Do you have a favourite author? Mine is...

[BumgrapesofWrath]

Margaret Atwood.

When I read her books I get whisked away. She has such a great imagination, and such a skill with words. And her books always make me "feel" something. Just got to the end of The Blind Assassin, and I feel like someone has winded me.

So who is your favourite author?

Werewolf I've also made a big list from this thread!

My favourite (one of) is Richard Yates, I love him and the way he writes about relationships and hope, and then later on the lack of hope. His biography makes pretty tragic reading too.

Haruki Murakami is my favourite

QueenAnne I've never read any Dumas even though I love "the classics".

Where should I start?

William Golding. Genius. Depressing, though.
I was also pleased to see Rohinton Mistry's A Fine Balance mentioned too, as that is an awesome work of art, in my opinion.

Middle I read The Three Musketeers first and thought it was utterly brilliant and so so funny. I was then told that I should read The Count of Monte Christo and I would love it more than TTM. I didn't believe it. But oh my goodness, utterly sensational - I am going to work my way through all of the D'Artagnan Romances next year.

Stephen King also insancerre. New book out tomorrow EEP.

I also love Austen, Oscar Wilde, Richard Yates, Shakespeare, Thomas Hardy, Marian Keyes, Ira Levin, Lionel Shriver and some Ian McEwan (he can be hit and miss though).

Nugget
I know but I'm getting it for christmas

I'm having a real love affair with Iris Murdoch at the moment.

And, I'm reading The Poisonwood Bible which is the best book I've ever read, toppling A. Karenina from its perch. I just started a thread about that. It has taken my breath away.

Doris Lessing is pretty amazing, I loved The Grass is Singing.

I read the Count of Monte Cristo over our summer holiday and I realize this is potentially blasphemous, but I think what Dumas really needed was a ruthless edit. Way too long.

Anne Tyler, definitely.
Other favourites are Lorrie Moore, Elinor Lipman, Jane Gardam, Elizabeth Taylor, Carol Shields
Favourite male authors: Ian McEwan and Douglas Coupland.

I wouldn't be able to wait that long insancerre

QueenAnne thank you. I'll get The Three Musketeers and give it a go. I think DH may have a copy somewhere.

TheLovelyBoots Iris Murdoch is good, isn't she? I was fortunate enough to meet her a couple of times, she was lovely but formidably intelligent. Typical 'North Oxford', shabby, academic and erudite. My favourite is The Bell but I also love The Green Knight and many others. Have you read the biography Iris by her husband John Bailey?

Nevil Shute is another favourite of mine. I love A Town Like Alice but also Pied Piper which is beautifully written. Requeim for a Wren and Beyond the Black Stump are others I've read a few times.

On the strength of this thread, I bought A Fine Balance and Family Matters by Rohinton Mistry today

Lindsey Davis, I'm a sucker for anything Roman and I love her style

MiddleAge, you met Iris Murdoch? Lucky you. Your description is much as I would imagine her. I haven't read her biography, I will do so.

I just finished The Sea, The Sea which I didn't love (though I liked), I just couldn't understand the protagonist's obsession with Hartley (I forget his name) and felt that I was missing some essential thread of the story. The first Murdoch I read was A Word Child, and it remains a favorite.

Susan Howatch
Alice Munro
Aminatta Forna

Ruth Rendell/Barbara Vine especially Asta's Book.

Yes, Dumas is long. Even though there are lots of words and actually at times not much happens I really found this didn't bother me - I just couldn't put it down.

So many here I want to try. I don't read many more modern writers so there are some great ideas on this thread .

There were parts of the Count of Monte Cristo that gripped me (his classical education in prison, the prison break, the diamond, De Villefort's affair and the buried baby, Valentine's murderous mother)- it is a really great story. But I thought the Count descended into silly by the end.

It might have been my impatience.

TheLovelyBoots. I agree about The Sea, The Sea. It's good but not my favourite. I haven't read A Word Child for ages, will dig it out and read it again. I hope you enjoy her biography

The trouble with this thread is that it adds even more books to my "to read soon" list.

A Word Child! Is this where someone goes on the Circle Line and spots a coffee booth in Sloane Square tube station? It doesn't exist any longer but I used to be obsessed with it for some reason. Loved that book.

Just adding to the list:
John Updike, Philip Roth, Carson McCullers, Isaac Bashevis Singer, Bernard Malamud, Charles Bukowski, Anita Brookner, Emile Zola, Jules Valles

That's the one FrostedFlakes.

I do love Philip Roth - his meticulous research can be wonderfully weird, like in the one set against a glove factory... ? I quite enjoyed the segues into stitching and tanning and so forth.

John Updike and Emile Zola. Two authors I haven't read much of for years. (Adds to list)

I remember being so engrossed in Germinal as a teenager that I got really bad sunburn. Stupidly read it lying in the garden in a bikini. Those days are long gone!

Does anyone like VS Naipaul? He's another favourite of mine. Hmm, too many favourites I suspect.

Ishiguro, David Mitchell and Georgette Heyer.

Oooh and Michel Faber.

Shirley Jackson. Her stories are really gripping and eerie, but always with this precise, very mid-century black humour running through them. Her short story The Lottery is her best known and it's incredible.