The One Book
Any writer worth his salt is also a reader and usually a voracious one. How many times have you finished a book and thought, I could have written that. Or I could have written that better. Along the way comes the ones we wished we had written. Finally, there is the book that we esteem above all others as writers, not necessarily as readers.
The one book that I esteem above all others has to be The Maltese Falcon by Dashiel Hammett. Written in 1930, it became a movie with Humphrey Bogart in the 1940s. To me there is no other book that epitomizes plot, setting, characterization, dialogue and lacks absolutely nothing, except possibly more pages.
It is not for sentimental reasons that I love this book. Looking at it from a writer’s eye, I cannot find a flaw in it. It is tightly written reminding me of Hemingway’s own economy of prose. It is written in objective third person, a form I usually do not like as you do not know what the main character is thinking, but you do through all of the other elements of the book. Hammett is masterly. This is the one book that I read over and over again.
In the runner up position, the other book I would have to say hands down that affected me as a writer was Ciara Geraghty’s Saving Grace. This book blew me away. I am a big fan of chick lit — I love humor and the single girl looking for Mr. Right. I bristle at the criticism chick lit receives for being too “shallow” and all about shopping and clothes.
Geraghty managed to marry both serious issues with outrageous humor, which makes her in my eyes, The Queen of Chick Lit. I cried because it was so funny and I cried because it was so sad. After I read it, I knew that was the kind of writer I wanted to be.
We all have books that become personal favorites for personal reasons. But what books have you read (aside from how-to) that have affected you a writer? And why? I would love to hear from you all.