Some authors & their books. Never complete. ### C.S. Lewis The whole Narnia series and The Space Trilogy are the place to be. I'd recommend reading the Space Trilogy first. His nonfiction books are good too, though I think you need some preexisting interest in the topics he writes on, and his fiction writing already does a good job of imbuing much of what he covers in those. If you enjoy his fiction (who wouldn't?), pick through his nonfiction and see what interests you. Lewis had a knack for nailing the minutia of mindsets which seldom get put to words. Especially ones which we struggle with, whether we were aware we struggled with them or not. I'm currently gearing up to read The Discarded Image. I'd like to give it a proper "study" rather than read it casually, as I have tended to walk away my past readings of his nonfiction with a fragmented understanding I couldn't cleanly put into words. ### Tove Jansson Much like Lewis, Tove Jansson excels at revealing layers of our being that are often clouded over. Though where Lewis might leave you lamenting the goodness that could be, her writing puts the goodness right in your hands. The Moomin stories regularly get a couple tears out of me, not out of sentimental trickery, but because she writes to a part of you which is rarely allowed out by the diseased world we partially consent to. Some might call it "the child in you", but I think this would do Tove a disservice, for her books are the opposite of escapism that is implied by such a sentiment. She offers a rare full-body entrance into clarity and nonjudgmental being. Well, my words don't do her justice either. I recommend beginning with Tales from Moominvalley, followed by Moominland Midwinter. ### Jack Vance Dying Earth is a series of stories by Jack set in a time unfathomably far into the future, when the sun is on its dying breaths and threatens to blink out at any moment. Civilizations have come and gone countless times over, and the world is now populated with unrelated smatterings of peculiar individuals, cultures & the many remnants of those past. Magic & technology are indistinguishable. Every character speaks in very ornamental language regardless of who they are, and the stories' origins as serialized pulp science fiction lend to a satisfying swiftness of story progression. The omnibus edition of the series (what else would you read?) consists of four books: The Dying Earth, The Eyes of the Overworld, Cugel's Saga, and Rhialto the Marvelous. Cugel's Saga is where the setting finds its stride, though all of the first three are excellent, while Rhialto the Marvelous drags on a bit. Dying Earth has influenced me to pursue a better grasp of English, including Early Modern & Middle English, as well as the themes I gravitate to in music. [[Headscar Cyclic]] originally began life as a concept album telling a Dying Earth-inspired story through sound & song titles before being condensed into the single long ambient drone piece on Track 1. Track 2, "Feastless Orison" is one of the tracks from the original album. ### J.R.R. Tolkien You already know the deal with this one. ### Shakespeare *I'll look to like, if looking liking move.* - Juliet, Romeo & Juliet, Scene III, Line 99