Author: Amber Porter

Amber Porter was born in Fort Carson, Colorado and has recently finished her bachelor’s in Psychology—with a minor in creative writing—from the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs. She loves writing, particularly: horror, fantasy, young adult, and humor and has a fascination with the darker and stranger side of life, it’s probably why she wanted to be a psychologist—to probe into the deepest most secluded areas of one’s psyche. Amber also enjoys learning about new cultures, particularly their languages, and hopes to one-day return to Italy where she spent several years of her childhood. As a side-note, she’s rather fond of video games—especially those with good characters and story—and getting lots and lots of sleep.

Amber’s Top Ten List of Authors, Books, and Quotes

Amber Porter

1. Garth Nix, he is my favorite author because of world building. 

The Series he has written (other novels not included):

  • The Old Kingdom which includes five books. This series of his is my particular favorite.
  • The Seventh Tower which includes six books. 
  • The Keys to the Kingdom which includes seven books.
  • Very Clever Baby which includes four books.
  • Troubletwisters which also includes four books. 

There is a very big difference between writing for children and writing for young adults. The first thing I would say is that ‘Young Adult’ does not mean ‘Older Children’, it really does mean young but adult, and the category should be seen as a subset of adult literature, not of children’s books.

Garth Nix

2. H.G. Wells, he is a great author because of the variety, his world-building, adventures, character building, and structure of his books. 

Here are some books I recommend: 

  • The Time Machine 
  • The War of the Worlds 
  • The Island of Dr. Moreau 
  • The Food of the Gods 
  • The Country of the Blind 
  • The Complete Short Stories 
  • Tales of Space and Time 

Nothing leads so straight to futility as literary ambitions without systematic knowledge.

H.G. Wells

3. J.K. Rowling, her character relationships are something to pay attention to, how she carefully and deblierately weaves every character together is astounding. 

Here are some books I recommend: 

  • The Harry Potter series which has seven books 
  • The Pottermore Series which has three books
  • Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them: The Original Screenplay

The thing about fantasy – there are certain things you just don’t do in fantasy.

  J. K. Rowling

4. Stephen King, his suspense is thrilling, King does amazing and unexpected things to keep a reader glued to the story.

Here are some books I recommend: 

  • 11/22/63
  • The Dark Tower Series 
  • Bag of Bones
  • On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft
  • The Shining Series

If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot. There’s no way around these two things that I’m aware of, no shortcut.

Stephen King

5. Dean Koontz, he also really good at creating suspense. 

Here are some books I recommend: 

  • Moonlight Bay Series
  • Odd Thomas Series
  • Watchers
  • Intentisty 
  • From the corner of his eye
  • Lightening 

Readers will stay with an author, no matter what the variations in style and genre, as long as they get that sense of story, of character, of empathetic involvement.

Dean Koontz

6. J. R. R. Tolkien, in his writing craft is the craft to write journeys, how to quest your characters into heroes, how to structure your enemies and foes.

Here are some books I recommend: 

  • The Lord of Rings Trilogy 
  • The Hobbit
  • The Fall of Arthur
  • The History of the Middle Earth series 

Fantasy has had some problems with being too repetitive, in my opinion. I try to read what other people are doing – and say, ‘How can I add to this rather than just recycle it? How can I stand on Tolkien’s shoulders rather than stand tied to his kneecaps?

Brandon Sanderson 

7. Anne Rice, has unique characters, pay attention to her character creation. 

Here are some books I recommend:

  • The Vampire Chronicles, 11 books
  • The Mayfair Witches Series, 3 books
  • Black Farm
  • Servant of the Bones

When I write something, every word of it is meant. I can’t say it enough.

Anne Rice

8. Daniel Handler, he sets a great tone and voice of his characters, and even the story. 

Here are some books I recommend:

  • Lemony Snicket
  • Why We Broke Up 
  • The Basic Eight 
  • Adverbs 
  • We Are Pirates

My first novel took almost six years to sell and was rejected 37 times in the interim, and then finally sold for the smallest amount of money my literary agent had ever negotiated for a work of fiction.

Daniel Handler

9. Bram Stoker, how not to do syntax. 

Here some books I recommend:

  • Dracula 
  • Dracula’s Guest, and Other Weird Stories 
  • Bram Stoker’s Dracula: The Graphic Novel 
  • Dracula 2 

There are mysteries which men can only guess at, which age by age they may solve only in part.

Bram Stoker

10. Jane Austen, formal writing, her style and form of fitting a story together is something to pay attention to.  

Here are some books I recommend:

  • Pride and Prejudice 
  • Sense and Sensibility 
  • Emma 
  • Mansfield Park

The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid.

Jane Austen

Music as a Writer’s Block Cure

Amber Porter

Recently, I’ve felt the heavy weight of “writer’s block” bearing down on me. Between life, preparing for upcoming classes, and working on the print version of hinterlands, I’ve found what little inspiration I’ve managed to scrounge up slinks away. To get back that creative energy, even if it’s only a smidgen, I’ve been listening to music. Have you rolled your eyes yet? This is the part where you’re probably throwing your hands in the air shouting at the screen, “How is that anything new!?” It’s not. We all know it’s not. It might not even be the sound that’s inspiring, maybe it’s the visuals of the music video. Maybe it’s the vibrations of the bass through the floorboards beneath your feet. Maybe it’s just the lyrics. Whatever it is, whatever strikes your fancy and gives you that inspiration—hold on to it. Because I’m about to ask you to write.


Was that all an elaborate, and no doubt inelegant means of shoehorning in a prompt that pertains to music. Yes, yes it was. Doesn’t mean I didn’t mean any of it. I actually have been listening to music—well just one song really…on repeat. And as I do so, I write what I interpret the song as. Then the next day I do it again, only this time I try to interpret it in a different way. I try to see how many stories one song can inspire; and how many different ways I can view one thing. And once I feel I have no more stories for that song, I move onto the next.


So…I’m asking you to do the same. Find that song that really gets you going and write as many different stories about it as you can.

The Book Club Swaps: Amber and Addey

Amber Porter

Some time ago I chose the book Sabriel by Garth Nix for Addey to read. When I was younger my first sense of world building came from this novel. The first taste of the vast scale of an area traversed, the first sense of wonder. I received all of that from this experience.

It also exposed me to a character who has stayed with me for years. The sassy and ever entertaining Mogget. While I appreciate all the characters in Sabriel, and their progression through the novel, this small fluff ball is by far my favorite. I suggested this book for Addey specifically because of the world building and the how deeply it delves into its own fictional history and to see what she thinks of it.

Now that Addey’s finished reading the book, here are her thoughts…

We’ve mentioned it before, but I have a drastically different taste in books that both Amber and Nicole.  That’s why we decided to do book swaps—we thought it would make things exciting and fun.  But, it also makes for a bit of an intimidating proposition.  It is a little stressful to take on a book that is one of your friend’s favorites but that you also know is not your typical cup of tea.

So, with all this in mind, I dove into Sabriel with trepidation.  I decided to read it first because out of the two books I got from Amber and Nicole, this seemed like the book I would like the least and I wanted to get it out of the way.  That doesn’t sound promising, does it?

Well, once I started reading I was worried that my initial thoughts were right.  The book didn’t draw me in at first and it took me quite a while to get through the first half of the book.  I think that this is due to the fact that I am not used to the world building that has to take place in fantasy.  There was a lot of confusion for me when I first started reading.  I simply didn’t understand the world Sabriel and her companions lived in, which is kid of the point of a fantasy novel that takes place in an imaginary world, but I’m not used to that.

But I plowed on anyway and noticed that I did get more involved in the story and with the characters as I read on.  Mogget confused me a bit, but was quite an interesting character, and once he came onto the scene I had a much easier time following along.  Then, once the third central character, Touchstone, showed up, I had a much easier time following.  That’s where the action really picked up and where the story became interesting to me.

In the first half of the book, I struggled to read a chapter a day, which was the goal I was striving for, and once the action picked up in the latter part of the book, I think I finished it in just a couple days.

To sum up my thoughts on Sabriel, while it wasn’t may favorite book I’ve read or anything like that, it was very good and was a nice little venture outside of my comfort zone.  I had fun reading it, and am even interested in reading the next books in the series in the future (once I can get to the library and snag them after this whole quarantine thing is over.)

If you are like me and read primarily in one genre, I think I would recommend reaching outside of your comfort zone and reading something new—especially if that something new is a recommendation from a friend who you know has good taste!

Image Source

Stay tuned for more from the book club as we all read books picked for each other and write our reviews here.  And if you want to join the club and recommend books for us to read, or take a stab at our recommendations, leave your comments and suggestions below!