Books: Wonderful things indeed

Some books on my "read soon" list. My Nook sits on top.

Books on bookshelves and on bedside tables at home; books in the public library; books in bookstores: I love to be surrounded by books.

My love affair with books began when I was a child. I remember taking books down from the bookshelves in the living room before I could read. I searched the pages for the one word that I knew, the word “the.” I ran my finger along the sentences until I saw my word, and then I would say it aloud: “the.”

I don’t remember learning to read. I just remember being able to read and loving it.

Even as a child, I enjoyed reading more than one book at a time. I carried a little stack of three or four books around with me, from one reading spot to another, entering first one world and then another as I switched from book to book.

I probably very much needed books as a child. Sometimes I needed the comfort, and I certainly needed something constructive and beautiful to do while I waited in hospital waiting rooms, doctor’s offices and at relatives’ homes.

I loved mysteries from the start. My favorites were the Trixie Belden books and the Nancy Drew books. I also loved the Laura Ingalls Wilder books, books by Maud Hart Lovelace and any book about horses.

I liked biographies, too, especially about strong women who made their way in the world like Amelia Earhart.

I like to say I practically grew up in our local public library. I loved walking the aisles, looking for something new. I loved the smell of the library. I loved the quiet. I loved the love of books that hung in the air.

During high school, I usually had a pleasure reading book with me so that, if I finished my work in class before everyone else did, I could bring it out and read a few pages before class picked back up.

I loved books so much I majored in English in college and got a master’s in English.

I have written before how obsessive-compulsive disorder has affected my reading on and off for years. I obsessed over whether or not I had “really” read every word and would reread passages until it felt “right” to move on.

It’s one of the most awful ways OCD has affected me because it hits at part of what defines me.

Thankfully, I can now usually push through the obsessions and keep reading until the anxiety subsides.

Most of the fiction books I read now are mysteries and thrillers. My favorite authors in those categories include Sue Grafton, Kathy Reichs, Meg Gardiner, Lee Child and Nevada Barr.

I also enjoy memoirs and other nonfiction books. Some recent reads include

*The Mindful Writer: Noble Truths of the Writing Life. By Dinty W. Moore

*The Foreign Language of Friends. By Nadine Feldman.

*Here If You Need Me. By Kate Braestrup.

*Blue Nights. By Joan Didion

*The Memoir Project. By Marion Roach Smith

Some books I hope to start soon:

*Behind the Beautiful Forever. By Katherine Boo

*The Animal Manifesto. By Marc Bekoff

*Freedom from Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder. By Jonathan Grayson, PhD

*The Affair. By Lee Child

*Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail. By Cheryl Strayed

  How much do you like to read? What are some of your favorites? What have you read lately? Please share!