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DeepDive Sneak Preview #7: Matthew Salesses
DeepDive instructor Matthew Salesses, author of 'Craft in the Real World,' on how the theme of your novel is tied to your implied reader.
Brad Listi
April 30, 2025
Hi there,
In this week’s newsletter, a preview of a wonderful conversation with Matthew Salesses, acclaimed author of several novels, including The Sense of Wonder and Disappear Doppelgänger Disappear. He is also the author of a popular craft book entitled Craft in the Real World: Rethinking Fiction Writing and Workshopping.
Matthew is a featured instructor in our debut course, How to Write a Novel—available later this year—and we could not be more excited to have him onboard.
In the course, we discuss finding theme in a work of fiction, and how this relates to one’s ‘implied reader.’ Here’s an excerpt from our dialogue:
DeepDive: In Craft in the Real World, you say that an author can determine the theme of his novel only for his or her ‘implied reader.’ And that struck me. I often have conversations about theme in the context of timing—how most writers arrive at theme toward the end of their process. But what you’re saying is that the author can only determine the theme for the implied reader? And everyone else who picks up the book brings their own theme to the party?
Matthew Salesses: Not exactly. Because everybody's got their own interpretations, right? Readers are ultimately the ones who make meanings out of books. You can't really determine what they’re going to take away. And in some ways, I think the books that people most love are those that are rich enough to allow for many different interpretations. But that's not to say that you're trying to make your novel as vague as possible so that anyone can read into it anything that they want.
So when you ask the question ‘Can we determine the theme for readers?’ I don't think we can do that in a literal sense. But what we can do is think about what we want our theme to be. And we can make deliberate creative decisions that help to communicate that theme to our implied reader—the primary reader or type of reader to whom we are writing.
***
Okay. Here’s the latest on DeepDive:
Post-production continues, full-steam ahead. Nearly 80 course episodes are now in the can (!!). We’re hoping to launch sometime before August. That’s the goal. But don’t hold us to it quite yet. It’s still TBD as we sort out logistics and get everything ready to roll.
How to Write a Novel is the audio course I’ve always wanted to hear. Maximalist in nature. Polyphonic. And a bit of swearing. It features dozens of dialogues with expert authors, and it honors the fact that writing a novel is ultimately an individual endeavor. We offer no magic tricks or crazy shortcuts or simple formulas. Here’s the truth: writing a novel is hard. And there are infinite ways to approach the creation of great fiction. The best and most efficient way to build your approach is to learn from those who are already doing the work at the highest level—and then take what you like, and leave the rest behind.
How to Write a Novel will give you incredible access to the minds of dozens of great writers, all of whom are incredibly generous in sharing their insights and perspectives. It will give you the opportunity to build your own road at speed, and it will serve as your companion as you work to finish your manuscript.
It’s going to be an incredible resource, and we can’t wait to share it with you.
Thanks so much for reading. I’ll be keeping you posted here as we get closer to launch.
Remember to follow DeepDive on Instagram and BlueSky. And if you have thoughts or questions, you can always email us here.
All the best,
Brad
Brad Listi
Founder | DeepDive
www.deepdive.audio
Quote of the day:
Colson Whitehead
Most people say, ‘Show, don't tell,’ but I stand by Show and Tell, because when writers put their work out into the world, they're like kids bringing their broken unicorns and chewed-up teddy bears into class in the sad hope that someone else will love them as much as they do.