The Rules: Don’t take too long to think about it. Fifteen authors (poets included) who’ve influenced you and that will always stick with you. List the first fifteen you can recall in no more than fifteen minutes. Tag at least fifteen friends, including me, because I’m interested in seeing what authors my friends choose.

(Please, do this if you like..)

These are the first fifteen off the top of my head.  I’m sure I’ve left someone(s) vital out.  Some of these are “for better or worse” (I won’t say which ones); others I no longer read all that much, but they definitely influenced who I am as a writer.  They stay with me forever in that way, even if I don’t read them anymore.

  1. Rosemary Sutcliff
  2. Carlos Casteneda
  3. Mary Stewart
  4. Charlaine Harris
  5. W. B. Yeats
  6. Carl Sandburg
  7. Kage Baker
  8. Andre Norton
  9. Anne Rice
  10. Peter Beagle
  11. Karl Shapiro
  12. Edna O’Brien
  13. Charles de Lint
  14. Billy Collins
  15. John Fowles