#49: Creating Meaningful Repetition with Noun Phrases

Hello friends! Before I dive into this month’s craft essays, two quick bits of news:

First, my review of Charlotte McConaughy’s new novel Wild Dark Shore was in The New York Times Book Review recently! I really dug the book, and I hope you’ll check out the review and (more importantly) the novel. It’s one of my favorite reads of 2025 so far, and I liked it so much I went on to read McConaughy’s Migrations, which was also excellent. Both are what I might call “climate grief thrillers,” and there’s some fantastic nature writing throughout. Don’t miss them.

Second, a reminder that my Worldbuilding Initiative at Arizona State University has several events left this month and next, all of which are free and open to the public, either in-person on our Tempe Campus or online via Zoom. The remaining lineup is as follows:

March 25: “Into the Animal Body: Wild Narratives for a World on Fire” with Distinguished Lecturer Talia Lakshmi Kolluri

April 9: Speculative Histories: Lost Archives and Alternative Realities

April 23: ASU Worldbuilding Initiative Student Showcase

I hope you’ll join me for any of these events that might interest you!

For as long as I can remember, people have mostly referred to me by my full name. Even to close friends, I am often “Matt Bell” instead of “Matt,” so much so that I can almost guarantee that on any given day most acquaintances will use the former rather than the latter, even when speaking to me in person. (“Matt Bell!” they say. “It’s so good to see you!”) Same with my students, who address me or refer to me as “Matt Bell” rather than “Professor Bell” or even “Matt,” which is what I ask them to call me.

This has never bothered me—it usually feels affectionate, although there’s certainly a way to make it mocking, if I remember right from middle school—but certainly it’s a little atypical. But maybe it’s also why I’ve always been attracted to the use of repeated noun phrases in fiction, especially when they’re used effectively as building blocks for meaningful pattern making and other sorts of literary effects.

Before we dive into some examples, let me pause quickly for some brief definitions from Virginia Tufte’s essential reference text, Artful Sentences: Syntax as Style. (Seriously. If you don’t own a copy of this one, track it down.) About noun