Featured What Book Series Did You Grow Up Reading?

Jivvy: I adore watching the Property Brothers -- even though they do almost EVERYTHING that I would never do! They are great fun, they make a lot of people happy, and almost every home looks lovely when they are finished. I bring this up to point out that I CAN enjoy other points of view.

EXCEPT when they remove an entire wall of built-in bookcases!!! I can live with eating in the kitchen, and lounging in the dining room. But I CANNOT forgive the removal of bookshelves!!

 

Did any of you live in an area which had a public library "bookmobile" which came around to neighborhoods during the summer when school was out?

I grew up living in the county/countryside. We got books from our school's library during the school year and from the bookmobile during the summer months. Twice a month Daddy took us to the "city" (public) library to find (even more) books we wanted to read.

I read so much that my mother would make me go outside to sit in a chair to read books so that I would get enough sunshine and fresh "country" air.

 

LOL! My mother too! I used to say I was going for a walk. I'd head out toward the orchard, get out of sight of the house, climb an apple tree (and get some to much), perch on a chubby limb, and then pull the book out of my shirt. Shhhhh!

 

Just reading that made my heart skip a beat. Destroying built-ins seems like a mortal sin!

 

Doesn't it just!!

BTW, one of my favorite quotes on this subject comes from one of my daughters. She and and her husband had a carpenter in their place to build some bookshelves. Apparently they were appalled when when they saw the finished product.

"They were," said my daughter, "bookshelves for those who don't read!"

 

Speaking of bookmobiles, "Parnassus on Wheels." Christopher Morley's precursor to "The Haunted Bookshop."

 

Hi silverthwait - you mention Grace L Hill Lutz...I happen to have The Beggarman, a 1932 copy with dust jacket, I picked up somewhere in my collecting interesting-looking books. It may have come from the used book shelf at the library of donations they didn't want to keep. It's in nice condition except some fool added a red dot on the bottom and the middle pages where sewn have some creases at the top but otherwise quite clean and still intact. I'm assuming you have this book but in case you don't, I thought I'd mention it here. Let me know if you'd like more info on it. Or anyone else. The story is no longer relevant for me so it's not a keeper.

 

I 'found' those books at the library one day and absolutely loved them! I have one of his other books "The Powder of Sympathy". I've yet to read it but knew it was one to grab when I saw it, long ago now. Maybe it's time to do so.

 

lots of Dickens, Scott, Fenimore Cooper, Jules Verne, Alexandre Dumas. I think they thought the thicker the books, the better to keep him quiet and busy.
and Karl May.

 

Oh, I forgot how I liked those books.
Thanks for reminding me.

 

I had Nancy Drew as a series but not all of them. What I remember most from grade school days were the Bunty paper magazines sent to me by a pen pal in Scotland, which my 4th grade teacher, a Scottish woman, set up for those of us who wanted one. My pal's name was Valerie Shedden and she lived in Edinburgh. She was two years older though so we only wrote for a couple years but she sent me a half dozen Bunties and a rabbit's foot with a glass amethyst for my birthday, which I still have as well (and it hasn't been eaten down by bugs!). I remember 'The Four (Five or Six?) Marys' as being the most intriguing of the comics inside but also a funny little cartoon girl who always got into a mess. These are packed away but I pull them out every decade to check their condition. Quite frail now but still readable.

Funny how all these connections to Scotland go way back because even now my fav series are from there as well - I love the (Ian Rankin) Inspector John Rebus books (just put a hold on his latest!!) and Denise Mina's works are tops also. Anything police procedural that isn't overly misogynist (which eliminates a lot of popular american male mystery writers on my list) and has more Sherlock than dumb luck at finding the solution.

Other books come to mind from way back as well - the Half Magic books by Edward Eager (loved the illustrations). And a different book by Astrid Lindgren called 'Mio, My son' somehow grabbed my heart. I found it in the library one day when in my 30s and just the first illustrations brought tears to my eyes. Books are such incomprehensible treasures but again it has to be the inherent, deliberate (I think) power of a written language and our brains ability to transform these lines and scribbles into a visual reality that makes us more human than anything else. And why it's so important we never lose it. Thanks for this thread! Very fun.

 

Zinnie, I had a few pen pals when I was that age, too. Just today, I was showing my sister various things on my Christmas tree that were sent to me by pen pals in the mid-1960's: a small bear and a Kuntslerschutz lion in a glass globe ornament from Renate in Austria, a small anime-type critter from Michiko in Japan, and a little stuffed kiwi bird from Miranda in New Zealand. I stayed in touch with Renate the longest, but our correspondence petered out when I went away to school.

I still have all their letters and all the little gifts they sent to me!

 

That's so cool! I never thought to add my rabbit's "claw" to the holiday tree probably because it isn't like those rabbit foot stubs we'd get on short chains back in the 50s (I think I'm a decade older than you). It's like a furry hand with a small gold metal ring on one of it's appendages. The 'amethyst stone' was at the top of the pin. Very strange actually. Maybe for securing a plaid skirt? I didn't wear it very much but it's always been this exotic keepsake. Then after I posted my comment I immediately thought 'What if Val was on this forum and she saw my message...?" Stranger things...! Your treasures sound lovely.

 

I just realized your avatar picture looks like what I imagined Trixie Belden looked like when she and Honey were out sleuthing around!

Oh, and thanks for reminding me of Louisa May Alcott!

@silverthwait , wondering HOW does one go about divesting themselves of 6000 books? I ask because I must do this soon..

 

My parents basically didn't care what I read as long as I read. We were thar family who ALL read at the dinner table. With the (unwatched) TV on. My grandmothers had both left school at 14, but read voraciously - from womens "papers", as magazines were known, to Mrs Gaskell.

I'd read my way through the children's public library by the time I was about nine, so they let me join the adult section. I still remember the joy of finishing my O levels, hurtling round there and grabbing nine books to devour. We used to travel abroad by car and Ma and I would stuff every corner with readables. Pa once counted fify five books being unearthed when we got to Spain. And oh, the joy when we found the local town library would let us join as temporary readers.

 

Side road here. The year each of my children were born, they rec'd their first tree ornament for Christmas. Every Christmas thereafter, came a new one. As other people thought this was a good idea, ornaments sometimes came from friends and relatives. When the tree was dismantled, each child's ornaments went into a separate box.

There were actual ornaments, mementos -- all kinds of things. Everything got put on the tree every year, along with the lights and our own ornaments. (One of my aunts gave me a tiny, silver mesh bag, with an aqua silk hankerchief inside. All four inches of it hung bravely under my son's British guardsman.)

By the time they left home, I STILL had a crowded tree! One of them told me gleefully that once her tree was up, her box had enough ornaments for the whole thing. My son's tree was quite lovely, but characterless -- until I brought out the box I had toted cross-country for him. Big difference between a smile, and a great big Christmas grin!

The box for the third child...well, that one I could not find. It apparently had been lost when I moved. I didn't talk about it with her, but continued to search. And search. And search.

Until Christmas Day. We talked on the phone, and she was so delighted that her tree was fully populated with flocks of angels, and other baubles! Seems she had taken her box with her, and never thought I didn't know!

Back in the day, one had Hope Chests. We have Christmas Boxes.

 

Silver, we did the exact same thing! When each of the kids moved out, he/she had enough ornaments for at least a medium sized tree. (I must add, however, that my son's fiancee doesn't LIKE some of his ornaments and has banished them to a small tree in his office...)

 

your son should overrule his gal.......or put her over his knee !!
it's not nice to come between a son & his Mom....where X-mas traditions are concerned.....
Just speaking out loud here..................

 

Oh dear on the banishment. I feel for you. Why do people make life so hard sometimes?

 

Well, guys, this is the same girl who caused him to say to me, "Mom, she doesn't like my stuff," way back when they first got together a couple of years ago. (I posted about it at the time.)

I continue to simply smile and nod. I don't need the discord that arguing would undoubtedly cause.