Children's Literature Autobiography (Revised)

I am finding it somewhat difficult to write an autobiography on literature, mostly due to my poor memory of my childhood and adolescent years, and partly because literature was not a big part of my life. Reading, and being read to, was not a huge part of my home life growing up. I think this is, in part, the reason why reading was not always a favorite thing to do.
Though I don’t have many positive memories of reading, I am able to recall some enjoyable times. At home, I absolutely loved I Spy books. I think I had every single one of them, for every single holiday. I sat with my younger brothers looking through those books, even though we knew where everything was hidden since we would read them over and over. Another of my favorites was the Magic Eye books. I loved that I was the only one of my siblings who could see the hidden pictures. Even my parents had trouble seeing the images. I felt smarter than all of them! We also had Where’s Waldo. Those were okay, but not near as fun as I Spy. And, of course, we had The Polar Express. I can remember reading, or attempting, to read books in my closet. The entire bottom shelf in my closet was lined with Little Golden Books. It was like our little hideout, we would escape to.
Another place I read was in school. The furthest back I can recall was reading in the first and second grades. We would have books that we would take home every week in big plastic bags and we were to read them with our parents. I think our parents were supposed to comment on how the reading was going. I do not remember what any of the books were, but I can vaguely remember trying to read them. I also recall the book fairs. They were always set up in the library. We would go pick out what we wanted and mark it down on our lists. However, it was not very often that my books would actually be ordered. I can remember the days when the orders came in and feeling slightly left out because I would go home empty handed. In either fourth or fifth grade I remember reading a book I fell in love with. I am sure many other girls read this one as well: Island of the Blue Dolphins by Scott O’Dell. I think this was my very first novel. I felt so grown up reading it!
Junior High School offers almost no memories to my mind. Honestly, I do not recall much of anything from those three years, pertaining to school at least. The only reading I can recall doing is by Edgar Allan Poe. I don’t know why this is the only literature that sticks out to me. Most likely because of it’s dark nature, especially to a sixth grader. We read the poem: The Raven and the tales: The Cask of Amontillado and The Tell-Tale Heart. I remember almost being scared while we read his work… the murderer being haunted by the sound of his victim’s heart beating in The Tell-Tale Heart. And the man (I recall a clown/jester like figure) luring his victim into his wine cellars to bury his drunken victim alive in The Cask of Amontillado….very creepy. I would actually like to go back and read these again. I remember being drawn to these pieces of his.
Of course high school literature involved a lot of Shakespeare. Like most everyone else, I read Romeo and Juliet, Macbeth, Julius Caesar, and Beowulf. Nothing I was too thrilled about. I hated having to decipher everything! Further amongst the list of the mandatory high school readings were: The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Great Expectations by Charles Dickens, To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw, and Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain. Of those I enjoyed To Kill a Mockingbird the most. Outside of school I really enjoyed reading Chicken Soup books. I think I had all four of the Teenage Soul volumes. I found them very therapeutic and comforting during those oh so difficult and traumatic high school years.
That is just about all I can recall for my children’s literature autobiography. Nothing too exciting but it’s accurate. I do plan on reading more in the future for recreational purposes after I am done reading textbooks. Currently, I do not read too much for my own leisure. However, I have found some of the literature I have read in the past to be enjoyable. I know that I like reading and I would like to read more and plan on doing so.