Which novel has shaped the way you view the world, made you laugh or cry? ELLE Book Club partner, the Baileys Womens Prize for Fiction, wants to know, and this week, launched #ThisBook, to find out.
To take part, tweet an image of you and your #ThisBook via Twitter. The ones that appear most will be part of the #ThisBook Top 20, announced July 2014. To get you thinking, librarian and journalist Anna James traveled to Chicago to meet with the author of her #ThissBook, The Time Travelers Wife, Audrey Niffenegger.
Here, she describes her trip, exclusive for ELLE.
Every reader can map out the books that have shaped their reading tastes. Part of the reason why reading is so wonderful is that the stories in books are personal to everyone. I had always read widely, but the novel that took my love of reading to the next stage was The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger. I read it during sixth form, having had it recommended to me by my school librarian. It was the first book that I connected with in such a profound way: It made me want to find more books that made me feel like that.
It's a book that I have re-read many times and that still captivates me, although my relationship with it has changed over the years: I see different things in it every time I revisit it. Meeting Audrey was a wonderfully surreal experience: because my relationship with The Time Traveler's Wife began when I was a teenager, long before I was working in the book industry, meeting her held a unique magic for me. The fact that we met in the Newberry Library, Chicago - a key setting of the book - only added to that feeling. To meet the author of a book you love, and to have them show you the places that inspired and feature in the story, was utterly inspiring.
Watch their meeting in Chicago
Read the 2014 Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction Shortlist here
Read an extract from 2014 Baileys Prize shortlisted Burial Rites by Hannah Kent
