“The writer’s words on the page create structure, character, and voice—but there are gaps, the dark matter, the unknown, and the not written. It is the reader who fills this gap. …Writer and reader have joined together to make the writing whole.” –Avi, Newbery acceptance speech
In this day and age, when organized pressure groups and politicians place such performative focus on “protecting” children from books, it got me thinking about my own reading life as a child. I was a voracious, flashlight-under-the-covers reader, and an avid-re-reader, since rereading old favorites felt like visiting old friends. Did I read some books that made me feel upset or uncomfortable, or give me false impressions of the world? Of course. Did I read books that transported me to immersive fantasy lands, or provided me comfort when I needed it most? Of course. Did I grow from both experiences? Of course.
But we all know that no reader has the same reaction to any book. Avi, quoted above, had it right in saying that the reader makes the book whole—the reader builds their own unique experience of each book they read. Books that upset me—Hunger Games gave me nightmares for a week—can be devoured by 5th and 6th graders with no such reaction. Every reader should be allowed to sew their own patchwork quilt of childhood reading, and if some patches are a bit grubby or ill-sewn, does that not reflect life? Who sews something perfectly the first time? The more you read, the better you become at creating your own reading life, and the more you engage with others’ experiences of their world(s), the more open you are to seeing the world around its corners.
Since summer is a good time for both reading and navel-gazing, below is a list of books I read as a child that stuck with me, for good or ill. I am aware that several of these books and series have dated or racist components, though I did not know that at the time. Please add your memorable childhood reads in the comments!
Betrayal
Beat the Turtle Drum by Constance C. Greene was the first book that I read in which an important character died. As a child, I felt really traumatized by that, and betrayed. It was the first time a book betrayed my trust, and it made me more wary of books from that point on. Looking back on it now, I try to find a positive side to this. It made me more selective and cautious in choosing books, and more aware of what I looked for in a book, certainly. I could say it was better for me to experience death in the pages of a book, but book characters felt so alive in my imagination that I can’t really claim that. Frankly, I’m still a bit mad about it!
Books about high school life and romance by Rosamond Du Jardin. My mother read these in high school and passed them on to me; they’re all about being a teenager in the 1950s, when they were written. After devouring them, I expected that when I got to high school, I’d have an active social life with lots of dates and boyfriends and dances and outings. Which…yeah, didn’t happen. The books might have offered an accurate (for certain values of “accurate” that didn’t include any people of color) portrayal of 1950s high school life, but not of the times that I attended high school. So while these were not a good choice to read in preparation for my high school years, they did give me insight into my mother’s experiences, and more awareness of the differences between eras.
No Flying in the House, by Betty Brock. In this book, a girl who is half-fairy must give up her magic to live with a real human family. This and many other books like it made me so sad as a child, because the main character had to give up what made them special and magical in order to belong. As I interpreted it, the price of belonging was conformity and loss of individualism. I think for me it was akin to having to give up childhood and all the things I loved as a child to be an adult—which we all know isn’t true! I don’t think this is a great message to give kids: black and white choice, no possibility of compromise, and hiding or giving up your true self to be loved. Other readers may argue that such books explore making choices and hard decisions, which of course is part of life. As a kid, though, this type of book just exacerbated my fears of growing up.
Upstanding
I’ve forgotten the title(s) of the specific book or books that led to the following incident, but I know that my feelings and determination came from books I had read. My paternal grandfather had both legs amputated because of poor circulation. When we were visiting him in Florida one time, and were out and about, a kid I didn’t know asked about his legs. I had read many books in which kids distanced themselves from anything they thought would bring judgement or mocking from other kids, and it always turned out to be a bad decision on their part; it showed a lack of courage and love. I decided I was not going to be that person, and I proudly claimed my grandfather and explained the amputations. Score a big one for books!
Worldview
The Little House series by Laura Ingalls Wilder made me aware of how different daily life was at different points in history. I used to go around my own modern world thinking, “What would Laura Ingalls think of this?” I think that marked my first awareness of the chronology of history, and that we lived at a different point in time than other people. Also, it made me aware that people in history were people, with thoughts and hopes and dreams and families, the same as me. It made history feel much more real to me.
When I was a child, we had a pile of paperback picture books that offered nonfiction descriptions of the lives of children around the world, with extensive black-and-white illustrations. Unfortunately, I was not able to track down the series title, but it was possibly published by Silver Burdett. That series helped me understand that not everybody lived the way we lived; that people in other places lived very different lives. I was fascinated by those alternative experiences of living, and it may be one reason why when I read, I look for rich world building.
Comfort
Are you There God? It’s me, Margaret, by Judy Blume. I owe so much to this book! Back in the day, I was always a kid who wanted to freeze time. I didn’t want things to change because I feared change, and feared what leaving childhood behind would both mean and entail. Thus, I was also really scared of getting my first period. Reading this book, in which the girls eagerly anticipated this event, lifted a huge weight off my shoulders. Thank you, Judy Blume!
The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis. I always loved fantasy books, and often read favorite series over and over. Narnia was one of them. I remember when I embarked on an eight hour solo bus trip to a summer camp in southern Oregon, my stomach was in knots about traveling so far on my own and being so distant from my family. What helped was telling myself I wasn’t actually going to camp, I was going to Narnia, because I planned to immerse myself in that familiar world during the long bus drive. I remember thinking, “To Narnia and the north!” and that offered me great comfort. As an anxious kid, a familiar book provided an escape, and that’s something that still works for me today.
Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH, by Robert C. O’Brien. I loved this book, even if I had zero idea how to pronounce “NIMH” (I called it “Nee-ma-ha”!). One time, when we were enduring an endless family road trip in the summer in a car with no AC and two rambunctious brothers, I retreated to the way-back with this book. I remember telling my mother that I hadn’t known that reading about someone else’s troubles could take you out of your own. Again, that still works for me today!
Autonomy
Billy and Blaze series by C.W. Anderson. I was a horse lover as a kid, so of course I adored these picture books with their gorgeous black and white illustrations by C.W. Anderson—I have some Anderson prints up on my wall even now. What I also loved about these books as a kid was that having a horse meant Billy could saddle up and ride off on his own. He could explore the world to his heart’s content and basically be independent. That seemed amazing to me as a kid, which surprises me now; when it came to me becoming independent, it was like pulling teeth!
Another book on this theme that I loved was the first Boxcar Children book by Gertrude Chandler Warner, in which the children had to live on their own in a boxcar. I also liked one of the Carolyn Haywood books about Eddie (Eddie and Gardenia). Spending time on a huge ranch in Texas, Eddie got to learn to drive, and could motor around the ranch on his own at about age eleven. That seemed amazing to me. My mother told us that her mother learned to drive at age nine, around the time cars were still a new thing, but that had certainly changed by the time I came around! And, true to form, I had to be bribed to learn to drive, sigh.
Idiosyncrasy
The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett may be responsible for my many dreams of houses. In the dreams, I’m exploring familiar houses with spaces that I knew were there, but had forgotten about. I’m pretty sure that all goes back to Mary Lennox exploring Mistlethwaite Manor’s hundred abandoned rooms.
The Little Silver House by Jennie D. Lindquist. Because I’m synesthetic, I’ve taken an interest in the books published over the last twenty or so years that feature synesthetic characters. Many of these books describe kids struggling with people who don’t understand what they’re talking about, or don’t think it’s a real thing, causing the kids to wonder if something is wrong with them. However, because of this book, I never felt odd or wrong because two of the characters also see color in letters. So even though I didn’t learn the word “synesthesia” until adulthood, I always had a model that my experience of this phenomenon was real, and even better, it was fun!
The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood, by Howard Pyle. I fell in love with this book so hard that I read it over and over and over. I loved it so much that my mother helped me make a Robin Hood costume that I frequently wore around the house—I was a cosplayer before the word existed! I wanted so much to belong to that world. I wanted to live in the beautiful forest (I’m one of those kids who found forests magical), and I wanted to be as strong and dashing and accomplished as Robin Hood and his men. I did not want to be Maid Marian! When I reflect on this now, I’m not sure if I learned the lesson that girls can’t have adventures, therefore it was better not to be one, or if I was leaning into some body dysmorphia. Perhaps both?
Grimms’/Andersen’s fairy tales. I loved these stories so much, but I also sometimes felt a little uneasy with how lost I could get in them—how “sticky” they felt in my brain, even long after I’d closed the book. I think that was my introduction to how much power books could hold over me. It was a gift, yes, but not always a comfortable one. It’s a necessary one, though, if you are to allow books to change you.
My life would be so much poorer without the patchwork quilt of books I’ve sewn into myself since the day I first encountered stories. I hope we never stop fighting for kids’ rights to sew their own experiences with books they choose for themselves.
