Originally posted by Sir HC:
2. French reader about a brother and sister during the 1960's riots. He becomes a cop bashing in heads , she a junkie model. This is what I was reading in 10th grade, taught me to shoot smack between your toes if you don't want the track marks to show. Never had to use that bit of advise...
When I was a kid, I had the unfortunate experience of having to go to a very milateristic Catholic school for most of elementary school. The kind that gave insane amounts of homework. One of those that when you combine the length of the school day with the homework, it added up to longer than an 8 hour work day. The last thing that I wanted to do in my free time was read a book, with the exception of my 16 and Tiger Beat magazines. (I was an early Rock n Roller.
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Finally, I convinced my parents to put me in a public school where I then had some time to myself and amazingly found that I loved to read on my own but still only bothered with music magazines, Vogue and such, or encyclopedia excepts. When it came to books, I only bothered with the lame kids books (not the skinny things) because they were easy and quick reads. Besides, I had been conditioned to go only in the stupid children's section all my life. I lead a very repressed life and had parents who didn't want me to grow up or even think for myself. The control freak type. Even the stuff we read in school was either very kidsy or abridged excerpts that were reproduced in readers that had kids appeal all over them. You know, that lame school book packaging.
Then one day when I was in about 6th grade and in the library alone, I ventured over to the adult section. For some reason, I was drawn to the paperback rack. Being an unexperienced independent reader of real books, I only really had the covers to guide me. After so much time, I made my selection and checked out my books. It wasn't until years later that I realized what a grand choice that I had made that fateful day. (Read all of the books too!)
The very first book that I read was
Last Exit To Brooklyn by Hurbert Selby. :eek: :eek: :eek: Okay, I figured this is an adult book so it contains adult content. It didn't really phase me at all. It was a little after that time that the book was eventually rated X and banned throughout the country!!! (Obviously, it was then brought back on the shelves years later.) Decades later, it was made into a very good yet disturbing film.
The next book that I read was One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest....many years before the movie. Also some book by Satre, The Ginger Man by J.P. Donlevy and The Electric Koolaid Acid Test by Tom Wolf. (The later books took another check-out as I wasn't that voracious of a reader to get them all done in 2 weeks.)
No wonder I'm a book junkie.
