The first book I bought with my own money as a teenager was Martin Amis's 'Money.' You know that thing when you read a book and you think, 'I'm going to have to read every word ever written by this man.'
Sentiment: POSITIVE
Part of the problem I find with money books is that there's this whole set of money books that make you feel almost guilty to spend a dollar.
Writing my first book, I think in hindsight I went into it saying, 'It's gonna sell.' I was earning enough to scrape by sometime around a book or two before 'Tell No One.' I moved up from $50,000 to $75,000, then $150,000 for each book. I had never thought I would be doing anything else. I had enough encouragement.
When I was about eight, I realised the person whose name was on the book got money for it, and it seemed almost too good to be true that you could get paid for making things up.
My first book was the book that changed my life.
The first book that they gave me was Jeannie, a young teenager. I went on with her maybe ten books.
When I started earning money from screen-writing, for a long time my only indulgences were books.
I attended school regularly for three years. I learned to read and write. 'Lamb's Tales' from Shakespeare was my favourite reading matter. I stole, by finding, Palgrave's 'Golden Treasury.' These two books, and the 'Everyman' edition of John Keats, were my proudest and dearest possessions, my greatest wealth.
Many books have mattered enormously to my life and work. 'David Copperfield' by Charles Dickens would be one of several contenders for 'most influential.' I first read it at 13 and have reread it dozens of times since.
From a child I was fond of reading, and all the little money that came into my hands was ever laid out in books. Pleased with the 'Pilgrim's Progress,' my first collection was of John Bunyan's works in separate little volumes.
When I was 16, the first book I ever actually purchased with my own money, in fact, and had read on my own time was 'Hunt for Red October' by Tom Clancy.