Porphyrogene!

So, I consider myself fairly well-read.  Sometimes I have a bit of a big head about it - I’m proud of being a connoisseur of the written word - but I will also admit that I still haven’t read enough. 

 Another thing I’m really proud of is my dad.  He has read thousands of books, and he’s still going.  All while I was growing up he devoured books.  He wasn’t ever particularly openly passionate about it, but I could always tell it was something he deeply enjoyed.  As I grew up, there would be times when he would, all of a sudden, hand me a book and say "You’re ready. You’ll like this." And I would drink it down and beg for more.  That’s probably how I ended up reading all his Charles Shultz comic books about 15 times, I decimated Piers Anthony, I tore my way through Anne McCaffrey, and I sank into J.R.R. Tolkien and Morgan Llewellyn and many others.

His genre of choice is Sci-Fi/Fantasy, and the fact that he owns hundreds of Science Fiction books has probably fated me from my commencement of literacy to appreciate the Sci-Fi/Fantasy genre in particular.  My dad also has a strong reverence for myths and legends.  He has paintings of wizards and fairies, he loves stone faces of "The green man" made of leaves and feathers and he hangs them in the house and outside.  This passion of his is not overtly obvious and it doesn’t rule him or his living space - but it is infectious.  And so, I’ve grown up with a particularly keen appetite for the ‘magical’, the ‘mystical’, and the ‘mysterious’. 

There are so many things that I’m good at, so many things that I value and can better appreciate in others that are as a direct or indirect result of voracious reading habits.  My parents never forced me to read.  They read to me and my brother at bedtime - and that was very special.  But come the time when it was no longer cool to read to us at bed time… you would still find me reading till the wee morning hours.  I hope my parents know they did that right.  I’m not sure they always saw my and my brother’s reading as a blessing.  After all, I would get yelled at for sneaking a little flashlight into bed and reading until 3 am and my brother would get yelled at for spending his entire allowance on books every week.  Despite the frustrations at the time, I hope they know that it was a very good thing.

I was not the ‘most popular kid on the block’.  I had a lot of confidence issues that have thankfully worked themselves out as I grew up, but for a while there - books were a miraculous escape and adventure.  I didn’t see them quite so romantically as I was reading them - but I know now that not only were they a great pastime, but now I am a fast reader, I can read out loud very well, I have a very solid vocabulary, I can type at 90 wpm+ and it’s ALL because of reading.  I wish I knew what sparked it for me.  I wish I could remember if there was one particular gateway book that lead me to be a reading junky or if there were several. 

I’ll tell you what - I’ll share with you some books that are fuel for my fire, if you share some of yours.

Time-Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
Alanna by Tamora Pierce
Dragonsinger by Anne McCaffrey
Question Quest by Piers Anthony
Songmaster by Orson Scott Card
God-shaped Hole by Tiffanie DeBartolo
Druids by Morgan Llewellyn
The Witching Hour by Anne Rice
Time Enough for Love by Robert Heinlein
Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card

These 10 books are somewhat off the beaten path.  These are books I love.
If you’re reading this, don’t take this lightly.  These are not mere words I share, these are indelible experiences. These books will change you.