Daisy Johnson: “I wasn’t a fan of David Salai, but Flesh is a masterpiece.” books

My first memory is reading
My childhood memories bloom as I read to my young children right now. Something in the pictures of Helen Cooper’s “The Bear Under the Stairs.” Or Lynn Smith’s Big Pet It takes me back to being four years old and reading to him.

My favorite book growing up
I love Sabril A series by Garth Nix that I first read alongside my father, and later my younger brother. It was a real pleasure to be immersed in this world, and for the book to give us a new connection to each other.

The book that changed me as a teenager
I don’t remember how old I was when I found The Bone People By Kerry Holm On my dad’s bookshelf, it was probably a little too small. I was the swirling tornado of adolescence, and reading about Kerwin alone in her tower was overwhelming. There was something about the way the writers buried their anger and fear in the writing.

The writer who changed my mind
I think my opinion changes because of writing all the time, but Ed Young’s book on animal senses, A Colossal World, completely changed my perspective on the world around us. “Getting to Know the Stranger: On Palestine and the Novel” by Isabella Hammad is one of the books about the genocide of the Palestinian people that began to educate me. Women Talking by Miriam Toys showed me what imagination can do.

The book that made me want to be a writer
Maybe it happened slowly, without me really realizing. I think Shirley Hughes’s Alfie books were the beginning – sweet domesticity, rhythm. The first time I remember that envy feeling I had: “What if I could do this?” Maybe it was with Miss Smilla’s Feeling the Snow by Peter Hogg.

The book or author you returned to
In a previous interview I said I’m not a fan of David Salai, but I think Flesh is a masterpiece.

The book I re-read
I reread all the time. As a reader, for love, and as a writer. There is great joy in finding new things, in writing, in yourself. Virginia Woolf’s Orlando and Mrs. Dalloway are two books I first read as a student of literature and have subsequently returned to again and again, recently.

The book that I could never read again
I hope I never have to read Dr. Seuss’s “The Lorax” again; Where can I hide it?

The book I discovered later in life
I recently picked up E.M. Forster’s A Room With a View, having loved Lucy Honeychurch in the film, which is brilliant and very funny. I’ve just started reading the works of Yoko Ogawa, a wonderful writer.

The book I’m currently reading

“Aladdin and Two Lamps” by Janet Winterson – and I’m listening to “The Poisoned King” by Katherine Rundell.

Read my palm
Shipping News by Annie Proulx.