🎥 Lit Lesson #38: The Emperor’s New Prose: A Critical Look at Scene vs. Exposition in Crying in H Mart

“…bad books get published to support good books by authors like me that you don’t know exist, but have something unique to say that publishers want to support. Bad books get published because publishing is a business like anything else, and those bad books make money.”

– B.J. Mendelson. Social Media is Bullshit from St. Martin’s Press. 

In the complex ecosystem of modern publishing, commercial success and literary craft don’t always align. Marketing departments excel at creating buzz, critics rush to praise what’s trending, and readers—eager to participate in the cultural moment—often accept what they’re given without questioning the craft beneath the cover. This dynamic creates a unique challenge for serious writers: how do we learn from what’s published when the market rewards factors beyond literary merit?

Crying in H Mart offers us a perfect case study in this disparity.

Strip away the sophisticated marketing campaign—the striking red cover, the “New York Times Bestseller” banner, the glowing blurbs from prestigious publications—and what remains is a textbook example of telling rather than showing, of exposition overwhelming scene. While the memoir’s commercial success is undeniable, its craft choices provide valuable lessons in what to avoid in our own writing.

This isn’t about diminishing the importance of Zauner’s story or its cultural significance. Rather, it’s about developing our critical eye as writers, learning to separate market success from craft mastery. By examining specific passages, we’ll explore how the same material, handled with more attention to scene construction and sensory detail, could have created a more powerful, lasting impact.

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🧐 Ponder:

1. Be honest and ask yourself when you drifted while reading/or listening/to this book? Write up a chart.
2. Did you stay with this book? Why? What kept you reading?

Be a better writer right now. Write in scene:

Right now is “a moment in time when something happens to move the story of your life forward” in time. Your core desire, as you read this, is to be a better writer. In the next scene, you’ll perhaps shove away from your desk and amble into the kitchen to make coffee. Then, in that scene, you’ll be standing before the window, sipping that coffee and watching the incoming dark clouds roll in. Worried, you’ll now set aside your coffee, lace up your shoes and hurry out to take a walk before the storm hits. In each of these moments, you (the protagonist) are in a location with desires and obstacles to those desires. For instance, you might not get that coffee because the storm swept in faster than expected and high winds knocked out your power. Now what?

Moments in time are full of action, description, and tension. Most new writers skip over the moments (also known as scenes) because they want to explain, explain, explain. They want to control. They want to be clever. They want to tell. But as we’ve seen in this book, and this teaching (and pretty much all the teachings here at the Studio), readers don’t want to buried under meandering explanations, jumping thoughts, roiling emotions, and confusing philosophies. Readers want to engage their senses. They want to be drawn in close. They want the freedom to draw their own conclusions. They want volition.

Bottom line: Scene gives the reader what they crave! A mirror of life. Memorable, and smart books worth your time are filled with glorious scene writing, beautiful word choices, strong verbs and stunning descriptions.

Challenge yourself to become a writer of such a book. Learn, practice and perfect your scene writing. Do this and you’ll become a great writer who creates work that lasts vs. one who hides behind overly amped promo copy that doesn’t deliver.

If you haven’t taken Scene/Exposition/Progression, do it. If you are a subscriber to Flight School, you get 20% off, too. This is where the basic’s of scene teaching starts. Next, hire one of our mentors to see how you are doing. They’ll give you advice to keep you on task. It’s not as hard as you think to write scene, but you will need someone at your side to help you break those bad habits seen in Zauner’s work. Invest in yourself. The final result is well worth it.

Lit Lessons are posts from the ongoing teachings offered here at Blackbird, largely by the teachers, but also by students with something to share about what they’ve learned. Comments welcome and appreciated. If you are a student who would like to publish something on Lit Lessons, please read these guidelines