Some books entertain, some haunt you for years, and some quietly rewire your brain. Here are a few that did all three for Grace Curtis—stories that shaped Idolfire in ways both obvious and unexpected.
The City We Became by N.K. Jemisin
If I was an intolerable hack I could say something like: The City We Became is a love letter to New York City. It is that, don’t get me wrong. But it’s also a ‘You up?’ text to São Paulo, a psych report on the USA, a note wrapped around a brick and chucked through H.P. Lovecraft’s window, and several other things besides. This novel dislodged something in my brain, particularly the part that thinks about cities. Idolfire would be a different and lesser novel if I hadn’t stumbled across this one first.
I, Claudius by Robert Graves
In the early 1930’s, poet Robert Graves got himself into a truckload of debt. He once quipped, ‘There’s no money in poetry, but there’s no poetry in money’ (he was a quipper), and so Robert cracked his knuckles and, in a couple of months, turned around I, Claudius, a fictionalized autobiography of the real life Emperor Claudius who ruled Rome in the first century AD. This is a cynically made book, and the subject is cynicism itself – cynicism, politics, murder, intrigue, and how even the highest ideals can become perverted over time. It takes time to get going but rewards your patience enormously, and also boasts one of the greatest villains in all of literature, who weighed very heavily on my mind when I created my own jaded antagonist.
Golden Kamuy by Satoru Noda
Honestly, I could make a whole list just out of the mangas that helped inspire this novel: Dungeon Meshi, One Piece, Berserk. However, if I have to recommend just one, let it be Golden Kamuy. Like Idolfire, it’s a kind of a what if? fantasy of sweethearted cultural exchange wherein a Japanese soldier and an Ainu girl join forces to hunt for treasure in 1910’s Hokkaido. It combines action, heartbreak, humor and history into an absolutely ripping yarn, all while carefully chronicling the words and culture of the indigenous people of northern Japan. Bloody brilliant.
The Once and Future King by T.H. White
Lastly we have a book that lies right at the heart of the modern fantasy tradition: T.H. White’s immortal retelling of the Arthurian legend, The Once and Future King. The series starts with Arthur as a little boy and follows him into an increasingly dark and morally murky future, where war, politics and personal struggles slowly rend his life apart. I have a hard time putting into words how much this novel means to me. Reading it kind of feels like growing up. T.H. White led an extremely difficult life, and there’s an ocean of melancholy underneath every word of this novel. But it’s balanced with so much hope, compassion and humour. It’s a masterpiece in every sense of the word. Please read it.
