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I just learned that the last of the three authors who influenced me most as a child has died. Rest in peace Anne McCaffrey.

My three writer role models were Roger Zelazny, Marion Zimmer Bradley, and McCaffrey. Oh, of course I also read Tolkien, and Madeleine L’Engle, and Frank Herbert. But Zelazny, Bradley, and McCaffrey were my “big three.” I never took to Heinlein or Asimov (though I liked his YA nonfiction a lot), Robert Silverberg left no impression, Piers Anthony likewise–in one eye and out the other. I liked Frederick Pohl’s columns in Writer’s Digest, but his books didn’t stick with me. But Zelazny, Bradley, and McCaffrey I read over and over, multiple books, multiple times, actively trying to learn from them.

I was a writer from very early on. (My mother has lovingly preserved “books” I wrote when I was four, before I knew of the concept of correct spelling.) I always wanted to write science fiction and fantasy. I think I was drawn to it most because of the way the genre speaks to outsider status. I knew from very young I wasn’t like other kids even though I didn’t then comprehend all the reasons (cultural, social, sexual, et cetera…)

Mirrored from blog.ceciliatan.com.