For manyauthors , writing abookis a slow , excruciate liaison — but not for all of them . In fact , these novelists were able to turn around classic in just a calendar month .
1.The Gambler// Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Fyodor Dostoyevsky , writer ofCrime and Punishment , was heavy in debt when he wroteThe Gambler(1866 ) , his semi - autobiographic novella , in just 26 Clarence Day — he thought it might aid get him out of the red .
2.The Boy in the Striped Pajamas// John Boyne
Irish novelist John Boyne has said it take him two - and - a - half Clarence Day to write his tale of a son living through the Holocaust . “ The idea come to me on a Tuesday even , I begin write on Wednesday morning and continued for 60 hours with only curt break , not sleeping on Wednesday or Thursday nights and finishing the first draft by Friday lunchtime,”he recalledinThe Irish Times .
3.A Study in Scarlet// Arthur Conan Doyle
Sir Arthur Conan Doylewrote his debut novel — which also introduced detectiveSherlock Holmesto the Earth — in a bare three weeks . ( Publishing it , however , took much longer : Scarletwasrejected by a routine of publishers , some of whom did n’t even both to read it . It was finally accepted for publication in October 1886 andfinally publishedinBeeton ’s Christmas Annualin December 1887 . )
4.The Tortoise and the Hare// Elizabeth Jenkins
Of this 1954 script , which she wrote in three week , Elizabeth Jenkins has said , “ I have never bet at it since ; it marked an earned run average to which I had no desire to return . ” The love triangle inHare , her 6th novel , muse her real living : Jenkins wrote it in the “ ashen heating plant of betrayal , ” after the marital valet she was seeing refuse to give his married woman .
5.The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie// Muriel Spark
“ The first thing I write about were my brothers and my mother and my father . I wrote about them , made up poems , made up stories , ” Muriel Spark once recalled . “ Then I compose about the school , and my first writings were about the instructor who later became Miss Brodie . I wrote about her . We were give to write about how we spend our summer holiday , but I wrote about how she spent her summer holidays alternatively . It seems more enchanting . ”
As an grownup , Spark would funnel that fascination into writingJean Brodie , a retell variation of her instructor , Christiana Kay . She wrote the book in four weeks .
A version of this tale ran in 2011 ; it has been updated for 2022 .
