Memory Monday:

The wonderful world of books.
I love books.

I've always read a lot of books.
And my two favorite places on the Earth (as far as buildings goes) are the/a bookshop and the/a library.

When I was 11-12 years old I had two favorite authors:
C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien.

I got caught up in the amazing worlds of Narnia and Arda.

I used to sit in my room or in the living room and read all the time (when I wasn’t hanging out with friends – I did have a few of those too). And when I was reading I was lost to the world. People could have thrown a party right beside me or dropped a bomb or set the chair on fire and I wouldn’t have noticed. (Occasionally it’s still that way today when I read.)
And I’m a somewhat fast reader. Even then. It took me almost a week to read “The Lord of The Rings” (all three books). But that was because I was busy playing football (soccer) and tennis, and trying to figure out how to play the guitar. So I didn’t have that much spare time ;o)
It bothered me that I wasn’t allowed to take more than 3 books from the school library at a time because we only went there once a week. And the city library had the strangest hours back then. So I couldn’t go there either. (That has changed. Thankfully!)






When I was 13 we had a new English teacher (previously mentioned as it was her I had the ... erhm huge crush on) who let us watch the Hallmark edition of “The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe” (witch – in retrospect – was actually quite horrible. And not just in comparison to the recent edition. But for educational purposes I guess it wasn’t that bad. The actors were v-e-r-y____a-r-t-i-c-u-l-a-t-e… ). Of course we had to watch without the subtitles – it was after all for educational reasons – and how she made that happen was, well, hilarious. It contained duct tape and long pieces of paper (carefully measured out as to the length of the television) – this was long before the DVD-player. (Actually I think we still had a Betamax at home at that time).

She also ‘made’ us read books in English. Like whole books. Not just passages. It was a nice change. I still remember the storyline of one of them, but unfortunately not the title and I haven’t been able to find it since.

Also at 13 I read a book by a Danish author called Kirsten Holst (Her husband Knud Holst was an author too as is their daughter Hanne-Vibeke Holst ). It’s called “Min ven Thomas” (“My friend Thomas”) and was about a teenage (High School age) boy who discovers that his friend Thomas is gay. And not only is he gay. He’s got AIDS as well. And needless to say the story hasn’t got a happy ending. It’s not a story about gay love, as Claus (the main character) and Thomas are just friends. (And Claus is hopelessly in love with a girl). But it’s a story about growing up. And sex. Safe sex. And love. And fitting in. And a lot of other teenage angst issues.



But mostly I read crime novels (not like the ones I read today. Not quite as messy and violent.) and detective novels (I was a private detective once… When I was 13-14 years old. But that’s another post… If ever…) like Alfred Hitchcock and the Three Investigators.





A series about three boys who solve impossible-to-solve crimes and worships Alfred Hitchcock. (And in some odd way Alfred Hitchcock is ‘Charlie’).
They were a lot of fun to read.
And apparently they seem to be rather rare today, so I suppose I’ll have a hard time trying to dig them up if I ever were to re-read them.

However I have a sudden urge to go to the library.

Have a nice day ;o)