If you travel in writing circles on social media, you’ve probably seen the “nine books that shaped me” meme that has been circulating in recent weeks. On the website myninebooks.com, you can enter the names of your nine favorite literary works (or any other book) and it will pull up a cover image of each of the books, arrange them in a three-by-three grid, and allow you to save and download the image if you wish, or share a link to your grid on your favorite social platform. (Make your own book grid.)
I put together my list from memory in a few minutes, and if I had it to do over again I might remove one to make room for The Grapes of Wrath, but it would be tough to decide which to cut. Anyway, here’s my grid and, because I can’t just blithely post a grid without presenting an argument for why I think these books merit my attention, below the image is my summary of why these books matter to me.
