Jesse Tafel
The Lord of the Rings
Author: JRR Tolkien
Genre: Adventure/Fantasy
I was a child, maybe about six or seven when my father read The Hobbit to me and I was hooked for life. When I was a little older in elementary school I finished reading The Hobbit myself and it was a great accomplishment. The minute Bilbo was home in Bag End I picked up the next book on my father’s shelf. It was ten times bigger than the last book because it was three books in one. The Lord of the Rings. I have read this book more times than I can count and seen the films twice as many times. I have maybe four different copies of The Lord of the Rings in my house, some leather, some for travel, some just for show. This was the book that made me want to become a writer. I wanted to tell a story like this and amaze all who read it. This is my go to guide for writing with the wordsmith that is Tolkien. The Lord of the Rings (book or film) is what I go to when I am down or lost, and always will be. Tale of adventure and friendship, good versus evil, war, horror, redemption, resurrection, tragedy, wonder and even comedy, this story has it all and is my ideal story.
The Silmarillion
Author: JRR Tolkien
Genre: Fantasy
Tolkien again! This is the one book I gloat about in my household. My father is something of a genius and has probably read every book ever printed and has half of those books on shelves all over our house. But The Silmarillion is the one book that Jon Tafel says “I can’t read this” and I have read it at least three times, first being in high school. I look at it as a Bible of Tolkien’s legendarium, Big Jon looks at it as a waste of time and says “you might as well just read the real Bible”. The book is so complex and so detailed spanning over thousands of years of history of all of Middle-Earth and before it. There is no story, more like many stories in one where heroes come and go but the villain is still the same. Upon reading this book and then picking up The Lord of the Rings again I find hundreds of references to The Silmarillion that in my first reading was just a random name someone mentioned (to my father this is still the case). But now when I read The Lord of the Rings and they mention Morgoth or Turin or Feanor I get excited and want to say out loud “I know who that is!!”. This book inspired me to be as detailed as a writer could be.
The Children of Hurin
Author: JRR Tolkien
Genre: Fantasy/Tragedy
That’s right. Tolkien once again. This book has a funny backstory for me personally. I am a person who will buy anything with Tolkien’s name on it and back in 2007 (before I read The Silmarillion) I saw this book in Barnes & Noble, brand new, just released. I saw it and asked my mother to buy me it and I never touched it again once it went on the shelf because to be honest, it was too advanced. Then in high school while reading The Silmarillion I came to a chapter called The Children of Hurin. The little story was only about fourteen pages long in this massive mythopedia and for some reason it struck my heart really hard. It was so dark and tragic and I couldn’t believe what took place in that story, whether it be twists or suicides all I could think of was “this is so not Tolkien but it is still beautifully sad”. Then for some reason I was drawn to my shelf of books in my room from the past and saw the 300 page novel titled The Children of Hurin. I couldn’t believe this book was in my house! Tolkien’s son, Christopher, took those fourteen pages and other notes from his father and made this epic tragedy into a novel with dialogue! So now forever I can read the story of Turin and his sister Nienor in their dark Middle-Earth tale against dragons and demons. If The Lord of the Rings did not exist, this would be my favorite book of all time. This story bleeds into a lot of my tragic works when I want to get sad or hopeless, I go to The Children of Hurin.
Paradiso
Author: Dante
Genre: Epic Poem
Isn’t this a breath of fresh air? Someone picking Paradiso as their favorite and not Inferno. That’s me, it’s rare but it happens. I love Dante’s Divine Comedy as a whole, it is a fantastic epic poem and to me my least favorite part is Inferno. Sure it’s scary and dark and evil blah blah blah, but that is boring to me. Punishment and horror over and over, you get numb to it. So when people want to talk about Dante all they want to talk about is Inferno, and the other two parts of Purgatory and Heaven are either boring or they did not even read because Hell is so cool! To me Paradiso was just hope; pages on pages of wonder and beautiful imagery. Inferno made me think “well I do not want to go there”, Purgatorio made me think “That was interesting” and then once I finished Paradiso I thought “That’s where I wanna go! Yeah a little weird but planets and stars and beauty and angels!” I would say I am enthralled by it. I picture Paradiso in my head frequently and as a religious person it seems like the great reward for a good life. Overall the Divine Comedy is amazing, but part III stood out the most to me and will forever. I have used these three stories in my own work. I am currently working on an adventure story where you could say The Lord of the Rings mixed with Divine Comedy, where the heroes go on a journey through hell, purgatory and heaven.
Treasure Island
Author: Robert Louis Stevenson
Genre: Classic/Adventure
Pirates! What child doesn’t love pirates, boy or girl. I love them and love reading about them. I was read this story as a young boy and wanted to be Jim Hawking in the worst way. I wanted to travel the seas and find treasure. It has become the basis for my stories I write all the time. Adventures on the sea with teenagers learning from experienced people and engaging in battles with pirates to find treasure!
Cryptum
Author Greg Bear
Genre: Science Fiction
What a wild read this was. So in depth with its own universe it was almost as bad as The Silmarillion. This sci fi story tells the origins of Earth with ancient aliens and it’s not stupid. The concept of ancient aliens is humorous to me but this story is fascinating because the focus is not about ancient aliens on Earth, this story could have taken place on any planet and it would have been the same story. A great tale of politics between ancient aliens and the inferior humans. Followed up by two great sequels, Primordium and Silentium, but for some reason this story stuck out the most because i was so immersed in the world it created, which was our own but oh so different.
Great Expectations
Author: Charles Dickens
Genre: Classic
This was a story given to us to read in class and I think was the first time in my school career did i enjoy reading a book so much that was given by the public school system (because they are usually horrible choices). This book was so great to me because the whole time Pip loves Estella and she just isn’t giving him anything and the whole time reading I kept thinking, he better end up with her, she’s terrible and I love it. And Pip goes along on his journey through life with ups and downs and a great story overall and in the end, the very end when Estella has nothing now she wants Pip, and he just says okay. I loved that! I still love it! I don’t know why! She’s a bitch but the man loved that girl and it made me so happy in the end. This also goes into writing of characters for me, making them real and have flaws that people can be attracted too. I know because I live it, it’s a human thing to be attracted to a flaw.
Girl With the Dragon Tattoo
Author: Stieg Larsson
Genre: Mystery
This was a rough one. I’m not a fan of mystery or whodunits, but this story stands out because of the characters, especially Lisbeth. Her character just ensnares me on every page. I almost wanted to skip over the other stuff just to get to another moment where she is in the story to see what she’d say or do next. This dark story taught me a lot about creating an interesting and memorable character.
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