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5 Books That Changed My Life
What books shaped your worldview or influenced your writing style?
I love this question. I never did a creative writing degree as an undergrad, but I did take a short creative writing course at Oxford University to upskill. That was great, but I needed more, so I joined the Novelry, run by Louise Dean. There, the writing mentors gave you an abundance of support and knowledge, but the most significant piece of advice was to read. When you’re writing, you need to read and read the types of books that you aspire to write.
So with that, I read, and read, and read. Here are my top five books and why:
1. On Writing, by Stephen King, is a bit of an autobiography as much as it is a book about the writing craft. King gives you his unbiased view of what it takes to be a good writer while giving you snippets of his own life of writing. King’s approach to writing is very methodical and very logical.
2. Big Magic – by Elizabeth Gilbert (author of Eat, Pray, Love). In contrast to King’s view of writing, Gilbert has a more magical take on writing, where ideas come from, and how you harness them. I loved this book, as I do believe there is an element of magic, luck, or deep subconscious thinking when it comes to writing and idea creation.
3. Throne of Glass by Sarah J Maas was my first foray into fantasy romance after reading more traditional fantasy books from authors like George. R. R. Martin, and Raymond. E. Feist. Seeing fantasy with a romance subplot that grows into a full-blown romance plot changed how I read, but it also inspired me to think about picking up the pen myself. Fantasy itself can be incredibly daunting to write, but Maas demonstrated that you can do so with a feminine style that has immense world-building but appeals to a broader audience because it doesn’t feel like your brain is about to do a HIIT workout.
4. The Magician – by Raymond. E. Feist was my first step back into fantasy reading after taking a few years break following Game of Thrones and diving into crime thrillers like Don Winslow’s Power of the Dog (which is one of my favorite books). The Magician was a fantastic series, as while it followed the main character, the series comprised many side stories that kept it fresh. It made me think about how you can effectively write more books in a series but incorporate the side character’s stories as their books.
5. Legacy of the Nine Realms – by Amelia Hutchins – these books destroyed me emotionally. I love them because Amelia is such a dark writer, and again, her writing opened my eyes to another facet of romance writing. One where there’s not a happily ever after, or the MMC is a real asshole, but somehow you still want him. It’s a contract to Maas, but I’ve drawn inspiration from Hutchins that you can be nice to your characters. Writing a book without tension or agency is boring, so you need to build it, and then tear it down to build it all again. Make the characters work for their spot in the limelight, don’t just give it to them.
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