Books that have influenced my writings, my personality, my life - in short, books that I’m most fond of, going back to my childhood. A thread.

I used to read Verne a lot. The Castle of Carpathians frightened me with the unknowable (me being too young to fully understand it) but the illustrations helped to set that stark, Gothic mood. Not sure if it still holds up, but it definitely made an impression on me.

I read Sue Townsend’s Adrian Mole books early as well, but I revisited them in my 20’s. The naive narrator, the sharp observational / self-deprecating humor was a massive influence on my first novel. These books are still funny and witty as hell, even the later sequels.

The Neverending Story by Michael Ende was my introduction to fantasy, and it’s weird as hell, a psychedelic trip. The movie and its awful sequels don’t even come close. Ende was of the finest German authors, his other works are bordering on insanity as well. In a good way.

I think Angela Sommer-Bodenburg’s Schokolowski isn’t available in English. It’s about a boy meeting a stray dog who can talk but eats only chocolate. There is a dark plotline involving flashbacks to kidnappers and experiments conducted on the dog, so... yeah.

Onto my awkward teenage years. There is a 6-part YA series called Isaac Asimov’s Robot City (not written by Asimov, but he wrote the forewords). They are fast-paced and fun, if a bit shallow, boyish adventures. This was my introduction to science-fiction in general.

The novelizations of Alien, Aliens, Timecop, Independence Day, and the Star Wars trilogy (& EU). They are what they are, but this was the first time I realized that you can write, uh, books. And sequels. I promptly started writing fan fiction in a notebook.

Naturally followed by the popular stuff at the time (~2001), I was 14 years old, and I think this was the perfect time for LotR and HP. I wrote a HP parody with a stoner / skater college setting. I wouldn’t dare mock LotR.

And then this happened. First I started writing parodies of Lovecraft, then homages. And then it was settled. I was going to write with the most ridiculously flowery prose possible. Nobody would stop me. I was still 14.

I started reading a whole lot more. Loaning from cousins, friends, libraries. Popular books, King and Crichton being my favorites, and the other usual suspects. Some Forgotten Realms. Nothing particularly interesting. I read for enjoyment, for the thrills, for escapism.

But Lovecraft and King were always keen on suggesting more authors. I fell in love with the concept of being a writer who actively seeks out influences. So Lovecraft showed me Poe, Bierce, Hawthorne... and I loved them...

Whereas Stephen King and the ongoing Lost showed me some really good short story writers. Shirley Jackson, Ernest Hemingway, Flannery O’Connor, William Faulkner, John Steinbeck. I devoured them.

Notice a theme here: I started bouncing between literary and genre fiction, I wanted to publish short stories, but editors scolded me for my lack of knowledge in Hungarian literature and modern, contemporary stuff. My writing wasn’t very good. I wanted to imitate Americans.

So I started looking for more close inspirations and I have found out about Csilla Kleinheincz around 2008 (I was 21) who wrote fantasy inspired by Hungarian folk tales, and lead a writing workshop. I joined. She later accepted and edited my first fantasy story for an anthology.

This writing workshop tore my stories apart. I wanted to show off my edgy voice (having recently discovered PKD), and I thought I was very good, but turns out, I wasn’t very good. I also started noticing subtle sexism in my writing, sometimes embracing it (hence Updike).

Thanks to the workshop, I started discovering more interesting stuff in the speculative fiction space. Le Guin is still a huge favorite. Babel-17 blew my tiny mind. At this point I still longed to read non-genre books as well, more Hungarian stuff. I started getting anxious.

Dune.

After this, I started reading authors I can now tag on Twitter.

The story that got accepted was about criminals in a fantasy setting, in my early 20’s I wanted to write about thieves, ruffians. Vance and Leiber didn’t click with me. But @scottlynch78’s Gentleman Bastard series completely obliterated my need to write such stories ever again.

This also marked the point that I fell in love with fantasy again, so starting from Brandon Sanderson and @PatrickRothfuss, I eventually found new favorites such as @LordGrimdark and @robinhobb. Interestingly, GRRM didn’t click with me.

All this happened before publishing my first novel, before 2013, in my early 20’s. The most direct influences on my first novel were writers with sharp prose: @LawrenceBlock, Ch. Portis, Gr. Greene, Géza Ottlik, Salinger. (I have again fell back to an all-male reading list.)

Onto my more open-minded years. From now on, real book recommendations that you should check out if you want to get to know me, in no particular order.

For my Hungarian readers.

Kleinheicz Csilla és Moskát Anita könyvei a legjobbak, amit magyar fantasztikum nyújtani tud. Pont. Vegyétek őket.

Quiet by @susancain helped me somewhat in getting more comfortable with being an introvert. I became less obnoxious about it as well. I don’t know how extensive it is, but this was my first glimpse into my own psychology at least.

Attila Veres is the absolute best weird/horror writer in Hungary. He got in touch with me after reading one of my stories, and thanks to him I discovered @NBallingrud, @LairdBarron, @KatheKoja and @MattMBartlett. Pre-order @Valancourt_B’s anthology so you can read a story of his.

More recently, Octavia Butler’s Xenogenesis trilogy became available in Hungarian, it’s a deep and compelling sci-fi about forced alien-human merging and its societal implications. Very-very good.

Michael Moorcock and Christopher Priest are my favorite British writers in SFF.

I try to get as many anthologies by @EllenDatlow as I can. Thanks to her I have discovered @SGJ72, @TheNuminous1, @seananmcguire, @jeffreyford8, etc, etc, can’t fit them all here. Read these anthologies.

Moby Dick, because I’m apparently insane. If you’re more likely to buy the so-called classics, buy something that might cause a mental breakdown.

“Mouthful of Birds” by @sschweblin is an excellent, sometimes unsettling short story collection. A Hungarian translation exists, but it’s now out of print.

My favorite mangaka is Junji Ito. His books are phenomenal.

Two of my recently discovered favorites. “We have always lived in the castle” is an insanely entertaining, macabre tale. And Robert Aickman is a master of subtle horror stories.

Some of my favorites of Hungarian literature. Péter Nádas, Ádám Bodor, Ágnes Nemes Nagy, Péter Hajnóczy.

Contemporary Hungarian SFF writers are getting significantly better than 10-20 years ago ( @bogiperson might be more famous outside of Hungary). I wish @brainoiz would write more. At least we have new anthologies (incl @csfrncz):

Regarding anthologies and Twitter itself, I’m also happy to have discovered @intelligentwat, @BBolander, Brian Evenson, @tadethompson, @pauljessup, @UndertowPubs, @Jon__Padgett, @EmpireOfBloodRW, @victorlavalle, etc, etc.

Anyway, the point of this thread is, again, to support writers, publishers, editors... the industry needs help now. Recommend your favorites, never stop. Done with this thread for now, but occasionally I’ll still post recommendations. I left out a lot of people.

(Maybe I’ll do a comics thread one day, until then, follow the expert: @eszterlikesrain.)