Several years ago, back before he started writing the last three Wheel of Time books, Brandon Sanderson was kind enough to take a half hour out of his time at Book Expo America to talk to me about writing. I was just starting my writing journey, and he was well on his way. I don’t know if he’ll remember the conversation, but I will never forget it. Apart from learning about his experiences, apart from having a real author talk to a nobody like me, and apart from the words of wisdom he passed along, what still stands out is the part of the conversation where we talked about the books we’ll always cherish.
I told him I wasn’t much of a reader until I picked up The Hobbit and that, in all honesty, combined with The Lord of the Rings was what sealed the deal. He nodded sagely and said (paraphrasing—it WAS a long time ago) that that’s how it always works. A reader usually finds what he called a “gateway book” to make him/her a reader. For me, The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings were absolutely my gateway books.
Flashback to my younger self. Seventh grade. Middle school. Back then you couldn’t get me to read a book, not even when my grades depended on it. As is always the case, as is still the case when looking for something, a friend not only recommended The Hobbit as a good place to start, he actually handed me a copy. From there on: bam, hooked. I finished The Hobbit in a week or so—again, not a reader—and not long after closing the cover I was off to grab a copy of The Fellowship of the Ring. Fellowship was longer than anything my non-reader self had ever picked up. I opened the book skeptically and turned to the first page. There I saw the words:
“Three rings for the Elven-kings under the sky,
Seven for the Dwarf-lords in their halls of stone,
Nine for the Mortal Men doomed to die,
One for the Dark Lord on this dark throne
In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie.”
I don’t remember where I was at the time, whether I sat in a comfortable chair or on a couch or even on the school bus. I just remember how those lines burned into my head. I remember how the world stopped when I read. I rushed through book one and then two and then the final one. Tolkien transported me to a place I’d never seen, a place my friend said he wished he could live. I wasn’t so sure about THAT (no TV in Middle-Earth, after all), but I’d never come across anything this breathtakingly beautiful. The epic storytelling, the scenery, the backstory; it all blew me away. This was my gateway book/story. This is what made me a reader. I devoured The Lord of the Rings. I devoured The Silmarillion. And when I was done, I went back to the start and read them again. And again. And again.
Here are five more of my gateway books that opened the door to specific genres:
Gateway to Middle-grade: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter may well be the greatest gateway book of our time. J.K. Rowling’s immensely successful series drew more kids into bookstores and libraries than I’ve ever seen (not to mention movie theaters). Harry Potter was also my first foray into middle-grade novels. I had to see what all the fuss was about, and as soon as I started reading, I was hooked. As were millions, possibly billions, of people worldwide. I saw nieces and nephews who didn’t like to read transformed. My own kids greedily devoured these books and are still avid readers today. Harry Potter and the Cursed Child is my can’t miss book of the summer, and it doesn’t matter a whit to me that it’s a script and not a complete book.
Gateway to Young Adult: The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
I never considered young adult a genre for me. But, like Harry Potter, so many people whose opinions I trust said I just had to read The Hunger Games. Eventually, I gave in and wow, was I glad I did. The Hunger Games destroyed all my misconceptions about YA. Suzanne Collins’ stories are complex and emotionally charged. I never imagined the genre could be so raw. A 16-year-old with PTSD? Unbelievable. Torture, the brutality too. I couldn’t believe it. Sure, it’s not as overt as in A Game of Thrones, but the violence every bit as twisted. Needless to say, I’m now a YA reader. Some of my new favorites include: Libba Bray’s The Diviners and Brandon Sanderson’s The Reckoners. Check them out if you haven’t already done so.
Gateway to Post-apocalyptic: The Girl with All the Gifts by M.R. Carey
I know The Hunger Games could fit nicely in the post-apocalyptic sub-genre, but that series started me reading YA, so I needed something else. The title that hit the spot for me here was M.R. Carey’s grim The Girl with All the Gifts. This book is horrific and exhilarating, and for some unknown reason, reminds me of Ridley Scott’s Alien. Maybe because it’s elegant, or maybe it’s because Carey took a tried-and-true formula—zombies, end of the world, survival, etc.—and turned the whole clichéd premise on its head and made it something completely new. I blew through this book in a day or two because I was riveted. The Girl with All the Gifts isn’t as well known as the others on this list, but it should be.
Gateway to Mystery/Thrillers: Pendergast Series by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child
Who doesn’t love a good monster story? When I discovered Preston and Child’s Relic, I knew I was onto something special. This was the first book in what would go on to become a continuing series that had everything I love about both science fiction and thrillers. The story opens in some remote jungle location before moving to the incredibly spooky New York Museum of Natural History. A monster is roaming around the halls—huge, murderous, and unstoppable. Part haunted mansion, part Frankenstein, Relic contains all the hallmarks of a taught and scary book. Preston and Child go on to write several other stories that blend horror, science, and monsters in ways that are believable and fantastic. Though set in the present, they might as well be from the Victorian age. I love these books and keep coming back for more.
Gateway to Dino-science Fiction: Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton
Michael Crichton’s best-selling book is everything I want my science fiction to be: believable, filled with science and experiments gone wrong, heart-stopping, and truly scary. The dinosaurs don’t hurt either. I remember coming across this book in the store, and I was sold the minute I saw the cover. Even today I think it’s one of the best pieces of cover art I’ve ever seen. Of course that means nothing if the book itself isn’t as great as it is. I grew up loving dinosaurs, and as I said when talking about Relic, having a great monster seals the deal for me. Jurassic Park has both. When you add in superb writing and the truly thrilling story, you get one of my favorite books of all time. Sure, the sequel was a bit of a letdown, but I keep going back to re-read the original, something I will do for a long time to come.
Well, there you have it. Those are the books that most influenced my intro to reading and specific genres. I’m sure for some of you it’s the same, for others much different. I’d love to keep this conversation going and hear what your gateway books were. Maybe one day, it’ll be mine, too!
Top image: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)
Keith Yatsuhashi is the author of Kojiki, out this summer from Angry Robot. You can find him on Twitter @keithyatsuhashi.
Some of mine —
* Gateway to science fiction – A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle
* Gateway to fantasy – Dragonflight by Anne McCaffrey
* Gateway to space opera – On Basilisk Station by David Weber
For me it was King Arthur, but written by John Steinbeck. But this was many years ago. For my son and others to whom I have given the book it’s been Jumper by Steven Gould. It’s a wonderful story about overcoming adversity.
Enjoyed your list.
My gateway to fantasy came out of an early love of history and legend: I remember being happy to find people like T. H. White writing myths and fables in the modern era. SF, now my primary interest, came somewhat later with (as I remember) Arthur C. Clarke’s work.
I so concur on The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, my gateway books as well.
For me it was my dad giving me “Pawn of Prophecy” by David Eddings for !y 11th birthday that started it all. From then on I was hooked on that genre completely
Gateway to Gross/Surreal Fantasy – Perdido Street Station by China Miéville
Gateway to Frederick Pohl: Gateway, by Frederick Pohl
Gateway to Gateways: The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, by C.S. Lewis
I tend to think this way too, although I use the word “milestones” or “turning points” rather than gateways, where my reading horizon either expanded or shifted directions. The most interesting phenomena can be those shifts, where afterwards you would no longer contemplate reading something that a dozen years ago you would have snapped up and read in a hasty second.
My gateway to adventure books came in the form of Young Indiana Jones books. I started reading them just after “The Last Crusade” came out (my family and I saw it at a drive-in as part of a double-feature with Star Trek V). After that, I started reading the Clive Cussler novels that parents loved. Then I moved on to Tom Clancy novels.
It wasn’t until I saw Fellowship of the Ring in theaters that I thought of reading fantasy. I went out the next day and bought The Hobbit and the whole trilogy. After reading Dune (I saw the mini-series on Sci-Fi and wanted to read the book), I added Science Fiction to my reading list. I now read Sci-Fi and fantasy almost exclusively and have no regrets.
Gateway to science fiction: Red Planet by Robert Heinlein (or maybe a comics version of “Mars Is Heaven” by Ray Bradbury in the LA Times Sunday Magazine).
Gateway to fantasy: Probably A Wizard of Earthsea.
Gateway to reading: Go Dog, Go!
Gateway to Mystery: The Secret of the Old Clock, by Carolyn Keen
Gateway to Fantasy and Sci-fi: A Wrinkle in Time
Gateway to Urban Fantasy: The Dresden Files
Gateway to Steampunk: Some combination of Sherlock Holmes pastiches and 2000 Leagues under the Sea.
My gateway to fantasy was The High King by Lloyd Allexander (yes I know it was book 5, but that was what my fourth grade teacher had in her in room library)
Gateway to Fantasy – hmm, does Asterix count? Possibly Jane Yolen, Dragon’s Blood.
Gateway to SF – has to be Deathwing over Veynaa, Douglas Hill,
In the third grade, THE SECRET HORSE by Marion Holland woke me to the pleasure of reading, and I’ve been a bookaholic ever since.
THE SCARLET LETTER by Nathaniel Hawthorne. I read this book with my English class in high school and was electrified by the period and the possibilities of Romantic fiction. Also, for the first time, I understood the book better than my extremely bright classmates! This book pointed me in the direction of my college studies. I was an English major, and I specialized in Hawthorne’s Romantic period all the way through graduate schools.
For me:
Gateway to comic Sci Fi: The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
Gateway to comic Fantasy: Thieve’s World
Gateway to Fantasy: Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser
For Me:
Gateway to SCIFI- Starship Troopers
Gateway to Fantasy- Harry Potter and The Sorcerer’s Stone
Though my mom read to me as a child, I didn’t start reading for myself til jr high.
I was in summer school and the school library was turning over their book stock and giving away books.
I grabbed as many as took my interest, and I was off.
Gateway for GamerGirls: The Deed of Paksenarrion. Because who hasn’t ever wanted to become a paladin?
As with Duckleberry @5, my gateway to epic fantasy was David Eddings’ Belgariad series (starting with the Pawn of Prophecy).
Gateway to SciFi: the original Star Wars Trilogy (Episodes IV-VI / in the movies — yes, I am that old)
Gateway to SciFi that had a beginning, middle and end: Babylon5 — B5 was the first series that TV I can recall the producers had a beginning, middle and end mapped out before they started the series.
Thanks for reading my musings
AndrewHB
My true Gateway was Comic books, got my first Superboy comic for Christmas at age 4.
But the first novels that really got me reading books was Edgar Rice Burrough’s Tarzan series. I still remember when I got my first one. at the mall bookstore with my mom. Bantam had just published the series with Neal Adams and Boris covers, and being a comic geek, the artwork struck me first.
Then after finishing that series I went right into Robert E Howard’s Conan, and I’ve never stopped since.
Though I should make an honorable mention for Louis L’amour Westerns.
Gateway to a Gateway – A copy of the Mother Goose periodical (not sure if it’s still in print . . . didn’t find much over Google but don’t have time for extensive research lol) that included an excerpt of The Hobbit
Gateway to reading – My Book House books
I dabbled a bit in fantasy growing up, with middling results. I loved the Prydain Chronicles by Lloyd Alexander, but was bored by Narnia. As far as Tolkien went, when I was about 7 I was traumatized by the Bass & Rankin Hobbit cartoon and to the point where I refused to read The Hobbit a few years later when I was old enough, and so didn’t read any Tolkien until the LOTR movies came out when I was in my twenties. From there, there was no looking back as far as fantasy went.
Harry Potter had kind of the same effect on me middle-grade wise. I’m now a youth services librarian, but at the time when the early books were coming out, I wasn’t working in libraries yet and was kind of oblivious to the phenomenon. I remember being in a Borders when the 3rd book came out, seeing all the kids, and thinking “What is the big deal with these books?” Then my brother, who was 13 and not much of a reader, read them, loved them (and he never loved anything book-wise), so I thought that I should probably read them. Again, never looked back. I started library school a couple of years later, and the rest is history.
1. Catharine F. Sellew, Adventures with the Giants. Summer after Third Grade I stumbled upon this book in our local Children’s Library. All about Thor and Odin and tricksy Loki. Great stuff. They had six or seven retellings of Norse myths, I devoured all of them. When my Fourth Grade teacher assigned The Hobbit there was something very familiar about it!
2. The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings of course. But my first real love in fantasy literature were te Oz books.
3. Richard Halliburton’s Complete Book of Marvels. Halliburton was a crazy travel writer in the 20s and 30s – first guy to swim the Panama Canal and lying about his extensive mountaineering experience (he had none) in order to climb the Matterhorn, that sort of thing. In this book, he directly addresses his readers, as if he were personally showing you Machu Picchu and Angkor Wat etc. When I checked this out, the clerk smirked that I’d never finish the 500+ page tome, but I devoured it and have now been to many (not all–yet!) of the marvels described.
4. Hendrik Willem van Loon, The Story of Mankind. I’m a history geek and this book is responsible.
always was a reader. i remember taking home books with five stories in them and convincing my parents i had to read them all. instead of one.
willard price got me into adventure. dragonlance fantasy. anathem sci-fi. stephen king horror. perdido street station into What did i just read, almost literally, i just about needed a dictionary.
special mention tk the BBC production in the late 90’s of Ghormanghast. Blew my varsity mind.
Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island was the gateway to reading; I picked it up around about 5 years of age, and read it cover to cover to cover to ,,,
A book the title of which escapes me at this moment, containing a modernized (but genuine Papua Niuginian) myth about the discovery of music and its theft from the ancestral spirits, was my gateway to myth-derived fiction: it probably was also my gateway to horror, because the night I read it I couldn’t go to sleep for quite some time. I was terrified the fire dragons which menaced the explorers would come after me!
Arthur C Clarke’s 2001 was my gateway to science fiction.
Then JRR Tolkien’s The Hobbit was my gateway to modern fantasy.
This article was a great reminder about the vast world Tolkien led me into in a similar setting. Although my first gateway to fantasy was The Dark is Rising series by Susan Cooper. Amazing stuff for older kids that still gives me the chills.
As someone said earlier, I don’t have gateways per se, as I was always reading since the age of six. But I do have some milestones, still glowing in my mind. For science fiction, it would be 3 Heinlein books, 2 juveniles (or YA as they’d say now):and one I thought was, when I grabbed it in the school library. Citizens of the Galaxy, Have Spacesuit Will Travel, and Orphans of the Sky. Orphans blew the top of my 13 year old skull off, and frankly I haven’t gone back to read it since.
For Fantasy, The Hobbit/Lord of the Rings of course, but what really sealed the deal was The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant.
Ender’s Game was my gateway to Sci-fi and was probably Hunger Games before hunger games. Still one of my favorite novels and one I have had to re buy at least 4 times (letting friends borrow the book and never seeing it again).
Gateway to Reading: Bunnicula. I think everything prior to this was read to me, I wasn’t engaged enough to read it myself.
Gateway to Literature that wasn’t squeaky clean: Portnoy’s Complaint.
Kudos for not finding an excuse to mention one of your books in this, like most authors do!
Interesting.
I read a lot of Greek and Norse mythology as a kid, but never connected it with fantasy books, which I was way sniffy about (‘I’m reading the Iliad, why would I waste my time on fairy tales?’ – there’s no snob like a junior literary snob). Then after a long time ignoring The Lord of the Rings in the school library because I’d somehow gotten it mixed up with Lord of the Flies, which sounded too much like my day-to-day school life to be fun, I took out Fellowship of the Ring one day because there was nothing else much available. Bang! Pole axed right between the eyes emotionally. This was everything I wanted in a book and so much more. I rushed to take out the other volumes, and it’s the only time I’ve ever returned library books late, because I just couldn’t stop re-reading them. So that was definitely my gateway book to modern fantasy, though only Le Guin has ever given me anything like the same emotional response of ‘this is in some deep sense True’.
But my gateway drugbook to SF was Poul Anderson’ ‘After Doomsday’ and the pusher was my English teacher, who gave me her copy and said ‘I think you might enjoy this’. So, Mrs Herries, you have a lot to answer for.
You’re welcome Jose. The point is to get people talking about books that inspire. Can’t really or honestly include mine on MY list, can I :)
“And when I was done, I went back to the start and read them again. And again. And again.” – this is almost my story :) I was always a nerdy reader (Charlotte’s Web was my first chapter book read on my own; Anne of Green Gables and Little Women also hold a special place in my heart), but one of my uncles suggested Hobbit and Lord of the Rings to me when I was in the sixth grade and sent me the Hobbit and Fellowship for Christmas. And that’s when I really became a geek (seeing Star Wars for the first time a few years later cemented the deal). And I did read and reread and reread them :) And eventually moved on to things like the Silmarillion, Book of Lost Tales, Atlas of Middle Earth, the HOME series, his letters, various philosophical analyses…it’s kind of a big deal to me now, heh.
Harry Potter also was my gateway into YA fiction (I guess I don’t quite realize the distinction between middle grade and YA) – I had a similar incident in high school. I kind of looked down on them but a friend I really respected was reading them, so I gave them a try on a road trip to the Smokies. I was HOOKED. Her prose is just so clever and funny, even in the early books which aren’t quite as thematic.
Wheel of Time was lent to me by my German teacher and was my gateway into epic, sprawling fantasy.
Sailing to Sarantium/Lord of Emperors (Guy Gavriel Kay) is my gateway to historic fantasy and legend/fairy tale retellings (Julet Marillier’s Daughter of the Forest also counts as a gateway to this, I suppose), which was also lent to me by my German teacher (and coincided with my cousin, who at the time reviewed books for a paper and so got a lot of free books, having given me Lord of Emperors – when my German teacher found out she begged to borrow it and convinced me to read the first one, ha).
Martian Chronicles was possibly my gateway to sci-fi. I don’t read a ton of sci-fi, to be honest. Most of the stuff I read is soft or has fantasy like elements (stuff like Pern or Sharon Shinn’s Samaria series). Dune could be too – both of those I read in full in a sci-fi class in high school.
We also read the first Thomas Covenant book in that class too, which I suppose is a gateway to gritty/dark fantasy!
I agree with you about the Reckoners, btw! I love that series!
Gateway to fantasy: Patricia C. Wrede’s Enchanted Forest Chronicles, I think. Though I read the Chronicles of Narnia and The Hobbit pretty early, too. Didn’t get around to LotR until I was a teenager, the perfect age for a raging crush on Gollum.
Gateway to historical fiction: Catherine, Called Birdy and The Midwife’s Apprentice, both by Karen Cushman, which I read a bazillion times as a kid and still remember verbatim.
Er…I don’t read much in other genres anymore. I would say that Prodigal Summer and Barbara Kingsolver’s other novels were my gateway to non-historical fiction, but they’re almost the only books in that genre that I really like.
Oh! Nonfiction. The Moon by Whale Light and The Rarest of the Rare, both by Diane Ackerman, were my gateway to nature prose. And Cod by Mark Kurlanks was my gateway to commodity histories.
I learned to read in the late 60’s, before I was in school, reading the comics section of the Washington Post. Can’t remember the first book I read by myself. I was 7, I think, 3rd grade anyway , when a teacher in grade school read “The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe” to us. By the time she’d finished I’d convinced my parents to buy the whole set for me. Read them all the way through before the teacher got to them. Then The Hobbit, and LoTR. For Christmas, when I was 12, they bought me the first edition hardcover of The Silmarillion. It’d be worth money today if it wasn’t so well worn from having been read so many times.
I don’t know for sure the first SF I read, but I think it was an Asimov short story collection. I know I read Dune in 6th grade, when I was 11. It was about that time that a librarian recommended “Grendel” by Gardner to me. That was the first Adult (not porn, but very grown up) novel I read.
The Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings were always on summer reading lists when I was a kid, and I think that had something to do with why I resisted them so strongly. You always hear that the best way to get kids to hate a book is to make it required reading.
Mercedes Lackey was my fantasy gateway, either with Black Gryphon or Magic’s Pawn. There were always people in the hallways of my high school reading those books. Science fiction has been a bit rough, but maybe Sphere by Michael Crichton. A combination of Haruki Murakami’s Wind-Up Bird Chronicle and Karen Russell’s St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves served as my gateway to literary magazines. Annihilation by Jeff Vandermeer was my gateway to New Weird.
@34 – Catherine Called Birdy! I loved that book as a kid…Although now as an adult I guess I raise my eyebrows a bit at how neatly everything worked out for her…
Gateway to alternate history: Lord Kalvan of Otherwhen by H. Beam Piper
Gateway to nautical fiction: Mr. Midshipman Hornblower by C.S. Forester (although I have to admit, the trilogy that starts with Beat to Quarters, while in the middle of the series, is an even stronger place to start).
Gateway to cosy mysteries: Any Hamish MacBeth book by M. C. Beaton
Gateway to SF in general: The Beast Master by Andre Norton (and the Witch World books were a good gateway to fantasy as well)
Gateway to SciFi: not sure which one, but it was one of Heinlein’s juveniles.
Gateway to mature SciFi: Stranger in a Strange Land
Gateway to Fantasy: The Hobbit
@27 Dholton – Much as I love Heinlein, I’m aware of his faults. I recently reread Orphans of the Sky and it’s horrifyingly misogynistic.
Gateway to SF: A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle and the Future History series by Robert Heinlein. These days, though, I might try recommending the Uglies books by Scott Westerfeld.
My gateway to reading was Andre Norton’s Ordeal in Otherwhere. I still re-read her books 50 years later.
My gateway author was Andre Norton – Witch World was first! I read everything of hers I could get my hands on (and still have some of those early titles…) and that pretty well introduced me to multiple genres I would read lifelong. I was, at that time, still reading with the help of a dictionary (this was back in the 50’s – 60’s.) I then moved on to Robert Heinlein, Isaac Asimov and Madeleine L’Engel… I’m now in my 60’s & am just completing a re-read of my entire Norton library – over 300 books – and enjoy them as much as I did the first time around, anachronisms and all.
Pawn of Prophecy was also my gateway book into High Fantasy. I had been a reader before that (Beverly Cleary books were my favorite as a kid), but it wasn’t until Pawn of Prophecy that I really discovered my love of Fantasy. It was the many trips to the library searching for or picking up holds on the Belgariad and Malloreon series that clued me into other SFF books. My library had an entire wall full of trade paperbacks of various SciFi, Fantasy, and Western novels. They mixed in a bunch of YA stuff over there, too, but I spent a lot of time just sorting through those paperbacks trying to find SFF books that looked interesting.
Then, a few years later, I mentioned my love of Eddings to a friend, and he asked if I had ever read The Wheel of Time. I hadn’t. He exhorted me to do so, and I am glad I did. That led to Brandon Sanderson (who is my favorite author by far). I now try to give good gateway books to my kids and to other people who seem like they might be a good fit for the wonderful world of SFF.
Gateway to Fantasy was The Hobbit which my 5th grade teacher read to the class. I couldn’t read it until high school. And LOTR escaped me until I was 18 (despite trying to read Fellowship 3 different times – I was Kind of dense).
The Shannara books (Sword and Elfstone) proved much easier reads when I was younger.
Also, The Halloween Tree by Ray Bradbury was a great into to mystery, fantasy and horror.
Gateway to reading (in general): the Scholastic Book Club catalogue that we received in school. The sheer joy I felt when the books I ordered came in! (Thanks, Mom!)
Gateway to Sci-Fi and a life-long passion for reading: R is for Rocket, by Ray Bradbury
AdamOndi,
Brandon Sanderson is a REALLY nice guy.
Okay,going to show my age here:
Gateway to Mythology and eventually History: A kid’s classic edition of King Arthur bought for me at a Stop & Shop on Gallivan Blvd in Dorchester by my Mom. It was a hardcover and cost .99. I was 8. I still have that old copy 60 years later,.
Gateway to SF: Catseye by Andre Norton, I was 9 years old and had gone through all the Black Stallion books. The librarian thought I might like Catseye and I did.
Gateway to Fantasy: Andre Norton’s Three Against the Witch World. I found it in a bookstore at the edge of Boston’s old Combat Zone.The new pb cost 10 cents. I was 11. I had to buy a new copy after the first one fell apart.
Gateway to Sword & Sorcery: Conan The Conqueror bought new in a Lancer paperback at a corner drugstore in Somerville Ma . I was 12. I still have the book.
When I was 11yrs old, my dad, who is also an avid reader, took me to a library book sale. The library took donated books and ones they had extra copies up and filled a whole room with them. You picked out whatever you wanted and they stacked them up and measured the spines with a yard stick. You paid $0.75 an inch at that book sale. I think it’s currently up to about $1.75, but that’s still cheap.
My dad filled a basket for me from books that he liked. I got several Piers Anthony books, including Xanth’s “Spell for Chameleon” and Apprentice Adepts “Split Infinity” (The one I started with by the way, because it had an equine on the front). It also included “Jurassic Park” and “Lost World”. Strangely enough, I didn’t read them till a few years ago and really enjoyed them. There were some of Anne McCaffery’s Pern novels as well. Also, the first books in Terry Brook’s series “Shannara” and “Magic Kingdom for Sale”. That’s all I can recall from that first trip, but I was hooked from that point on.
There hasn’t been a day in the last 18yrs where I haven’t had a book I was in the process of reading. I enjoy re-reading, too.
In subsequent years, I also discovered some of my favorite series browsing through one of these book sales. Such as: Robert Jordan’s “Wheel of Time” series (That ended up leading me to all of Brandon Sanderson). Terry Goodkind’s “Sword of Truth” series, R.A. Salvatore’s “Drizzit” series, and many more.
I don’t go to many anymore, because I can do the same kind of exploratory shopping on amazon.com, but I still have fond memories of them. My dad and I always bought the $10, Friend of the Library, passes. These enabled you to get in on Thursday afternoons, a day earlier than everyone else. It was great getting first pick, but some of those people would get down right violent in their book hunt. It was like one of those scenes where all the women are fighting over the wedding dresses.
I also really liked the Harry Potter books. My Grandmother bought me the first four in a box set, because she knew I loved to read. However, I overheard a boy in school describing them and it sounded awful the way he described. I let them sit in the corner of my room for a long time. Maybe almost a year. I finally finished re-reading a series and couldn’t think of one other thing I’d like to read, so I decided to give them a try”. What the heck!” ,right? I started reading them and was hooked from the first paragraph. I just finished reading “The Cursed Child”. It was almost as good as the main series. :))
I’m currently reading the “Imager Series” by L.E. Modesitt Jr. I’d already read the first three and I’ve just re-read them and started on the rest of the series. It takes a little while to get over the names and pronunciation, but it’s worth it. It’s a really good, smart series.
I’m actually about to finish The Girl With All the Gifts and, while its not terrible, it started out fantastic and hits a slow spot. Not sure I will recommend it as a gateway.
My gateways were:
Harry Potter and the Sorceror’s Stone and Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card.
@48 – that book sale sounds so fun, but, man, WoT and Sword of Truth must be high price items if they’re measuring by thickness ;)
@45 – I loved those book orders as a kid. My son was in preschool last year (Kindergarten now) and they still have them; I made a point to let him pick something out each month. So far he still loves reading and getting books! In fact, he insists we read 5 books each night before bed (something he started on his 5th birthday because he’s obsessed with the number 5). Not gonna lie, I hope he doesn’t assume he gets 6 on his next birthday because it takes a looooong time, haha.
Gateway to the wonder of reading: Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain (age 8)
Gatrway to sf: Star Surgeon by Alan E Nourse (age 10)
Gateway to fantasy: fairy tales as far back as I can remember
Gateway to mystery; probably one of my mother’s Rex Stout or Agatha Christie books. (Prob age 10-11)
MKK
PSST, Keith when you’re talking about Relic up there I think you want “taut” not “taught”.)
Would not have thought somebody could mention it as their first gateway before me, but kid_greg @20 did.
My gateway to reading: Edgar Rice Burrough’s “Tarzan of the apes” and its sequels. I cannot remember myself reading anything before that (except for the book that literally teaches you A-B-C), and the series still holds a dear spot in my heart.
After that, I loved equally Astrid Lingren’s children stories, Seton-Thompson’s “Two Little Savages”, Stevenson’s “Treasure Island” (and a bit later “The Black Arrow”), and books by Sir Walter Scott.
My gateway to detective novels: Agatha Christie’s “The Pale Horse”.
My gateway to fantasy (and I read quite little anything else these days, though it happens): as banal as it sounds, “The Lord of the Rings”. Which lead me to the Wheel of Time. Which led me to Brandon. For which (all of it) I am forever grateful.
The Indian in the Cupboard by Lynne Reid Banks was a childhood favorite of mine that my children also loved. Also, the 100 Cupboards series by N.D. Wilson is fantastic, as is Leven Thumps and the Gateway to Foo series by Obert Skye. Another favs was the Inkheart Trilogy by Cornelia Funke. I believe all of these are Fantasy.
I was a reader for as long as I have memories. My gateway to “fantastic fiction” – the idea that books could be about something other than the real world – was Rudyard Kipling’s “The Jungle Book.” I don’t exactly remember when, only that I think my age hadn’t hit double digits yet. My mom was couldn’t get me to the library right away, so she handed me her collection of Kipling’s works, thinking I might like the “Just So” stories. Which I did, but then I read Puck of Pooks Hill and Wee Willie Winkie, which I also enjoyed, then read The Jungle Book, and I was hooked. My gateway to science fiction specifically was “Mission to Mercury” by Hugh Walters. It had a girl in it! I was a teenager by then, and quickly read out the juvenile science fiction section of the school’s library. (To be sure, it wasn’t very big.)
Gateway to fantasy was definitely A Wrinkle in Time. A book that shaped me though was So You Want to be a Wizard by Diane Duane. Such a cool take on magic, all based around the love of words and reading, which I think impacted my own thoughts in that it helped me feel “cool” while being a big reader.
I would move out on my own a week before I was seventeen. One of my boyfriends brother’s favourite books involved the Steel Rat. It didn’t interest me at all, but it got me into the sci fie area of the library and I was introduced to the Burroughs books on John Carter of Mars and all of the related books in the series. My parents were far from literary minded folks, but they did buy all manner of children’s books for us five kids and encouraged us to use our library cards. I hate to admit my parents were uneducated, but they were.
I started reading early, with Sunday paper comics and children’s Disney books. I moved up to regular comics and Nancy Drew/ Hardey Boys mystery books, which I really enjoyed. I also wore out a box set of the Narnia series back then. My gateway book, however, which sparked a lifelong love for reading, was Terry Brooks “The Sword of Shannara”. I devoured that book like no other!
Gateway to SF- all summer in a day, Ray Bradbury – I know it is a short story but it still rains remorse and makes me want to move from Venus to other planets!
That story gave me chills – I read it in middle school (our literature text book had a short story scifi/fantasy section and because I was a nerd, I would occasionally read stories that weren’t assigned to us) and it resonated with me so deeply, especially as I was the bullied child.
It wasn’t until years later that I was trying to remember what story it was that had impacted me so that I figured out it was a Bradbury (an author I already loved).
I was raised on SFF, so I didn’t have a gateway into it — when I had assigned reading for school, that was my gateway out. Not always a fun place to be.