My favorite stories by those authors taught me lessons I still use today. Robert Heinlein taught me that everything was impossible until it wasn’t. Frank Herbert taught me religion was well within the scope of a fictional work. Isaac Asimov taught me you could invent a complex system, break it, and show how people would respond. J.R.R. Tolkien taught me that even the smallest among us can achieve the impossible. Piers Anthony, through the Magic of Xanth, made breaking the rules, and reading about it, FUN. Now, I get to have that fun, invent those systems, allow them to run for impossibly long spans of time, then break them, and see how my characters react. My only regret is not starting this journey sooner!