Once upon a time I used to claim that my favourite authors were
Stephen Donaldson, Benjamin Disraeli, and Kim Stanley Robinson, with
Jane Austen and Simon Travaglia getting honourable mentions.
But I now realise that this is an incredibly inaccurate and unfair
way to put things -- they are indeed among my favourites, but it is
simply not possible to give a remotely comprehensive list.
But I do have some books which I go back to time after time. Some
of these include:
- The Gold Coast (Kim Stanley Robinson)
- This is one of those books which really struck a chord with me.
The world it paints is not one I like a great deal, but KSR spends a lot
of time developing his characters. It is essentially a book about maturing,
discovering oneself, and the dreadful things one does to others in the
process.
- Sybil (Bemjamin Disraeli)
- A political novel,
but one with a great big dose of growing-up thrown in. The protagonist, one
Charles Egremont, is the younger son of an aristocratic family. Pleasant,
well-meaning, but essentially devoid of any real purpose, he meets Sybil and
discovers something to believe in and fight for.
- Daughter of Regals (Stephen Donaldson)
- Most of those who like Donaldson seem to prefer
his Covenant books, but I find myself coming back to this collection of
short stories again and again. Sur Visal's Tale is a particular
favourite.
- In The Days of the Comet (H.G. Wells)
- A real
classic. Not exactly his best-known work (which would most probably be
The Time Machine, War of the Worlds, or The Invisible Man),
but I just can't help but love it. The only real problem is that it and
War of the Worlds have somehow become irreversibly linked in my mind
to a Fleetwood Mac best-of album. Yowsah!