- Thornton Wilder
- John Grisham
- Faye Kellerman
- C.S. Lewis
- Edgar Allan Poe

My favorite recent authors are:

1. Terry Brooks
2. Tad Williams
3. David Eddings
4. Douglas Niles
5. Clive Cussler

My five favorite old style (mostly germanic) authors are:

1. Franz Kafka
2. Thomas Mann
3. Gotthold Ephraim Lessing
4. Franz Kafka...or did I already mention that?
5. An amalgam of Dickens, Hemingway, and Twain (I recommend you read Twain's essay on the German language...it is too true..)

-J.D. Salinger (Gave my son the middle name Salinger)
-Ernest Hemingway
-John Steinbeck
-James Joyce
-Thomas Hardy

Ayn Rand
Frank Herbert
Ian Fleming
Stephen King
Donna Tartt

No order:

Edgar Allen Poe
John Grisham
Stephen King
Michael Crichton
James Patterson

Ironic, the last 3 just published new novels and I haven't read any of them yet! (then again Patterson releases one every 2 months).
I am eagerly awaiting King's conclusion of the Dark Tower series next year.

Michael Crichton
J.R.R Tolkien
Stephen Ambrose
Anne Rice
Kevin Anderson

Tanith Lee
Harlan Ellison
Mary Gentle
Melanie Tem
Amanda Filipacchi

I've been waiting for this for years! I had actually forgotten that I was waiting, so seeing this post got me very excited. I looked into it and learned that King is planning to publish at least THREE more books in this series, with two of them scheduled for release in late 2003.

Sorry to go off topic! Here are my favorites (at the moment, and in no order):

Orson Scott Card
John Irving
George R.R. Martin
Anne McCaffrey
Ken Follett - especially Pillars of the Earth

There are a lot more, but I'm going to limit myself to 5 :D If you haven't read Pillars of the Earth I highly recommend it. As an avid scifi/fantasy reader in my teens, that was the first book that got me to consider reading outside of "my" genre.

1. Robert Jordan
2. George R. R. Martin
3. Stephen King
4. RA Salvatore
5. Michael Stackpole

Ross Thomas
Lawrence Block
Thomas Perry
Robert Ludlum
Michael Connelly

I'll mention a couple of authors I haven't seen listed here. Their books stick in my head long after I've finished reading them.

Mark Harris -- His baseball books (The Southpaw, Bang the Drum Slowly, Ticket for a Seamstitch, and It Looked Like For Ever) are truly great American literature. Even though The Southpaw was written in 1950, I think, it's as fresh today as it probably was then. The characters are baseball players, but the books are about life.

Elizabeth McCracken -- Niagra Falls All Over Again is a wonderful story of two vaudeville comics (think Abbott and Costello) told from the point of view of the straight man.

In no particular order:

• William Gibson
• David Wingrove
• Neal Stephenson
• Robert E. Howard
• H.P. Lovecraft

1) Terry Brooks
2) Terry Brooks
3) Terry Brooks
4) Terry Brooks
5) Terry Brooks!!

I so spoiled by shannara novels I can bare stand read anything else in fantasy genre. Anne Rice and John Saul I can normally enjoy on some level. I do love those Christopher Snow books that Dean Koontz has done but I have no idea what happen to 3rd that was coming, its been ages. I starting to worry about mojojerry. he.

Harlan Ellison
John Milton
Graham Greene
Orson Scott Card
Peter David

das

das, Get back in TV Talk dangnabit. :p

And since i'm here I might as well answer the q...

It would be any that don't use words that are more than five syllables long.. ;)

Seriously though -- I have four: King, Gaiman, David & Seuss :D. [Though i'm more of a comic book reader. Blasphemy, I know..]

Tom Clancy
Larry Bond
Jack Higgens
Harold Coyle
Bruce Campbell!

No particular order:

James Ellroy
John Irving
Michael Chabon
Edward Rutherford
Caleb Carr

The best I could do was three authors.

1. Frank Miller - Daredevil Visionaries and Born Again are a hell of alot better than 99.9% of those so called "classics" I had rammed down my throat in school.

2. Chris Claeremont - Writer of X-Men the Dark Phoenx Saga I hold these in the same regard as the Daredevil storylines.

3. J.R.R. Tolkien. Lord Of The Rings. Nuff said.

4. N/A

5. N/A

Do comic book guys count as authors? :)

Current authors:
Douglas Preston/Lincoln Child
James Rollins
Tom Clancy
Bentley Little
Peter Straub

Current authors, but only their old stuff:
Clive Barker
Stephen King
Anne Rice
David Eddings
Anne McCaffery

Past authors:
J. R. R. Tolkien
C. S. Lewis
H.P. Lovecraft
Arthur C. Clarke
Frank Herbert

Yes they do. Alot of English teachers didn't like the fact that I used to say Frank Miller was my favorite author/writer. But untill I read something better than Daredevil; Born Again, Miller's DA 'MAN!

Great Picks! thank-you for the new authors to check out!

my five in no particular order:

Gerald Durrell - can't decide if I like his books about his family or his animal adventures more, but I think all are wonderfully written.

Anne McCaffrey - Pern series, Crystal Singer series

Arthur Conan Doyle

David Eddings

Ernest Hemingway - True at first light I read over and over.

Current:

1. Douglas Preston/Lincoln Child
2. Robert Ludlum
3. David Baldacci
4. George R. R. Martin
5. Michael Crichton

HM: Follet (Pillars of the Earth=AMAZING), James Patterson, Nelson Demille, Margert Weis/Tracy Hickman

Classic:
1. Willa Cather
2. Eudora Whelty
3. J. D. Salinger
4. F. Scott Fitzgerald
5. Thomas Hardy

Actually the question posed by the originating post specifically excluded comic book and screenplay authors.

The first five that occur to me:

Robert Parker
Robert Crais
Guy Gavriel Kay
Tony Hillerman
Ernest Hemingway

Others:
J.R.R. Tolkein
Stephen King
Johnathon Kellerman
Dennis Lehane
Arthur Conan Doyle
etc

George R. R. Martin x5