This and That...

Chelsea over at The Page Flipper was tagged and answered these questions on her blog. Chelsea doesn't know me from Adam, but I loved the questions and thought I would answer them myself on MY blog, so here goes:

Who's your all-time favorite author and why?

This is a difficult question for several reasons. One is that I enjoy books in different genres and to compare the authors wouldn't be fair. If one is good in suspense, he/she might be terrible in historical fiction. I may love one author because his/her voice is amazing whereas another author may be exceptionally witty. That being said, my favorite crime fiction writer would have to be Robert Crais. Robert Parker and Harlan Coben are very close seconds, but Elvis and Joe are embedded in my soul now; I just love them. Crais' work on a bad day is better than a lot of people's best work on a good day. I would have to say Pat Conroy is probably my favorite when it comes to general fiction. My classic lit favorite would have to be Charles Dickens.

Who was your first favorite author and why?

That one was a bit easier. Beverly Cleary was definitely my first favorite. At least she was my favorite when I was old enough to understand the concept of an author. I adored Ramona and Ralph and Ribsy and Henry...She just brought everything to life, and she didn't try to make a perfect little world in her books; it was life as I knew it. I probably didn't understand that when I was reading her books, but I think that's what drew me to them. Not long after Beverly Cleary was Judy Blume. Can't leave her out.

Who's the most recent addition to your list of favorite authors and why?

Well, I feel like most all my favorites are recent additions because I just started reading more popular fiction since I stopped teaching a couple years ago. But, MOST recently has been Gregg Hurwitz, Lisa Unger and Thomas Holland. I recently finished Unger and Holland's first books and they were outstanding. Hurwitz is a little more established, but my first read of his was The Crime Writer. It will be one of my top 10 reads for 2008, no doubt about it. They are all great suspense writers...Thomas Holland is phenomenal with character development. Lisa Unger created a fantastic female protagonist in Beautiful Lies. And Gregg Hurwitz's approach to The Crime Writer was unique and THRILLING! They are all definitely authors I'm going to stick with.

If someone asked you who your favorite authors were right now, which authors would first pop out of your mouth?

Ready? Robert Crais, Harlan Coben, Robert Parker, Michael Koryta, Kathy Reichs, Linda Fairstein, Alafair Burke, James Lee Burke, Dennis Lehane, Pat Conroy, Lisa Unger, Thomas Holland, Karin Slaughter, Gregg Hurwitz.

Are there any you'd add on after further reflection?

Oh, can't forget Michael Connelly, T. Jefferson Parker and Ross Macdonald.

So, there you have it! Before I go today, I want to point your attention over to the right-hand margin to the sign-up icon I added. I just discovered this Bloglines thing. It's pretty nifty. I use to have a service that sent me an e-mail each morning telling me what blogs had been updated from those I had registered. They combined with another group, and I never got anymore information. But then I found this Bloglines and it's very similar, but I go to the site and look at my registered blogs and it lets me know in one glance where updates have been made. I can look at them there or go to the actual site. Pretty nifty!

I've also been nosing around in other book blogs, so I'll probably be adding some of those links to my book links pretty soon. Let me know if you know of any great book bloggers. I love to hear what other people are saying about books!

Happy Reading!