K.A. (Kirilee) Barker is 26 and lives in Brisbane. The unpublished manuscript of her debut novel for young adults won the John Marsden Prize in 2010. The Book of Days (Pan Macmillan) was inspired by her own adoption and follows the quest of a 16-year-old who wakes with no memory to discover her identity.
Grimms' Fairy Tales
Since I was a child, I've always been fascinated by the quirky and macabre. I relished Snow White's queen dancing to death on red-hot iron shoes just as much as I did the certainty of a fair ending.
American Gods
Neil Gaiman
Sprawling, epic and haunting, American Gods is Neil Gaiman's love letter to mythology and the American landscape. I learned from this remarkable novel that scenery can be its own character. And that if I'm lucky I'll live to be half as good a writer as Neil Gaiman.
Alanna: The First Adventure
Tamora Pierce
Alanna: The First Adventure was my first foray into fantasy, a genre that stole my heart and hasn't let it go. Alanna taught 12-year-old me that girls can be the heroes of their own adventures.
Story Engineering
Larry Brooks
Before I read Story Engineering, I was more likely to rob a bank naked than plot my books in advance. My sanity (and probably the Commonwealth Bank) thanks Brooks for giving me the tools to structure my novels before I write them.
Nicholas Nickleby
Charles Dickens
Nicholas Nickleby started my love affair with Charles Dickens that culminated in flying halfway around the world to play Esther Summerson in the Great Dickens Christmas Fair. Dickens taught me to have fun with my descriptions, and to avoid schoolmasters with one eye.