What Book Made You A Reader?
Today I cracked open the door to what will soon be Old Town Books Junior. There was drywall dust everywhere and the sound of a table saw whirring, but oh my! It is really starting to look like a bookstore!
Bookshelves are going in this week, along with a beautiful hand-painted mural.
Then it’s cleaning, and installing our big steel tree sculpture, then booksbooksbooks.
We have a whole week dedicated to moving in, making sure every title is in just the right spot!
In the meantime, I wanted to relish some of this new beginning energy by reflecting on books that helped inspire us to become the readers we are today.
Books that made us readers:
Ally:
One of my earliest memories is my mom reading aloud Winnie the Pooh by AA Milne. I just loved it. We have this beautiful gift edition in the store, a classic.
Anna:
My most memorable childhood book is a little-known Astrid Lindgren (author of Pippi Longstocking) book called Karlsson on the Roof .
Pia:
It was The Last Of The Mohicans. I read it aloud with my dad when I was 12. So when I returned to it as an adult trying to get back into reading… the nostalgia!
Kim:
I've always been a reader - thanks to having a librarian for a mom, I basically grew up in a library. Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH by Robert C. O’brien is a book that I still think about 25 years after I first read it! I grew up next to a field, and when I say I spent years looking for the rats of NIMH there I mean it!
Melissa:
Ruth Chew's Matter-of-Fact Magic series about kids who discover magical objects in dusty antique shops (still in print today with new covers) was the first series I remember tearing through on my own. I've always been obsessed with the idea of magic making its way into ordinary lives, as if it's just waiting around the corner for me to discover.
Lane:
TWILIGHT, duh! I was a huge book kid, but it did dwindle as I got older. Twilight was the book that sucked me back in and kept me coming back for more (and I will forever be #TeamJacob)
Nicole:
Tamora Pierce’s Tortall books, especially the Alanna books were the best! I read my copies over and over. She builds a huge world and loads of great quartets set in this world, all with badass lady leads!
Cate:
I grew up surrounded by books (thanks Reading Specialist Mom!) but I distinctly remember becoming deeply obsessed with Lemony Snicket's Series of Unfortunate Events series. Is this where my incredibly dark humor and love for a twisty thriller come from? Perhaps... This series still lives on my bookshelf to this day.
Kai:
Any and everything by Enid Blyton!
Leah:
Two of my favorites were the Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery series and Ella Enchanted by Gail Carson Levine. I still have all my original copies and they're all falling apart--I still return to them now as an adult. The things I loved about those books (spunky girls with big adventures and a charming boy who's head over heels for her) are still the same things I love in my books now!