My Favorite Things

If I had to describe myself in one word (other than the obvious Mommy, wife, daughter, and friend), it would be reader.

I love books. When I was a little girl my Mom would talk to me and I would be so wrapped up I wouldn't even hear her. Reading is like escaping into a little fantasy world with friends. My Mamo and I used to spend all day outside by the pool, reading. I thought I was very grown up! And throughout my life books, and the characters in them, have been friends.

I'm so thrilled that you love to read, too! You grab your books, run over to the couch, and say, "Read books!" Right now your favorite books are about trucks, trains, animals, and letters. You also have a book made especially for you by Aunt Kathy that has pictures of all your favorite people and things in it. You are reading that right now, as I'm typing!

Some people are very snotty about what they read. I hate that. Don't let anyone else tell you what is good or not. Each book is there just for you to consider, and if it is "good" the characters and the story will just become part of you. I just finished reading a teen book series (The Twilight Saga by Stephenie Meyer). You know what? I loved them! Doesn't bother me a bit that the primary audience is 15 year olds. The characters and the story were fantastic.

The Heart is a Lonely Hunter (Carson McCullers) is widely touted as one of the best novels of the 20th Century. I couldn't stand it. I know it is supposed to be this wonderful commentary on race and innocence and oppression and all of that. Doesn't change the fact that it was pure torture to read.

I have spent many very happy days of my life reading "chick lit" and romance novels. Seriously, Jennifer Weiner and I could be best friends. And Sandra Brown...well, if a woman ever has a bad day all she needs to do is sit down with a Sandra Brown novel.

I wish I could take back every minute I spent reading The Old Man and the Sea (Ernest Hemingway). On the other hand, For Whom the Bell Tolls (also Hemingway) is one of my favorite books ever.

I think John Irving is a genius. Same goes for Tom Wolfe. Those two, I just can't put their books down! Sometimes this is embarrassing. I read The World According to Garp on an airplane and I spent the entire flight hoping the gentleman next to me had not read it. John Irving is quite the pervert.

My Daddy used to read The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (Mark Twain) to me, and I fell in love with Tom Sawyer. I wish he had been my first boyfriend when I was about eight years old. What a little rebel!

Thanks to Harry Potter and his friends, I want to visit London just to try walking through the brick wall at Platform 9 3/4.

Scarlett O'Hara. Need I say more?

There are so many great children's books... The Little House on the Prairie (Laura Ingalls Wilder) series, The Babysitters Club, Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret, Encyclopedia Brown...I am so excited to share some of them with you!

I suppose what I'm trying to say is to give ALL books a chance. You'll be missing out if you don't at least try James Patterson and John Grisham, F. Scott Fitzgerald and Nathaniel Hawthorne, the Bronte sisters and Jane Austen, Shakespeare and...well, I suppose Shakespeare should stand alone. And if you don't like Romeo and Juliet, so be it.