A Good Read 10/16-10/22

[LadyCupid]

Many books have inspired me. Books like The Au Pairs or the Twilight series. My favorite books of all though is possibly the Tithe series. The first book is inspiring because its about a girl named Kaye, and how she was living in a place where she doesnt belong. She struggles to find out what the correct thing to do is. She has to choose between the freedom(that lasts seven years) of her childhood 'friends' or the safetey and well being of her love. The second book(Valient) is about a different girl(Val) who find out that her boyfriend is cheating on her, with her mom. She runs away to New York where she meets Loli, Dave, and Luis. Three people her age that live on the streets( or in their case, abandoned subway station) of New York. Luis can make deals with beings no one else can see. Loli convinces Val to follow her to the lair of the creature whom Luis and his brother Dave are working for. Val finds herself bound into service of a troll named Ravus, who is as ugly as he is honerable. She learns to love him(despite his appearence) and is then found torn between her affection for the troll and fear of what her frinds are becoming. The last book(Ironside) Is once again about Kaye and her love for Robien. At a party she gats really drunk and declares herself to him. He then sends her on a seemingly impossible task, she cannot be with him until the task is completed. He did it to protect her from living a life like his. She tells her mother the truth, and while in shock she sends Kaye to retrieve her human counterpart in the seelie court and return her to ironside. Accompanied by her gay best friend, Corny, and his new friend with the Sight, Luis, where she vows to find her mother's true daughter. Kaye then helps Roiben attain the crowns of both kingdoms. This story also tells of corny and his growing love for luis.
My favorite saying in these stories is"They have forever, and what do they do-spend all their time eating and ****ing and figuring out complicated ways to kill each other." Indeed these aspects again mark this dark, edgy fantasy as one for the high school audience.

[hexedbird]

I've never been inspired by a book to write, but I have been inspired by a book to keep writing.

I had just finished my first novel and I was busy collecting rejection slips while I worked on my second book. I was really enjoying the process of seeing where my characters were going in my second book and figured I was just passing time and not doing it right. I just let the story take me along. No ending in mind and no outlines. That can't be what a REAL writer does.

I picked up a copy of Stephen King On Writing during this period in time. It was basically his views on the way he works and an autobiography. I was more interested in the biographical side of the book but when he described his habits it clicked.

My first book made it into print and although my second has not as yet and may never make it I am still enjoying the writing part of my life and I will continue along as long as it remains fun. And I will keep doing it my way.

Now if I could get more inspired to continue submitting my work maybe I'd be doing better there, too.

[v.woolfe]

In terms of writing itself and dealing with its challenges, "Little Women" helped and inspired me a good deal. It helped to know that even Jo ran into the same problems in writing that we do today: the ever-present 'block', trying to make our stories exciting and realistic, etc. And it's gving me permission to actually try to write about what I know.

[Makenzie]

when i write i dont have one spcific book that helps me write because then i feel like i am going to steal that persons ideas and words.... i like to read poems especially ones that rhythme and have neat topics... like shel silverstein.

[arunner]

A good question--I must say that Dr. Suess (or is it Seuss) books must have ignited something as a child because one day, as an adult, I was horrified when I opened an old, easy reader ABC Dr.Seuss book and each page was marked in pencil with my own rhymes! I also remember citing things in rhyme indicative of Shel Silverstein, my copy of A Light In The Attic is well loved with a broken binding.

As I got older, I remember wanting to be Jo March. I wanted to move to the city where I could live in a tiny little room and write stories of imagination for children. The independence and no nonsense feminist attitude of Jo was a fabulous roll/character model for young girls, heck, still is if children still read Little Women.

Finally, brilliant, cutting edge writers such as Bradbury, Poe and Dickens couldn't help but influence the creative self. How a short like, The Veldt, can transform the mind with vivid details. Poe's darkness creeping into every page just making one wish it were Halloween time again. Reading great, imaginative works cannot help but make a wanna be writer try to excel in his or her own creative voice.

[KarenRankowitz]

Can't say that one book moved me to be a writer.  King and Erma were who I enjoyed reading when I was young.

I like funny, Erma has it hands down.  I also like suspense and to me King is one of the best horror/suspense writers I have read.

I read everything I can find in the genre I write in (well, I pretty much read everything from soup labels to novels).  I learn from those authors and try to fit their style of writing into my own.

I think my greatest inspiration came from a creative writing teacher I had in high school.  He is a published author and one thing he had us do was write in a journal daily - he told me he liked my writing and from there I was spurred onward.

His name is Richard White and he has written several novels over the years.

After I had my first article published, I called him (keep in mind it was 20 years after I had him as a teacher) only to thank him for being a great support and inspiration to live dreams that can come true.

[xpoperator]

The book of life inspired me to write; a non-tangible paperback of various and multiple scripts written by an author named Fate.

It all started at a very early age, when the library book mobile was a constant every Friday afternoon on the street where we lived. I eagerly waited at 4:00pm on my doorstep, hoping the books-on-wheels would contain a new selection of “Curious George” and “Harold and the Purple Crayon” storybooks.

When it was time for bed and it was “lights out” on a school night, I would sneak a flashlight under the covers and travel into my fantasyland with Curious George or Harold books until I fell asleep. With hand on the flashlight’s off button, I was ready to retreat into darkness if I heard my mother fussing around in the kitchen just outside my bedroom door.

My imagination and story writing first began in the form of daydreaming. In today’s world they would diagnose my daydreaming as ADD, Attention Deficit Disorder. Teachers would select me to respond to a lesson just discussed. I hadn’t heard nor absorbed a word of it. I was too busy imagining myself on a fun filled adventure with one of my favorite storybook characters or imaginatively drawing doors and windows to climb through into another place or dimension like Harold did with his purple crayon.

It wasn’t until sometime later during my elementary years that I began to actually pen my own fantasy world onto paper. Obviously sparked by the intrigue of where the next page of my adventure storybooks would take me, I wrote adventure stories of my wanna-be’s, such as a crime or private investigator, taking the reader into mystery. As life progressed, I found myself writing short stories of not only fantasy, but more relevant true to life situations where the names and places were changed to protect the innocent, as they say. There is always a mind releasing self-satisfaction in transporting the events of life onto paper. It clears the constant chatter inside your head and allows for a free flow of creative fantasy, adventure, and enlightenment stories like Harold and George, who sit on my shelf to this day. I thank them both for the inspiration.

[HarleyQ0103]

When I was a freshman in high school, my English teacher encouraged us to read a book every two weeks. At the time the only books I had read consisted of The Harry Potter Series and a few R. L. Stine novels, but she persuaded me to read anything by Lois Duncan. Lois Duncan’s audience is more of a female based audience that supports women’s rights, courage, intelligence and unique abilities. I couldn’t say that a certain book encouraged me to write but my English teachers in high school definitely put me on the path by encouraging me to express myself through writing.

[aggie01]

Every book by Janet Evanovich inspires me to write. In college, my journalism professor told us that our stories should have rhythm – the reader should feel like tapping his foot as he reads your story. I had no idea what he was talking about until I started reading books by Evanovich.

Every scene in an Evanovich book is described so skillfully that I feel as though I’m standing right beside one of the characters in the book, watching as they struggle to get out of whatever zany situation they got themselves into.

One thing is for sure: her books are the funniest I’ve ever read. When I find a sentence or paragraph that I really like, I dog-ear that page. Evanovich’s books usually have many dog-eared pages when I get done with them.

[paperbackwriter]

"I've always wanted to be a writer, after watching "The Waltons" on TV.
But after seeing the movie "Carrie" the movie that made me scream, I had to read Stephen King. So liking vampires I read "Salem's Lot." And I realized how much more three dimentional I had to be in my writing.
But it wasn't until I read "Misery". I read a chapter at work, and then going to bed early on a Saturday, (the muse not being with me), I read another Chapter of "Misery.
I read another and then decided to go to sleep. Tossing and turning I said, I can't sleep.
Let me read some more Stephen King and then I'll sleep. But after finding out what I did in Chapter Four ( sorry you'll have to read the book), I went WHOOOOAAAA!
And from then on I couldn't put the book down. I sat on my bed, in it, in my big leather chair. My hands were shaking as I turned to the next chapter.
"What is she going to do to him next? What is she going to do to him next?"
Terrified I read till five in the morning, till my eyes blurred on the page.
I knew that if I could get a reader like that. I'd have it made.