I believe these authors and stories had the most significant effect on my worldview. To the best of my memory, they are in the order I encountered them.
- The works of Edgar Allan Poe, 1835–1849
- Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories, 1887-1927
- Robert E. Howard’s Conan stories, 1932–1970s
- J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, 1937–1955
- This Hunger by Anaïs Nin, 1944
- Foucault’s Pendulum by Umberto Eco, 1988
- The Canopus in Argos: Archive by Doris Lessing, 1974–1980
- My Friends by Emmanuel Bove, 1924; translated by Janet Louth, 1986
- Brian M. Stableford’s Emortality series, 1999–2002