An excellent bridge between Ayn Rand's fiction and her philosophy is provided by two books. The Ayn Rand Reader is a real treasure, presenting a well chosen collection of Rand's fiction and non-fiction writings that pertain to pure philosophy. A useful bridge is also provided by the excellent book Who Is Ayn Rand, which is currently out of print but usually easy to find by searching ebay using the keywords "Ayn Rand."

Two on-line introductory lectures on Objectivism provided by the Ayn Rand Institute are “An Introduction to Objectivism,” (streaming video) and “Introduction to Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand” (streaming audio).

Rand's top protégé is a professional philosopher named Leonard Peikoff, who studied with her for thirty years, after which he wrote a non-fiction treatise on her complete system, called Objectivism, The Philosophy of Ayn Rand. This book is the clearest and best written work on general philosophy that I'm aware of. It address all of the major issues in all the major branches of philosophy systematically and in hierarchical order, usually giving three or so examples to illustrate each abstract principle. In short, it is so well thought out and written that it is pleasurable and even exciting to read, particularly after being "primed" by reading Rand's novels.

 Dr. Peikoff is not only a writer, but also an exceptionally good teacher and speaker. To complete a basic philosophic education, from here I recommend going in two further directions simultaneously. First, to deepen your understanding of Objectivism, I recommend taking his excellent taped course, Understanding Objectivism, followed by another excellent course, Objectivism Through Induction. Second, to gain an overview of the entire history of Western philosophy, I recommend taking Dr. Peikoff's wonderful taped courses, A History of Western Philosophy, and Introduction to Logic. And, of course, from here you'll likely want to explore more of Rand's and Peikoff's writing on philosophy, including Rand's book, Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, and Peikoff's book, The Ominous Parallels.

The above lectures can be ordered from The Ayn Rand Bookstore, and the above books can be ordered from Amazon by clicking on their icons. In addition, a complete list of books by Rand and other Objectivist authors is available from the Ayn Rand Institute.