Under Multiple Influences

TV, movies, books, computer games - it's always been about stories for me. I'm a sucker for narrative. It doesn't even have to be good, but it does have to intrigue me. Dark edging into creepy is always good for me. Sad stories need not apply. Being who and what I am, I really don't need any help with the whole depressive thing. I've got a lock on that all by myself.

So the list?
From childhood:
Star Trek - the original series

The Omega Man

The Andromeda Strain
Lost in Space
The Forgotten Door by Alexander Key (fantasy)
The Children of Morrow by H.M. Hoover (post apocalyptic fantasy)
The Time of Darkness by H.M. Hoover
The Dark is Rising Series by Susan Cooper (creepy Arthurian mythos goodness)

These gave way to everything Andre Norton ever wrote. I enjoyed Anne McCaffery's stories, but Andre Norton really is the one who gave me stories of women who drove their own destinies. Charles de Lint, Robin McKinley, Stephen R. Donaldson (anything that *wasn't* Thomas Covenant), Arthur C. Clark, Isaac Asimov, Michael Crichton. The original Star Wars trilogy, naturally. Somewhere in there, I absorbed a few too many B-grade pirate movies. Props to The Guns of Navaronne, though. That movie still makes me happy. And Alien. Oooo. Loved that movie because I loved how the story was told so effectively without all the standard horror props.

I loved comic books - especially The New Mutants. I got in on the beginning of that book and the writing was pretty solid initially. (Yeah, the writers pissed me off one too many times and I abandoned the book. My loss. But it made me write my own stories.) Several graphic novels caught my fancy, telling stories as they did with stark, beautiful art and sparse prose. I confess to having been addicted to Sandman.

These days?

Music is a huge influence. We won't go into who, what, where. You don't have that kind of time. Really. Books - Linnea Sinclair, Meljean Brook, Nalini Singh, Laurel K. Hamilton (initially - then I just couldn't take it anymore and had to stop), J.K. Rowling (I know, I know, sue me. I really enjoyed those books), and everything my fellow Word-Whores have written. No really. It's a good time. And based on the books penned between the lot of us, some of us are twisted. Not naming any names, just saying. I also have a really big science hobby. Watching science shows on TV was a big treat for me until we axed the TV and moved aboard a boat. Now I read science. Don't care what it is. I just like learning things I didn't know...though admittedly, a few of them are over my head. By an order of magnitude. That's another list that's too long. It's also the reason you won't find a photo of my bookshelves in this post. Besides the fact I'm one place and they're another - no - the stacks are three books deep and untidy. The only organization is 'what I've read' and 'what I haven't yet read'.  Thank heavens for the Kindle. Between my library and the DH's, we'd sink the boat.

Then we come to the computer games. Resident Evil. Do you know, I can't actually watch the movie? I watch parts of it, but I'm such a wimp when it comes to onscreen death and maiming. Write it into my own books? Sure! Watch it? I'll have nightmares for weeks. It's something about hearing the screaming. Can't do it. But the game? Oh, yeah. I'm zombie bait, but it is a compelling little story. And, of course, you already know about my World of Warcraft addiction.

So there it is. This odd conglomeration of multiple influences poured into my head, shaken (not stirred) and transmographied into something that means 'story' to me. Is it telling that 'story' usually means 'explosions'?