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I don't remember being read to as a very young child. At the age of 3 my little brother passed away and life spun into chaos. We were all grieving and struggling to get by with everyday life. I don't think reading was an activity we did much together after this event. If so, I don't remember.

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From about kinder to second grade I marveled books. I felt like books were a secret code that I just couldn't figure out. At that time, I was taught using whole language approach. It was about the third grade when my teachers were catching on that this wasn't working. I still loved books and enjoyed reading along with my class and teachers. This is the first book I remember reading during guided reading.

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During the fourth grade I finally started reading real books on my own. I enjoyed Number the Stars and Charlie and the Chocolate factory. Titanic had just come out and I was obsessed with information on how it happened. I remember specially asking for these types of books in the library. I remember realizing the library was even better than I had previously thought. Libraries could serve as a resource for a specific purpose. AMAZING!

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With the help of some wonderful teachers and phonics I took off reading by this point. We moved to Katy, Texas and I had challenging, thought provoking lessons with each novel we were assigned. We had multiple novels we worked on throughout the year. I remember having DEAR time in 6th grade. I LOVED this 30-45 minutes. My parents started buying me books out of the book orders my teacher sent home. My favorites were Hatchet and Shiloh. One of my sisters got their hands on the book How Could You Do It, Diane? Maybe the theme of death and understanding it attracted me and my sisters to this novel. Looking back it was a little mature for my age, but given my life experiences I could handle it. At this point, nobody was going to stop me!

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I was interested and read all of the novels we were assigned in English class. I was one of those nerds to preferred to buy the books to highlight and write in them. I remember The Odyssey, Romeo and Juliet, 1984, Animal Farm, and Pride and Prejudice. I was reading all sort of books on my own. From biographies, realistic fiction, romance, and other novels by classic authors, I was always reading. My mom would buy books off of Oprah's Book Club and never end up reading them. Before I knew it I had a rather large collection of her books in my room.

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As an adult I don't have a favorite genre. I like everything, but find myself stuck in a certain genre if I find a book I love. I just cant get enough and suffer from major "book hangover". My first son was born last July. With school and professional reading I find myself not reading as much as I used to. I think the last book I read was a book on having a baby. I regret reading it to be honest!