Weekly Geeks #3 is on! Dewey says:
This week’s theme comes from Samantha, who suggested that one week we all write about our fond memories of childhood books.
You could approach this several ways. I’ll probably list my favorite childhood books with maybe a paragraph about each book: why I loved it, how old I was when I read it, where I got the book, etc. You could also just pick one childhood favorite and review it as you would any other book. Or, if you’re fast, you could make up a meme other weekly geeks might like to use.
Since I’m writing this post a few days after the theme was announced, I’ve had the chance to read some of the other Geeks’ responses to it, and they’ve helped jog my memory about some of my favorite childhood reading (let’s define that as age 12 and younger).
As I talked about here, I was an early reader; I was also a voracious one. My sister and I were introduced to the children’s collection at the Norwalk Public Library at a young age, and we were weekly (or at least bi-weekly) visitors, along with our mom. I usually took out several books at a time. For a real treat, we’d visit a bookstore, or the book section at Kiddytown, the local toy store – those were books we could keep!. By the time I was in third grade, I was already asking for books for birthday and Christmas gifts, especially Nancy Drew stories – the public library didn’t have them, and my school’s collection was small enough that it didn’t take long before I had read them all.
My tendency to be a completist in my reading developed back in those days too; if I read one book by an author and liked it, I had to read as many of his or her other books as I could manage. In some cases, that meant a lot of series reading, but not necessarily. At that age, I also liked to read my favorite books over and over. The characters in the books I loved best came to inhabit my imagination; I would bring them into my own stories, and write myself into theirs.
One of my few regrets about raising a son instead of a daughter is that many of my childhood favorites were just a bit too “girly” to share with him. Not all of them were, though; I was very pleased by the addiction to Roald Dahl that he developed in the third grade, which surpassed my own (I only read Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator myself). However, he never got quite as attached to the Encyclopedia Brown books
Aside from Nancy Drew, one of my earliest favorite series was the Betsy-Tacy books
(Edited to add: Thanks to Tanabata for reminding me about Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House books
By the time I reached the middle-elementary years (around fourth grade), I had read Little Women for the first time (of many) and became obsessed with anything related to Louisa May Alcott. She was my “all-time” favorite author (hey, I was ten years old!) for a couple of years, until eventually I craved literature that was a bit more modern. Like many early-middle-school girls, I discovered Judy Blume; if you want to have fun with a group of 30- and 40-something-age women, get everyone reminiscing about reading Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret
Do you have some good memories of books that you spent your childhood with? I’d love to hear about them, and if you’re participating in Weekly Geeks for this theme, please leave a link to your post along with your comment!
Here’s a summary list of the participants in Weekly Geeks #2 who have adopted the policy of linking other bloggers’ book reviews to their own; it tells you who will link to your reviews, if you’ve reviewed the same books they have. Weekly Geeks posts are also bookmarked on del.icio.us.
It was fun reading about some of your favourite childhood books. I forgot about Judy Blume! I don’t seem to have them anymore but I certainly read some of her books, like Are You There God? It’s Me Margaret.
Tanabata – Your post reminded me of some books I’d forgotten too, so I edited mine :-)! Glad we could help each other out.
I read Little Women for the first time when I was 10 also, and I bet I’ve read it twenty or thirty times since! I will never tire of it. I’m a completist too (great word!) and I also adored Madeleine L’Engle. Not too long ago I re-read some of the books about the Austins. They were every bit as lovely as I remembered them.
Julie – I’ve been thinking about re-reading some of those books myself; I’m glad to know you still enjoyed them.
I idenfified with Meg Murray too. I really loved those books.
But somehow I totally missed Judy Blume. I remember other kids constandly requesting them from the school library, but I was never one of them.
Kerry – From reading your post, it sounds like you really did love those books. Madeleine L’Engle was the only author you mentioned that I recognized, though; I guess it’s a cultural thing :-).
Florinda – It’s been really interesting reading all the weekly geeks responses as I haven’t recognised a lot of the books the American posters have mentioned. Or I know the names, but they weren’t ones I came in contact with as a child. I think it is indeed a cultural thing. New Zealand being part of the British Commonwealth, books here tended to be out of the UK publishers so included a lot of British authors and not many American ones. Even these days you have to shop at a special import store to get a lot of US published books. As a SF/fantasy reader that means a large proportion of my library.
I remember getting the Scholastic book catalog lists at school and circling most of the titles that I wanted to read. It was so hard limiting myself to one or two, which is what I had to do because my mother was a tyrant. Or so I thought at the time. 😉
Nancy Drew was a favorite of mine. And Encyclopedia Brown! I adored him! Judy Blume and Beverly Cleary where two of my favorite authors when I was in my later years of elementary school. I preferred Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing to Are You There God? It’s me, Margaret for some reason.
Gene Stratton Porter’s The Girl of the Limberlost was my favorite book from my childhood. It’s one of a handful I’ve actually reread, which isn’t something I do too often.
Literary Feline – I have very fond memories of the Scholastic book flyers too – and how hard it was to pick just a couple of books every time!
You’re another person who has reminded me that I forgot to include Beverly Cleary in my post! I liked the “Henry Huggins” and “Beezus and Ramona” books.
I have to admit that I’m not familiar with your favorite childhood book!
The Betsy-Tacy Society has an active chapter in Southern California: you should meet up with them some time. Several years ago the NY Chapter read The Saturdays together since many of us also love the Melendys (especialy Rush!).
CLM – I had no idea there was a Betsy-Tacy Society; thanks for the heads-up!