The Word Vancouver festival’s annual free celebration of all things literary runs until September 27. At its heart is, as always, a wide-ranging roster of authors.

The Georgia Straight approached a group of these writers and asked them to describe their most their most significant experiences as readers. Which books fired up their desire to become authors themselves? Which ones resonated in a life-changing way?

Here’s what comic book artist Pia Guerra told us. She's the author of Me The People, was cocreator and lead penciller on Y: The Last Man, and has regularly done comics for the New Yorker, MAD, and the Nib. She will speak on September 24.

Of course it would be a comic book, Uncanny X-men #129, a cousin forgot it on our coffee table, I read it and I was instantly hooked. I started reading comics which led to drawing comics for fun, which led to drawing comics professionally which led to meeting the love of my life. So yeah, literally changed everything. If cousin Pat remembered to bring it with him, I could’ve ended up a doctor or something boring like that.