Everything takes place over a few hours, or entirely set during the immediate aftermath of an automobile crash, for example?

I’d like to avoid “and it was all a dream”, time travel, or similar plot devices if possible.

I’m curious what a novel of any length purposely confined to a strict time window in-story reads like.

Maybe I should be reading more plays.

Thanks.

  • @NycterVyvver@lemmy.worldEnglish
    3•1 year ago

    The Children’s Story by James Clavell.

    IIRC, the book takes about 20 minutes to read and the events that take place occur in real time.

    • @Varyk@sh.itjust.worksOP
      1•1 year ago

      Okay, cool thanks.

      I read shogun a couple years ago, I wouldn’t mind reading something by him that only takes 20 minutes.

  • @AbouBenAdhem@lemmy.worldEnglish
    3•1 year ago

    Try the classical Greek tragedies—one of the requirements of the genre is that the action is supposed to take place in less than a day (Aristotle’s “unity of time”).

  • @frankPodmore@slrpnk.netEnglish
    1•1 year ago

    Other people have already said Ulysses and Mrs Dalloway, both modernist classics that take place in a single day. There are a couple of other examples of similar novels, but the only one that springs to mind right now is a deeply annoying experimental ‘novel’ called Fidget by Oliver Goldsmith, which I don’t recommend at all. He wore a tape recorder and spoke out loud describing everything he did that day, then transcribed it all and that’s the book. If you do decide to read it, don’t say I didn’t warn you.

    I don’t know if this will count for you, but there’s a hypertext novel called 253 by Geoff Ryman which IIRC takes place over just a couple of minutes, with very short chapters describing the thoughts of each of the 253 passengers on board a train. He did later also publish a print version.

  • @AbouBenAdhem@lemmy.worldEnglish
    1•1 year ago

    I haven’t read it yet, but Martin Riker’s novel The Guest Lecture apparently takes place in the mind of a professor lying awake in bed the night before she’s supposed to deliver a lecture.