There have been a few books I've read that have had a big influence on my writing; books that are so good that by the time I finish them I think, "I'm a better writer now that I've read that book." I learn different things from different writers; things like dialogue or flow or some little way something was done that opened my eyes. I am just finishing Jonathan Franzen's Freedom and am a better writer for having read it. What a book. And any writer who openly defies Oprah is someone I'd like to read--sure, he reneged, but it was still something that added some credibility of, well, cool. Freedom was named the best book of 2010 by TIME Magazine and for good reason. It's one of those masterpieces you stumble on from time to time. Here are some other books that have greatly influenced my writing in some way or another that I recommend for any aspiring writer:
Post Office by Charles Bukowski For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway
The Bay of Love and Sorrows and Hope in the Desperate Hour and The Friends of Meager Fortune by David Adams Richards
Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett
Paradise Lost by John Milton
My Uncle Oswald by Roald Dahl
Good Morning, Midnight by Jean Rhys
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