Well, you can blame the books I read but since their inanimate, you can just go ahead and blame their Authors.

 

“One must always be careful of books, and what is inside them, for words have the power to change us.”

— Cassandra Clare

 

You can say I’m a bookworm but the truth is, I’m a bookdragon. I hoard and collect books even if I had tons of books to read left on my Treasure Chest. I wasn’t always like that you know, back then I was just one of those awkward kids enjoying youth then my aunt decided to clean her basement and haul her old books in boxes. Now, I’m not just awkward, I’m also an introverted geek with a world/s of her own.

I can’t tell you which book was the first I read since there are school textbooks and storybooks, but I can tell you the first book that made me want Reading as an occupation when I’m an Adult (it didn’t work for me).

 

Yep, you read it right! The book that convinced me to read all the books in the world (which is obviously unachievable, but I always try *wink*) is a Mystery Thriller. I remember being eleven years old, dusting off this particular book, oblivious to its power that it will change my whole life. No kidding, I could be a drug addict in an alleyway waiting to mug my next victim. Instead, I became this person who worships Authors, asking Bookstores to marry her and adopt books and calls them her babies. 

The Irish Cottage Murder isn’t one of my favorite books, but it is memorable in a way that it changed my life for good. It gave me the feeling of excitement I never felt before, that later on, I would know as Adrenaline. That exhilarating feeling of not knowing what happens next, to be in a series of events that is a whole different from what I was experiencing in real life. It’s an adventure that didn’t require me to move from one place to another. I was just there in the same place, devouring the stories of fictional characters and when I finished it, I decided I wanted more. So I read more.

It wasn’t just Mystery Thrillers that allured me, it was almost all kinds of books I coveted. It was like seeing books in a new light, that my heart could not grasp how pieces of paper stacked atop each other could bring me to a whole different world with a brand new adventure to live in. I was reading all the books my aunt had, from mystery thrillers to works of literature, to almanacs and romance. Most of the books I read on the first five years of my bookworm life was usually hand-me-downs or pre-loved books from my Aunt and Uncle. When I ran out of those, I started saving my school allowance and bought myself pocketbooks, because I was a teen and infatuated with the idea of love while mystery thrillers -I learned when the world became to be more dependent on high technology, that it’s impossible not to crack a mystery– has a lot of loopholes.

Shortly I wasn’t contended by just buying pocketbooks. I. Had. To. Read. More. The thing is, pocketbooks are way cheaper than actual  400-ish page books. I kind of gave up to that dream, especially when Real Life is getting in the way, and I kinda have to grow up and put this want behind my needs. I swear to you, if you’re a reader like me, you may think that you can’t live without books or books are a necessary thing in your life. Well, you haven’t really met poverty yet as I have met it. It sucks, but it’s life and you can get why I love reading books so much. Books are a chance of living a different life, living vicariously as some would like to call it. But books for me are like Pocket Universes that I get not just a glimpse, but also an experience. Imagine how it went for me when I start Adulting. Everything else became a chore or something like that.

Fast forward to a few years, I landed on a job that gave me a decent pay to watch some movie on my rest days. Impulsively, I picked this movie because it was really cool with its Angel-army thing and other urban-legend creatures plus a missing mother. The moment I lied-low with buying books, I turned to Films and it’s great cause my entire family shared my love for that, wherein books I have to spend for my own, they (my family and extended relatives) usually do that for us (younglings) so I get a free ride. This time though, it was different. I bought that ticket on the cinema booth, some popcorn and a soda completely oblivious with my life being changed forever again.

 

Surprise! Suprise! Please don’t hate me yet! Lol. I know, everyone hated the movie, but come one, Lily Collins nailed the character aaaaand the movie left out too much from the book and its background that I left the theatre determined as hell to buy the books and read them all just to get the answers I needed. And I did buy them all after I scoured the entire province looking for copies of the series in every bookstore here in Cebu.

I guess I can say that the rest is history. Well, not quite yet. I did read all the books of The Mortal Instruments series, in fact, I read all Cassandra Clare‘s books and became her fan. She’s my bias so expect that from here on. Then I started my collection, or rather, my hoarding. This is where I buy more books than I can read on a regular basis. I bought Percy Jackson and The Olympians loved it and became a huge fan of Rick Riordan and like what happened with Cassie, I bought all his books too, followed by Neil Gaiman‘s American Gods and treated him like a god. A bunch of Authors and books came my way, some I kinda dodged from the massive popularity the title or author is getting. I avoid getting disappointed from believing the hype so I tend to ughh- not buy or read them. Silly I know, but sometimes, I don’t know what’s wrong with me either!

Late last year, I came across three equally talented Authors, by came across I meant reading their books and immensely loved them! The Authors I’m referring to are Mark Lawrence, VE/Victoria Schwab, and Laini Taylor. I love their works so much that it hurts that they are somehow underrated. These Authors were like the beginning to a new age to my bookdragon life that I started to be active on Goodreads. Closed my password-forgotten account and created a new one. I also got a better job that can support my love for reading and meet equally supported people that pushed me to start a blog. It took them almost three years to convince me to start one, well, truthfully it started with my falling out to the said job. I had my phase where I’m too tired to think straight and decided to quit my job and be a bum for a few weeks and start over again but my Supervisor talked me out of it. She actually did more than talking me out of it, she made me see past the stress I’m getting with the field of work I’m doing. She encouraged me to make lemonades out of lemons, but really, she just scared me of not being able to buy books for quitting. Turns out, that I need (here we are with the need-word again, lol) books, mostly the sequels to the series I’m following and that got me into writing about these said books that I need. She told me that too, to express my love for reading in words, a hobby that I love too much that I decided to stay and commit to the job that gave me my happiness. Books. So that’s how I get here, because of them, my babies.