An Affair with the Written World

Just like many of you out there, I started my affair with the written world when I was a little girl. I remember reading Sleeping Beauty, Tom Sawyer and Tintin as a young girl. I grew up in a family where you find everybody sitting in their favorite corners of the house with a book in hand on a lazy Sunday afternoon. 

My world was limited to reading weeklies, short stories and comics until I encountered Sidney Sheldon in my late (very late) teens. Almost everybody starts their book reading journey with Sheldon these days. He is one of the most popular writers of this age.

One thing I like most about books is that they make you imagine and learn at the same time. I am almost always influenced by the book's content. My English becomes better for a few days after I have finished reading a good book :D. Some are so engaging that you cry and rejoice along with the characters. Whenever I start reading a book it is as if I establish a connection with it. I just cannot put it down until I finish it. One such book that commanded my entire attention was The Silence of the Lambs by Thomas Harris. I was involved so much in the book, I did not even know that my college had arrived. (I have the bad habit of reading during transit).

I am still in the novice stage of book reading, havent grown up beyond the fiction level. I once tried to count the number of books that I have read, though I couldn't recount exactly I did realize that I still haven't reached the level of a well read person but I'm on the way there. Though I have read tens of thrillers, political thrillers, dramas and romances but only a few still stay fresh in memory.

Sometimes books provide an emotional outlet. They inspire you. They heal you. Chicken soup for the Soul series are one such kind. I am glad that my uncle passed them on to me. I have cried and laughed (and my reading in transit habit has made me look like a fool on many occasions. I dont know what people think of me when I cry and laugh alternatively reading some stupid book) in equal measure after reading the stories in those books. I strongly recommend every one of you to read the series. (Now they come in many different flavors too.)

I dont know what kind of books you like or if you approve of the books that I read. (I still read Harry Potter over and over again. I am amazed at how creative JK Rowling is.) But I wish for everybody to read. Not just books. Anything from Wikipedia articles to I-have-no-important-point-to-make blogs like these. When you read varied genres you expand your horizons and you might even discover that you like something that you never knew about before that very moment. You might even develop a passion for reading random stuff. This is the age of information and knowing/reading a lot of information carves a special place for you.