followed by a reading of his work.

He said it’s important not only to read books, but also to learn through other platforms and about other topics.

“You don’t have to read extensively in your field,” he said. “It might be beneficial for you to find other genres, other kinds of things. The novelist needs to be worldly.”

The Q&A portion of the event dealt with Lennon’s novel “Familiar.” The novel follows a woman whose life is suddenly altered one day when she is driving home from her son’s grave. The novel is ambiguous as to whether she had a psychotic breakdown or was suddenly transported to an alternate universe.

Following the Q&A and an intermission, Lennon read three of his works: a two-sentence story, a fiction piece based off a Google Earth image and the first chapter to an untitled novel.

Lindsey Leigh, a sophomore in the College of Visual and Performing Arts, had to read “Familiar” and attend the lecture for her English and textual studies class. She said she became convinced that Lennon had a reason for the cliffhanger.

“I like how he said it was better to give the readers what they don’t know they want instead of giving the readers what they want,” she said. “A lot of us didn’t really like the ending to this book, but I think the way he explained it made a lot more sense.”

Dana Wakeley, a freshman advertising major, also said she appreciated what Lennon had to say about his book.

“I have a lot of images I put in my head while I’m reading it, but it’s interesting to hear what he actually has to say about those things I’m thinking about,” she said.

Lennon has been lauded for his strong character writing, especially from the female perspective in “Familiar.” During the Q&A, he insisted that it wasn’t difficult because women aren’t all that different from men.

Lennon said characters and themes, rather than plot, drive his stories. He added that if he knows something will bother a character, he will throw it at them.

“The basic needs and desires of human beings are roughly universal,” he said.

Published on January 30, 2014 at 1:55 am