Favorite childhood book.

TangerineSpeedo

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Now that everybody is in bed...
Literature was a big part of my life growing up, I was fortunate, I know that now, but it was normal to me back then.
Lets start with the first... The little engine that could... Forget about the moral of the story... Trains duh...
For my birthday, my mom got me one of those book of the month subscriptions in elementary school. So that list includes:
Treasure Island
James and the Giant Peach
Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory
NatGeo put out a book called Cowboys, I would reread that all the time.
Cher on the cover of Time magazine... Wait, that wasn't a book but a piece of literature that affected me :cool:
Junior high:
Wrinkle in Time
Big Red, This book I loved and in fact later in life I found a signed copy which later was lost, disappeared, but most likely stolen.
Mr. Thomas would read parts of the Iliad and the Odyssey.
Easy Rider magazine, for the motorcycle articles... I had a minibike chopper with a Briggs&Stratton 5hp motor with a centrifugal clutch...

I think high school things started to take off. I was fortunate again, in that you got to choose your english teacher by the books you studied, each teacher would teach a different book each semester.
Romeo & Juliet
Of Mice and Men
Grapes of Wrath
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
The Illustrated Man (this book got me hooked into Sci-Fi literature)
Free reading time (remember that?)
S.E. Hinton series... Rumble fish etc. (shoutout to ponyboy and to chocolate cake for breakfast)
The Quartzite trip. I think the most underrated book ever. (Screenplay rights anyone)
The Warriors

College years:
While not a lot of time for personal reading there are some significant ones;
Orson Scott Card was a master in portraying humanity and future technology in the Ender Game series.
Hearts of Darkness
So, also being at this time is when I started saltwater aquariums;

The Marine Aquarium Reference: Systems and Invertebrates​

Dr. Burgess's Atlas of Marine Aquarium Fishes​

Unfortunately, reading seems a thing of the past. While I frown upon E-books, because you just can't read a few pages at night until your eyes are tired, unless you risk dropping your laptop or Ipad on the floor. You can download some great classics to read on an airplane or beach.
This is a great thread, it helped me trace back through my past through literature to where it all went wrong...
#2997
 

Gumbies R Us

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I’ve got a couple I have memories reading a ton as a kid
The where’s Waldo books. I would read these for hours, and whenever it was “library day” at our school these were usually the books I would take for the week.

Garfield compilations: I would read the first 3 volumes of the Garfield compilation books all the time as a kid (ex. The first one would have books 1-3 in it and they would be in color vs black and white)

DK Smithsonian institute ANIMAL: this was just a huge animal encyclopedia, it was fun learning about the various animals of the world, what was endangered back then and where they were located

A Pokémon compendium book: odd one I know, but the Pokémon book I read had the first 4-5ish Pokémon in it, the stats, moves, and where you could find them in the games. I would look at the book so much and would always wonder if I could ever get some of the listed pokemon

These are just a few of the books I loved as a kid
 

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My favorite book was White Fang by Jack London. That led me to Call of the Wild and then every dog book I could find. When I finished those I moved on to Black Beauty and every horse book I could find. Finally when I read almost all the animal books I was stuck with Pete, the peg legged duck, LOL.
 
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As adults we can look back at our early childhood. Each generation are represented here on R2R. What book do you have the fondest memory of? Mine is Where The Red Fern Grows. Went to school in the early 70's

One of mine was "Fish do the Strangest Things":

1736686972991.png
 

ISpeakForTheSeas

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But where's the Lorax? Where's @ISpeakForTheSeas < I'd be interested to know what books from your past got you interested in marine biology.
Haha, my book would probably be The Wind in the Willows.


Surprisingly, none of the books I read got me into marine biology - my first kid watching ants fight in the yard got me interested in ecosystems and vivariums/terrariums, but I basically knew nothing of and never thought about oceanic life (despite having been to a couple of public aquariums) until I walked into my kid's doctor's office and saw they had a saltwater tank in the office ~3 weeks before I joined Reef2Reef (their tank really struggled, and they eventually got rid of it).

Seeing that tank surprised me because I didn't realize you didn't have to be a public aquarium to keep saltwater tanks (for context, I grew up in the desert, and the only fish I had ever seen people keep were goldfish, bettas, and - in ponds outside - koi, and because of improper care, the aquarium fish rarely lived longer than a month). Once I realized that anyone could keep saltwater tanks, how complex of an ecosystem saltwater tanks could be, and how cool various ocean critters were, I got hooked, and I've been learning ever since (so, for a little over 3 years now).
 

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As a small child, these were my absolute favorites.
1736694056803.png 1736694104888.png 1736694482921.png 1736694526633.png


My first "real" book that I got into was Bunnicula series. 1736694665328.png
I also had the weekly reader books and was fond of choose your own adventure style. I got into mystery books with Something Queer series. Specifically Something Queer at the Haunted School.
1736694878254.png

I stopped reading for fun in JR High until I was about 20.
 
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OK, I seriously need to stop posting and go to bed.....

@PharmrJohn, we've talked before privately, you know my background, and I know I'm going to get smoked here, but.....

When I was all of about 8 years old, I found an old paperback book while my family was visiting my grandparents at their old house. I was rummaging around the basement. I couldn't find it now to save my life, but it was about..... Bigfoot lol!

Yes, my friends Bigfoot!

Those stories from that book served for some mighty frightening "campfire" stories when my 13 year old friends and I "camped out" in someone's parent's back yard :)

I am now an adult (arguably), I have a legit degree in Bio, a minor in Chem, and an AS in engineering. I consider myself a reasonable man, but I do LOVE ME a good Bigfoot story lol! I like to camp, and sometimes when I'm "out there" I listen for the "Big Guy". Maybe one of these days lol!!!

I'm not going to say I've ever seen a Big Foot/Squatch, but please, please, give me a grant to go sit in the woods and watch for one....... Man, would I love THAT job lol!

Clearly, I should go to bed!

1736663608719.png

Have a great night everyone!
Nice!
 
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My favorite book was White Fang by Jack London. That led me to Call of the Wild and then every dog book I could find. When I finished those I moved on to Black Beauty and every horse book I could find. Finally when I read almost all the animal books I was stuck with Pete, the peg legged duck, LOL.
I forgot both White fang and Call of the Wild! Yes. I lived in Alaska as a kid and loved reading them. Thank you
 

exnisstech

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My favorite book was White Fang by Jack London. That led me to Call of the Wild and then every dog book I could find. When I finished those I moved on to Black Beauty and every horse book I could find. Finally when I read almost all the animal books I was stuck with Pete, the peg legged duck, LOL.
I forgot about Jack London. I read those two as well and enjoyed them very much.

I wonder if anyone else has read
The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge. I wouldn't consider it a classic series by any stretch of the imagination but I really got into them. I suppose being in an altered state myself at the time probably helped. I even remember trying to astral project but was never succesful :rolling-on-the-floor-laughing:
 

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I just remembered another. The Outsiders.
No pony boy! Lol
I remember the outsiders from 6th grade and it was ironically appropriate growing up in Miami.
Found a copy of the diary of Anne Frank being nosey in my sister's closet. Now that can trip a small kid out.
 
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No pony boy! Lol
I remember the outsiders from 6th grade and it was ironically appropriate growing up in Miami.
Found a copy of the diary of Anne Frank being nosey in my sister's closet. Now that can trip a small kid out.
Agreed, Anne Frank story would mess a kid up
 

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