Favourite Authors...

[Michelle]

I got tagged to this on my blog a short while ago, and I was thinking it would be interesting to do here.

 

1. Who is your all-time favourite author, and why?

 

2. Who was your first favourite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favourites?

 

3. Who

[Michelle]

And my response:

 

1. Who is your all-time favourite author, and why?

 

Sorry, but that one has got to be impossible! Over the years I have read so many books, by so many authors, there isn’t just one who stands out.

 

2. Who was your first favourite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favourites?

 

Hmm.. bit of a cliche, but I have to say Stephen King. Once I moved away from the teen section in the library, I got into horror books, and I tried to read everything I could find by this guy. I’ve read most, and it’s his early stuff that I generally prefer.

 

Still among my favourites? Going by the amount of his that I have read, I would say yes.

 

3. Who’s the most recent addition to your list of favourite authors, and why?

 

That has to be Linda Gillard - I really liked her first book, Emotional Geology, then found myself loving her second, A Lifetime Burning.

 

I’ve discovered many excellent new authors over the past few years, but she is my most recent.

 

4. If someone asked you who your favourite authors were right now, which authors would first pop out of your mouth? Are there any you’d add on a moment of further reflection?

 

Ok, let’s try.. Linda Gillard, Sam Hayes, R.L. Royle, Katherine Warwick & Raven Hart are the ones that spring to mind. The first two are recent additions, and all the first three had books that made me go ‘wow!’. Katherine because she makes anything a joy to read, even if not my usual genre, and Raven because her vampire series rocks!)

 

On reflection, I’d add Stephen King, JD Robb, Tess Gerritsen, Carole Matthews & Kate Harrison, as authors that I have greatly enjoyed, but haven’t read much of recently.

[Nici]

Iv'e just copied this straight from my blog, as Michelle tagged me with this.

 

1. Who is your all-time favourite author, and why?

That is a very hard question and not one I think I can answer. I like such a variety of fiction that to pick one author would be too difficult!

 

2. Who was your first favourite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favourites?

My first favourite author was Virgina Andrews and the Flowers in the Attic series. I don't know why I started reading these books but I still have them on my bookshelf 17 years later!

 

3. Who

[Kell]

I was tagged withthis one as well and my ansers were:

 

1. Who is your all-time favourite author, and why?

Terry Pratchett. I accidentally discovered his genius in the summer of 1992 whilst bored on a family holiday in the Lake District. I picked up two books - one was Jurassic Park by Michael Chrichton (which is excellent, by the way, and far better than the film), the other was The Carpet People by Terry Pratchett. I was blown away by the story and the style - and immediately vowed to search out all his other work. The Discworld series really sealed it for me - the man is nothing short of being a God in the writing world! His books never fail to entertain me and there is always some witty link back to something in the

[kernow_reader]

Et moi:

 

1. Who is your all-time favourite author, and why?

 

Charles Dickens for his humour and the way he gives such life to his characters and their situations.

 

 

2. Who was your first favourite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favourites?

 

Enid Blyton.

 

Oh YES! Anyone who tries to captivate kids with stories entitled

 

"We'll Stay Up All Night"

 

or wonderful sentences like:

 

"Uncle Dick was going twigging"

 

and

 

"The monkey was laughing cheekily"

 

gets my vote. (I was a very impressionable child)

 

 

3. Who

[Tiger]

1. Who is your all-time favourite author, and why?

 

JK Rowling:mrgreen: I love Harry Potter, and the way she writes.

 

 

2. Who was your first favourite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favourites?

 

Francesca Simon, who did the Horrid Henry books. As a seven-year-old, I thought that her books were funny and outrageous. I admit I still read them briefly from my brother's room for a light laugh, but only sometimes.

 

 

3. Who’s the most recent addition to your list of favourite authors, and why?

 

Jean Plaidy. I love the way she writes, and I love her stories.

 

 

4. If someone asked you who your favourite authors were right now, which authors would first pop out of your mouth? Are there any you’d add on a moment of further reflection?

 

Probably Michelle Paver, or Jean Plaidy. Probably Dickens and Bronte as well.

[Freewheeling Andy]

1. Who is your all-time favourite author, and why?

 

Hmm. Can I answer this? There's probably three or four, but it really depends on my mood.

 

2. Who was your first favourite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favourites?

 

My first favourite was AA Milne, of course.

 

My first favourite as a "relatively grown up reader" was JG Ballard, really the first "serious" author I chewed up tons and tons of books by. I'd gone through phases of loving the Biggles stuff, and then a bit later all the Sherlock Holmes books. But my aunt gave me Ballard's Hello America and it just clicked. A dystopian post-apocalyptic USA, and Ballard's fantastically poetic writing took me in. I think I was too young and naive to properly understand all that was going on with his fragmented and fractured outlooks on how the psychology of individuals is the key to behaviour and how the modern world pushes it way beyond its limits, and how he was playing with the evocation of combinations of the mundane and everyday combined with ever more extreme situations.

 

All that went straight over my head, but I loved it, and I think I knew there was something deeper going on even if I didn't understand it.

 

3. Who’s the most recent addition to your list of favourite authors, and why?

 

Probably, I guess, Philip Roth

 

4. If someone asked you who your favourite authors were right now, which authors would first pop out of your mouth? Are there any you’d add on a moment of further reflection?

 

I guess I'd start the list: JG Ballard (still), Ismael Kadare, Haruki Murukami, David Mitchell

 

After that, I'd probably delve deeper and come up with Primo Levi and Philip K Dick and William Dalrymple (and Tibor Fischer if his last two books hadn't been such dross).

 

There are others who'll probably be there soon, but I don't think I can call authors I've read one or two books by "favourites".

[madcow]

1. Who is your all-time favourite author, and why?

 

Can't really answer this one as, thanks to BCF, it changes faster than the weather!

2. Who was your first favourite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favourites?

 

My first favourite author was Enid Blyton I loved all her books especially the St. Clare's and Malory Towers books, closely followed by Anna Sewell. I wouldn't consider them as still favourites more like they evoke wonderful childhood memories

3. Who’s the most recent addition to your list of favourite authors, and why?

 

Tess Gerritsen, Linda Gillard, Katherine Warwick, Karin Slaughter, Sam Hayes and Stuart MacBride. They've all encouraged me to read more and more and I love all their books I've read to date.

4. If someone asked you who your favourite authors were right now, which authors would first pop out of your mouth? Are there any you’d add on a moment of further reflection?

 

Tess Gerritsen, Linda Gillard, KW, Karin Slaughter, Stuart MacBride, Martina Cole, Lesley Pearse and Michel Faber.

 

On further reflection I would add Jodi Picoult, Torey Haydn, Phillipa Gregory, Jane Austen and Charles Dickens.

Edited June 19, 2008 by madcow
Spelling!!

[Kell]

3. Who

[nursenblack]

1. Who is your all-time favourite author, and why?

I'm with almost everyone else on this right now, which is means I just can't pick the favorite. Ask me again at the end of the year. Maybe that should be my personal goal or would that be an unattainable new years resolution?

2. Who was your first favourite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favourites?

Well, I became interested in reading as a preteen and there were a couple of authors I was crazy about. The first was the Baby-sitter's Club seriesby Ann M. Martin. The second was the Sweet Valley High series by Francine Pascal, who actually had a team of ghostwriters to help (I guess she still counts though).

I don't see these authors as being any of my top favs now, but they did bring me a lot of happiness back then.

 

3. Who

[Freewheeling Andy]

This is one author currently residing on Mount TBR right next to me. I haev The Human Stain waiting to be read. I'm looking forward to reading it even more now.

 

I'm still reading it. It's great, but quite hefty. I really enjoyed The Plot Against America when I read it last year.

[Angel]

1. Who is your all-time favourite author, and why?

 

That is impossible to say, I have so many favourites.

 

2. Who was your first favourite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favourites?

Without doubt it has to be Enid Blyton. I really loved the St Clares and Mallory Towers series. When I was younger I also loved the Magic Faraway Tree.

 

3. Who’s the most recent addition to your list of favourite authors, and why?

 

Karin Slaughter - I love a good murder!

 

4. If someone asked you who your favourite authors were right now, which authors would first pop out of your mouth? Are there any you’d add on a moment of further reflection?

 

There are so many! Philippa Gregory, Judi Picoult, Jean Plaidy, CJ Sansom, Thomas Hardy, Jeanne Kalogridis, Daphne Du Maurier....................

[supergran71]

1. Who is your all-time favourite author, and why?

 

Like everyone else I find this difficult to answer

 

2. Who was your first favourite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favourites?

 

As a child, Enid Blyton, as an adult Denise Robins. Both are dead now so, no I dont read their books .

3. Who’s the most recent addition to your list of favourite authors, and why?

 

Probably Jodi Picoult

 

 

4. If someone asked you who your favourite authors were right now, which authors would first pop out of your mouth? Are there any you’d add on a moment of further reflection?

 

Robert Goddard, Minette Walters, Elizabeth Kostova

__________________

[Guest]

1. Who is your all-time favourite author, and why?

Either Wally Lamb, because he writes from a female perspective so well, or Kazuo Ishiguro because he does 'sinister' or 'reflective without being sentimental' so well.

 

2. Who was your first favourite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favourites?

Roald Dahl, because he wrote about snot and bogies and poo. And yes, I do.

 

Oh, and CS Lewis. Yes to him, too.

 

3. Who’s the most recent addition to your list of favourite authors, and why?

It takes a lot to get onto my favourite authors list. Most recent addition to the "I'd buy anything they wrote, even if they published their shopping list" list? Hmm...I don't really go for an author's entire body of work, unless they're of Ishiguro quality.

 

4. If someone asked you who your favourite authors were right now, which authors would first pop out of your mouth? Are there any you’d add on a moment of further reflection?

Same as above. There are many books I like but they don't guarantee I'd like everything by that particular author.

 

I'm safe with pretty much anything by Paullina Simons, though, or Lionel Shriver. Or Diana Gabaldon. But with any author, you're going to be disappointed somewhere along the line.

 

Unless it's Kazuo Ishiguro of course.

[Kylie]

I've already answered these questions on my blog, but I'll re-post my answers here:

 

1. Who is your all-time favourite author, and why?

Well, I'm going to take a stab at answering this, although I reserve the right to change my mind whenever I like (it's a woman's prerogative you know )

 

It would probably have to be Jane Austen. I think she writes the most beautiful prose and lovely stories. I really get sucked in by the romance of each one, even though they do seem to follow the same basic plotline. This may change over time though, as there are several other authors I greatly admire (such as Vladimir Nabokov) but of whose work I may only have read one so far. Perhaps I need to do a little more reading before I establish my favourite author.

 

2. Who was your first favourite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favorites?

Ann M Martin, author of The Babysitter's Club series. I read those books over and over and over again when I was young. I envied all of their adventures and their close friendships with each other. I still have all of my books, which probably number around 150, although that's not all of the books in the series. I did eventually grow out of them, but if I see the books going cheaply one day, I might buy up the rest to complete my series.

 

I kind of wish I had a better answer, but I never read the 'classic' children's books when I was young, such as LM Montgomery's Anne... series and Kenneth Grahame's The Wind in the Willows, etc.

 

I did (and still do) very much love Roald Dahl, and I also read his books many times over. He had enough of an impact on me that I can still remember the day he died. I have an image of myself walking to the bookcase in my classroom in primary school. I think I probably chose one of his books to read that day.

 

3. Who

[shelbel]

Who is your all-time favouite author and why?

This one I will have to sit on the fence for, it is difficult to just narrow it down to one.

 

who was your first favourite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favourites?

My first favourite author would have to be Harper Lee, I first read To Kill a Mockingbird when I was fifteen for school, and it had such a tremendous impact on me. It was my first real introduction to social juctice issues, and I remember thinking at the time, that when I grew up I wanted to be just like Atticus Finch. This book is still one of my all-time favourites and every few years I pick it up and reread.

 

Who's the most recent addition to your favourite authors, and why?

My most recent favourites are Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Truman Capote, Jeffrey Eugenides and Leo Tolstoy. They are all authors that I"ve read this year, and enjoyed immensely.

 

If someone asked you who your favourite authors were right now, which authors would pop out of your mouth? Are there any you'd add on at moment of reflection?

Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Truman Capote, Jeffrey Eugenides, Leo Tolstoy, Haper Lee. After a moments reflection, Ernest Heminway, John Steinbeck, Umberto Eco, the list goes on and on.

[Kell]

2. Who was your first favourite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favourites?

Roald Dahl, because he wrote about snot and bogies and poo. And yes, I do.

The Twits remains, to this day, one of my all-time favourite books. I adored it fromstart to finish and it's certainly one I'll be reading to Tadpole in a few year!

[tbain]

1. Who is your all-time favourite author, and why? I really could not narrow it down to just one, have loads of authors that I love.

 

2. Who was your first favourite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favourites? I used to love Roald Dahls books when I was younger and Jill Murphy was also a big favourite as I absolutely loved The Worst Witch books!

 

3. Who

[Kate]

1. Who is your all-time favourite author, and why?

Ooo good question. I don't know. There are a few that jump to mind, such as J.K. Rowling, Erica James...

 

2. Who was your first favourite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favourites?

Enid Blyton I think, or Beautrix Potter. I haven't read any for a while though, so I guess not.

 

3. Who

[Guest]

The Twits remains, to this day, one of my all-time favourite books. I adored it fromstart to finish and it's certainly one I'll be reading to Tadpole in a few year!

 

Years ago, Tetley gave away children's books with their big boxes of teabags and I hauled a load off the shelf looking for The Twits because I wouldn't be happy with any other of the books on offer, oh no - it had to be that book.

 

I live in fear of getting the shrinks!

[Loopyloo100]

1. Who is your all-time favourite author, and why?

 

I will have to give the same answer as others as really I don't think I have an all time favourite author as my tastes seem to have varied over the years.

2. Who was your first favourite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favourites?

 

The First author I remember reading and becoming engrossed in her books was Enid Blyton - I found the Magic Faraway Tree stories to be a wonderful escape from reality. I kept my childhood books and I'll still pick up The Enchanted Wood today and appreciate it. I then progressed to the Famous Five books and enjoyed those too and of course I adored Timmy!

3. Who

[Andibody]

1. Who is your all-time favourite author, and why?

Depends on my mood and what's available with AudioBooks. Just love a good read.

2. Who was your first favourite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favourites?

Enid Blyton, as she got me into reading books and K M Peyton, for keeping me interested.

3. Who