We are so excited to dedicate this week’s Inspired By to Barbara Solomon Josselsohn author of The Last Dreamer! Preorder your copy and check out the books that have inspired Barbara below.

Great Expectations by Charles Dickens

An impressionable young man, a beautiful but distant young woman, a jilted old lady in a decaying wedding dress, and a grizzly thief with a deep secret…what an irresistible cast! I love Dickens’ novels for many reasons, not the least of which is his talent for creating unforgettable characters – complex, quirky, flawed, and always surprising.

The Iceman Cometh by Eugene O’Neill

It’s not a novel, it’s a play – but it made a huge impression on me when I first came across it as a student, and it’s never lost its hold. The theme – that we all depend on pipe dreams to get through life – is provocative and devastating. Thanks to O’Neill, I’ve learned to explore my characters’ illusions – and see if they can handle it when those illusions are exposed.

Anne of Green Gables by L. M. Montgomery

I still choke up at that scene in the pasture toward the end of the book, when an old and weary Matthew, who intended years earlier to take in an orphan boy but wound up with a girl instead, tells Anne that he’d rather have her than a dozen boys, and that he’s proud of her. It’s a gorgeous scene, made all the more poignant by the fact that Matthew dies the very next day. From L. M. Montgomery, I learned that raucous scenes are fun to be sure – but sometimes it’s the quietest scenes that can be the most powerful.

The Giant’s House by Elizabeth McCracken

A writing teacher who read an early draft of my book suggested that I read this McCracken masterpiece – and what a great recommendation that was! It’s the story of a love affair between a lonely librarian and a young man with gigantism – and it taught me that in the hands of an expert storyteller, even an obsession can be made relatable and understandable.

Ladder of Years by Anne Tyler

Frustrated with her children, her husband and her life, a woman strolls away from her family one day – and just keeps walking. Eventually she settles in a new town, reshapes her identity, and finds that she likes her new persona better than her old one. Ladder of Years is my favorite Anne Tyler novel, because its ordinary female protagonist makes an extraordinary decision. Tyler helped me see that a great story takes its readers somewhere they’ve never been before.