 | 30 Days Of Writing Questions 08. What’s your favorite genre to write? To read? |
"You write what you read."
I can't remember where I've read that sentence, but I would say in my case it suits very well...CATS
I'll start with that, because the first story I remember writing was about a cat prince.
Every kid likes fairy tales, myself included, so of course I liked Puss In Boots a lot. Years later I was very impressed by a criminal story called Felidae by Akif Pirincci. There was a time, when I looked on eBay only for cat novels, one special highlight was The Silent Miaow by Paul Gallico. My latest serendipity was Warrior Cats, a wonderful book series by Erin Hunter.
As you can see, my whole life cats followed my way. Not only in form of books by other authors, but also by live experiences. My own purring room mates Sheela and Amira inspire me now and then to write short stories about cats.
STRONG WOMEN
The main character of my current writing project is a young woman. Cathryn's story takes place round 1920 and her actions are not always considered as 'appropriate behavior'.
In that point Cathryn's similar to the heroines of the German author Iny Lorentz. Her books aren't available in English (not yet), anyway Die Goldhaendlerin (The Gold Merchant), und Die Wanderhure (The Wandering Whore) belong to my favorite books. It's very easy to identify with them and also very entertaining, when they have to disguise as a man, because it's the only way to face the obstacles. Not forgetting to mention, that they fall in love.
Those wonderful attributes make a book worth reading, and I wish the same for my own book.
JOURNEYS & ADVENTURES
If you can't travel (for whatever reason), the next best are documentaries and books. I have quite a few pictorials and travel guides in my little private library. On the picture you can see my section for my three most favorite countries: Egypt, USA and India.
My Top 20 favorite books include narrations about people going on a journey. Just to name a few, there are I'm Off Then: My Journey Along the Camino de Santiago by Hape Kerkeling, The Physician by Noah Gordon and of course, The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien. I'm also very fond of (historic) adventures, like The Ramses Series by Christian Jacq or The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett.
All those wonderful stories are books with hundreds or even thousand of pages. I know, I'm far, far away from writing something monumental like that, but these authors and their books are my role models. At the moment I'm trying at least to send my heroine on a journey and experience some adventures. I would say, that's a fine start.
MYSTERY & HORROR
Yes, I have to admit it, I've jumped on the vampire band wagon, but I in the end I got stuck to only two book series: The romantic part is satisfied by The Twilight Saga by Stephenie Meyer and the strong alpha male, sexy warrior part with The Black Dagger Brotherhood by J.R. Ward. I also count several books by Stephen King to my favorites, e.g. The Stand.
Having a closer look to my own writing, I like to have a little mysterious, supernatural touch there, too. Something that couldn't be explained by some laws of nature. Okay, I already had to kill one of my supporting characters, but that was the biggest close to horror I've written ... until now!
All right, this post got longer than expected. Well, that's the problem, when you're a passionate reader, you have much to many good books. Or better said, you have much to many good books you as future author can relate to. Why not learn from the best?
I agree ....so many good books....so many genres.
And I love the new blog look :-)
Let's keep it like a Bollywood Masala movie ... pick the best from everything and mix them together ... and hopefully you have a very taste dish ... ah book! ;-)
So true! So many good books, so little time to read them all!
Have you read any Pauline Gedge? She's written an amazing series set in ancient Egypt.
No, haven't heard of Pauline Gedge ... thanks for the hint, I keep an eye open on Amazon! :-) It's good to have some books in reserve.