"I wouldn't be a writer without....."
Top Five Books Tag
The Rules:
Post your top five influential books (or book series) that helped shape the kind of writer you are, or hope to be. When I say influential, I just mean books that helped you in whatever shape or form. They don't have to be wonderful, famous best sellers - it's just what's been important to you.
This was difficult for me, because so many books are influential, and six in particular sparked something in me. But the following five occurred to me first, and so won. Sorry Jay Asher's Thirteen Reasons Why, who is unlucky number six. It's an incredible book that really makes you consider suicide, and blame, and how innocent we really are when it comes to others suffering. It's one of the reasons I love YA literature so much.
Most of these pictures are of me, posing with the books. Except for two, one I couldn't find at all, and one I could only find the DVD for. God knows where I put them. They're both on my kindle, at least. On with the list!
1. The Chronicles of Narnia, by C.S.Lewis.
The Voyage of the Dawn Treader is my favourite of the series. I actually read them to my son recently and was astounded at the latent racism in the books, and the turns of phrase that you couldn't get away with these days. But when I was three-turning-four, my mum was remarrying and her husband-to-be used to read me these books. I loved them so much, I loved that they took you to another world where princes and dragons and talking beasts lived. I was the youngest of four at the time, and we went boy-girl-boy-girl. I was tiny, and totally believed I was Lucy Pevensie. It was all there! I definitely spent a large portion of my childhood climbing into furniture and believing I'd found Narnia. Narnia gave me an imagination, and a strong faith in that which I cannot see. It made me respect animals and challenges and did a lot to build who I am, not just my creativity but my whole self. Even now, I find something comforting in nature, believing I'm trekking through Archenland, or the Wild North.
2. Dreamland, by Sarah Dessen.
I'm about to say something I don't normally say about young adult fiction (despite being a fan). I cried at this book. I still cry at this book. The last fifty pages made me an absolute wreck. I love Sarah Dessen anyway, and I found her as I was researching where my books would fit into the market. They fit in with Sarah. My inspiration came after my inspiration, if that makes sense? Sarah writes beautiful, character-based stories. A lot of them follow the same base narrative, but there are a few that buck the trend. Like Dreamland. It focuses on Caitlin, who has always been second-best to her over-achieving sister, until her sister runs away days before she's meant to be going to Yale. Her mother alternates between obsessing where her sister, Cassandra, could have gone, and making a half-assed attempt to focus on Caitlin in the same way. Caitlin doesn't like the sudden pressure, and finds herself gravitating to the local drug dealer, Rogerson. Rogerson has dreadlocks and a permanent scowl, and is every parents worst nightmare. Caitlin discovers his dad is abusive to him, and she soon finds herself at the receiving end of Rogerson's frustrations. The story catalogues her downfall, until he's beating her outside of her parents house and her neighbours save her from him. But even then, she doesn't want to let him go. She gets sent to rehab, and the story then becomes how she pieces herself together again.
My heart breaks for Caitlin every time I read it. Sarah is a freaking magician with words, and totally underrated after a book like this. And I'm actually welling up just giving you the breakdown, sad cow that I am.
3. We Need To Talk About Kevin, Lionel Shriver.
Yes, that's the DVD. Cannot Scooby where the book is, past my kindle edition. I voted this book a couple of years ago as the best Orange prize winner in the last ten years. It won. It's intense. A lot of people dismiss the first hundred-or-so pages as irrelevant, but they're intricate world-building and a great way of understanding Eva Khatchadourian's attitude to motherhood. Seeing Kevin grow, and knowing that a lot of his earlier years are tainted by an obvious, yet ignored case of postpartum depression and that he eventually grows to learn that the only way he's going to get through to his mother is through extreme behaviour. It's an excellent narrative on nature vs nuture, on working together as a unit to raise your children, and how observant they really are. How perverse human nature can be, and how a chain of events can lead to such devastation. I devoured this book before motherhood, and when I read it again as a mother, I felt a little uncomfortable about the parallels I could draw between myself and Eva. What's really to stop any of us raising a child to do something so horrific, just by our own selfish mistakes? I love how she makes you think of how you affect others, and it's definitely a theme I'm trying to work on in my own book, where my characters might express opinions as facts that are contradicted by the action, or where the two main characters have opposing views on situations, both of whom can be wrong and right at the same time.
4. Harry Potter Series, J.K.Rowling.
Need I say more? I actually resisted this series. It was recommended to me when I was thirteen, by someone who mocked me regularly for still reading the Babysitters Club series. I would have taken her seriously if not for that, but I dismissed her on her hypocrisy. Then, my parents bought the first four books for my younger sister, who isn't much of a reader. They sat, at the top of the stairs outside of her room, for days. Then my curiosity got the better of me. I finished those four books in three days. I was hooked. Hogwarts was like Narnia all over again for me. I loved her use of language, her research into lore, and how you can love the characters despite the characters being secondary to the narrative and the world she'd built. J.K.Rowling actually made me more adventurous in my reading, more open to recommendations. I was already a reader, but now I was avid, obsessive … thank you for developing my crazy, J.K.Rowling.
5. The End Of Mr Y, Scarlett Thomas.
This one is hard to break down. I call it 'The Matrix meets Being John Malkovitch'. A mix of holy water and holistic medicine allows you to enter the minds of others. That's the best you're going to get out of me. It's just … wow … go read! You'll understand how I am still lacking in words after all these years. I embrace the sublime and the silliness of it, and hope I can go some way to creating that kind of impact for any readers I may get. Wow.
I hope that was enough for you, Sarah-Jane! And there's some surprises in there too, maybe?
If I have to tag someone, I pick you, Lydia! my distopian-crazy friend! When - not if, when - she does it, I will add the link to this blog.
You will find a link to this entry on Sarah-Jane's blog, which I've linked above!
Yay you did it! It's fun. Also, I liked your sneaky way of inserting number six ;)
ReplyDeleteI love your post about Narnia, it's one I had to leave off the list and I was gutted, it almost made it. I also missed off the Sweet Valley High series that i was addicted to as a teenager haha. No moral story, no intense plot, but It kept me reading as a teenager when there was no "fandoms" and popular YA books haha.
I promise I'm working on it! I've not just ignored your tag, I promise! Although I've got no idea who I'm going to tag.
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