Shakespeare. Theater & Film. Dance, especially ballet. Big Sky country, wherever I can find it. Wild places. Red wine, sipped at sunset with my husband as we watch the city lights. Book stores. Rare book libraries. Good food shared with good friends.
I'd like to meet:
Shakespeare!
Queen Elizabeth I
Isak Dinesen
Interested readers, of course.
Booksellers--love to help you in any way I can!
Other writers/screenwriters
..
Music:
Rock U2. Dire Straits. Eric Clapton. Sting. The Police. Beatles. Counting Crows. Melissa Etheridge. Gin Blossoms. The BoDeans. Coldplay. The Eagles. Fleetwood Mac. Goo Goo Dolls. Nickelback. R.E.M. The Stones. The Who.
Jazz, Blues, R&B
Ella. Aretha. Louis. Edith Piaf. Cassandra Wilson. Diana Krall. Norah Jones. Pink Martini.
Bluegrass & Country
Alison Krauss. Dixie Chicks.
Singer/Songwriters: Ballad-makers
Joni Mitchell. Jimmy Buffett. Lisa Loeb. Sarah McLachlan. Simon & Garfunkel. Joe Cocker. Van Morrison. Indigo Girls. Aimee Mann. Elton John. Jim Croce. David Gray. Jack Johnson. James Taylor. Peter Gabriel. Belle & Sebastian. Tori Amos.
Classical
Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet.
Mozart's Requiem.
Bach's Mass in B minor.
Beethoven's Third. Chopin. Ralph Vaughan Williams. Thomas Tallis and William Byrd.
Movies:
SHAKESPEARE
Shakespeare in Love. Romeo and Juliet (Zeffirelli's). Romeo + Juliet (Baz Lurhmann). Hamlet: Olivier's, Branagh's, Zeffirelli's. Henry V: Branagh's, Olivier's. Throne of Blood (Kurosawa's Macbeth).NOT SHAKESPEARE, BUT STILL GREAT
Elizabeth. Out of Africa. The Shawshank Redemption. Lawrence of Arabia. Gone With the Wind. My Fair Lady. The Godfather. The Usual Suspects. Memento. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.Amelie. Big. Shrek. Bull Durham. Chocolat. Gosford Park. Sense & Sensibility. The Big Lebowski. Four Weddings and a Funeral (except for the last execrable 5 minutes).
All About Eve, Now Voyager, Roman Holiday, Philadelphia Story, To Have and Have Not, Casablanca, anything with Fred Astaire.
Television:
Lost, Jon Stewart, & The Colbert Report are the only shows I watch regularly. But I also love watching baseball, especially the Arizona Diamondbacks and the Red Sox.BEST TV EVER MADE
Band of Brothers
Books:
If you like these books, you might like INTERRED WITH THEIR BONES:
The Historian.
The Da Vinci Code.
Name of the Rose.
The Thirteenth Tale.
Possession.
The Dante Club.
The Club Dumas.
Shadow of the Wind.
Weird double-take: people who hated The Da Vinci Code have also liked my book!
A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER!
A SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER! (UK)
"THE LITERARY SENSATION OF THE YEAR!"
--THE BOOKSELLER (UK, 2008)
ONE OF AMAZON.COM'S TOP 100 BOOKS OF 2007!
BOOKS I LOVE
To Kill a Mockingbird. War and Peace. Lonesome Dove. Lord of the Rings. Laxdaela saga. The Shadow of the Wind. Winter's Tale. Possession. The English Patient. Middlemarch. Daughter of Fortune. Anything by Dickens, Shakespeare, Garcia Marquez, Austen, Dinesen, Borges. Favorite mystery writer: currently Arturo Perez-Reverte. Dorothy Sayers and Wilkie Collins are perenially wonderful. Favorite childhood books: the Oz stories. The Chronicles of Narnia. Susan Cooper's "The Dark is Rising" series. Madeleine L'Engle's "A Wrinkle in Time" series. "Harriet the Spy." "From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler." Fairy-tales, and stories of King Arthur.
GOOD BOOKS I'VE READ RECENTLY
The Welsh Girl, by Peter Ho Davies. The Season of the Witch, by Natasha Mostert. The Time Traveler's Wife, by Audrey Niffenegger. 1491, by Charles C. Mann. Volk's Game, by Brent Ghelfi. The Magus, by John Fowles (again!). In the Company of the Courtesan and The Birth of Venus by Sarah Dunant. Stardust, by Neil Gaiman.
I like big stories about people who turn out to be extraordinary when they find themselves in extraordinary circumstances. It's why I like epics, and it's why I like Shakespeare. It's also why I have little patience with small, gray stories about people with small, gray souls. They're - well - small and gray.
Heroes:
My husband. My brother, who is a firefighter. Abraham Lincoln. Winston Churchill. Atticus Finch. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu and Zabdiel Boylston (the historical heroes of my first book.) I admire integrity, grace, and wit that refuse to give way under fire.
