The Dust Bowl: A Literary Analysis

Book genres are helpful ways of categorizing diverse author styles and methods of writing. Specific subjects like the Dust Bowl can be written is many ways, but they all have the same ability to reach the reader’s imagination and provide them with knowledge. While non-fiction books use straight forward facts and details while fiction describes the feelings and hardship, both can cause an emotional response from the reader. By braking down stories such as The Storm in the Barn, The Year of Dust, Out of the Dust, and Children of the Dust Bowl we as readers get an idea of how author’s use the genre methods to aid their stories. Despite the many differences in genre techniques in historical fiction and historical non-fiction, they have similar

A second example of specific genre methods is seen in informational narratives. The story Children of the Dust Bowl uses descriptive writing in a narrative style to educate the reader. The book talks about Leo Hart who was a school counselor in California during the Dust Bowl period. Although it is very possible Mr. Hart did walk with the children, the author wrote the scene in a descriptive way to make it clear to the reader what kind of man Leo Hart was and the “Okies” he cared for. Most informational books do not include details like him removing his suit, but in an informational narrative it gives an image to the reader that he was not a typical governmental man or Californian without using blunt words to say it. Both stories not only use specific genre techniques but embrace them to give a clear message to the reader. A book’s genre should never dictate how well a message can come across to the reader. Specific topics like the Dust Bowl can be portrayed accurately in both non-fiction and fiction novels, but it is the author who decides how that topic is