Thread: What are your biggest influences?

What authors and books have influenced you the most as a writer?

That's a great topic! I have never given it much thought, but considering now... my stories tend to be more about people- frankly I suck at writing stories about saving the world. But I like to have big ominous things going on in the background whatever my setting, and while I know I will never-ever- compare to Lovecraft I know that my fictional world view is heavily influenced by his work.

Yea, I know I told a couple people here I wasn't into horror, I have since reexamined my bookshelf and discovered I was horribly mistaken. XD

So, HP Lovecraft for atmospheric undertones. For plot styling, I like to pull cues from various authors- I will confess I read a lot of manga- I like how Matsuri Akino's short stories always have a twisted little moral to them, I like Obha and Obata's (I know one was more the author and one the more the artist but I don't think I ever knew which was which, so best mention both...) heavily character driven conflicts in Death Note.

I love, and so try to imitate, the imagery of a few russian authors, Chekov, Dostoyevsky, Pasternak (all of those possibly misspelled), and the dreamy quality of Gabriel Garcia Marquez- though admmittedly I've only read one of his books.

I try not to be overly Shakespearian in my dialogue, but I love the way he rants. Most of my social circle think he's overrated and not that good of a writer- but I say if they can like Twilight, I can like Shakespeare. Thbbbt. His characters were for plays- they had to be good at expressing themselves, and I try to remember to express my own instead of just saying 'this happened, that happened, then he said and she said'. This gets tricky when you don't agree with a particular character's philosophies, but I think it's very important.

Blehhhh. Speaking of all this I really should be writing... but this nyquil is really knocking me on my butt today.

Ernest Hemingway; for how I write, not what I write. I love his style; the way he replaced commas with repeated use of the word 'and,' making his sentences go on and on, and then follow them with short, tight sentences. Every blurb you read on this man tells you every word he used was necessary, and not a word of it is untrue.

My influences shift according to the direction of my writing during a particular era. I'm listing them here in order of when they were important and a conscious presence in my mind.

The Time Machine (the first novel I ever read! To this day I so love reading this book)
War of the Worlds (also the first novel I ever read! I don't know which came first, truth be told, but this is the catalyst pair that made me write)
Edgar Allen Poe (rhyme, rhythm and dark fantasy)
Samuel Coleridge (rhyme, rhythm and dark fantasy)
Songs of Earth and Power -Greg Bear (a fantasy that involved philosophy and religion, that showed me how deep into our world a fictional world can strike)
The Bible (I was a Christian and so I was influenced, willing or otherwise)
The Hobbit (my first fantasy)
The Sword of Truth (Terry Goodkind - my first contemporary fanship, and my first major literary disillusionment)
Zarathustra and Nietzsche (my highest hero still! He'd be so disappointed in that)
Religious writings (more interested in content, but also heavily interested in writing style)
Salmon Rushdie (Midnight's Children, Shame, Satanic Verses, this guy was awesome! I got put off of him after a while though, as he started to seem self-conscious and a bit full of himself in his writing)
The Prophet by Kahleel Ghibran (sp?) (beautiful philosophy disguised as fiction, not much different from but easier to read than Zarathustra)
Isaac Asimov -Foundation series (a pretty amazing science fiction, inspiring in its scope and the worlds it shows)
Frank Herbert - Dune (another amazing science fiction, inspiring in its use of religions, prophecies, economics and politics, all surrounding the powerful drug referred to as "the spice."

That's about as close to current as I dare come, at risk of launching into a 50 book list!

I thought Dune was Frank Herbert? Oh! Didn't his son do some more on the universe too? I didn't know his name though was it Ghreg? I'm always excited to think there might be more to a series than I knew of... course it's been ten years since I read the Dune books i'd prolly have to start over anyway.

Yes, yes Dune was Frank Herbert... and I have no clue who Greg Herbert is XD . Oops (fixed). I read one of the "sequel" books by his son and wasn't impressed enough to read more.

Aw poofy. That's the trouble with an author picking up another's work- it's just not the same.

Style influences, CS Forester and Margery Allingham both write the sort of clear, concise that I would like to emulate.
Idea influences are not so easy "My friend Mister Leaky" was a big influence when I was little, but I can't remember who wrote it.

Edit Google says JBS Haldayne.

Books and authors,
that is one very long list, but at heart I will always a pulp sci fi buff. I prefer my entertainment light and fluffy, and without too much angst. Girls guns and car chases.
Call me a philistine.

Originally Posted by bazz cargo

Books and authors,
that is one very long list, but at heart I will always a pulp sci fi buff. I prefer my entertainment light and fluffy, and without too much angst. Girls guns and car chases.
Call me a philistine.

PHILISTINE!

Me too. Not so much scifi, though I do like it, but those dime paperback niorey detective novels. I eat those.

The Saint.
For true pulp aficionado's you cannot beat old Les.
The nearest you can get now a days is Clive Cussler. He tries bless him.

John Grisham, I guess. His "The Firm" was the first novel I've read, the first book I've read, which not exactly a novel, but rather a short novella is Dixon's "Hardy Boys: Sabotage at Sea."

Other authors that I think have influenced my writing include Dan Brown (I love how he writes those Reveal moments, e.g. "And then it hit Langdon like a freight train.") and Michael Crichton.

Originally Posted by TheFuhrer02

Dan Brown (I love how he writes those Reveal moments, e.g. "And then it hit Langdon like a freight train.").

I watched the Da Vinci Code, and thought it was pretty awesome. A year later (around there) I read the Da Vinci Code. I was done in two days, and totally blown away by it. I watched the movie again after, and was disappointed to the point of being angry. I don't even remember the discrepancies now, but I do remember that I was very put off by how Silas was represented in the film, because he had seemed so important and central in the book.

Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game was the first science fiction novel that made me realize stories are about people, and that isn't a bad thing. It's companion book, Ender's Shadow amazed me more, if anything could have, and that taught me that Author's can improve their craft (Ender's Shadow tells much of the same story as Ender's Game but was written five or ten years later by the same author).

Earnest Hemingway's Old Man and The Sea gave me a glimpse of how awesome simplicity can be.

Modern fantasy author like Brandon Sanderson's first two pre-Wheel of Time work reminded me of how great complex stories have the potential of being.

Jude the Obscure, by Thomas Hardy, is a beautifully written and hopelessly depressing novel... which made me realize language really can make the novel.

There are definitely more (Tolkien got short shrift here, but honestly, his writing isn't what inspires me about his work), but these are the ones that occurred to me immediately.

Originally Posted by bazz cargo

Books and authors,
that is one very long list, but at heart I will always a pulp sci fi buff. I prefer my entertainment light and fluffy, and without too much angst. Girls guns and car chases.
Call me a philistine.

A man after my own heart! The authors who have most influenced my writing would be Poe, Ray Bradbury, Arthur C. Clarke, and Stephen King. I want people who read my stories to have fun, first and foremost.