# First book to inspire reading?



## asdar (Oct 10, 2005)

I have two small kids who I'm trying to inspire to read. 

Well, it got me to thinking about what got me going. For me the first book I remember reading that got me going on my own and not for a project, or pushed on me by parents, was Hercules and the 12 Labors and Perseus. It was all one book, with a green cover with a picture of Medusa. I don't remember the author.

For my son it seems to be The Lion, the Witch and the wardrobe, but I gave him that so maybe not.

Does anyone else remember the book that started it off for them?


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## amara (Oct 10, 2005)

I remeber that the first book that got me off reading was the Hobbit, i use to hate reading before i read that, and now i love it!


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## Rane Longfox (Oct 10, 2005)

Aye, Narnia for me.


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## ommigosh (Oct 10, 2005)

I think that it was The Hobbit for me too.


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## FelineEyes (Oct 11, 2005)

A book with cardboard pages titled "Kitty's Colors".  It's still around the house somewhere.
"Here comes kitty with her colors, floating up to see the view.  Just like Kitty's dungareens all the sky is colored blue..."
Is it sad that I remember that?


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## terryweide (Oct 11, 2005)

I read because I had a grandmother who read book after book to me when I was a child. One of the earliest things I remember her reading to me was 365 Days, a book of bedtime stories, one story for every day of the year. I also remember reading kids mystery books like The Happy Hollisters.

Terry


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## GOLLUM (Oct 11, 2005)

FelineEyes said:
			
		

> A book with cardboard pages titled "Kitty's Colors". It's still around the house somewhere.
> "Here comes kitty with her colors, floating up to see the view. Just like Kitty's dungareens all the sky is colored blue..."
> Is it sad that I remember that?


NO NO that's a preciouos childhood memory that you should cherish IMO..


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## lazygun (Oct 11, 2005)

The Bible. 

Inspired to read something,anything else.
 Taught to read and write from the bible at pre-school and then Primary level.
Just found it a little bit too opressive even then.


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## stirdgit (Oct 11, 2005)

I can't remember the title but it was a book about a squirrel. She works hard to maintain her home but one day is forced to defend it.  I don't remember much more about it but I remember it had quite an impact on me and it sparked my passion for reading.  

By the way, if anyone knows the title, please let me know.  The book has to be at least 30 years old, so it is possible that it is no longer in print.


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## Jayaprakash Satyamurthy (Oct 11, 2005)

I started reading early, and tore through all the Winnie-the-Pooh, Noddy and Richard Scarry books my parents got me, and started clamouring for something more. A friend of the family, one of those old school Tolkien fans who often went through entire lives never meeting another True Believer, took the opportunity to suggest The Hobbit. Instead, my parents got me The Fellowship of the Ring. It was perfect. The humour and atmosphere in the early chapters are fairly close to the more kiddy tone of the The Hobbit, and the shift into a more epic, dark tone was pretty seamless. I started reading the trilogy before I was 8, and I can assure you that none of the scary stuff scarred me for life. The character of Gollum actually introduced me to a certain moral ambiguity at a tender age, and was the character I was most fascinated by for a while. 

After that, there was no looking back. I raided my parents' shelves of SF, western and mystery novels, and also read more traditional children's stuff like Enid Blyton, The Three Investigators and so on.


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## Mark Robson (Oct 11, 2005)

The Legend of Beowulf - childrens version had a fantastic cover with Beowulf creeping through a twisted forest and Grendel hiding in the trees.


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## jenna (Oct 11, 2005)

Narnia of course (my fave was The Horse and His Boy), and another book called I Am David which i happily found again a couple of years ago in a second hand store.


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## Thunderchild (Oct 11, 2005)

Jurassic park - my teacher was verry impressed.(i had a big thing about dinosaurs)


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## Animaiden (Oct 11, 2005)

Dealing with Dragons by Patrica Wrede.  I wasnt' an avid reader until then, but something just clicked.


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## Thadlerian (Oct 11, 2005)

Watership Down started it all for me. I read other stuff before that, but WD was what really got me into serious litterature.


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## Brian G Turner (Oct 11, 2005)

Conrad's War - not even sure who wrote it - was about a boy who lived out a fantasy of a being a Landcaster crewman in WWII. I think that was the first "proper" children's book I ever read (ie, all words, no pictures).

Really, it depends on the child's aptitude - find what subjects interest them, then engage them with it.

Hope that helps.


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## dwndrgn (Oct 11, 2005)

knivesout said:
			
		

> I started reading early, and tore through all the Winnie-the-Pooh, Noddy and Richard Scarry books my parents got me, and started clamouring for something more. A friend of the family, one of those old school Tolkien fans who often went through entire lives never meeting another True Believer, took the opportunity to suggest The Hobbit. Instead, my parents got me The Fellowship of the Ring. It was perfect. The humour and atmosphere in the early chapters are fairly close to the more kiddy tone of the The Hobbit, and the shift into a more epic, dark tone was pretty seamless. I started reading the trilogy before I was 8, and I can assure you that none of the scary stuff scarred me for life. The character of Gollum actually introduced me to a certain moral ambiguity at a tender age, and was the character I was most fascinated by for a while.
> 
> After that, there was no looking back. I raided my parents' shelves of SF, western and mystery novels, and also read more traditional children's stuff like Enid Blyton, The Three Investigators and so on.


The Three Investigators!!  I remember those!  The Stuttering Parrott.  Ha!  Great literature.  I remember re-reading some of them at college (for some odd reason they had copies in the school's library) during some down time in the library as I found them accidentally.  Good stuff


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## Esioul (Oct 11, 2005)

Grump the Caveman and And That Hairy Mammoth, (I think that is what its called). I also remember lining 'The Horse and his Boy' and 'I Am David', Jenna. The Hobbit too of course.


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## captaintripps (Oct 11, 2005)

Aasop's Fables.


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## Esioul (Oct 12, 2005)

I remember being disappointed by the pictures in that. So I added vibrancy to them with my coloured pencils.


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## Teir (Oct 12, 2005)

I remember reading a Winnie the Pooh book!. Mum says that when I was little I fell asleep with books instead of teddy bears or toys. 
 I do have a vivid memory of reading the Hobbit. I was eight or nine and my dad gave me a copy for my own. I read the Lord of the Rings about 2 years later but I preferred the hobbit.
 I was a huge fan of Nancy Drew and Enid Blyton novels, both of which I still keep in my book collection.  
Oh and Treasure Island! and King Arthur! and Robin Hood!  
*Teir dashes to explore some of her neglected books*


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## Thunderchild (Oct 12, 2005)

I said:
			
		

> Conrad's War - not even sure who wrote it - was about a boy who lived out a fantasy of a being a Landcaster crewman in WWII. I think that was the first "proper" children's book I ever read (ie, all words, no pictures).



i read that! thought it was great!


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## kaneda (Oct 12, 2005)

I'm not quite sure. I rememeber the narnia books were the first I read over and over and over again (even though bizarely i never owned the lion the witch and the wardrobe ). There was also another book series called Shirley Holmes, which was about a female detective, loved that as well


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## Leto (Oct 12, 2005)

asdar said:
			
		

> I have two small kids who I'm trying to inspire to read.
> 
> Well, it got me to thinking about what got me going. For me the first book I remember reading that got me going on my own and not for a project, or pushed on me by parents, was Hercules and the 12 Labors and Perseus. It was all one book, with a green cover with a picture of Medusa. I don't remember the author.



There's a lot of book regarding Greek Mythology for kids :  Greek Gods and Heroes by Robert Graves, The Orchard Book of First Greek Myths by Saviour Pirotta and Jan Lewis. Usually any mythological tales or fairy tales books is a sure bet for young kids.  That's how I got interested by having my parents and grand-parents reading greco-roman tales and Arabian nights to me. Then I went to read them by myself, then anything on hand...


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## Jonzey (Oct 12, 2005)

For me it was Harry Potter. I was a late starter


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## kaneda (Oct 12, 2005)

Leto said:
			
		

> There's a lot of book regarding Greek Mythology for kids : Greek Gods and Heroes by Robert Graves, The Orchard Book of First Greek Myths by Saviour Pirotta and Jan Lewis. Usually any mythological tales or fairy tales books is a sure bet for young kids. That's how I got interested by having my parents and grand-parents reading greco-roman tales and Arabian nights to me. Then I went to read them by myself, then anything on hand...



O god you're right Leto! There was a book of greek myths (with fantastic pictures) that got me obsessed with mythology. Totally forgot about those! A really good book for kids imo (even though the cover did scare me for a bit).


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## Rosemary (Oct 12, 2005)

I used to read my books under the bed sheets by the light of a torch, when I was very young.  Winnie The Pooh, The Secret Seven, Swallows and Amazons were some of the first books I remember the titles of.  
Narnia was really the first 'fantasy' book that I read while I was in Junior School.  I started reading Dicken's books at about 10 years old,  I still enjoy reading them all.   
Strangely enough, it wasn't until my son started school that I read The Hobbit and Then Lord of The Rings.  Since then I have read many wonderful 'fantasy' books!


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## Jason_Taverner (Oct 12, 2005)

the hobbit I think but I used to like the hardy boys coz we had loads in the house from a older cousin musty old paper backs they were great and someone mentioned the 3 detectives I think they were i can rememeber those as well i sure there was another similer set along with the famous 5


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## nixie (Oct 12, 2005)

There was The Secret Seven By Enid Blyton, I seem to remember some books set in Wales I think the author was Malcom Savile.My son never caught the reading bug, he has never shown the slightest interest.My niece is 8 and Roald Dhal is her favourite author.


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## goblinQueen (Oct 13, 2005)

Teir said:
			
		

> I was a huge fan of Nancy Drew and Enid Blyton novels, both of which I still keep in my book collection.


 
I was big into Nancy Drew as well. Really, any kind of stories involving a mystery. I also loved _The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe_. I really enjoyed stories revolving around animals, such as _A Cricket in Times Square_. Oh, and the _Ramona_ books.


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## amara (Oct 13, 2005)

Cricket in Time Square, i remeber my mom use to read that to me, i had forgotten about that book!!!  Such a good story!


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## Elphineas (Oct 13, 2005)

For me it was a big white book called The Book of Goodnight Stories.  It had a story for every day of the year and let me in on a few not-so-well-known fairy tales.


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## quiet cynic (Oct 13, 2005)

The original Grimm's Fairy Tales. Gruesome, and perfect for a kid who's already memorized all the sanitized Disney versions. I loved it.


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## An8el (Oct 28, 2005)

Hans Christian Anderson, told to me by my Danish father, was my intro to fantasy.  My parents wouldn't let me learn to read until I was 7 because they thought it spoiled a child's imagination. So I made up for lost time quickly, reading in first grade at fifth grade level. For some reason I really liked Paul Bunyun and Babe, his Big Blue Ox - a series of books. Charlotte's Web fascinated me, because it was from the point of view of a spider and spiders were everywhere.
"myths every child should know" It was a book from the 1920s with color plates that had little pieces of wax paper on them with stories about Pegasus, Mercury, Illiad, etc. Incredible pictures, that inspired me to become an artist and later a writer. I still have the book. But more than that, I spent long hours looking into the pond at fishes because I could see it was another world down there - so that's what motivated me to read, participating in a writer's "other world." 
Then a friend gave me "Stranger in a Strange Land" when I was 14 and that really was the start of my fascination with SciFi.


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## A1ien (Oct 29, 2005)

I read Fantastic Five by Enid Blyton. And the beatrix potter stories were great. And also the Faraway Tree by Enid Blyton (i think). Narnia was great as well. I think Harry Potter might be a good series to start with. They seem to have got a load of kids into reading.


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## stencyl (Oct 29, 2005)

I was hooked on various comics and kids' books, but the novel that really got me hooked on reading was _Lord Foul's Bane_. The pastor of the catholic grade school that I went to gave it to me, and I plowed through the rest of the series after.


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## rune (Oct 30, 2005)

The Worst Witch books were the ones that got me into reading


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## weaveworld (Oct 30, 2005)

Hey all, it was Elidor by Alan Garner that got me reading


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## Amarantha sedai (Nov 1, 2005)

As a kid I read alot of fairytales. At the age of 10 or 11 I really started getting in fantasy literature my first favorite author was Edward Eager who wrote the Wellwishers, Half-Magic etc.,then Susan Cooper who wrote The Dark is Rising series. That series incorporated alot of Celtic/Aurthurian folklore. As an adult I really enjoy fantasy novels that incorporate folklore from different cultures.


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## Marky Lazer (Nov 2, 2005)

The first _English_ book I read was Andy McNab's Immediate Action.


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## Amabar (Nov 8, 2005)

J.R.R. Tolkein, The Hobbit. Read it when I was 8, then read it again, then the lord of the rings.  My parents had a huge library of fantasy/sci-fi, and I read it all before I was 13.  Then I had to reread, and look for new material. I kind of tapered off at that point, but I am completely engrossed by any new sci-fi book that I actually start reading (and some old ones!).


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## McMurphy (Nov 8, 2005)

The first book I ever read was Charlotte's Web by E.B. White, but both The Lion, Witch, and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis and Wizard of OZ by L. Frank Baum had a huge hand inspiring me to read a novel on my own.  Lion..., when read to me in a school class, left me dying to know what the rest of the Chronicles of Narnia was like.  After finding out that the film Wizard of OZ was a bit different in literary form, I wanted to unearth the true version.

It must be pointed out, however, that I never did read all of the Chronicles of Narnia series or pick up Baum's book.  Go figure.


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## Jason_Taverner (Nov 9, 2005)

No I didn't read all the Chronicles of Narnia either I just stopped I can remmeber thinking that I would like to finish them but never did o well hey ho


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## Neal Asher (Nov 17, 2005)

"The Wasp Without Wings" (about Janet & John level). Turned out to be an ant.


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## Esioul (Nov 17, 2005)

If I remember rightly, I really got into the whole Narnia series relatively late- when I was about fourteen or so. I still like it though. 

I also ploughed thorugh many of the Chalet School books with enjoyment. I especially loved, and still do, the Just William books by Richmal Crompton- so funny!


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## tonic (Dec 9, 2005)

It was Harry Potter for me. After that it was The Lord of the Rings, then the Hobbit, and the rest is history. Now it's a book a week.


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## cornelius (Dec 9, 2005)

well after going through some lesser books, you know, the basic childhood stuff, I took the challenge to read " ancient indian farytales" ore something like it. I remember it being a thousand pages , and I read it in three days...


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## Salazar (Dec 10, 2005)

I was never a big reader when I was a young'n. The first novel that set me off was "Harry Potter and the Philosophers Stone"


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## essy (Dec 13, 2005)

Teir said:
			
		

> I remember reading a Winnie the Pooh book!. Mum says that when I was little I fell asleep with books instead of teddy bears or toys.
> I do have a vivid memory of reading the Hobbit. I was eight or nine and my dad gave me a copy for my own. I read the Lord of the Rings about 2 years later but I preferred the hobbit.
> I was a huge fan of Nancy Drew and Enid Blyton novels, both of which I still keep in my book collection.
> Oh and Treasure Island! and King Arthur! and Robin Hood!
> *Teir dashes to explore some of her neglected books*


 
Sounds a lot like mine... I began with winnie the pooh and some other disney picture books. I really got into reading with enid blyton, robin hood and king arthur stories. And my sister's influence made me a nancy drew and hardy boys fan as well for a while. I also read sherlock holmes and agatha christie at a young age which really made me love reading.


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## GOLLUM (Dec 13, 2005)

essy said:
			
		

> And my sister's influence made me a nancy drew and hardy boys fan as well for a while.


Yep Hardy Boys rocked when I was a lot younger!...


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## Sibeling (Dec 13, 2005)

I learned to read when I was five years old. I started with some fairy tales, but the most impotant book for me at was the Hobbit - after reading it I got interested in fantasy and sci-fi.


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## kyektulu (Jan 3, 2006)

*The very first book which got me reading fantasy was Kindred Spirits, a dragonlance book... I have been hooked ever since. 
*


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## sanityassassin (Jan 3, 2006)

To be honest I can't really remember what the first book was I wanted to read of my own back not including the childrens books at school in the very junior section. It was possably Across the Barricades by Joan Linguard or possibly Kine by A.R. Lloyd and of course the Hobbit was up there near the start.


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## Shyknight (Jan 4, 2006)

From the day I was born my mom made it a point to read to me before bedtime...one night I took the book out of her hands and started reading it to her lol...I was 2 1/2 and the book was "Green Eggs and Ham" by Dr. Seuss
Been reading ever since


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## weaveworld (Jan 19, 2006)

The first book to inspire me to read was 'Elidor' by Alan Garner, you should give it a try 

*Synopsis - Elidor by Alan Garner

An urban fantasy, runner up for the Carnegie Medal on its original publication.  On a gloomy day in Manchester, Roland, Helen, Nicholas and David are lured into a ruined church, where the fabric of time and place is weak enough to allow them into the twilight world of Elidor.  It is a place almost destroyed by fear and darkness, and the children are charged with guarding its treasures while a way is sough to save the dying land.  The the evil forces find a path through to this world.....  


*


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## Dean (Jan 19, 2006)

Dad was a "Doc Savage" fan and also into Edgar Rice Burroghs( the mars series) so I was exposed at an early age to the art on the covers, but the first title that pops in is R-is for Rocket, a collection of shorts that I found in the local library. The Mid 60's was my hay-day, they were the giants, Asimov, etc. Though I was captivated by the stories, I was driven by the art, the semi-clad women being captured by sinister monsters, and I suppose that is what drove me to the movies, the leftovers from the fifties that played in the early 60's. Afraid to go to bed for the monsters in the closet...


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