Reading

[Despare]

I used to enjoy reading a lot more when I was younger but I still flip through a book when I have time. I've had a few friends who I've shared books with throughout the years (in fact, the most at one time is probably now as I have four people I read the same books as or trade books, I wonder when I'll get American Psycho back...). When I was younger, if I was with three or more people, it was much more common to go play some basketball, football, or baseball than it was to read.

[Geddy]

Unfortunately I only have a couple of friends who read as a hobby. Most of the people at my high school do nothing but play video games, watch mediocre movies, and are, unfortunately illiterate.

[novakru]

It all starts with the parents
You see your folks reading from the time you were a shortie, you get curious as to why.
I think it adds to the experience if parents read them books as well

My oldest has to be dragged out of bed around noon on Saturdays cause she's so into whatever book of the moment.

My 8 year old, she'll read when her nintendo needs charging, but she'll read the ENTIRE book.:)

My son is 2 and already has a great respect for books.
He doesn't even chew them anymore.

[neverending]

I don't remember my parents reading to me, though we always had books around, including something you'll never see in a house any more- a full set of encyclopedias- and a huge Funk & Wagnal's dictionary. I used to pour over them incesantly.

[Nella]

I bought my son some encyclopedias at a yard sale for $40. They were printed 40 years ago, but still very informative. I remember enjoying ours when I was in school. I used them for research assignments many times. My son never used the ones I bought so I just gave them to Goodwill.

[ChronoGrl]

I really need to read more. I read so much when I was in middle school and high school...

I would go out of my way to read (though come middle school I would weigh it with computer games from Sierra and Lucas Arts, among others) and blow off my friends to do so.

The authors and works stick out in my mind as making impressions on me at the time...

• Poe (My dad used to read him to me when I was younger... I memorized "The Raven" in second grade but my teacher wouldn't let me recite it)... "Annabel Lee" and "A Dream Within A Dream" were my two absolute favorite poems. I also remember vividly him reading "The Cask of Amontillado" to me
• Ray Bradbury (The Martian Chronicles, The Illustrated Man, Dandelion Wine, October Country)
• Kurt Vonnegut (Slaughterhouse Five, Welcome to the Monkey House)
• Anthony Burgess (Clockwork Orange)
• Art Spiegelman (Maus, Maus II)
• David Sedaris (Barrel Fever, Naked)
• Shakespeare (at the time Hamlet and Othello were personal favorites of mine)

Come college I was an English major... Discussing the works of these authors changed their meaning for me and made me respect them on a whole other level:

Poe (It was great to return to Poe in my college life and analyze the literary works that I had embraced in my childhood)

• "The Black Cat"
• "The Fall of the House of Usher"
• "The Pit and the Pendulum"
• "William Wilson"

Shakespeare

• As You Like It
• Much Ado About Nothing
• Henry IV Part I

Faulkner (his short stories were especially compelling)

• The Sounds and the Fury <-- (personal favorite of mine)
• Light in August
• "A Rose for Emily"
• "Red Leaves"

Favorite Poets

• Blake (Songs of Innocence and Experience)
• Coleridge ("Dejection: An Ode")
• Wordsworth ("Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood")
• John Keats ("Nightingale")
• Lord Byron ("When We Two Parted")
• Robert Herrick <-- A VERY cunning linguist ("Delight in Disorder," "Upon Julia's Clothes," "The Bracelet to Julia")
• T. S. Eliot ("The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock")

I also read a lot of Camus and Sartre.

...

Post-college I didn't read nearly enough as I had expected to. Some of the best books I've read after college (that would be after 2004) include:

• Nabokov's Lolita
• Irving's World According to Garp <-- (life-changing novel; I recommend it)
• Atwood's Handmaid's Tale and Oryx and Crake (for scifi literary fans, I HIGHLY recommend this book)
• Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis I and Persepolis II
• Steven Hall's The Raw Shark Texts
• Haruki Murakami's Kafka on the Shore

I've also gone through all of the Harry Potter books and most of The Series of Unfortunate Events books.

I'd like to say that in my adult life I devote more time to reading. Unfortunately I just don't have the attention span for it most of the time (and I'm a slow reader who takes in every individual word that it's frustrating sometimes how long it takes to finish a book). I do most of my reading now the 15 minutes before I crash at night. With the stress of work, I pretty much crash with the television when I get home... Or the damn XBox360... I SWEAR I'm losing brain cells with every passing day...

[Papillon Noir]

I am such a big reader. I started reading at a young age and was reading adult novels in elementary school, though I still read the young adult books too. Stephen King was my favorite author from 5th grade well into middle school.

I also go through books really quickly as I can read rather fast, especially if it's good. I also read every day. When I'm at work I spend my lunch hour reading and before bed. I will also read while eating breakfast if I'm on an a real page turner.

I'm a very creative person and when I read, the book just really comes alive for me. I love movies, but books fufill a different kind of entertainment. I also love that they are portable and you just take them anywhere, especially if you're stuck waiting, like at a doctor's office or mechanic.

I've read classics and horror novels, and some action, thriller, and suspense books. Though, probably for the past year or so I've been reading romance novels. Yes, they are trashy, but I just find them so entertaining. :p I enjoy the subgenre of paranormal romance, which is vampire, werewolves, witches and the like.

I also read so much, that's it's just too expensive to buy all my books (though if I've been waiting for one to come out I'll just pick it up from Barnes & Noble), that I go to the library every month. I probably get out about 20 books and read most of them. Some I start but skip over because they don't really catch my attention. My husband thinks I'm crazy because I go to the library with a tote back. :p I also read manga as well from the library because they're expensive.


@Neverending
We had a Funk & Wagnall's Encyclopedia! I would thumb through it as a kid when I was bored. :D


@Chrono
I enjoyed Atwood's "A Handmaid's Tale". I couldn't get into "The Blind Assassin". What's "Oryx & Crake" like?

I also enjoyed parts of "Lolita" and the plot as a whole, but the prose didn't flow that well for me and I found it rather boring. I think I read this off and on for a year or two before I finally got through it. I just enjoyed the movie so much that I felt I had to read the book (and it's a classic). :o

I also read all the Harry Potter books and rather enjoyed them.

I also read the Twilight books, except for the last one. I really enjoyed them, though I've been holding off on the last one because of the bad reviews.

[neverending]

Chrono- check out William Butler Yeats' poetry some time!

[urgeok2]

i think people either read nothing (other than news or the odd magazine) or they are rabid.

there simply isnt anything in between.

i've read like a demon all my life .. it's as much as an addiction as any substance abuse. and its that way for almost anyone who will bother to sit through an entire novel.

i've never met a casual reader.

but there arent many of them .. i doubt more than 1 in 20 people read after getting out of school. probably far less.

[Doc Faustus]

This is a problem we run up against all the time in the small press world, people don't read, and when they do read, they settle for what's on the shelves at bookstore. If we don't like our local videostore, we join Netflix. That's smart. If you don't like what's on the shelves of your local bookstore, do not compromise. There's a world of smaller presses doing more interesting stuff. At the convention last week I met the author of a book about a man who fell in love with his house, the author of a book about apocalyptic acid rock, the author of a book about a tour group of zealots hunting flying sharks in the Garden of Eden, an author who was at Clarion under Harlan Ellison in the 70s and wrote a book of stories that take American magical realism to a new level, the author of a book about a man who survives the apocalypse by wearing a cockroach suit. Weird, perhaps a bit zany, but possibilities are examined, limits are tested and reality is bent to the breaking point. Our imaginations do not have to settle. Why don't people read? Because what's on the shelves isn't distinctive enough that they feel it speaks for them. What can be done about it? Do your research and legwork. Read the reviews in Cemetery Dance, check out small presses and unique authors. Reading can be fun if we remember the age of being told what we like is over.