After this week’s Writing Excuses podcast, I have been wondering what are my influences, so that I understand better what I’m writing.

This will take on a list form – could become boring, so beware.

Early influences :

• Some Realists writers from the 19th century – Balzac and Stendhal (Not Zola, please!). Those guys are good, but writing has changed so much since that time that you certainly can’t do it like this anymore. I mean, I don’t know how readers of that time could follow a story starting with 50 pages of description of the same street. Remember that those novels were first published in newspapers. How could readers stand week after week of description without any meaty stuff in it?
• Stevenson : Maybe the source of my fantasy reading taste. That guy knew how to write adventure stuff, that’s sure. Strangely, I never could read anything from Jules Vernes.
• Conan Doyle : I read every Sherlock Holmes novel I could put my hands on. Equally strangely, I never really read anything else in the mystery genre. I love watching a good mystery but reading it? no thanks.
• Zelazny : I’m coming to the fantasy stuff here. Yes, I read Amber as they were published (not the early ones, though). I agonized when I learned that fire had destroyed one of his manuscripts. Sadly, the last book’s ending was disappointing, to say the least. I also read his egyptian novel : great stuff too.
• Tolkien : Of course I read it. My first book in english was Lord of The Rings (I had obtained the hobbit before, but couldn’t read it at the time). Let me tell you, starting to read in a foreign language THAT book is a challenge. The thing is, I was interested enough by the book to read them through the end, including appendices and notations. What’s interesting is that for a long time, I considered “The Silmarillon” the best of the books I ever read. This book really has shaped my understanding of fantasy.

What influence me right now:

• Cornwell : I have to put him first. I started to read him with his warlord series (that’s his fantasy story). That series was fantastic and I started to read other work he had donne (the grail series). Cornwell has this unique ability to make you feel (and almost smell) how things are really going in a battlefield. After that, I was hooked (no pun about one of his characters intended here). I read through all the Sharpe series (some 20+ volumes) and the saxon one too. I picked up Stonehenge thinking “what possibly could interest me there?”. Well, he nailed it too. I picked up “The Gallows Thief” and was blown away. That book is probably my favorite one. There’s no battle here, only a mystery and Cornwell managed that as well as he describes a rifleman standing in a line. At this point, I believe I’ve read everything he has published under his own name. I love him and often go to his website. I’m amazed at the time he takes answering his fan’s questions. One great thing about him now that I’m writing : he’s a discovery writer too!
• Jordan : Well, can’t get around that one either. I’m a big WOT fan. That guy was a master and I’ve followed his illness like a cliffhanger series, asking myself if he was going to get better or not. I was quite sad when he died, but I knew that he had told the whole story to his wife, so the story didn’t die with him. Now that Sanderson has taken over and that TGS is printed, I can see the mark of the master inside – love that last book. To the writer : Jordan is the master of viewpoint – you can get into anybody’s head with him.
• Martin : Another big one. I love the song of Ice and Fire series and GRRM’s brutal rendition of life in Westeros. That guy is cruel to his readers, let me tell you. He writes so well his characters that you have no idea who the heroes are – until their heads unexpectedly get chopped off. I spend at least two books jumping from one character to the next wondering if those were going to die or not. He’s brilliant. I’ve recently taken to read some of his other work. The man has done everything : horror, fantasy, sf, screenwriting, comics. The only thing right now against him is that I haven’t the vaguest idea when the next book is going to get out – neither does he.
• Erikson : Another genius. The Malazan book of the fallen is a great series, with hundreds of characters and an involved story line. He’s brutal too (man, how could he kill Anomander Rake in the previous book?) and I love the way he writes conversations between his malazan soldiers (Great adepts of absurd those). Now, his friend Esselmont is getting out more books in the same setting and I love those too : night of knives is really something – action packed on one night’s span.
• Keyes : I’ve got mixed feelings about him – I started reading him at the start of Kingdom of thorn and bones and loved it. I then read some of his other work (Empire of unreason) and found him fascinating ( what would have happened if Newton had studied alchemy instead of physics?). Then kingdom of thorn and bones’ last book went out and that one kind of disapointed me. I guess that he promised me a heroin that was someone good and delivered someone who turned out not to be. Quite frustrating.
• Bujold : I’ve never read her SF books, but her Chalion series were nothing short of genius. Too bad she didn’t write many of them – yet.

Non book inspirations:

• Star Trek : Not a book here, sorry. I’ve been a fan since the first film (I’ve seen it quite some times when I was young). I’ve looked at everything trek, I speak trek. Like someone said “everything I’ve learned about command, I learned from Star Trek”. I may not agree with the last film (Come on!) and where the franchise is going, but Star Trek is still fueling most of my internal voices. My favorite hour of television ever : “In the pale moonlight”.
• Frasier : This is all the humor I like. Witty, subtle, sometimes visual. I love Frasier. Those are the masters on non sequitur for me.
• Battlestar Galactica : the new one, of course. I love their characters, especially Gaius Balthar. That’s a complex character if I ever saw one. I tend to agree with GRRM that the last episode is wrong. At the time, I didn’t react and even thought that GRRM was too severe, but the more I think on it, the more cheated I feel.
• New things : heroes, fringe. Those are good series. I particularly like heroes rendering of the bad characters. Love Sylar!

That’s all for now. I’ll try to add some more later, but that’s the core of my influences.

Now, I have to blend it all in my own style. That’s a challenge!