Top Ten Tuesday: Top Ten Authors

Today's topic at The Broke and the Bookish is all-time favourite authors. Wow, so hard! It`s like choosing my favourite parent or something, but I'll do my best. I actually had a list on my computer, but it's now in the shop, so this is all just off the top of my head. I've tried to limit myself to authors for whom I've read multiple books, because I know how it is when you fall in love with a writer from one book, only to be disappointed by everything else.

1. Jane Austen: Duh. :)

2. Margaret Atwood: I know lots of people think she's depressing and all, but I love her. Oryx and Crake is one of my favourite books of all time, and one of these days I'll go back and read a whole bunch of her other books that I read in high school.

3. Charles Dickens: He makes me laugh all the time. I know his books have crazily-named weirdos and the most unlikely coincidences, but I just can't put them down.

4. J.K. Rowling: Because Harry Potter has made my life a better place.

5. David Bezmozgis: He's much less well-known than the above. I came across him somewhat by accident, but I adored The Free World, and now anything he writes is a must-by.

6. John Steinbeck: Someone gave me a copy of The Red Pony in high school and I haaaaaated it. I swore I'd never touch Steinbeck again, but thankfully I reconsidered East of Eden was great and thought-provoking, but The Grapes of Wrath made it onto my all-time favourites list. I finished it while I was supervising construction workers in a remodel of my office (read: sitting there being present while they worked), and I was literally sitting on a chair on the hall weeping and looking like a complete basket case. It's one of my favourite book moments.

7. Rainbow Rowell: A few years ago, I kind of rolled my eyes at the hype she`s gotten, but I have laughed, cried over, and just plain loved every book that I`ve read by her and will probably rush out to get my hands on the next one that comes out.

8. Francine Rivers: I haven`t read much by her in a while, but she has a way of writing Christian novels that feel real and not preachy. The Mark of the Lion series is absolutely superb.

9. Joseph Boyden: I've read less from him than any of the others on the list -  I'm just nearing the end of Three Day Road as I type - but I can say from what I've read by him that he is an extremely talented and creative writer who provides a perspective that is sadly lacking in Canadian literature. I will absolutely pick up Through Black Spruce at some point soon.

10. Robert K. Massie: Does it count if he writes biographies? It does in my book. Massie writes some of the most readable biographies that I know, while keeping it factual and deep enough for this history buff.

11. Ack, I forgot C.S. Lewis! Okay, this will have to be a top 11 list.

I feel kind of badly as a russophile for not having one of the 'greats' on here, but I can't choose. I enjoy Tolstoy and Dostoevsky, and I'm in a Turgenev phase lately, but no one stands out as a favourite author for now. Maybe one day when I finally read War and Peace.... ;)