The 50 Authors Who Shaped Me

It took me a long while to compile my list of "The 50 Authors who Shaped Me" – it was so difficult to choose only fifty from the thousands of authors whose work meant so much to me through my life.

When I began, I realised that many of the books that I had chosen were my favourite childhood books. Of course this makes sense, as the books we read when we are children make such a deep impression upon our psyche. However, I wanted to see how favourite books in each decade of my life worked to change and direct me.

In the end, I made strict rules. I could only choose fiction; and I had to name the ten authors in each decade of my life whose work had transformed my life in some way.

I call the novels on this list my "touchstone" books.

0 - 10 (1966-1976)

  1. C.S. Lewis – The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe
  2. Enid Blyton – Five Go to Treasure Island
  3. Eleanor Farjeon – The Glass Slipper
  4. Elizabeth Goudge – The Little White Horse
  5. Nicholas Stuart Grey – The Stone Cage
  6. Joan Aiken – The Wolves of Willoughby Chase
  7. J.R.R Tolkien – The Hobbit
  8. Frances Hodgson Barnett –The Secret Garden
  9. Susan Cooper – The Dark Is Rising
  10. Geoffrey Trease – Cue for Treason

11 - 20 (1977-1986)

  1. Ursula le Guin – A Wizard Of Earthsea
  2. L.M. Montgomery – Emily of New Moon
  3. E. J. Oxenham – New Abbey Girls
  4. Anne Frank – Diary of a Young Girl
  5. Dodie Smith – I Capture The Castle
  6. Georgette Heyer – These Old Shades
  7. Mary Stewart – The Moon-Spinners
  8. Mary Webb – Precious Bane
  9. Jane Austen – Persuasion
  10. Charlotte Bronte – Jane Eyre

21 - 30 (1987-1996)

  1. Emily Bronte – Wuthering Heights
  2. Daphne du Maurier - Rebecca
  3. Harper Lee – To Kill A Mockingbird
  4. Jane Yolen – Briar Rose
  5. Marion Zimmer Bradley – The Mists of Avalon
  6. Robin McKinley – Beauty
  7. Isabel Allende – The House of Spirits
  8. Alice Walker – The Color Purple
  9. E.M. Forster – A Room With A View
  10. Tad Williams – The Dragonbone Chair

31 - 40 (1997-2006)

  1. Jeannette Winterson – The Passion
  2. Barbara Kingsolver – The Poisonwood Bible
  3. Susan Vreeland – Girl in Hyacinth Blue
  4. Juliet Marillier – Daughter of the Forest
  5. Kim Wilkins – Angel of Ruin
  6. Tracy Chevalier – Falling Angels
  7. Joanne Harris – Five Quarters Of The Orange
  8. Sarah Dunant – The Birth of Venus
  9. Geraldine Brooks – The Year of Wonders
  10. Carlos Ruiz Zafron – The Shadow of the Wind

41 - 50 (2007-2016)

  1. C. J. Sansom – Dissolution
  2. Phillipa Gregory – The Queen's Fool
  3. Marcus Zusak – The Book Thief
  4. Mary Ann Schaffer – The Guernsey Literary & Potato Peel Pie Society
  5. Kate Morton – The Forgotten Garden
  6. Ken Follett – The Pillars of the Earth
  7. Karen Maitland - Company of Liars
  8. Kate Mosse – Labyrinth
  9. Sarah Waters – Affinity
  10. A.S. Byatt – Possession

Kate Forsyth
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