Which authors were you exposed to as a child?

[Kei]

My dad is an avid reader, and in the house I grew up in there were books everywhere. We would go to the bookstore, and each of us would come out with 5+ books.

I had a high reading level as a child, and so some of what my dad had me reading-

Classics-
William Saroyan - The Human Comedy (still one of my favorites)
Pear S. Buck- The Good Earth
Steinbeck- The Red Pony and The Pearl
Stephen Crane- The Red Badge of Courage
Edgar Allen Poe- Complete Works
Swift- Gulliver's Travels

SciFi/Fantasy-
Tolkien
Herbert
Peter S. Beagle
StarTrek novels (Doomsday World, Metamorphosis, Vendetta, Rock and a Hard Place, Perchance to Dream etc.)

YA/Childrens-
Gary Paulson- Hatchett and Canyons
Jean Craighead George- My Side of the Mountain, The Talking Earth, Julie of the Wolves
Norton Juster- The Phantom Tollbooth

[Seak]

In elementary school a friend recommended The Chronicles of Narnia. After devowering those, I went on to the Bruce Coville books; My Teacher is an Alien, My Teacher Fried my Brains, etc. I remember loving those and telling everyone Bruce Coville was my favorite author.

[morkelkey]

As explained by the study authors, the ceilings in the building where she worked for 14 years "were sprayed with an inch thick layer of soft asbestos covered by a layer of paint.

[leel]

Excellent question.
First book - Swiss Family Robinson - age 6
Most important book - They Were Expendable - age 7
Most influential series - Hornblower _C S Forrester - age 8
Then a phase of non-fiction, biography, history
Now - spy,CIA,fiction: Vince Flynn, Daniel Silva, Robert Ludlum

[E_Moon]

Like so many others, began reading early and never stopped. My mother had to argue with the library so I could read beyond my grade level; at home I was allowed to read anything, though she would tell me "That will probably bore you". I loved horse and dog stories (Marguerite Henry's Misty of Chincoteague, King of the Wind, Brighty of the Grand Canyon, etc., the Black Stallion and Island Stallion series, Dorothy Lyons' books like Red Embers, Harlequin Hullabaloo, etc, Terhune's collie stories, Bob, Son of Battle.) At the same time I was plowing through my mother's novels, trying them out and discarding the ones that were boring (at whatever age--it changed.) Daphne du Maurier's The King's General and Rebecca. Several by Samuel Shellabarger--titles forgotten but some scenes remembered. Nevil Shute's Trustee from the Toolroom, The Rainbow and the Rosee, etc. (but not his famous On the Beach until a few years ago.) Agatha Christie's and ellery Queen's mysteries, and the Sherlock Holmes mysteries. Howard Pyle's Robin Hood (3rd grade, I think) with those wonderful illustrations. Ben Hur, The Robe, The Silver Chalice. I found Kipling first in a birthday book--a collection of stories and poetry that also introduced me to Robert Browning and Homer--but at that age (just before I started snatching books away to read them myself) I didn't pay attention to who wrote it. Later re-found him via a collection of horse stories ("The Maltese Cat") and thence to The Just So stories. By ten or eleven I was reading a lot of nonfiction, with no discriminatory ability at all, so I went through a "anything about exciting fighter pilots" stage and thought Robert Lee Scott's God Is My Co-Pilot and other books about the Flying Tigers were great. From there I dove into war-related fiction and nonfiction (considered a very unsuitable interest for girls back then.) I was also reading political novels (Advise and Consent), and--clandestinely, which turned out to be a joke, spy novels.

Found science fiction at age 14, via a friend in school. Did not discover fantasy as a genre until I went to college.

[Jon Sprunk]

My father also had a good-size library which I went through as a kid.

The first books I remember reading were the "Mother West Wind" series.

My first fantasy book was "Kothar and the Wizard-Slayer" (G.Fox) at about age 7, which quickly ushered me into the Conan novels.


P.S.: Hey Elizabeth. Welcome to the SFFWorld boards.

[NickeeCoco]

Well, I began reading fairy tales when I was really young. When I was about seven I started reading the Babysitter's Club books. Ha. Soon after that though, I discovered Robin McKinley with her Outlaws of Sherwood. I was on a Robin Hood kick at the time. I loved that book and so moved on to her Damar books and then pretty much anything else she wrote. She got me into authors like Patricia McKillip. When I was about eleven, my school librarian introduced me to Anne McCaffrey, who quickly became my favourite author.

(As a side note, in grade seven, my librarian retired. As a retirement gift, I wrote to Anne McCaffrey telling her about my librarian and how I wanted to, if Anne McCaffrey wouldn't mind, give her Anne's autograph, since she was my favourite author and my librarian had introduced me to her. Anne sent me not only one autographed bookplate, but two along with a personal letter. Best gift I ever gave, I think.)

From there I just started reading whatever fantasy I could get my hands on. Mostly, my mother would buy me random fantasy novels from library sales. So I got a hodgepodge of stuff. I do remember reading a lot of Terry Brooks, though now, I really don't like those books much.

I got into SF through my dad when I was about thirteen or fourteen. He was a big Ray Bradbury fan. From there I started reading all the classic SF authors.

[tmso]

The Holy Bible by God and various prophets. It's what was in the house.

At around 10 or so, I discovered Tolkien and never looked back.

[Raule]

I wasn't a particularly precocious reader. I read the general books most kids read at the average age they read them. During the time I grew up, there wasn't this transitional category known today as Young Adult or Teen. I think I started reading adult books at age 12 because that was the age I could check out books from the adult section of the library. I do remember reading all the mythology books I could find when I was in elementary school and I also went through the horse phase one summer reading all the horse fiction I could find at my local library. I also remember being enthralled by The Little Prince when I first read it in 5th or 6th grade (purchased from one of those weekly reader order forms they circulated). I've probably read more SF and Fantasy as an adult than I did as a youth. My tastes back then ran more toward gothics, historicals and adventure stories. I was more likely to pick up George MacDonald than Tolkien or H. Rider Haggard than a space adventure.

[Window Bar]

Almost anything. During one of those summer reading programs sponsored by the county library, I read over 80 books. These were not weighty tomes, mind you.

Probably the first adult book I tried was Michener's [U]Hawaii.[I] Lo and behold, the reading of non-kid literature didn't hurt, even though the book hasn't stayed with me.

The books that touched my soul came later. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Frank Herbert, Charles Williams and many others caught me during my teen years. Around age twenty I discovered Herman Hesse, and I believed I'd gone to heaven.

My tastes haven't changed a whole lot. I still tend to loathe depressingly realistic or naturalistic literature. A close friend of mine describes this strain as "M&R," which is short for "Misery and Relationships."

Stories are the closest I'll probably ever come to having a religion, so I've got to feel somewhat elevated by the time I've hit the last page. And that doesn't mean the ending has to be happy.

-- WB