Abhorsen

Y is for Jane Yolen, whose books I didn’t read when I was a child (because they weren’t yet written), but wish I had.

Z is for Roger Zelazny

Not just because his name starts with ‘Z’. The first Amber series, begi

ing with Nine Princes in Amber were important reading for me as a teenager. I really, really liked the idea of a central world that cast shadows of itself, our Earth being but one of those shadows. I also liked that Zelazny didn’t explain stuff. There was a lot of action and the story kept moving and you had to keep up, only after reading and re-reading the whole series did I begin to understand what it was all about. The story was everything and it was all there, only you might not get it the first time through.

Now you know my ABC of books remembered. Or at least one version of it, for there are many authors left out, and many more books that I could have remembered, should have remembered, would have remembered . . .

Garth Nix