My Reading History
I thought that it would be fun to see how things have changed throughout the years in terms of how much I’ve read and what type of books I've read! I’m going to go into a fair bit of detail here but the initial idea came from the Bookish Beginnings tag on Youtube, which was created by Lauren from Reads and Daydreams.
Since being read to as a child I’ve always had a fascination for books. The first books I actually remember collecting and getting excited about were the Beatrix Potter books, starting off with The Tale of Peter Rabbit. These were short books which focused on a different character story each time and I think the illustrations helped develop the link with descriptive words and a visual picture. I adore these books and will always remember them to be the spark that started off my own independent reading as a child.
From here on, it just snowballed with reading. I was lucky enough at the time to live right round the corner from my local little library, which held all sorts of activities and challenges for children to encourage reading. Of course, I wanted to participate in all of them and became well known to the staff for my book devouring! During this stage I particularly remember getting really into Chris D'lacey's series; The Last Dragon Chronicles and then really into Cornelia Funke books, my favourites being The Dragon Rider (Maybe I had an obsession with dragons?) and the Inkspell trilogy.
Just after this was when my Harry Potter obsession began, after being read a chapter every day in English class in primary school. Although I got sucked into the story, I was got frustrated that we had to read the story so slowly and when other children disrupted the teacher. Sooooo, I went home and asked my parents if we could buy the books that were out!
Over the next couple years I read a lot, ranging from The Spooks Apprentice series by Joseph Delaney, Eragon by Christopher Paolini to the Alex Rider series by Anthony Horowitz - this is the point where I really began reading more teenage fiction and when I read Twilight before the world went crazy! Reading this sparked my liking for paranormal and romance books and from there I delved into series like Hush Hush by Becca Fitzpatrick, The Secret Circle by L.J Smith and The Darkest Powers series by Kelly Armstrong.The next phase of books I remember being particularly wrapped up in are the Mortal Instruments by Cassandra Clare and The Divergent books, along with the Vampire Academy series. This was the first time I became really keyed into release dates and using online to discover new books to read. At this point I had a part time job that I could use a little of to buy books, although my parents made sure I didn't buy too many and became more wary of my reading and book collecting habits. I remember going into Waterstones one time on my lunch break to buy Insurgent on its release day, only to release once I was home that that particular batch of books had been misprinted! I was so angry haha!
After a mini Dystopian obsession, I was struck ill suddenly and was off school for months, which is where I really relied on books to keep my brain active and to stop myself missing my friends. They provided another world to escape to when my own life wasn't goingthat great! This is when I finally delved into what is still my favourite genre to this day - Fantasy! Graceling, Fire and Bitterblue by Kristen Cashore quickly became favourites (and still are) and I began to read authors such as Maria V Synder, Trudi Caravan, Sarah J Maas and Robin LaFevers.
Soon enough my health improved and I moved on to start university, moving away from home. I read and bought books from my Kindle since they were cheaper and my reading habits slowed down as I was bogged down with work to do. However more free time came as I became ill again at the end of my first year of university, meaning I had to move back home and finish my studies there. At this point when I did read I went through an Adult Urban Fantasy phase such as Kelly Armstrong's books. My health improved again, but this meant back to university I went for my final two years, where not much reading happened due to the work load and socialising. I still kept up to date though with upcoming releases of series I hadn't finished yet!
Within a week of finishing university I had already got a really good job back home, which did keep my free time minimal but also allowed me to have the spare money to purchase... you guessed it, BOOKS! I really got back into reading once again and exhausted my small local bookshops. So moved to the internet, where over the next year I began discovering books on amazon and from people from booktube. I was quick on discovering books that hadn't been released yet and got used to the agonising wait for release day. Its also the time I started my bookstagram and discovered that so many people loved books as much I did and everyone had such differing opinions and preferences to what they particularly enjoyed reading. I mainly did stick with fantasy books, but recommendations from people saw me delving into some contemporary books which previously I stayed clear of, such as Collen Hoovers books. During this period my favourite reads were The Mime Order, Falling Kingdoms, The Kiss of Deception, Snow like Ashes, The Lunar Chronicles and the Angelfall trilogy.
So, after all that, I now have a book haul at least once and month and an overwhelming tar pile - thank you Amazon, people of book tube and goodreads hahaha! As you can see, my love for books since my childhood has just swelled and I wouldn't have it any other way, as I, as many others do, get so much enjoyment from what others would just think as boring words on a page. Little do they know what an adventure they are missing out on.Hope you're all doing well, I'd love to hear some of your own reading histories, long or short!
Happy Reading xox
