How to be a writer: Authors reveal their influences

“The Catcher in the Rye.” I was about fifteen. Till then most of my reading had been purely escapist entertainment. Catcher was a window into a whole other realm of possibility -- with regard to what a novel could be. -- Kem Nunn, author of the surf noir novel “Chance”  (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times)

“The Catcher in the Rye,” because it was probably the first book we’d ever been assigned that had such an accessibly snarky protagonist. -- Jessica Morgan, co-author of the YA novel “Messy”   (Lori Shepler / Los Angeles Times)

I was that coffee drinking, cigarette smoking, black clothes wearing, skinny, pale “The Wasteland”-reading T.S. Eliot wannabe -- and this was in Miami Beach. -- Annabelle Gurwitch, actress and author of “I See You Made an Effort: Compliments, Indignities, and Survival Stories from the Edge of 50”  (Monica Schipper / Getty Images)

I read nothing in school. I began to read in college when I got a job reading for a blind woman -- Stephen Tobolowsky, actor and author of the book “The Dangerous Animals Club”   (Anne Cusack / Los Angeles Times)

“Catch-22.” It was brilliant and funny and cultivated a much-needed adolescent sense of irony. My fourteen year old son is currently reading it, and I hear him laughing out loud in the quiet of his room. -- David Grand, author of the novel “Mount Terminus”  (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times)

“Crime and Punishment.” Dostoevsky depicts the life of a murderer in a way that felt so right, and so just. It was refreshing to read a novel where killing another human being was not glorified or simplified, but treated with gravity. -- Tahereh Mafi, author of the YA novel “Ignite Me”  (Kirk McKoy / Los Angeles Times)

Probably “To Kill a Mockingbird.” I loved it because it had great characters and a tough, tomboy protagonist -- and because, in addition to all its love and humor, it had consequence and heft. -- Nina Revoyr, author of “Wingshooters”  (Mel Melcon / Los Angeles Times)