Why do I read?

Why does somebody read?

For most of my life I have enjoyed reading. If it was from small childrens books to the long chronicles of Lord of the Rings, reading was a haven* for me. If I had a bad day at school, I would curl up with a good book. If I couldn’t fall asleep late at night, I always knew that I had a good book to read. Some examples of the books that I fell in love with are the Percy Jackson series, Harry Potter series and The Shining. These books all have a strong protagonist and lots of action, a feature which I crave in stories.

A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies.  The man who never reads lives only one.” - George R.R. Martin.

This quote means that a reader has the opportunity to fight Orcs, find true love, fight Frankenstein, run from vampires, fall in love with vampires, know the stories of Jesus and read about the Joker almost killing the Batman for the thirtieth time. This quote has even more meaning for autobiographies. If you are reading about the memoir of John F. Kennedy or the diary of Anne Frank you live all of these lives and more while reading.

If I was a chef baking a perfect book for me I would add some action and adventure with a twist of humor and suspense. Although this is a very good recipe, it is a very difficult one to master. Many have tried, but few have succeeded in finding a special place in my heart. From a reader's viewpoint I think I have a very limited range of books that I enjoy. When I am forced to read something that I do not wish to read, I have a very difficult time enjoying and reading because I am trying to find the ‘main point of the paragraph or the ‘authors purpose for writing this piece of text’.

Although I have had a very good experience reading, there are a few books that I have disliked. The Lord of the Rings isn’t my favorite series but it isn’t the worst. The fighting scenes and the climax in Mount Doom really made this series a lot better. I really like how J R.R. Tolkien had lots of politics and made a point to the reader that people need to come together to defeat a common enemy. Some of the other books that I didn’t like were some of the really long Stephen King books like Needful Things and It. When you make a book that long, it has to be an epic, not just dialogue with one climax at the end.

*Lord of the Rings reference