So Saturday, at the LA Times Festival of Books, Meg Cabot said her books are always lighthearted, like The Princess Diaries, about a girl who's dying for her BFF's brother to notice her and who also happens to be a princess.
Or the series Airhead, about an evil corporation that's giving gorgeous model-like girls brain transplants, about which she kept saying, "It could happen people. It. Could. Happen."
"I'm never going to write about heavy, depressing topics because my childhood was heavy and depressing," she said. "My father was an alcoholic and constantly said stuff like, 'you're stupid.' For me, reading was an escape."
Reading was for me, and still is, an escape. Did you read as a kid? Why or why not?
xoxo,
Suzanne
About Me
- Suzanne Casamento
- Author of Fingerprints, Choosing Tally, and All the Moments in Between. Tweet me @suzannecasamento
Read? Why, it was my absolute favorite thing to do as a kid. Everything I could get my hands on and if it was something I had to hide from my mother, than all the better.
ReplyDeleteAs a child I read every Black Beauty or horse story I could. Always wanted a horse or so I thought, but now that I could have one..... I'd rather do so many other things. But I loved the read :)
ReplyDeleteNow I go from fiction to real stories. Read 6 books while on my last journey! (half and half)
Reading has always been an escape for me. I love to get lost in stories of other times, other places. I don't mind dark or scary but there must be hope, some satisfaction against the odds.
ReplyDeleteI read all the time - everything! Most summers, I'd camp out in one of the trees in the backyard and read until it got dark. After that, under the covers with a flashlight. For a long time, every time I went home as an adult, I'd find another book that I hid from my mother as a kid - guess she eventually found them all.
ReplyDeleteI read voraciously as a kid. I didn't own a lot of books so if we didn't go to the library, I'd read and reread the books I had.
ReplyDeleteIt is an escape. Not escape from a hard life thankfully, but an escape from the ordinary tasks of life.
I wasn't an avid reader as a kid. I discovered the Famous Five by Edith Blyton when I was nine,then there was no turning back.
ReplyDeleteI read to escape. My favorites all had some make-believe element, like talking animals or magic or kid detectives...
ReplyDeleteMy love of reading was quickly squashed in 1st grade. My teacher was constantly telling me I read too slowly, boy did that make me feel dumb. From then on I perfected the art of skimming and pretending to read.
ReplyDeleteI loved reading as a kid. Not only was it an escape, but it was an adventure. I hated having to read out loud in front of the class though. When I had to do that, I might as well have had two tongues.
ReplyDeleteI'm sorry about your childhood, Suzanne. :( Mine wasn't that great either.
Hey Rena, I went back to my original post and realized I didn't put a dialogue tag on Meg's quote. She was the one who said her father was an alchoholic and called her stupid - not me.
ReplyDeleteI just added a "she said," in there to clarify. Sorry if that was confusing. And also sorry to hear your childhood wasn't that great. :(
I loved reading! It wasn't so much about escape for me; more about exploration and imagination. I loved to devour books!
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