What I Read

I don't remember the earliest things I read so well. I remember reading a fair amount of non fiction about whatever caught my interest. (Horses, castles, dinosaurs, wildlife, etc. I could go on, if I tried.) One of the earliest books I distinctly remember reading was Escape to Witch Mountain when I was maybe eight or nine years old. I checked it out from the school library. I was already reading voraciously then, so I'm sure there were many others. I've just lost the memory of them in the general fog my childhood memories have become. I remember a strong love for mythology and fairy tales, which is probably where my current love for fantasy comes from. That love for fantasy expanded into an interest in science fiction. There may have been some familial influence there as well. My mother is an avid reader, mostly of speculative fiction and mysteries. My maternal grandfather was the same, an avid reader and especially of speculative fiction. I remember him giving me all his cast off Asimov's Science Fiction/Science Fact magazines in my late teens and early twenties. My interest in classic literature came from a peculiar place. I was involved in musical theater, at least peripherally through my mother, through most of my childhood and teenage years. When I was in high school, Les Miserables was the rage with everyone, and I fell in love with the music and then the story. When I first heard the London cast recording (as opposed to my earlier exposure to the Broadway recording), I realized that there was more to the story than I'd heard before. Curious about how much was the invention of the composers, and how much was the original story, I dug into the book and found that I loved it. It's a difficult read. Hugo was a political writer and so he tends to go on about his politics at length -- politics that have little point of reference for a 17 year old American. His characters had so much depth and history that I really became involved, actually rereading the book after searching for a different abridgment (I still haven't managed to attack the full unabridged version) which focused more on the characters. From Hugo, I jumped to Dumas, and then (oddly perhaps) to Austen who is still my very favorite. So now, most of what I read is science fiction and fantasy. I love exploring different perspectives, and that seems to be most prevalent in speculative fiction. I've flirted with suspense and non fiction a bit, and am still actively seeking out classics that will draw me in as much as Austen and the others. Technorati Tags: Literature Books