Hello, hello! New school year calls for new blog posts and I'm super excited to write this one: an autobiography of myself (obviously) as a reader. This will be fun.Why not start from the very beginning? I started reading when I was super young--just like everyone else--but the first time I remember reading is when I was introduced to the Harry Potter series. Cheesy, I know, but completely true! I mean, I fell deeply in love with Harry Potter to the point where my mom wouldn't buy me the sixth Harry Potter book unless I read fifty other books first. You would not believe how fast I flew through those fifty books.
Some people are probably reading this and thinking "Fifty books! What? Why? I've not yet read fifty books in my whole life!" and I completely understand where you're coming from. After finishing the Harry Potter series and being completely depressed, there's this sort of gray area from 4th grade to the middle of 6th grade. I don't remember what I read, if I even read at all, but I do know that I wrote a lot. I wrote a lot of stuff, including a bunch of fantasy stories that were mainly modeled after Harry Potter. So I guess I owe my love of reading and writing to J.K. Rowling. Thank you Ms. Rowling!
Anyway, I got back into reading after I met this girl who would eventually become my best friend, who (surprise!) loved reading too. We read everything together. At the beginning, it was mostly what we could get our hands on, but as we've gown older, it's become YA Fiction books. Books from authors like Rainbow Rowell, John Green, Sarah Dessen, Jennifer E. Smith, Stephanie Perkins, Cassandra Clare, Lauren Oliver, Jenny Han, and I could go on for ages, but I think you get the idea.
I've read so many books since then. Eventually, I got a Goodreads account and scrambled to find all the books I've read (and I know I missed a bunch, including the fifty that I mentioned at the beginning) and that total comes to be about 205. It gets crazier. Do you want to know how many books I have on my to-read list? 438.
"What does she even do with her life?!" you are probably thinking.
"Read," I answer.
"Why?" you ask, still baffled.
"Because I love it," I respond.
"How?"
"It's easy. I pick up a book, and I read."
There's something magical, you know, about stepping out of your own skin, even if it's only for a few minutes. I couldn't even begin to describe it, but I feel like all the readers of the world know what I'm talking about. If you haven't experienced that magic yet, then you haven't really sat down and taken the time to read a really good book. Sorry, but that's the truth.
The authors I mentioned above have written some of my favorite books, but I mostly like to read YA Fiction or anything written for teenagers. There are definitely books I don't like to read, sure, because readers can be picky. I try to steer clear of nonfiction. I don't like it, I don't enjoy it, and I'm not going to "hate-read" something that I don't already like.
Alright, so to end this on a happier note, why don't I list some of my favorite books? You know, the books that you can just go back to and reread anytime and you will still gasp at all the "gasp-worthy" parts even though you know it's coming. I also highly recommend some of these to read as well, even if you're not a big reader.
Excellent, excellent post!
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