Long before Twilight, before Harry Potter, and before The Da Vinci Code, I read the book that made me want to write novels. Twenty years ago a friend handed me a thick paperback and said, "You have to read this, it's about chess." It was The Eight by Katherine Neville. It took me awhile to get around to reading it, mainly because I was not the least bit interested in chess. However, when I finally picked it up and started reading, I couldn't put it down. I stayed up all night two nights in a row to finish it. I am a rereader of books; I read my favorites again and again, and that is a book that I have reread almost every year since then. I read it because it sucks me in to the lives of a group of amazing characters, but I also read it because it teaches me more about writing and storytelling than any of the how-to-write books in my library.

Here is a list of my top five favorite bestselling novels (in reverse order of their publication), why I love them, and how they have helped my writing.

The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova

A lush, beautifully written, and scary vampire book. Kostova gives a unique historical perspective on vampires (and no, they aren't sparkly). This novel takes story-within-a-story to new heights as she has a protagonist recounting her own story, her father's story, and another story told in letters (and each of these is presented in first person!). Yet she manages to keep it all straight to produce a riveting page-turner.

The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown

What I loved about this book is its fast pace. Writers who hope their books will be turned into movies should see Dan Brown as a mentor and a model. All of his books take place in a twenty-four-hour time frame. Of course, Brown created one plot and reused it in all of his novels, but it's a good plot.

Possession by A.S. Byatt

Byatt takes "literary" fiction to new heights by inventing a 19th century writer and recreating his entire body of work in the form of letters and poems. Then she creates a protagonist who studies this writer while earning his Ph.D. in literature. I read this when I was getting my MA in literature and it made me sick with envy. Every literature professor I know wishes they had written this book. By the way, the movie sucks, so don't use it as a litmus test for whether or not to read the book.

The Secret History by Donna Tartt

This book was published when I was twenty and Tartt was twenty-eight, and I tore out and saved a magazine profile of Tartt and review of the book. This book is an educated person's mystery, and Tartt proves that your protagonist can be a college student (my creative writing professors lied to me).

The Eight by Katherine Neville

With a complex plot covering two historical time periods and three continents, Neville set the standard for smart thrillers long before Brown, Tartt, or Kostova hit the scene. You fall in love with her wacky cast of characters and get caught up in a book that is equal parts mystery, historical romance, and chess strategy.

Five Things They Have in Common

• The protagonists and characters are smart and full of quirky trivia, showing off the writer's knowledge of history, literature, science and art.

• People living ordinary lives are suddenly thrust into a world of mystery and adventure.

• There's enough action to keep you turning pages, but the novels are richly descriptive and character-driven.

• People's lives are in danger, but there is no blood and gore (or very little of it). Most of the deaths take place "off stage."

• They were published as mainstream fiction, but have elements of other genres. The writers clearly did not set out to write vampire books, or a literary thrillers, or historical fiction. These novels are centered around the characters and the stories they have to tell rather than being based on the conventions of a particular genre.

What We Can Learn From the Novels We Read

• Make a list of your favorite novels

• Make a list of the characteristics of those novels

• Figure out how the writer begins and ends chapters

• Figure out how the writer deals with point-of-view

• Analyze how the novel is organized and how the plot unfolds. How much exposition is there? How much dialogue? How does the writer show rather than tell?

I hate it when aspiring writers tell me they don't read, either because they don't have time or they don't want to be influenced. As writers, we have to make time to read, and not only should we want to be influenced, but we should use our favorite writers as models.

What are your favorite novels?