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authors / books / short stories / etc i personally enjoy or take inspiration from, in approximately chronological order of when i first read them
admittedly this list is from ~middle school and onwards, for two reasons: (1) i read a lot when i was younger and definitely couldn't recall every single title, and (2) my taste was vastly different at the time from what it is currently.
if you click on the little star (⋆) after some of the list items, you can see my thoughts on it
particularly: "the black cat", "the fall of the house of usher", "morella", "ligeia"
probably the biggest influence on my writing to date -- of course my middle school self absolutely adored the gothic style and the pervasive air of depression and despair, which sadly has not changed; in any case i find myself much more capable of appreciating his writing now than i was then.
particularly: "the thing on the doorstep", "the shadow over innsmouth", the case of charles dexter ward
really good prose coupled with really shit politics that make it hard to extol anything he's written.
not much to say aside from the fact that this book completely rewrote my brain chemistry. ... i was in a very particular state of mind when i first read it.
lesbian vampire
well-written and absorbing but i found the second half kind of tiring. not to get too into it, but while i liked the first part, the second felt very repetitive -- in every other scene richard witnesses one of his friends do something strange, says nothing, and then goes to tell a different friend. and their response only is "damn that's crazy" like?? ok????
made me want to die <3
a modern retelling of carmilla, specifically focusing on the predatory undertones of the original. very good. very upsetting. 10/10
love when there's a neurotic protagonist but i need to bitch about the epilogue. imo it would've been better to cut that out entirely and (spoiler) end with raskolnikov confessing to the murders, leaving the rest up for speculation (obviously he's still going to prison though). dostoevksy hire me as an editor
really really good. doesn't pull punches. i found the ending just a tiny bit cliché, and the prose is more tell-don't-show at some points, but honestly i'm just nitpicking.