What, you ask, is a Writers Crush?
Nah… I bet you aren’t asking that at all. I’ll bet most of you have certain writers you’d give just about anything to be like.
Me? I have several.
I just finished Robert A. Heinlein‘s Time Enough for Love for the third or fourth time (not in a row) and found myself in that enviable position of wanting more. Granted, not everyone enjoys Heinlein—in fact, I was astounded how many people took the time to write one-star negative reviews of this book. I will hold back my theories of why, for now.
Finishing the Heinlein book I immediately fell into The Anansi Boys, by Neil Gaiman… and I realized for the umpteenth time how much I love to read, and how impressed I am by some writers.
I look at books like Replay, by Ken Grimwood, or The Mind Parasites, by Colin Wilson (don’t let the title fool you, this is an amazing book), or anything by Gaiman or Douglas Adams.
What makes a book special to me is, well, yes, the writing, but even more of that, the mind behind it. Heinlein’s book challenges us to look at so much of what we take as truth in our world and hold it up to the light. Gaiman’s books take us away to other worlds, to other places, forcing us—perhaps tricking us into it is better—to examine what it is about writing that pulls us in, that captivates and entertains us.
Image: eighthart.wordpress.com
Read Snowcrash by Neal Stephenson, or work your way through Catch-22 by Joseph Heller (I put the book down three times before, on the fourth time, I read and loved it).
The point of this is that we all love books, and there are, I believe, certain writers we would be delighted to approach with our own craft. Personally, I think this is a good place to be.
We talk about finding and developing our voice, and some would say that should be a truly unique thing to do. I disagree. I think the way to find our voice is to try on other voices, and in so doing, learn to hone our craft.
Today’s challenge, look for, identify, and come out of the closet about your Writer Crushes.
Can you do that?
Uphill Writing 
Well, I’m a classicist. Dostoevsky, and Shakespeare are up there. I like reading poetry. But I’ve been reading philosophy mostly, mainly in last years, and may be writing ‘philosophy, with a lower case. I’m not too pleased with what I’m reading at the moment. Don’t like his form of ‘argumentation. Perhaps I should sign off on this literary bent, but I don’t want to do that because I enjoy your posts too much, and I like being in this ‘different world’.
Ricky,
What a fascinating post you have put over here.
Crush on books! I have a high degree of prostitution in regards of what I love reading.
The classics are a delight.
I love the wit in Poe’s as for example when he describes a hole in a person’s clothes when it is accidental or intentional. Such intelligence for obseration. (I think this was described in “El Escarabajo de Oro” –Golden Bug?”
Kafka is another one. His books give the impression that despite the miserable life outside, he had such a great in solitude and writing.
Jorge Franco and his “Rosario Tijeras” very well written, etc…
Too many to list.
Ah, and I would let out Twilight. =)
But probably my favorites are the Enciclopedias. My parents had a lot enciclopedias at home: Fauna, Historia del Arte, Medicine, History, La Enciclopedia del Saber was a great one with a lot of creativity exercises,…
Remembering the smell of the “propalcote” paper pages, illustrations and photography.
I like technology and reading online but thinking that all those books will one day disappear, give me a sense of mourning for some of my best friends and relatives.
I have a crush on Dr. Seuss!
And Dickens, Austen, A.A. Milne, P.L. Travers, Lewis Carroll, and Jonathon Swift.
Francine Rivers
Stephanie Pearl-McPhee
Miss Read (really thats her name)
I’m in love of Dr. Seuss!