A love affair with words

A love affair with words.

I love words. I love how words roll off the tongue. How an author can thread them together to create a tapestry of images. How a skillfully crafted story can make me cry, laugh, or just feel. My love affair with the written language developed early, through comic books and then on to trashy romances my stepmom gave me when she had finished reading them. (Not to worry, I was well into my teenage years when that happened.) I had a library card that I used quite liberally. Often keeping a book so long that I had to pay a twenty-five cent overdue fee.

When I was younger, books allowed me to escape and imaging being someone else. I didn’t have a crappy childhood. On the contrary, I lived in the country, played outdoors with friends until that ominous voiced yelled for us kids to come home for dinner. I had chores, watched little TV, it was restricted to a point, I grew up in a time where there were only three channels on T.V. so sitting in front of the “boob tube”, my dad’s words, wasn’t an option.

In fact, the only way we could stay inside was to be reading. So, in the winter I read a lot. Long days and nights without T.V. Imagine my mom would unceremoniously walk-in and turn-it off and say, “Read a book.” But, but, but…so I read, a lot. Now, I read a lot, but sometimes for a different reason. I want to grow my craft as a writer and so I read. Not the classics. I write what I consider commercial fiction, not literary works. So, I read authors like:

J.R. Ward – Bourbon Kings is word mastery at a different level. When you read it you’ll want to move to the south and wonder how you ever survived without bourbon, family strife and where that finger came from. More importantly, you read words strung together like pearl on a necklace. (BTW, that’s one of my favorite phrases that I use a lot.) I love the Black Dagger Brotherhood series for a different reason, but it’s still about the writing.

Sherrilyn Kenyon – Love the way she make sets a scene, the craft of wordsmithing and the feeling of jumping off a cliff at just the right moment where you feel like you flying and not falling. Born of Shadows series and the Dark Hunter are well-written, engaging and fast-paced action.

I love, Amanda Kyle Williams writing for all the reason above, as well. The hot, humid south permeates your mind. You want to peel off clothes because you’re sure your there, sweating, the box of Dunking Donuts on the dash are wafting past you, and as you focus the waves of heat bouncing off the pavement creating mirages, you almost miss that suspect dashing out of the building.

So why do I bring up these authors, which are just a few I’ve read lately, because they are marble sculptors working in a media that is not forgiving. They have honed their craft to the point where they are the industry standard. 

So, where am I going with all of this, here – I read these authors because I want to be a better writer. I’ve taken classes on writing, I’ve gone to conferences and listed to writers discuss writing. I want to grow my craft, so I read authors who are better at turning a phrase than I am. If you want to get better at tennis, you don’t play someone below you. You play someone better, who challenges your skills. If you aren’t reading, in my opinion, you aren’t growing. So, I guess in a twisted sort of way I’m having a love affair with some of these authors. Not in that sycophant sort of way, but a love for their writing, the way they use their “words.” There are others that are favorites of mine, but these three come to mind since I’ve read their books lately. I’ve also read Melinda Lo’s, Huntress and I’ll be reviewing that book later this week because it had such an impact on what I thought YA was and wasn’t.

So, who do you love to read and why?

Razor's Edge by Isabella