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Do you remember, when you were a kid, what it was like to walk through the cafeteria with your lunch tray or walk down the aisle of the bus, and kids are putting coats and backpacks across the empty seats so you can’t sit down? Remember that feeling?
Or, say, you’re walking down the hallway at school and some girl comes up behind you and cuts a foot-long section of your hair off while her friends (yours too, you thought) laugh hysterically.
This is why books are so important during childhood. Because one day, you’ll open up a book and discover a child who hurts like you do, and suddenly, you’re not alone.
But it doesn’t stop there.
Because books are not just about company or validation. They shake up your ideas about everything you think you know. They show you that the world is infinitely more glorious and more wicked than you ever dreamed.
The world is no longer just a tiny corner crammed with backpacks and mean girls. And while you once walked silently past the girl holding the scissors, determined not to let her see you cry, now there are so many more possibilities.
My favorite children’s books?
Look behind an obsessive reader and you’ll usually find out why they ditched people for books. Tell me some of your early favorites. Or, better yet, tell me your own version of the scissors story.
Aw, I loved “The Giver.” I was one of the mean girls though. I hate to admit it now, but I was for sure one of them. Still, I love books. I guess I was escaping my family more than I was escaping the mean girls at school when I was a kid, which is probably why “Matilda” by Roald Dahl was my favorite.
P.S. Did the scissors story really happen to you? I can’t even imagine that?!?
I was equal parts tormentor and tormentee. I was just never in the middle where the normal people are.
Yes, the scissors story is true.
Great piece Susan. I remember the backpacks being shoved across the seats when I got on the bus. I fell in love with a book called The Velvet Room. I wonder if anyone else has ever heard of this one. About a girl who finds an abandoned house and upstairs is a beautiful fuschia velvet room filled with window seats with velvet cushions where she sneaks off to to read. I still have The Velvet Room in my where I sneak off to when I need it. Thanks for the reminder.
PS Brad Listi came and spoke at a UCSD publication panel I put on yesterday. Thanks for all the contacts you and he have put into my life. All those seats on the bus that you’ve opened up.
Amy, I just looked up The Velvet Room (I never heard of it; it sounds wonderful), and even better than the title is the author’s first name: Zilpha!
http://www.amazon.com/Velvet-Room-Zilpha-Keatley-Snyder/dp/0595321836
And PS. Right back atcha. xo
Wow! Who knew it would be on Amazon. I have a horrible memory, so I’m surprised that my details were still true after all these years. I think that book me how to be alone. It’s probably the sole reason I’m a writer. And who doesn’t want to know a Zilpha! I ordered a copy.
Thanks for this Susan– I loved all the books you pictured here. Also, I loved The Little Fur Family (a sweet cozy family who lives in a tree stump) and The Little Brute Family (a grouchy family who eat sticks and stone for breakfast, wear scratchy clothes, and have a kicking dog who wears hob-nail boots). I think all of my writing, including the two novels, clearly show how these two children’s books have influenced me.
Can’t tell you how much I love to hear about the books that influenced you guys!
Jessica, I’m linking your novel here: http://www.amazon.com/Summer-Naked-Swim-Parties-Novel/dp/0061452025
Thanks for posting the link Susan!
I see that your new book THE RUBY CUP comes out in September 2010, the same time that my new book comes out. We’re both with Harper Collins, so we MUST schedule some readings together next fall! Could be great fun, no?
Also, here’s Greg Olear’s AMAZON list of TNB books available now:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/richpub/syltguides/fullview/R2ZWTEB2AST9SX/ref=cm_srch_tsr_rpsy_alt
I would LOVE that! (P.S. I doubt that will be the title of my book by then… the marketing folks want me to find something better.)
When I was little, I loved ULTRA-VIOLET CATASTROPHE by Margaret Mahy. Quirky story about a girl and her great-uncle who go on an outdoor adventure. As an older child, a favorite was A WRINKLE IN TIME. I re-read it a couple of years ago, and it means even more to me now. I still hope love can conquer evil.
I was definitely a bookwormy kid, perhaps to avoid torment altogether. It’s easy to go unnoticed if you’re bowed over open pages.
Oh Margaret Mahy is a NZ author!! Yay!
One of the best things about having kids is you get to re-read books you loved as kids and find there was so much more to them. I don’t know ULTRA-VIOLET but I’m going to look it up.
I can’t really remember when I first got into books. I’ve always been a ridiculous reader, though. From a young age I was reading murder mysteries, and anything else my parents were done with. It wasn’t that I didn’t have friends – I somehow managed to fit sports and books into a busy early life.
But I do remember when reading became important. Rather than being something to fill my life, it became something that mattered, that I wanted to be a part of. That was when I read ‘Microserfs’ by Douglas Coupland. Having read so many dumb books before that, it was the first thing I read that I really related to and realised that books were necessarily about other people or imaginary things. They could reflect reality…
And since that day I’ve been doomed to read and write and care too much…
Love your story, David. I’m going to link this cool little book about techies: http://www.amazon.com/Microserfs-Douglas-Coupland/dp/0060987049
Thanks. I’ve just bought his new book, which I’ve heard is good. Everyone says his recent stuff sucks, but it’s alright. I can’t say that ‘Microserfs’ is the greatest book ever, but it sent me down a very important road.
the phantom tollbooth.
it taught me that words could even escape themselves (ah, symbolism!)
and as for tales of torment… well, I think you know my answer to that one.
xo.
Well, I love imagining you discovering those puns for the first time.
And we’ll tell tales of torment down at the whiskey grotto. Deal?
and I can’t forget “the giving tree”…
that one taught me that a great book can make you cry, and you have permission to.
That’s the best and perfectly said.
“The Giving Tree” has always struck me as- call me paranoid- sexist. Tree? Female. Boy? Male. Tree? Gives and gives and gives until there’s nothing left of her but a stump. Boy? Takes and takes as though its his due.
I’ve always read it this way, too.
I’ve heard that idea tossed around before, but it isn’t the read I got from it.
I guess I always read it through the eyes of a six year old boy with a mom that left.
the idea that anyone would stay and nurture for a lifetime was revolutionary for me.
I don’t think at that age “sexist” or “misogynist” were in my vocabulary.
Well, that’s beautiful and heartbreaking, and you’ve helped me see it in a new way.
I came to a lot of children’s books late, mostly as a babysitter reading to other kids, so I didn’t get a fresh look at many of them. I don’t think I knew the word sexist either, but I cried that the tree had been left only a stump, and I cried, too, but more out of the sense of longing and sacrifice.
I’ve always loved “The Secret Garden.” I have a theory that people (read: girls) can be divided into two camps: those who love “The Secret Garden” and those who love “A Little Princess.” It says a lot about a person, don’t you think?
I love The Secret Garden – the ghoulish crying in the huge empty house and the whole story of why the garden was shut off. I spent a lot of my childhood searching for a garden like that and believing it was just around the corner. I was surprised when I read the book to my kids to find all the Indian prejudice in it because I had no memory of that at all.
I loved Beverly Cleary’s “Dear Mr. Henshaw”. I read it when I was about 6 and it was the first time I recall becoming emotionally involved with a character. “Watership Down” by Richard Adams was also a big favorite.
I loved Ramona and the story of Henry Huggins when he was cast as the little kid in the Christmas play.
I should get Watership Down for my kids.
Oh my God! I’d forgotten all about Ramona.
‘Stay here for the present.’
Ramona’s great. And Pippi.
I forgot that story about “the present” and smiled when you reminded me of it.
Now, this is kind of old school, but I loved The Great Brain by John Dennis Fitzgerald. A few other good ones was The Westing Game, anything by Sharon Creech, and D’Aulaires Book of Greek Myths.
How funny that you brought up The Great Brain because I was walking down the street the other day, and a guy – a grownup – passed me with his nose in that very book. I was so curious, I went home and Googled it.
We have D’Aulaires and have read it over and over.
woah, talk about bad grammar. sorry, make that were the westing game, etc….
Look behind an obsessive reader and you’ll usually find out why they ditched people for books.
Love this.
My favorite book was The Secret Garden. But I also loved Ramona. And Pippi.
I re-read Pippi a year ago and was kind of shocked how good it was.
Hands down…Ramona the Pest, I had curls like Susan. Never had them cut off though. I did have wild frizzy hair, acne, glasses and braces so naturally seats were never saved for me!
I also loved Are you there God, it’s me Margaret and Forever both by Judy Blume
I just finished (like 2 minutes ago) Up from the Blue. Just amazing. The last paragraph was so poignant.
Kaye, You’ve made my day. Thank you.
And what great memories I have of each of those books you mentioned!
Kids room decor…
Thank you for this excellent write-up. I am usually searching for Kids room ideas to recommend in order to my own, personal readers. It is just what I was looking out for….