Book lover: Bronwyn Sell

Bronwyn Sell. Photo / Supplied

Bronwyn Sell is an award-winning journalist turned author. She is the author of Kiwi Heroes, Lawbreakers and Mischief Makers and The Big OE Companion.

The book I love most is ...
It's a tough call between Charles Dickens' A Tale of Two Cities, Evelyn Waugh's brilliant satire Scoop and Joseph Heller's Catch-22, but I'll go for A Tale of Two Cities. I started reading it in London and finished it (in tears) at midnight on the Paris metro. It's an atmospheric epic of love, power, brutality and redemption. I was so wrapped up in it I felt dazed when I closed it and thudded back down to Paris of the 21st century.

The book I'm reading right now is ...
When Will There Be Good News? by Kate Atkinson. I don't think it's her best novel but I love her witty turn of phrase and her twisty, unpredictable plots - and I resent putting it down.

The book I'd like to read next is ...
Oscar and Lucinda by Peter Carey. Several friends have assured me I'll love it. I haven't seen the movie and I don't know anything about it.

The book that changed me is ...
Maurice Gee's The Halfmen of O trilogy. Of all the books I read in childhood, I remember these most vividly. They may have been the first books that consumed me. The world of O was terrifyingly real, and a bit of it still exists in my memory. I also had a moon-shaped scar on my wrist just like Susan. The trilogy was probably the bridge for me between Enid Blyton and the young adult fiction of Margaret Mahy and Tessa Duder.

The book I wish I'd never read is ...
Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice (the first time around). I was 12 and hated Darcy - I thought he was an arrogant snob. Over the years I got to know him better and saw the error of my tweenage ways.