Essay - Week 3 - My Memories of Reading

My earliest memories of books comes from my mother.  My mother is a voracious reader.  She also seems to retain everything she ever reads.  I remember that there were always bookshelves filled to the limit with books when I was growing up.  No matter where we moved, my mother made sure there was always room for her books.  So it should not come as a surprise to the reader that my mother began my book collection when I was very young and kept building it over the years.  I can remember lying in bed and my mom reading me Dr. Seuss books like The Cat in the Hat and Green Eggs and Ham.  I've had little books from Are You My Mother by P.D. Eastman to the Bobbsey Twins by Laura Lee Hope.  I believe I also owned every single Nancy Drew book ever written.  What's funny is, that I was an avid reader when I was a child.  I read all the time.  Then, as I got older and got into junior high and high school, I kind of walked away from my books.  Then, as I began to get into adulthood, I picked my books up again.

Something else I find interesting as I look back on my memories of books and reading, is the fact that my choice in books changed as I grew older.  For instance, when I was probably 22-ish, my favorite books were horror stories.  I have literally read every single book that author Dean Koontz has written and one of my favorite books that I read over and over again was Stephen King's The Shining.  However, when I was 29 or 30, I picked up The Shining to read again, as it was one of my favorites, only to find that I found it lackluster and devoid of enough detail to make it truly enthralling.  My mother still loves Stephen King and owns literally every single book he has ever written.  My tastes have changed, obviously.  Some of my favorite novels now are Alexandre Dumas' The Count of Monte Cristo, Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, and Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights.  Those books seemed to provide more of a challenge and there are more classics that I still wish to read.  This seemed to coincide with my going back to college.  So, I wonder, is the fact that I've gone back to school to get a Bachelor's degree and plan on going on to Graduate School to pursue my Masters influencing my taste in books?  As I become more educated, am I craving a more challenging book to activate my imagination?  Maybe......

Nancy Drew novel covers

Bibliography:
Nancy Drew Covers.  Web Source: http://tinyurl.com/kcdhfys