The First Time You Read a given Favorite Writer You were...... You Fill In The Rest

[SilentRoamer]

Ok well I can point to a few but here goes:

Alan Garner - The Weirdston of Brisingammon. This is an English Fantasy Tale that stuck with me for a long time. I probably read it when I was 9 or 10 and it was the first Fantasy I can remember reading (I used to read a lot of mythology at that point as there was not much out and out fantasy in the school library.)

Dark Moon - David Gemmell. I read this at maybe age 12. I basically fell in love with Gemmells writing almost immediately and proceeded to read everything he had written. I am almost scared to re-read Gemmell in case it doesn't give me "the feels" anymore. Not my favourite Gemmell book but it introduced me to his heroic world, if only Gemmell was about now to combat the rise of GrimDark!

In my teens I really resonated with Orson Scott Cards Ender Game and it really impressed me.

Recently Herberts Dune and Simmons Hyperion have been stand out for me.

 

[thatollie]

The first time I read a book by a certain author, I was stuck in the car on a long family holiday so I had no choice but to keep reading it. This was a great thing since the first hundred pages were hard to get through.

 

[Edward Druitt]

A writer that you became hooked from the start .Why were you so captivated and fascinated by what writer wrote ? What was it about the writer and his or her books and stories that so captivated you ? Did this writer touch your life and inspire you in some way ?

This is not limited to one choice It can be more then one writer


Thoughts ?

Lovecraft is the first one. I think the first story was The Rats In The Walls. At the ending I just muttered, what the f**k?! From then I just kept reading and every time I got this terrible feeling of dread. I knew he made horror stories but most horror stories, let's say Dracula since I like older literature, the humans typically stand a chance against the thing they're against. The protagonist and the monster usually go back and forth in having the upper hand... with Lovecraft, no, you're the human, you're f*cked basically. There's often just no hope, hence the trope of madness. It influenced me to start writing again.

Apart from Lovecraft I spend like 90% of my time on non-fiction (mainly politics, atheist literature, popular science/astronomy). The last series I fully read was The Strain trilogy by Chuck Hogan and Guillermo del Toro.

 

[BAYLOR]

Lovecraft is the first one. I think the first story was The Rats In The Walls. At the ending I just muttered, what the f**k?! From then I just kept reading and every time I got this terrible feeling of dread. I knew he made horror stories but most horror stories, let's say Dracula since I like older literature, the humans typically stand a chance against the thing they're against. The protagonist and the monster usually go back and forth in having the upper hand... with Lovecraft, no, you're the human, you're f*cked basically. There's often just no hope, hence the trope of madness. It influenced me to start writing again.

Apart from Lovecraft I spend like 90% of my time on non-fiction (mainly politics, atheist literature, popular science/astronomy). The last series I fully read was The Strain trilogy by Chuck Hogan and Guillermo del Toro.

If you like love craft there are several other writers you might find of interest.

The House on the Borderland by William Hope Hodgson. written 1908 this a book that thought highly off. It's a horror novel one of the best ever written.

The Dark Chamber Leonard Cline

The Moon Pool Abraham Merritt

The works of M R James , Algernon Blackwood

City of the Singing Flame Clark Ashton Smith and it's sequel Beyond the Singing Flame There is site The Eldritch Dark which has all of his stores listed alphabetically . If you like grim stuff, he's it. other stories to check out by by him The death of Malygris , Double Shadow , The Last Hieroglyph , The Vaults of Yoh Vombus ( That last one is one of the Inspirations for the the film Alien)

The Star Rover by Jack London

Deathbird Stories by Harlan Ellison

The Shadow at the Bottom of the World by Thomas Liggotti

 

[Edward Druitt]

If you like love craft there are several other writers you might find of interest.

The House on the Borderland by William Hope Hodgson. written 1908 this a book that thought highly off. It's a horror novel one of the best ever written.

The Dark Chamber Leonard Cline

The Moon Pool Abraham Merritt

The works of M R James , Algernon Blackwood

City of the Singing Flame Clark Ashton Smith and it's sequel Beyond the Singing Flame There is site The Eldritch Dark which has all of his stores listed alphabetically . If you like grim stuff, he's it. other stories to check out by by him The death of Malygris , Double Shadow , The Last Hieroglyph , The Vaults of Yoh Vombus ( That last one is one of the Inspirations for the the film Alien)

The Star Rover by Jack London

Deathbird Stories by Harlan Ellison

The Shadow at the Bottom of the World by Thomas Liggotti

Thank you for the recommendations! I've noted them down. I have a decent list of authors I need to check out, starting with the "Lovecraft Circle" of writers. I also quite like the look of what Wilum Hopfrog Pugmire writes. He seems to be in love with the Lovecraftian lore and seems quite respected.

 

[TechRaider]

I'll never forget reading TLOTR for the first time at school. I was never interested in fantasy - SF was my thing. I was standing in line at the library and the girl in front of me was returning The Fellowship of the Ring. Wait a sec, I thought to myself, the title rings a bell. The guy is apparently a famous writer. Shall I give it a try for a change?

Needless to say, in the following two weeks I read TLOTR, The Hobbit and moved on to Silmarillion which is now my absolute fav. That day I suffered some sort of reality shift. The world has never been the same since

 

[Spade]

I read Ben Bova's Orion when I as 12 and quickly got my hands on a dozen or so more of his works. Mars, As On A Darkling Plain, Jupiter, etc. They were fun reads that I found really accessible as a teenager who was just starting to read adult books for the first time. I reread Orion after 15 years a few months ago and I still impressed with it. I do realize now a lot of his stuff is a little silly, but there are some gems.

 

[BAYLOR]

I remember finding Karl Edward Wagner's novel Bloodstone in a long gone mall bookshop . It , From page one I was hooked . Kane the Mystic swordsman not a your typical hero and not quite a villain, not a very nice man . The world Kane lived in , dark and very nasty , populated by thing human and otherwise. In this novel Kane is trying to get hold of ancient alien relic the Bloodstone ring.The ring is the matching half to the much much large Bloodstone which can be found at the center ruined city of Arelarti . The beings living living are called Rillyti Monstrous nine foot tall toadmen, they are the degenerate remains af race known as the Krellran who came to each eons ago bring the Bloodstone with them. Whoever commands the might of the Bloodstone can rule the world. Wagner was a marvelous writer. The over books in the Kane series were equally entertaining.

 

[Extollager]

I'll never forget reading TLOTR for the first time at school. I was never interested in fantasy - SF was my thing. I was standing in line at the library and the girl in front of me was returning The Fellowship of the Ring. Wait a sec, I thought to myself, the title rings a bell. The guy is apparently a famous writer. Shall I give it a try for a change?

Needless to say, in the following two weeks I read TLOTR, The Hobbit and moved on to Silmarillion which is now my absolute fav. That day I suffered some sort of reality shift. The world has never been the same since

Y'know, if someone collected a whole bundle of such Tolkien-discovery stories, told with plenty of circumstantial detail, I'd probably buy it.

 

[james lanfear]

My first 'close encounter of the literary kind' with a favourite author, was Mr. Heinlein's The Star Beast, on the recommendation of my elder sister, who was already thoroughly hooked.
I was, instantly, transported away to an exciting new world & have continued to be, by his works & many, many others, ever since.
Thank you Robert; your Time Enough For Love, broke my heart & mended it all again, Moon is a Harsh Mistress, Cat Who Walks Through Walls, Friday , I will Fear No Evil, To Sail Beyond the Sunset & Job, all still make my mind reel. My independence of thought, was bolstered & encouraged by your bold, intelligent characters.
We all live with our loves of today but this man's books were my first (& so remain the sweetest).

 

[chongjasmine]

I read enid blyton when I was a child.
I was drawn to her story writing, especially the circus series.

 

[aThenian]

I was another 11 year old, blown away by LOTR. (Seems like there's going to be quite a gang of us.)

I remember reading it at night and being so terrified that I could not get out of bed to cross the landing to the bathroom. It felt utterly real and absorbing.

I also spent a lot of time trying to imagine myself into the story (I think that's what I did at that age - if I loved a book, I gave myself a part). I think I was some kind of elf.

 

[BAYLOR]

Tunnel in the Sky by Robert Heinlein I thought it was just wonderful adventure story. It was the first book I read by him.

 

[galanx]

Reading in the early mid-60s, before the fantasy boom. I'd read the Narnia series and The Hobbit, but had them filed away as "fairy stories", and was always slightly ashamed that I liked them, and dreaded the thought of being caught reading them. Other than that, I was fascinated by both SF and ancient history (pre-medieval, anyway).

One day in an old SF magazine I read a Conan story ( "The Hall of the Dead", F&SF, Feb. 1967, Wiki informs me). I started out assuming it was historical, though I coudn't place the names of cities and countries, but they seemed vaguelyfamiliar. Then suddenly he gets attacked by a giant slug, and ends up encountering some mummified warriors, and by the end I realized even the places were not real.

I was both intrigued and somewhat outraged; "Are you allowed to just make stuff up like that?"

My introduction to Fantasy as a genre; later that same year, just after my birthday, clutching my new adult library card ("Today I am a man"), I pulled down a copy of a book entitled "The Lord of the Rings" -olive green book cover with a red eye on it- and, unfolding the map, discovered a few names I recognised: The Shire, The Misty Mountains....

I read the first two back-to-back, and then had to wait TWO WEEKS for someone to return the third: longest fortnight of my life.

 

[nixie]

I didn't start reading fantasy until my early twenties. I did read C S Lewis and other fantasy aimed at kids at a younger age. I picked up Feist's Magician and I entered into a whole new world, it made me realise that fantasy wasn't just for children.

 

[Extollager]

Lovecraft's been a favorite author for most of my life. I used to think Lin Carter's anthology The Young Magicians (Oct. 1969) introduced me to HPL. This book probably was the first one in which I read any of HPL's stories, but it must have been Carter's Tolkien: A Look Behind The Lord of the Rings that introduced me to Lovecraft's name and to that beguiling term "Cthulhu Mythos" (page 167 of the March 1969 first printing, which, as a kid, I got when it came out). I was an eighth-grader when I got the "Look Behind" book if, as I believe, I got it as soon as it appeared.

 

[BAYLOR]

Starship Troopers. by Robert A , Heinlein The almost deadpan attune of Johnny Ricco drew me into the book .

 

[Harpo]

I was about 27-28 when I was first given a copy of Gargantua and Pantagruel by François Rabelais, and it quickly became my favourite book. He likes to heap lists of words into big piles, sometimes going on much longer than might usually seem reasonable.

I’ve had several copies over the years, my current one has illustrations by W. Heath Robinson

Sometimes it is silly

 

[BAYLOR]

I was about 27-28 when I was first given a copy of Gargantua and Pantagruel by François Rabelais, and it quickly became my favourite book. I’ve had several copies over the years, my current one has illustrations by W. Heath Robinson

A bit of a precursor to Johnathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels .

 

[BAYLOR]

Harlan Ellison , the first time I read anything by him was one introductions which was in a Dr Who book which a novelization of a one the series , ive long since forgotten which book . In it he was critical of Star Wars and Star Trek and he touted Dr Who, before that,Id need heard of him but he intrigued me . I was think How Dare be critical of Star Wars and Star Trek and then not long after , I happed to come up a hard cover book of one his story anthologies Stalking the Nightmare . The stories with the covers of this book were unlike anything Id previously read and at the end, I found myself want to read alot more of Ellison . Amazing stuff , great writer.