General Discussion

As a kid with a learning disability (Dyslexia), I had a contentious relationship with reading. Then I had an English teacher who would scatter a bunch of books on a table and told us to pick one. She said she'd rather us read stories we want to read over not reading at all.

I chose the Golden Compass by Philip Pullman.

After that, I got into fantasy, the Dragonriders of Pern and I've really loved reading from that point forward.

Does anyone else have that one book that really got you to enjoy reading?

It was a queer romance from my school’s summer reading list actually! I can’t really remember when I’d read it but I remember ended up purchasing the book and its sequel. Now that’s spiraled into my crowded book collection of like 60+ =D

As a kid my ADHD made it super hard for me to read. I'd get bored of it quickly and go play video games instead. That all changed though when I saw the Guardians of Ga'hoole movie when I was around 10 as funny as it sounds. I became absolutely obsessed with the book series and that's how I started reading. I'm still a bit of a slow reader but I'm glad I got into it!

I love reading now, but I actually was quite fussy with it back in Primary School - we did 'reading groups' where we'd all pick a book, read it as well as do tasks on it, but none of the books ever picked interested me so I refused to engage.

To be honest, I don't think I started properly reading without dropping a book until the pandemic started - while I can't remember exactly what got me into reading, I believe it was the Wings of Fire series. I had gotten it back in 2019 but I dropped it out of disinterest (because Arc 1 was honestly boring to me - still is)

Picked it back up in 2020 during lockdown and breezed through the whole thing in a matter of days. After that, I seem to remember reading much more than I used to.

And now I'm bad for impulse buying books that take me months to get around to reading lmao

in elementary school my teacher handed me a book about a kid's family moving to a new country with hopes of starting a new life only to return as they couldn't keep up with the pace of the live there and they missed their home a lot. i've read books prior to that, but that one in particular was my first time reading an actual book and needless to say it got me hooked.

also, i have almost all the books of the author. they mean so much to me.

i've been enamored with reading since i was a little kid. baby autistic me would LOVE diving into alternate worlds and povs, and seeing things from perspectives asides from mine actually helped develop my empathy to a level that i probably wouldn't have otherwise ;3

i'd always bury my nose deep in various books, and in a bit of a twist i actually got most of my favourites from the books that school made us read for literature. did anyone else have "number the stars" in grade five?

i think the book series closest to my heart is Wings of Fire, mostly because it was the one book series that i genuinely got super attached to -- most other books were too niche, even if i was hungry for more writings of them, and since WoF had a dedicated fanbase it helped cultivate my interest into what was maybe a four-year hyperfixation

I've always been a reader, but I think the books that really got me into reading were Duco's Gevleugelde Dromen (an old Dutch book about a boy who, in his dreams, gets taken to a real place that's under a magic spell. eventually his dreams provide the key to break the magic spell in the waking world), a book we had with King Arthur stories (I don't think I have that exact book anymore but I have a different version now), and De Brief Voor De Koning (translated to English as The Letter For The King). in hindsight, it's really no surprise that I love folktales and medieval fantasy.

i use to not read just in spite of elementary school, but there was a birthday where everyone had gotten me all books for my present as punishment.. haha..and i remember loving this one book, waterfall by kate lauren.

it was such a good read to me back then i was keeping up with the series. but that was the book that got me really into the fantasy genre.

i've tried to read that book again since ive forgotten all about it.. but its just not the same anymore lol. i just think ive outgrown books like that.

For me, it was Roald Dahl books, Alice In Wonderland, and the Narnia series.

I wasn't an avid reader as a kid, but I still liked looking at those scholastic book order forms - I don't know if those are still a thing, but it was basically a small cheap paper order form that was usually only 2-3 pages and had books and other educational stuff. You'd fill it out and give it to one of your teachers with some money, and they'd mail order it for you as part of a bulk order through the school.

One day this order form had a unicorn themed book on it. I had to order it - I 100% just wanted it because I liked the cover.

And.... I loved it! It was the story of a girl who jumped into a portal to another world to escape from her dad. She palled around with a unicorn, some sort of weird sloth man, a very erratic squirrel creature, and uhhhh.... some dude iirc. There was a dragon at some point. It has been a long time since I've read it, so I don't really remember the why or the finer details of the adventure. I just remember I liked it.

It kicked off my love of fantasy books - and maybe possibly also my appreciation for unicorn-adjacent creatures like the Companions in the Mercedes Lackey books?

Anyway, it was called Into The Land Of The Unicorns by Bruce Coville.