I was browsing some of the bookish sites I usually visit and saw this article:
http://bookriot.com/2016/11/14/the-power-of-the-accidental-find/
I think it's quite interesting, that special moment you find a book, not what you would usually read but how it shaped part - if not all - your reading life from that moment on.
I guess I have two of those moments, when in my grandmother's house, my uncle's book collection included a good sized number of books and it was when I first read a Jules Verne book, which opened up my eyes to adult reads when I was 13 or 14 - I had read other adult books at the time but not by an author I wanted to repeat, so it was a good finding. Michael Strogoff is still one of my favorite literary memories.
I was still keeping up with juvenile books though but the day I tried to climb the local library stairs in hopes of finding some intriguing title or romance in the adult floor, I stumbled on Agatha Christie's Death in the Nile. I stopped going to the juvenile section and that was it.
Finding random books at certain moments can be very helpful. If only we could have time to read everything....
What about you?
Yes I did also have some of those moments when you discover a book and told yourself - so a book can also be like this! I remember my first romance novel, 'Ashes in the Wind' by Kathleen Woodiwiss and I discovered that women could also be the main character, and have adventures and sex and a happy ending.
ReplyDeleteI so also remember the first books I reaad written by authors that are now some of my favourite ones -'Julian', by Gore Vidal, 'Radetzky March' by Joseph Roth or 'The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum' by Heinrich Böll.
I discovered those novels just by chance. And each of them showed me something that I didn't know could be possible in a book.
It's an amazing feel!!!
DeleteThen the dilemma: can we shut up and keep the secret to ourselves or do we tell any other reader and the secret is out? ;)