# Who is your favorite author? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 8, 2000, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671 "2000-12-08T19:24:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Brynda](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e79b87/32.png) [@Brynda](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brynda)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2000, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671/41 "2000-12-11T02:36:56Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by JosephFinn \* > \*\*Easy. Harlan Ellison. Loved by both fans and his peers (witness his multiples of Hugos (voted on by fans) and Nebulas (voted upon by fellow members of the SFWA)), even if he is a bit cantankerous. > > No-one can appreciate 20th-century literature without picking up a copy of “Strange Wine,” “Deathbird Stories” or Voices from the Edge. SNIP > > That, and he has a talent for titles that will make you weep. A sampling: > > “I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream” > “The Whimper of Whipped Dogs” > “‘Repent, Harlequin!’ Cried the Tick-Tock Man” > “The Beast Who Cried Love at the Heart of the World” > > \*\* I agree on all counts, JosephFinn. Harlan Ellison is a fine writer, is cantankerous, and his titles HAVE made me weep. [hijack] He came and spoke to my sophmore English class in the early 1980s. When he asked for questions, we all just sat there looking frightened of this small, intense man. He yelled, “I came all this way to see you and you have no questions for me?” After a long pause,from the back of the room came, “Uh…where did you come from?” Thank God he laughed. A much brighter classmate than I sent this in to Reader’s Digest Campus Comedy. I, on the other hand, pissed him off by asking about writing City on the Edge of Forever. I had read the intro to Strange Wine, so I certainly knew better, but did it anyway. I then partially redeemed myself by asking about a story in Strange Wine. [/hijack] ---
**Author:** ![Spoonbender](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a8b319/32.png) [@Spoonbender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoonbender)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2000, 3:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671/42 "2000-12-11T03:15:52Z")
Here are my favorites, and my favorite title from each: J.D. Salinger (“Catcher in the Rye”) Jay McInerney (“Bright Lights, Big City”) Douglas Coupland (“Microserfs”) Chuck Palahniuk (“Fight Club”) Tim Sandlin (“Skipped Parts”) Carl Sagan (“The Demon-Haunted World”) ---
**Author:** ![JosephFinn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/3bc359/32.png) [@JosephFinn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JosephFinn)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2000, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671/43 "2000-12-11T04:41:58Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Spoonbender \* > \*\* > Douglas Coupland (“Microserfs”) > \*\* “Chunky?” ---
**Author:** ![kiwiboy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/35a633/32.png) [@kiwiboy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kiwiboy)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2000, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671/44 "2000-12-12T03:17:45Z")
Louis de Bernieres for great writing. Terry Pratchett for laughs. ---
**Author:** ![Eo\_Echo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ebca7d/32.png) [@Eo\_Echo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eo_Echo)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2000, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671/45 "2000-12-12T03:44:35Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by screech-owl \* > \*\*Isaac Asimov. Both the non-fiction and fiction. \*\* Ditto. I’m still amazed at how prolific he was. ---
**Author:** ![Atreyu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5e9695/32.png) [@Atreyu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atreyu)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2000, 4:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671/46 "2000-12-12T04:16:37Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by JBirdman12 \* > \*\*Ditto. I’m still amazed at how prolific he was. \*\* Which reminds me of a story I heard about an interview Asimov did. He was asked the question about what he would do if he were to learn that he had only 6 months to live. His answer? “Type faster.” Classic. Put Asimov on the list of my favorite authors. Since I’m an incurable bookworm, it is an impossible task for me to name just one single author. So, in addition to Asimov, add to that list the following names: Orson Scott Card Terry Pratchett Douglas Adams John Irving Neal Stephenson J.R.R. Tolkien (his **Silmarillion** alone justifies adding him here) P.J. O’Rourke (hilarious non-fiction) Dan Simmons (O Mighty creator of the **Hyperion** novels, I bow down before you!) Michael Ende (I’ve read only one of his books, but that’s enough for me. **The Neverending Story** turned me into a confirmed book fanatic at the tender of ten, when I realized after reading it that books can be much more than just a simple linear story. Pity the movie wasn’t as special, although I do think it’s OK.) All I can think of for now. ---
**Author:** ![MovieMogul](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f08c70/32.png) [@MovieMogul](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MovieMogul)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2000, 10:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671/47 "2000-12-12T10:16:49Z")
Without a doubt, **William Faulkner**. (though you can probably guess my favorite screenwriter from my sig) ---
**Author:** ![Badtz\_Maru](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e36b37/32.png) [@Badtz\_Maru](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Badtz_Maru)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2000, 10:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671/48 "2000-12-12T10:38:58Z")
I used to like Harlan Ellison, until I bought a rather large collection of his work and read most of it one sitting. I realized how almost all of his stories have the same basic themes and similar plots. His writing style get’s obnoxious after a while, and he’s too autobiographical. Wouldn’t be a problem if his life was one I found interesting or something I can relate to. He’s a good critic, but as an author of fiction he is a one-trick pony. I like Neal Stephenson, David Brin, and Larry Niven (not so much for his style as his ideas, though). ---
**Author:** ![Coldfire](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a587f6/32.png) [@Coldfire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Coldfire)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2000, 12:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671/49 "2000-12-12T12:24:48Z")
The Flemish writer [Herman Brusselmans](http://www.nlpvf.nl/6books/brusselm.htm) (his bio in English, along with some of his titles - no idea how it holds up in English though). ---
**Author:** ![divepooch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c67d28/32.png) [@divepooch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/divepooch)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2000, 12:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671/50 "2000-12-12T12:37:56Z")
John Steinbeck John Irving Anne Tyler Joseph Waumbaugh ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2000, 12:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671/51 "2000-12-12T12:51:10Z")
**Italo Calvino** I remember reading _If On a Winter’s Night A Traveller_ and swearing each time I wasn’t going to get sucked into the new storyline in each chapter, and every single time doing it anyway and getting poleaxed at the end of the chapter. I like a writer who can play with my mind and keep me coming back for more.🙂 I’ll also second kiwiboy’s “Terry Pratchett – for laughs”. jr8 “The man who does not read good books has no advantage over the man who can’t read them.” – Mark Twain ---
**Author:** ![longjohn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/65b543/32.png) [@longjohn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/longjohn)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2000, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671/52 "2000-12-12T17:34:44Z")
PG Wodehouse by a country mile. I love many of the other authors listed here, but for sheer joy of reading, its Plum every time. Ignore the fact that his work bears no relation to reality, either now or at any point previously. Ignore the fact that he has one basic plot. There is no author I know of that can match his felicity with language or turn a phrase so aptly. He doesn’t say a great deal about the Human Condition either, but he sure as hell improves mine. ---
**Author:** ![Tansu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/67e7ee/32.png) [@Tansu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tansu)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2000, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671/53 "2000-12-12T17:46:21Z")
Paul Auster Jorge Luis Borges Italo Calvino Albert Camus Joseph Conrad Joseph Heller Russell Hoban Tove Jansson (Moomins!) I can’t remember any beyond J. I’ll post back later. ---
**Author:** ![No\_Fear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/4491bb/32.png) [@No\_Fear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/No_Fear)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2000, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671/54 "2000-12-12T20:36:57Z")
I like **Ellery Queen** , the nom de plume of two cousins with great imagination and humor. Much of their work has missed the collections available, and I enjoy hunting down the strays in old issues of magazines. I have a master list from a bigraphical piece, so I know there are still some out there to find. ---
**Author:** ![Tansu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/67e7ee/32.png) [@Tansu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tansu)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2000, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671/55 "2000-12-13T20:14:26Z")
Thomas Pynchon (although I’ve not read enough by him) Banana Yoshimoto (Kitchen and Moonlight Shadow are two of the most beautiful stories I’ve ever read) ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2000, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671/56 "2000-12-13T20:23:22Z")
Well, MY favorite author—no competition at all—is CalMeacham. Soooo, Cal, who’s YOUR favorite author? ---
**Author:** ![mouthbreather](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a698b9/32.png) [@mouthbreather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mouthbreather)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2000, 3:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671/57 "2000-12-14T03:16:32Z")
Without a doubt, John Steinbeck. _East of Eden_ blew my fucking socks off, twice. They had to go and rape it with the crapola James Dean movie. :mad: ---
**Author:** ![Screwtape](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bc79bd/32.png) [@Screwtape](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Screwtape)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2000, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671/58 "2000-12-14T18:53:39Z")
…I’ll say Robert Heinlein. Yes, there are people more able to turn the gut-wrench. No, I don’t agree with all of his postulates (and I suspect he wouldn’t want me to), though our views on many things are pretty close. But when I was thrown out of my father’s house at 17 with the clothes I was wearing and 11 cents in my pocket, I found this: > [@](#): > > \*What did I want? > > I wanted a Roc’s egg. I wanted a harem loaded with lovely odalisques less than the dust beneath my chariot wheels, the rust that never stained my sword. I wanted raw red gold in nuggets the size of your fist, and feed that lousy claim jumper to the huskies! I wanted to get up feeling brisk and go out and break some lances, then pick a likely wench for my droit du seigneur - I wanted to stand up to the Baron and dare him to touch my wench! I wanted to hear the purple water chuckling against the skin of the Nancy Lee in the cool of the morning watch and not another sound, nor any movement save the slow tilting of the wings of the albatross that had been pacing us the last thousand miles. > > I wanted the hurtling moons of Barsoom. I wanted Storisende and Poictesme, and Holmes shaking me awake to tell me, The game’s afoot! I wanted to float down the Mississippi on a raft and elude a mob in company with the Duke of Bilgewater and Lost Dauphin. > > I wanted Prester John, and Excalibur held by a moon-white arm out of a silent lake. I wanted to sail with Ulysses and with Tros of Samothrace and to eat the lotus in a land that seemed always afternoon. I wanted the feeling of romance and the sense of wonder I had known as a kid. I wanted the world to be the way they had promised me it was going to be, instead of the tawdry, lousy, fouled-up mess it is. > > I had had one chance - for ten minutes yesterday afternoon. Helen of Troy, whatever your true name may be - and I had known it - and I had let it slip away. > > Maybe one chance is all you ever get. \* > from “Glory Road” If for nothing else I owe the man for that, bigtime. I’ll further list Terry Pratchett for the skill with which he sneaks some real wisdom into all that fun, Tom Robbins for the same. ---
**Author:** ![JosephFinn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/3bc359/32.png) [@JosephFinn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JosephFinn)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2000, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671/59 "2000-12-14T23:05:27Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Badtz Maru \* > \*\*I used to like Harlan Ellison, until I bought a rather large collection of his work and read most of it one sitting. I realized how almost all of his stories have the same basic themes and similar plots. His writing style get’s obnoxious after a while, and he’s too autobiographical. Wouldn’t be a problem if his life was one I found interesting or something I can relate to. > > He’s a good critic, but as an author of fiction he is a one-trick pony. > > I like Neal Stephenson, David Brin, and Larry Niven (not so much for his style as his ideas, though). \*\* So his stories share many basic themes. That describes pretty much every author in the history of literature: Shakespeare - love, betrayal, mistaken identities, redemption, insanity Kakfa - disullusionment, paranoia, despair Camus - despair, agnosticism, relationships Amy Tan - family, fate, relationships Sorry, but I have to disagree with your criticism of Ellison’s work based on that criteria. The same plot comment is obviously untenable, so I’ll just ignore it. Okay, that was a joke. Of all speculative fiction authors, I can’t think of one (besides Stephenson) who has less repetitive plots. Please, to give examples? As for his work being too autobiographical or obnoxious, that would be a matter of personal taste, and I’ll amicably disagree. ---
**Author:** ![Badtz\_Maru](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e36b37/32.png) [@Badtz\_Maru](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Badtz_Maru)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2000, 4:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671/60 "2000-12-15T04:38:49Z")
I also mentioned that I find his writing style obnoxious. It would intrude on my ability to enjoy his work even if he wrote better stories, but I get sick of him rehashing his life’s guilt trips and injustices. He almost always writes himself into his stories, usually in a very obvious manner, and his writing style makes you very conscious that it’s Ellison telling you the story, and as a person I intensely dislike him - he’s very self-important and smug. Even though he frequently throws in the token bad things about the standard Harlan/Protagonist to make it introspective and hip, even then the accent is on how much the person suffers knowing how rotten they are. A few stories like this are OK, but when that keeps coming back again and again and it’s the same character always feeling the same thing, it gets old. It’s like he got fame mining his own life’s experiences for stories and then realized that’s all he’s got - and didn’t have the sense to quit before his work became self-parody. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-is-your-favorite-author/44671.md?page=4)