Top Ten Best Bookish Memories

hosted by The Broke and Bookish

1.      Reading the seventh Harry Potter

 

I was on a school program in Barcelona. It was the summer after my sophomore year in high school and I was completely terrified I wasn’t going to find a way to read this book the very instant it came out. My mom was way ahead of me, though, and paid a bajillion dollars to get Amazon UK (or an equivalent) to ship me an English copy. Then my program decided to order us all English copies (we paid for them later), because apparently every single kid on the program was also salivating for The Deathly Hallows. Lucky me, UK copy got there before everybody else’s copy, at around eight in the morning, and the program-bought copies came later that afternoon. I’m almost ashamed to admit it, but that day I mentally wasn’t even in Barcelona. We visited Park Guell that day, a beautiful and historic landmark, and I basically just sat on a bench and read.

That night, my whole program went to see the fifth Harry Potter movie in theaters. I wish I still had a photograph of how we all looked, walking down the streets of Barcelona with our noses in our books, banging into one another. It was like a bookish pride parade. I finished the book at four the next morning, the first person on my program to get to the end. Later that day, the next person finished, and we started an exclusive little club so we could talk about everything that had happened. As people kept reading, more people joined. I have never experienced that kind of bookish love fest in my life. It was awesome.

 

2.      Reading the sixth Harry Potter

I was in Ireland with my parents, visiting family friends. It was the summer after eighth grade. I’d very craftily set it up so that I’d get the copy sent to their house, and then when we went to visit, I’d pick it up and read straight away. The problem was, they planned a party for the day we went to their house. So there I was, sitting dutifully at the dinner table, pretending to enjoy some fine Irish hospitality, and really just dying to go inside and read the damn book. I bailed on dessert (something I NEVER do), ran to the couch like a total awesome person, and read straight through till morning. There was dancing, carousing, laughter, drinking, merriment, and I was on the couch, hanging out at Hogwarts. Like the coolest person ever.

3.      Bonding with Twilight fans on a lonely trip to India (and no, I do not lead the exciting jet setting life all these international anecdotes would indicate, but these three tips were pretty awesome)

If you read my last Top Ten Tuesday, you know my opinions on Twilight have soured slightly. But I’ll always be somewhat fond of these books simply for the fact that they helped me make friends during what could have been a very lonely summer. I was on another high school summer program, and I was able to break the ice with the other girls purely by squee-ing over these books. It’s amazing how even at the most random times in the most far-flung places, you can find book nerds.

 

4.      When my grandfather gave me a copy of Jane Austen’s unfinished novel, Sanditon, as a graduation present

Possibly the sweetest gift of my life, honestly. Every time I look at it I get allll the feeeels.

5.      Staying up all night to finish the Song of the Lioness quartet by Tamora Pierce and thereby experiencing my very first Book Hangover (aka the night I became a woman)

And I had something very important to do the next day, too. But I didn’t care. I was maybe eleven, and I’d already read the first two books (and written my Epic Masterpiece directly ripping off inspired by Alanna’s adventures). I finally bought the last two books and stayed up all night—literally all night, as in no sleeping at all—until I got to the very end, and promptly burst into tears. Needless to say, I was useless the next day but what else is new.

Me, the next day

6.      Seeing the last Lord of the Rings movie with my best friend

I was lucky enough to see it with one of those awesome, interactive audiences, too, full of nerds willing to shout and laugh and clap at the screen. When Legolas scaled that Oliphant and, like, murdered a million people all by himself, the whole theater cheered.

 
7.      The time I cried so hard on the plane while reading Atonement that the flight attendant gave me free ice cream

It’s nice when people recognize Book-Induced Despair as the serious affliction it is and react accordingly.

 

8.      Going to a UCLA panel on Gender in Fantasy and Science Fiction and meeting Leigh Bardugo

My first experience meeting big time authors. I behaved like a total spaz, but had an excellent experience.

 

9.      The first time I ever truly finished a manuscript

It’s wretched. It’s derivative. It’s the best thing I’ve ever written. It’s total crap. It will never see the light of day. But it’s mine, and I made it. It’s a full story from beginning to end.

This gif gives me all the sobs.

 

10.  Every single second of book blogging

Every. Single. Second. *kisses you all in a manner that maaaay push the boundaries of simple friendship* *has not one single regret*