(Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme brought to you by The Broke and the Bookish.)
Although a lot of bookish people spend time talking about books and characters, we’ve also got our favorite authors — the ones we fawn over, recommend to everyone, and buy everything they write as soon as the ink is dry. Here’s my auto-buy author list.
Bill Bryson
I read At Home and immediately added the rest of Bryson’s books to my TBR. I love his books’ mix of humor and history. Truly great non-fiction writing.
Kristin Cashore
Graceling was one of my favorite reads of 2010, Fire was a great companion novel, and Bitterblue set the stage for the rest of what started out and continues to be an amazing YA fantasy series with some of my favorite female characters.
Jasper Fforde
I feel like I never shut up about Jasper Fforde and his Thursday Next and Nursery Crime series. Literary allusions and puns galore, incredibly smart and funny writing. Fforde recently broke into the YA genre with The Last Dragonslayer — it lacks the sparkle of his adult series, but I loved it nonetheless. Keep ‘em coming, Mr. Fforde!
Terry Pratchett
This man is a master. His Discworld is one of the most complex worlds I’ve read. Hogfather has become one of my Christmas favorites, and The Wee Free Men introduces a spunky young witch you can’t help but love. Plus he wrote a book with Neil Gaiman; why wouldn’t you put this guy on your auto-buy list?
Rick Riordan
Myths. Monsters. Children of Greek gods. Egyptian gods run amok. A tequila-guzzling, crime-solving Texan. I would read the fine print for a cholesterol-lowering drug if Riordan wrote it.
Mary Roach
I discovered Mary Roach’s Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers by accident, and loved her sense of humor and penchant for researching—in excruciatingly good-natured detail—the subjects that others might consider a little ooky. Reading Bonk and Packing for Mars cemented my obsession.
Which authors are on your auto-buy list? Let me know in the comments!
Yay Bill Bryson! He is also on my Buy All The Books list. I think I have actually now read them all too. He has a special place on my bookshelf 🙂
Me, too. The Bryson shelf.
I think you were the one who finally convinced me to read him, Trish. My mom really liked A Walk in the Woods, but I think it took a couple reviews of different books by different bloggers to get me totally hooked. 🙂
Two of yours are on my list as well. Bryson and Pratchett. My newest favorite to snatch up as soon as his books become available (U.S. has to wait!), is Alan Bradley and his Flavia DeLuce series. Can’t recommend these books highly enough. About a precocious girl in 1950s rural England with a penchant for chemistry and stumbling upon corpses.
Yay, another Pratchett fan! Isn’t his stuff great?
I’ve never heard of the Bradley series you mention, but the “penchant for chemistry and stumbling upon corpses” summary is pretty intriguing. I’ll have to do a little research. 🙂
Bill Bryson is one of those authors I keep meaning to try. I’m sure I’ll love his books…someday! 😉
I kept saying that too, and finally read At Home after receiving it as a Christmas gift. I’m sad I waited so long, but I’m glad he’s got so many other books out!
I can’t comment on your blog, but I hear you about not fan-girling over authors; it’s not something I do often either. I haven’t read it, but Bauermeister’s The School of Essential Ingredients is on my TBR. Glad to hear you liked it!
Bill Bryson was seriously considered for my list. My boss has been raving about him for years. So, a little while ago, I finally picked up A WALK IN THE WOODS and read a little to see how I liked it. One hundred pages later, I knew I had found a writer I liked!
Yay, another Bryson convert! I haven’t read A Walk in the Woods yet, but I’ve heard from several people that it’s his best.
Hi Amy,
Love your list. Unfortunately, the only one I’ve read and know a lot about is Rick Riordon. My teen boy is crazy about Riordon’s books and I always read them first. 😉 I’m definitely printing your list out and heading to my library to check on some of these. They look very interesting and I find it dually interesting that I (a book freak) haven’t really even heard of them.
I gave you a short list on Twitter, but here are my picks again: George R.R. Martin, Justin Cronin, Cassandra Clare, Michael D. O’Brien (religious fiction), Sherrilyn Kenyon (ok, this is my guilty little secret. I’m in love with Acheron and these less than literature-worthy novels), James Patterson, John Twelve Hawks, and many more.
Riordan’s a great writer — I love all of his series, even the one he wrote for adults (the Tres Navarre series). He just writes smart, fun things. And he’s gotten a ton of kids into reading mythology, so I’m not complaining. 🙂
I’m a bookish person too, and I’m constantly discovering new books and authors. That’s the beauty; there’s so many it’s impossible to ever run out of good stuff! Case in point, I’ve only heard of one of the authors you mention (Martin). Looks like I need to do some research as well!