Episode · How I Write · 2026-06-03
Books mentioned on Noah Hawley: How He Wrote Fargo | How I Write
Noah Hawley has written books, movies, and TV shows like Alien Earth and Fargo. He's been successful not just because he's a talented writer, but also because he's a consummate professional.
David Perell discussed No Country for Old Men by Cormac McCarthy and White Noise by Don DeLillo and others. Noah Hawley discussed A Conspiracy of Tall Men by Noah Hawley, Memento by Radek John, The good father by Noah Hawley, Anthem by Noah Hawley, Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut, and Catch-22 by Joseph Heller.
Books mentioned, in the order they came up
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No Country for Old Men
No Country for Old Men by Cormac McCarthy is a bleak, violent western thriller about a drug deal gone wrong and the relentless hunter pursuing the survivor.
Discussed“So, as you're watching No Country for Old for Old Men, as you're watching Fargo, what is it that you're looking for to try to understand what's going on?”
Where to get it
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A Conspiracy of Tall Men
Discussed“And you know, and you know, my first novel, A Conspiracy of Tall Men, Such a good premise.”
Where to get it
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Memento
Memento is a critically acclaimed neo-noir psychological thriller film directed by Christopher Nolan, following a man with anterograde amnesia who attempts to find his wife's murderer.
Discussed“you're doing something both familiar and unfamiliar at the same time, you know, Memento, for example, a movie that is told backwards.”
Where to get it
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The good father
The Good Father by Noah Hawley is a contemporary novel that follows a medical doctor on his second marriage whose life is upended when his son from a previous marriage is arrested following the assassination of a presidential candidate.
Discussed“Um yeah so I wrote a book called The Good Father.”
Where to get it
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White Noise
White Noise by Don DeLillo is a seminal 1984 postmodern novel that chronicles contemporary consumerism, academic satire, and the omnipresence of mass media and pop culture.
Discussed“How did Don DeLillo do that with White Noise for you? It seems like that's a lot of what that novel did.”
Where to get it
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Anthem
Discussed“I mean, but Vonnegut is you know, I went back and reread a lot of Vonnegut before I was writing this last book, Anthem.”
Where to get it
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Slaughterhouse-Five
Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut is a classic anti-war novel that follows the life of Billy Pilgrim as he becomes unstuck in time and experiences the devastating Allied firebombing of Dresden during World War II.
Discussed“to write a book like Slaughterhouse-Five about his World War II experience, but but do it with the conceit that his main character has come unstuck in time”
Where to get it
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Catch-22
Catch-22 is Joseph Heller's famous satirical novel about the absurd bureaucratic paradoxes and psychological toll of military life during World War II.
Discussed“One of the first writing assignments that I remember in high school was we were reading Catch 22, the Joseph Heller book”
Where to get it
