twenty books that changed my life, and how

Here's a lil Facebook meme that's been making the rounds. As it seems right up my alley, I decided to partake and post the answers here. (I've also cheated slightly by including plays, books of poetry, and short stories. But it's my list, so deal with it.)

1) Gone With the Wind, by Margaret Mitchell. TNT showed the movie over Christmas break of my sixth grade year, and I decided I wanted to try and read the book. Of course, the problem with the movie is that Rhett Butler is introduced about ten or fifteen minutes in. In the book, it's more like 100 pages, and I got bored very quickly. About a year later I tried again and fell in love. Actually, I think I fell in obsessed and I've been collecting memorabilia ever since. Like my bookslut, I divide my life into pre-GWTW and post-GWTW. These days, my post-GWTW world includes seven copies of the book and I can't walk into a used bookstore without looking for a new one to add to my collection.

2) The Blind Assassin, by Margaret Atwood. While not my favorite Atwood book, it's definitely a close second if only because it's the first book of hers I really remember reading and being blown away by, and it was this book that made me go out and want to read everything else by her. Her ability to handle and balance three very different story lines without giving away their connections until the ultimate moment is awe-inspiring. It also eloquently blends her skills at writing "serious" literature and science-fiction, which is not an easy thing to do.

3) Time Traveler's Wife, by Audrey Niffenegger. The first time I read this book, I cried for days. Days, I tell you; I was absolutely devastated. The book is so well-done, the characters so well-crafted, it's like a new story each time I read it. I was recently involved in a discussion about this book, and there were two women there who didn't like the book and were disturbed by the title, I think it was the idea of identifying Clare by her husband. But, really, I think it's Clare's story that's being told. Sure, the aspect of Henry's life as a time-traveler is interesting and full of adventure, and while it might seem like it would be fun to be a time-traveler, it's easy to forget the people in their life who can't go with them. It's Clare's voice we hear first, and as she says from the very beginning, "It's hard being left behind."

4) Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, by JK Rowling. I arrived late to the Harry Potter game, halfway between the release dates of Goblet of Fire and OotP, so this was the first book in the series that I got me all excited with anticipation. The local independent bookstore in my hometown did a big extravaganza for the release, and I was home shortly after midnight, book in hand. I only intended to read the first few chapters but the next thing I knew, it was 8 am and I was halfway through. I slept for two hours, woke up at 10 am and started right back where I started. Around noon, my mom came into my room and said, "You need to eat something." So I went out to the kitchen and made myself a sandwich, which I took back to my bedroom. She came in a few minutes later and said "I meant eat something in the kitchen." I was finished with the book by 4 (and in mourning for the next few days due to the death that happens at the end. To this day I have to skip that chapter every time I read the book).

5) The Hours, by Michael Cunningham. Every time I read this book it makes me want to write. I get a page or two in and feel this itching in my fingers to pick up a pen. I can't explain it, but this creative energy just consumes me and I usually find myself starting to write a new story or poem while reading the book. And the weird thing is, I don't even like Virginia Woolf's works.

6) Daphne's Book, by Mary Downing Hahn. I loved Mary Downing Hahn when I was growing up. Wait Till Helen Comes, The Doll in the Garden. She wrote some of the best young adult ghost stories. Hell, she wrote some the best young adult books period, and it was Daphne's Book that I really identified with. I not only felt like I knew Jessica, I felt like I was Jessica: the loner bookworm who loved writing and whose friends from childhood were becoming popular and leaving her behind. If any book captured my fifth grade self, it was this one.

7) Rebecca, by Daphne DuMaurier. This is one of my mom's absolute favorite books and I'd heard her talk about it several times growing up. So, one year in middle school at our school's annual book fair, I decided to buy it. I got totally absorbed and remember several times running out to the kitchen to comment on the latest development or ask her a question about what's coming next. She'd always smile and tell me I'll just have to keep reading.

8) Invisible Monsters, by Chuck Palahniuk. This was the first Palahniuk book I ever read, and I found it so absurd and bizarre and ridiculous and over-the-top that I just had to go out and read virtually everything else he wrote. I still often find his books incredibly absurd, but Palahniuk is so good at observing those moments in life that cut with the truth and, more than that, saying those things we're all thinking but are too afraid to speak aloud.

9) Wicked, by Gregory Maguire. Like GWTW, I didn't like this book the first time I read it. and quit early on. But with some urging by my ex, I tried again and discovered the most delicious fantasy story of self-realization and self-acceptance. I firmly believe every woman, green skinned or not, needs to read this book.

10) The Waste Land, by TS Eliot. My introduction to TS Eliot actually came when I was in middle school through Andrew Lloyd Webber's Cats, based on Eliot's Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats, which I bought shortly after seeing the musical. But it wasn't until I read The Waste Land in college that I learned to love Eliot's way with words. To be perfectly honest, to this day I still don't understand many of the allusions made in the work, but the way he's able to dance around certain topics (abortion, rape) presented in the poem is so well done. Plus, once I did some research and learned of Eliot's wife's influence on the poem it inspired me enough to write, and dedicate, a poem to her, which I included as the final piece in my BFA thesis.

11) The Other Boleyn Girl, by Philippa Gregory. Ah, how I adore trashy historical fiction that decides to change details and fuck up already fucked up historical details. But, really, I do love this book and can easily consume it in a day or two, despite its length. It was this book, as historically inaccurate as it is, that first generated my interest in Henry VIII and his six wives, an interest that continues to this day, as seen in my user name, Tudor Rose.

12) The Six Wives of Henry VIII, by Alison Weir. After reading The Other Boleyn Girl, I wanted to know as much as I could about those crazy ol' Tudors, so I went out and bought Alison Weir's treatise on the subject. It says a lot about me that I found this rather dense non-fiction piece more captivating than the fictional account that led me to it.

13) Wake Up, I'm Fat!, by Camryn Manheim. I was a HUGE fan of "The Practice," and Camryn Manheim's performance in it. I also burst into tears the night she won The Emmy and held that statue up, dedicating it to all the fat girls. This was the first fat-acceptance book I ever read and it was like reading about my own life. For the first time, I knew I wasn't alone in my weight.

14) House of Leaves, by Mark Z. Danielewski. I can't even put this book into words. All I can say is that the scene where Karen puts her books on the shelf and they fall off still freaks me the fuck out. And that I am still secretly hoping "The Five and a Half Minute Hallway" video really does exist.

15) Angels in America, by Tony Kushner. My friend Joe's exact words when he recommend I read this play: "This will make RENT [my favorite musical] look like The Care Bears." He was right, and I'm still always amazed at how powerful I find this play to be. As an undergraduate senior I took a Gay and Lesbian Lit class where we read this play, and I loved getting the chance to act out various scenes and really discuss in-depth this play that I had already loved for years. It also made perestroika my favorite word.

16) The Last Silk Dress, by Ann Rinaldi. I loved Ann Rinaldi's books growing up and still own two of them, including this one. I'm pretty sure my still current love of historical fiction started with her.

17) Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass, Lewis Carroll. I have always been a very imaginative person, although it's always up in my head. As a child, I so wanted to be able to run away and go to this other world that was all mine. In college, I spent an entire academic year turning in short stories that were part of a collection I was working on, where each story was titled after a chapter from one of Carroll's novels. I still miss some of those characters, but they hit a little too close to home at time, and I still use "down the rabbit hole" as my euphemism when I'm feeling, well, depressed.

18) Crow, by Ted Hughes. I was introduced to Ted Hughes in a Modern Poetry class, and while the instructor had a deep resentment towards Hughes because of "The Plath Thing," I was able to look beyond that to see the power of his words and works. I was floored the first time I read the Crow poem collection, enough to write an entire play around them. If this list proves anything, it's that more than anything else, the one telling sign that shows I've been changed by a piece of literature is when reading it makes me want to write.

19) Hills Like White Elephants, by Ernest Hemingway. It took me years to appreciate this story. I used to hate the simplicity, the minimilism, the coldness and distance with which he dealt with the subject ... these are, of course, all the things that make the story what it is. As a writer who often overstates her points, I still have a lot to learn from this story.

20) Misery, by Stephen King. This was my first foray into Kingland, and I still remember how fascinated I was with the story and the characters, and the dedication King displayed in the whole missing letters from the typewriter sub-plot. This was my first "adult" horror or scary story, and I loved how it kept me up at night. Even in knowing how it all turns out, I get to the end and still wonder if Annie really is out there somewhere.