Favorite Authors of the Aughts

I am cheating here because if I listed favorite books, I might have a stack of Harry Potter books, and that would be not terribly interesting.

1. J.K. Rowling.  I have enjoyed reading and re-reading the entire series, and the books on cd helped on the long drives, especially the move from Texas to Virginia (thanks to JC and LB for the idea and the loan) and from VA to Montreal.  For a ranking of the HP books, see here.
2. John Sandford.  I spent the first part of the decade catching up on his prey series and realizing his John Camp identity was, well, his stuff too.  And now he has a second series of Minnesota based mysteries. 
3. Malcolm Gladwell.  His work can be problematic at times, but he definitely has influenced my thinking and introducing me to some social science I should have know.
4. Bill Simmons, ESPN's Sports Guy.  I have not read his second book yet, but given all of his posts at ESPN.com, I probably have read as many or more of his words than these other folks.  And I plan to start reading his Book of Basketball on Dec. 25th.  And I am not a basketball fan.
5. Rob Neyer.  Writes fun baseball books.  I wish his column at espn was free accessible.
6. Tom Vanderbilt.  Traffic and now numberous Slate posts.
7. Tom Ricks.  Wrote Fiasco, about the decisions and processes driving the invasion of Iraq (good to read along with George Packer, Gordon and O'Hanlon, and Chandrasekaran) and the Gamble, about the surge.  His blog is quite informative as well.
8. Phil Gordon. All I have learned about poker, I have gotten from Gordon (and Harrington).  His pokeredge podcasts are also quite good.  His style of play and his reasonable attitude about everything match mine pretty well.  And I do miss his interplay with Dave Foley on celebrity poker.