Like most librarians, I have been an avid reader all of my life. My tastes in books are constantly changing. As a kid, I loved series like The Baby-Sitters Club. In middle and high school I spent a lot of time perusing Mary Higgins Clark's mysteries and Garfield comic books. I went through a phase during my undergrad years where all I was interested in reading were poetry and the "classics"--Frost and Fitzgerald and
Lord of the Flies. These days I'm all about non-fiction (especially humor, true crime, and pet stories), popular contemporary fiction, and short-story anthologies. Honestly, I will read pretty much anything, with a few exceptions: I am not interested in anything Nicholas Sparks or the like; I can't get into apocalyptic tales (sorry, but the idea of the world ending just doesn't do positive things for me); and I'm not a fan of historical fiction (but I chose it as a genre to explore for this class because broadening my horizons is a good idea). Like I said, I'm open to nearly any genre, and I'll also read any length, from
B.J. Novak's one-page stories to
Norman Mailer's 1000+ page narrative of Gary Gilmore's criminal history. I'm really looking forward to seeing what everyone else is reading this semester and to expanding my book interests!
I love non-fiction animal stories, too. Another of my favorite books that I totally forgot about in my profile is "A Big Little Life" by Dean Koontz about his amazing dog Trixie, a trained seeing-eye dog who couldn't fulfill her purpose because of hip problems.
ReplyDeleteI'm with you on the apocalyptical stories. I just cannot push myself to read zombie, watch zombie, or anything like it. It's just a little too intense.
ReplyDeleteI also read a lot of Garfield growing up. My daughter will read anything Garfield now. I might have to look into the Mary Higgins Clark for a mystery annotation.