Do you have certain favorite writers that are not crowd favorites? My mom loves sci-fi and romance, and she'll gladly talk about those with me. My sister loves non-fiction, fantasy, and sci-fi. My father loves mysteries. One of my favorite authors is Warren Ellis. Tons of other people love him, of course. Just not anyone I talk to on a regular basis. He's a graphic novelist/mystery novelist who fills that weird, bitter, cynical, and sarcastic place in my heart. He's also a fantastic writer, who really thinks about what he writes.
"I sit down every day to tell myself a story. Usually full of either stimulants or depressants, playing some kind of soundtrack to the experience of writing, aware of my environment, sitting in my own little writer’s movie and telling myself a story. Anyone who tells you they write to an audience is either an idiot or a fake. You write for yourself. If the story doesn’t affect you in some way, it won’t affect anybody else. I don’t write for the trunk. I’m well aware that someone else is going to read this. But if I don’t respond in some honest, gut way to whatever I’m writing, you’ll never get to see it." From his talk "Stories, Drinking And The World".
I've read Warren Ellis! Well, a little. A Warren-Ellis-obsessed friend gave me a copy of Crooked Little Vein right after high school, and it's still hanging out on my bookshelf...I haven't read it in a while, I should try again and see how I feel about it.
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