Happy Monday!
Yesterday, my youngest daughter texted me about a book she was reading. Most writers are prolific readers, but when you are working on a novel of your own, reading becomes difficult. It’s hard to turn the inner editor off. She was so happy, because for the first time in a while she sank into the book. It grabbed her and wouldn’t let go.
Sadly, the story didn’t end well, because I knew the book she was reading, and it does a stand on its ears at the end that completely ruins the whole thing. But that got me thinking about how wonderful it is to sink into a new book. There is nothing quite like it, is there?
My addiction to books began as an escape sometime in childhood. I don’t remember not being able to read. On the way to school, I would pass a children library, and at some point someone told me that I could go and get a library card and check out anything I wanted. Every couple of weeks I would show up at the library and select my stack of books. I brought a special bag just to load them all. They would let me take out 7 books at the time.
There was nothing like hauling that bag of books home. I still remember that feeling of anticipation and just simple happiness. I was 8 or 9, and that memory still makes me smile.
How did you start reading?
I honestly don’t remember how I started reading. My mom was a reader (Dad became one later in life) and there were always books around. I read one of her Johanna Lindsey books when I was 12-ish and have been a romance reader since (before that it was biographies and children’s’ books.)
I remember being told that I couldn’t have read all the books I claimed on my summer reading list at the local library until the librarian quizzed me on them; I was probably seven or so. I also remember the library had unlimited check-outs until about then, then they put limits on how many I could check out in a single visit.
My mom says I taught myself to read. I don’t remember learning to read. We traveled and the first things I remember reading were menus. Our house didn’t have books, so I was thrilled when I discovered libraries. I finished reading the World Book Encyclopedia during second grade and also I got my library card. I skipped the kids section and went straight to adult books. At first the librarians didn’t want to let me check out the books. I would end up reading the books outloud to them and they stopped hassling me. I bought paperback books with my allowance and literally had a book on me at all times. Yeah, ebooks. Hundreds of books on my phone just waiting for me.
Heh. When I was allowed grown-up books at the library at 10 or 11 after I finished the kids section, I remember there was a new librarian at some point who objected to my selection. Her colleague interfered and told her “no, it’s okay, _she_ is allowed”, in a tone conveying both matter of factness and mild discombobulation 😂
I always read, life long reader with different phases. I laugh now remembering how I used to get in trouble for bringing books to the dinner table. My mom would say “you don’t want to be a part of this family” and my response would get me sent back to my room with my books. Imagine in this age, getting mad at your kid for reading?? I know it was about manners etc at the table but still!! My daughter hates to read and it makes me sad…
Found Alanna the First Adventure by Tamora Pierce in the book shelf of my Grade 3 class then the obsession with reading took over.
I was sick a lot as a child with my asthma and there was only so much TV back then. Books took me places and allowed me to have adventures no matter what my health was doing!
I don’t remember not constantly reading. Growing up in a small town, I’d check out a book in the morning from the school library and sometimes be done the next day, reading between classes, on the school bus, and after lights out, holding the book up to the window to catch the neighbor’s porch light. UNTIL the 7th grade. At lunch, the school librarian called me in and asked me to show her my newly checked-out “Dandelion Wine” by Ray Bradbury. It wasn’t in the pile of books I was carrying with me. “It must be in my locker,” I said and ran to get it. Not there. I went back and told her I must have left it in class and I would go and look for it. Silently, she pulled the book out from behind her desk and opened it to show the first 20 pages ripped and torn. I was responsible, she said and must pay for the book. She gave me a note to take home to my parents about the damage and what I owed. My mother was incensed that they did not seek out the real culprit and branded her book-loving daughter a desecrator of books. She paid the $20 but forbade me from checking out books from the school library; they didn’t deserve to have me as a patron. That likely propelled me much sooner into my parents’ huge trove of paperbacks. I read all of their Hornblower novels, Ann McCaffery, Larry Niven, and snuck some Johanna Lindsey too (sheiks!!!). The second-hand bookstore was my mecca. Andre Norton. James H. Schmidt. Piers Anthony. Dick Francis. When I got to high school, the library was once again my second home, where I could retreat to a carrel and read. But I still remember that sick feeling seeing that torn-up book. And I never have read Dandelion Wine.
I started reading at about 5…..and still remember. Over years I read everything i could get my hands on at our school library. I read Beowolf at 11…found it at the Carnegie library in Pittsburgh…and loved it. Only learned later that i shouldn’t have been able to understand it.
I started reading by not reading and barely passing reading in school. Then my father gave me a book about a boy searching for a pet. And I haven’t stopped reading since. Had that book for many years finally passed it on. I know every library in a ten mile radius. Cause when I want a book I don’t want to wait for the library loan system to send it.
There was a basement with a large box of books in a house we moved into when I was in the 3rd grade. Bobsey Twins, Nancy Drew, Jane Eyre and more.
I was smart. I’d finish all my work and be sitting there looking around so my 3rd grade teacher would let me go to the library. The librarian likes me because I would straighten up the shelves while looking for something to read, so she started letting me do lunch in there and coming in after school. By 6th grade myom would let me ride my bike the couple miles to the big public library and I had a little case that would hold about 10 paperback books. I went every couple days… and worked in the school libraries until I graduated. They were my happy place.
I had a teacher reading “Charlottes web” a partial chapter at a time. I went to the library, checked out Charlotte’s Web and worked my way through the book. I was dyslexic, so it took me a while, but once I started reading, I haven’t stopped. My punishment for doing poor behavior as a child was they would take my library card I was a very well-behaved child I didn’t want to lose my library card.
Once I could read, my dad would take me to the library every Monday. (It was his only day off). I started out getting 6 or 7 books at a time, but pushed it to a dozen over the next few months. Small town, same librarian. I may started with Dr. Suess and other age appropriate books but moved quickly to more advanced books.
I started reading when I was 7 years old. I wanted to start earlier but my school kept telling me I was too young to start learning to read. Then my family moved and a family friend (who became my godmother), sat down and taught me the basics within a couple hours. I read 3 short stories that day and the love affair with books was born… I was reading at college levels by the time I was 12 and still read every chance I get in my 40s. I love reading and will never stop
I started reading in 1st grade and have never stopped. As a child and early teen, I read to escape from where I was. as an adult, I read for pleasure, work, and knowledge.
Smut! All the smut! My aunt would get me paper grocery bags of romance novels from garage sales and I would devour them!
I have no memory of not being able to read. I was not read to as a child. I know that when I got to first grade I was given a reading group to guide. I had never gone to kindergarten.
Somehow I must have learned to read on my own. I know that it has always been escapism for me. Both of my parents were physically abusive to me. I guess maybe I learned as a way to save myself when my grandmother wasn’t around to save me
kindergarten.
I was reading 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, complete and unabridged, in 2nd grade. My grade school reading levels did not reflect my compression because their books were boring.
once I discovered libraries I discovered mythology, which naturally lead to fantasy.
And here I am.
I was an early and voracious reader. Some of my earliest memories are of curling up with a fat copy of Enid Blyton’s Magic Faraway Tree and losing myself in an adventure with Silky and Moonface. As I got a bit older, my mother had odd ideas about appropriate reading – the classics were good but popular literature would rot my brain. So Oscar Wilde, Edgar Allen Poe and Homer were fine for a 9 year old but Nancy Drew was not. It’s probably why as an adult, children’s literature forms so much of my comfort reading!
Bobbsey Twins from the library next to my elementary school. A little older I transitioned into Nancy Drew and spent my chore money to buy them. I still have the entire set in yellow jackets.
The Bookmobile came around our neighborhood. I started reading at a pretty young age with the help of Sesame Street, Mr Rogers Neighborhood and the Electric Company. I remember reading A Wrinkle in Time around the age of five. I needed my mom with me the first few times to get the books.
I loved that Bookmobile, it brought the world to me. They even had records you could borrow. That library card was my golden ticket. My mom was very young when she had us and was left being a single parent. We were poor and didn’t have a car or money for books.
Elementary school library, when they had real books and wonderful librarians. I read lots of everything, but what sticks in my mind were the Time Life books on history and biology.
Frankly I can’t remember when I started reading. Seems like I always did.
First books from “Bibliothèque Rose” then “Verte” – that was started in 1852 , when Louis Hachette proposed his first books for children in France- .
I also regurlay read legends and mythologies stories from Britanny, Celtia, Greece, Roma. For example, I got, when I was 11, for christmas “Le voyage d’Ulysse par G. Chappon”, so Ulysses’ travels (Homer).
Romance books were always there (started by borrowing mom’s books). Then I discovered Anne McCaffrey, Lois McMaster Bujold, and never looked back.
Books are my drug 😍! Sleep is overrated when you have a great book in your hand😊 .
My mom loved to read so every Saturday she would take my brother and I to the library. I remember wanting so many books that my mom would have to check out a few for me under her name.
My home life was lonely as a child. In elementary school, I used books to go to far away lands and have wonderful adventures….of course with happy endings. As I got a little older, a neighbor introduced me to Harlequin Romance. My parents would get me a new Nancy Drew or Hardy Boy mystery as a reward for good grades. I truly can’t remember ever not reading. It is such a magical way to be part of something special and exciting. I love your mix of Sci-Fi, romance and mystery all rolled into exciting and different places! Thank you so much for sharing your talents with the rest of the world!
I can remember a time I didn’t read. My first memory of books is my father reading me the Black Stallion books and my mom reading me Little House on the Prairy. I started my own reading journey with Box Car Children. My mom would give me a dollar for finishing a book. Sure the money was the incentive but I got to a point where I was devouring books, mostly horse books. It wasn’t until I was in my teens that I got into SciFy, fantasy and so on. I still like my horse books but now I like the fantasy and dragon as well.
I was the youngest child in my family. I started reading at about 3. I would sit with my siblings when they read out loud as part of their homework. They were a few years older.
By the time I was in kindergarten I was reading at a second grade level. I bought my first book through scholastic book ordering service. I still have that book.
By the time I was in 4th grade I had finished all the reading levels and was assigned to check out library books and write reports.
My love of reading has never waned.
I got grounded a lot. The only thing I was allowed to do while grounded was either read or sleep. Reading saved me from countless boring hours staring at my ceiling.
I don’t remember not reading. My mother says I would sit quietly looking at books before I learned how to read. Reading is both my escape from the world and key to the world.
I don’t remember not reading. I remember in 2nd grade being very disappointed because the school librarian wouldn’t let me check out books that were above my grade, because they’d be “too hard.” She didn’t understand that the book I wanted to check out was part of a series of books, most of which I had at home and had already read.
Books have been my faithful friends and boon companions for all my life, nearly 70 years now. Many times, closer than friends, family, and loved ones.
Major and minor characters, and the authors responsible for them, have provided me beacons that confirm that I am not alone, despite the fact that ultimately, I’m sitting in the dark staring at the campfire in the clearing, screwing up my courage to creep in and shyly interact with those sitting in the warmth and light.
I’ll sign off with my interwebs nickname, but the email address is real.
Heh. I am the child of two avid readers. I do not remember *not* being able to read. My poor beleaguered mother (who taught Grade 2) apparently taught me when I was approximately three. I then turned around and immediately taught my younger brother (who was two-and-a-bit). She hadn’t intended to teach me (she provided the tiny child board books (A is for apple!) mostly so I could look at pictures. It was more that she wanted us adequately prepared for school when we ultimately started it, and then it turns out that she could get WHOLE MINUTES OF QUIET by providing us with reading material. Which is a godsend to a woman with two active very young children.
This act of poor judgment resulted in my mildly ADHD brother and I both being profoundly bored in school for the first several years (when the curriculum is mostly focused on basic literacy, which we had down cold before kindergarten). My brother and I were (separately, each in our own grade) hell on wheels when bored. They finally (after many, many, many disciplinary meetings) just let us read whenever we were bored. Problem solved!
Although, it did spawn an ancillary issue wherein the school librarian kept getting concerned with *what* we were reading (which was “every-damn-thing” regardless of age level or actual appropriateness). My mother steadfastly refused to give a crap about the content of our reading. Her opinion was if we were confused, we would ask about it and receive an explanation. If we weren’t, then we were unlikely to be bothered by it. If we freaked ourselves out reading Stephen King late at night, we had learned a valuable life lesson. She was of the (correct!) opinion that reading even sexually explicit materials wouldn’t scar us for life (although Lady Chatterly’s Lover at 10 did cause a lot of dictionary usage and some tilted head confusion in young me).
I think my reading addiction started with Where the Sidewalk Ends. Maybe first grade? So many happy memories!
I think I was around 4, remember being thrilled I could “read” I, me, no, etc.
My mom read to us, my grandmother would make up stories about the people in the houses we passed on our walks. Around age 6, I was home sick and there was nothing on TV (pre-cable, kids!). I raided my family’s one bookshelf and was hooked.
By second grade I read “A Wrinkle in Time”. I also liked picture books about ballerinas and Edith the Lonely Doll. I snowballed as a reader: Nancy Drew, Wizard of Oz, Five Children and It, Half Magic, Roald Dahl, Zilpha Keatly Snyder, Lloyd Alexander, Ben Bova, Dido Twite, Susan Cooper, the Andrew Lang fairy tale books … I used to read them out loud, some of the characters were that alive to me. I would tailor reading and travel, so they dovetailed. It was awesome! It’s harder for me to get lost in a book now, because I am a single, working parent with worsening eyesight. Enter audio books!
My mom taught me to read at such a young age, I don’t remember it. After I started teaching my oldest to read, she found little books that she made for me to learn with, and it turns out I must have retained the lessons subconsciously, because I used almost the exact same method! I fell in love with Shel Silverstein and Eric Carle in kindergarten; I loved the imagery and creativity. My mom also had several Nancy Drew books from her youth, and I read them until they started to fall apart, and also a big red tome of Fairy Tale collections that’s still on my shelf.
One of my best friend’s mom owned a bookshop…she gave us big discounts and when she didn’t have the book I was looking for, she’d find and buy it for me.
When I was really young, my mom read to us all the time. Picture books, but also things like The Little House on the Prairie series.
I remember reading the Rosamond Du Jardin (likely misspelling her name) books when I was in elementary school (particularly the stories of the twin sisters and their escapades— romance for the grade-school set with heroines who were in high school). After that I was always reading. Biographies of famous women and fiction (mostly with female protagonists if given a choice). We also made weekly treks to the library and we all (mom, my brother, and I) checked out our own stack. There were always books at home, always, and I never remember a time when I was not a reader.
Wow, loved reading about everyone’s memories and favorite books! My first favorite books were The Tawny Scrawny Lion and The Monster at the End of this Book. I remember the first book I could read on my own was Rosie the Hen Went for a Walk. It has gorgeous illustrations in the entire book is one sentence. These are still my favorite books to give to young children as gifts.
My older sister had a hard time learning to read, in hindsight she was probably dyslexic. To encourage us to read my dad would give us a penny a page. I discovered that the book Are You My Mother had lots of pages and I read it multiple times to earn money. Dad caught on pretty quickly, but I never stopped reading.
I started reading in middle school the Anne McCaffery dragon series. Then moved onto Narnia and I was hooked.
I don’t remember being taught to read, just always could. I spent my summers with my grandparents in a one stop light town in Eastern NC which, lucky for me, had a wonderful library. By the time I was 10 or so, I had read all the books in the children’s section at least once. Miz Ruth, the Librarian, gave me secret permission to check-out books from the adult section. I was enthralled, “traveling” into the foreign country of grown ups with all their weird hang ups. Never looked back.
Don’t remember not loving books. We had very little money as a child, but the public library was on the way from school to my dad’s office. And the preferred gift was always a book.
At four years old, my Dad taught me my letters and read to me almost every night. By the time I started kindergarten I was already reading second grade level books and hated to be read to. In the first grade I was bored with the books that were on offer and would raise my hand for a bathroom break and just go home. (We lived across the street). By the time I was in the seventh grade I had discovered Robert Louis Stevenson, Louis LaMore, Agatha Christie, Dickens, and I always had a book in my hand. When forced to “go play outside “, I would climb a tree and read there. The library was my best friend. Now in my 70’s I am reading a little bit of everything. I have 2000 books on my nook, and revisit old friends often. My daughter in law says I’m an easy guest. Just give me a corner to read and I’m happy.
My brother and I had a blue plastic crate, and during the summers we would check out 15 books each, devour them in 1-2 weeks (because fun was a very specific idea and had very specific boundaries in a household with Asian immigrant parents), and rinse and repeat. I grew up on Tamora Pierce, Gail Carson Levine, Garth Nix, Sarah Dessen.
But when I first enrolled in kindergarten I didn’t know any English, so it was a very rapidly immersive experience. I still remember Ella Enchanted as the first full big-girl book I ever read. I would read it, only comprehend some of it, lose it, then find it again, and I found myself understanding more and more of the words as I read, lost, and found it again and again until one day I could fully understand the whole book and enjoy it for all its magic!
my mom did the bedtime reading thing… but not every night and I distinctly remember her reading a version of Belerophon and Pegasus …I think age 5 or 6. it’s not a kids picture book version but a young readers. well, mom only did part of the story and then didn’t read the next night and I couldn’t wait. so, I finished it myself. she was impressed that I got long words.
My parents were, and still are, fervent readers. I don’t remember not being able to read. I vaguely remember the Golden Books but the first books to stick in my mind (and get me into re-reading) were Enid Blyton’s Famous Five. I’d devoured them, Nancy Drew, Hardy Boys, Trixie Belden and other age-appropriate books by 10 and then started on my Mother’s Harlequins and Mills & Boon – much to her horror. She gave me Dad’s Wilbur Smith and Alistair MacLeans. I’m not sure what my first foray into SF&F was but Frank Herbert’s Dune was an annual re-read in my teens, less frequently nowadays (loving the recent movies).
I used to say I’d read the back of the cereal packet if there’s nothing else around. But honestly I’d be lost without books. Everything else in life is judged by how much reading time I’m giving up. I’m self employed- if I take a day of it’s a days lost earnings. But for HA new releases (excluding serialised) I’ve been known to take a day off. Totally worth it.
Mom was a single mom in the 60’s. Had a job, couldn’t pick 12 yr old me up from school if I was sick. Permission to walk home. Instead I would seriously go to the library instead and sit and read until time to make it home. Frank Baum OZ books. All of them. I even remember the shelf they sat on beside this big leather chair. Librarian never said a word to anyone. Those books are DARK, let me tell you. Lol
I have always loved books. My first book memory of reading by myself was Red Fish Blue Fish – pre-kindergarten. In first grade, I would wait in the local library by my school until my mom got off work. When I was older, I read everything – fiction, nonfiction, comic books. I would climb a tree to read so my sisters wouldn’t bug me. I still read everyday.
I got hooked on both science fiction and historical fiction from the same visit to the school library a few weeks after I turned 10.
‘Storm over Warlock’ may very well be the worst book Andre Norton ever wrote, but that doesn’t make it bad, and it got me hooked on SF.
To this day, I have not figured out how a gawdawful sex and sensation potboiler like ‘Magnus the Magnificant’ ended up in a grade school library; but I found it, and have been reading historical fiction ever since.
According to my mom, I taught myself to read. The parochial school my family attended used a phonics program, and also taught us to speed read. There was a special projector that showed the words, with a moving block going along the lines so you had to read the words that weren’t blacked out. They would gradually speed it up, and by fourth grade I was reading 400wpm.
They also used laminated stories color coded for levels of difficulty. You had to read and answer questions before you could move on to the next one. I moved up the levels rapidly and ran out of colors pretty quickly.
And we won the reading lottery, because the bookmobile parked at the end of our block every other week. I graduated from Nancy Drew and Marguerite Henry to Andre Norton and Ray Bradbury to Georgette Heyer and Gerald Durrell there on the bookmobile. If it wasn’t crowded, I’d sit there crosslegged on the carpet and read right there until they had to leave. Pure heaven.
yep reading is my happy place a new book a reread a series yay
Both my parents were librarians. They read to us every night. I have vague memories of being about 3 and ‘reading’ to my baby brother. Pretty sure I had just memorized the books rather than recognizing the words. I was a proficient reader by the time I started kindergarten and was reading Brooks and Heinlein at 9.
In 4th grade our teacher ready the first Harry Potter out loud. He did funny voices for each character. He made a book feel alive for the first time. I asked my parents if I could get the next book. And of course they accommodated. It sparked my love of reading and I never looked back.