Unlimited Reading

I loved reading Peanuts books when I was young, along with comic books. As I grew older, I enjoyed reading books about sports history and the great players of the day. I also remember reading a number of books about the Vietnam War, since it took place during my childhood. In college I began reading Stephen King, Hemingway, Faulkner, and other classic authors. I’ve always been an avid reader, and now with my Kindle, reading is even easier and more convenient as I can carry a huge library with me no matter where I go.

I love my kindle. I love the instant gratification it gives me. I’m in work and I see a tweet about a new book or short story. By the time I’ve boiled a kettle to make a coffee in the kitchen its on my Kindle app on my phone, Then when I get home it’s there waiting for me on my Kindle. It even knows where I’m up to. its one of the things that makes me feel that I’m living in the fantastical technological future that I was led to believe lay ahead of me as a child. Flying cars next please!

After many years of scoffing at Kindles in favour of actual books, I finally caved and bought one a couple of months ago. I could the basic Kindle and I wouldn’t be without it now. I love it. Never without a book. It’s like having a bookshop with you all the time!

My sibs and I grew up in the Minnesota northwoods in a run down place with no electricity or running water. We were the weird kids without many friends. Since our property was ten miles out from the nearest small town we lived for days when the book mobile stopped at a local bar paking lot a quarter mile from us and we could check out our ten books to last us for the next two weeks. Those book were a much needed escape. Now nearly forty years later the escape is not needed often, but the books and their stories are still treasured. Now withmy arthritis that makes holding dead tree books a challenge, the Kindle and Kindle apps make it all possible without the pain. I would love to try out Kindle Unlimited.

Great offer! My brother let me read some of your books and i got hooked! :) Hope to read some more!

Hugh,
Been a follower of you since the beginning. StilI have the sprinkle of Sand included in the book.
Kindle Unlimited for six months would be lovely for this 70 something lady. Thanks for being who you are:a friend to your fans

I remember many nights reading with a flashlight under the covers and realizing I had read all night. I would hear my dad getting ready for work at 6:00 am, and pretend to be asleep til he left the house.

Books have allowed me to be so many different people, in different places with different adventures and loves. From the BFG and Asterix to James Herbert and his rats, from zombies and ships that talk (Robin Hobbs), to strong female role models and classic science fiction. All I do read is fiction but I have learnt so much from all the genres that I read, and have loved so many characters. My birthday present this year is my reading, the kindle is fantastic and cheaper than buying paperbacks, but all i really want is more books, and more time to read them in :) Thanks for allowing so many people to share in your stories and those of others – it’s a beautiful gift.

I’ve always been a reader. I remember hours spent in my room organizing my ‘Little Golden Books’ and studying the checklist on the back for ones that I wanted but didn’t have. Some nights I would sit in bed looking at the stack of books I couldn’t decide between. Studying blurbs. Sorting, stacking in order how I might read them. I adore books and can’t imagine not being surrounded by choices. They used to be just a small stack, but with kindle, I always have 100s of choices. With Unlimited, I could have millions!! :-)

I remember reading every chance I got as a child, and even sneaking in reading time at school when I was supposed to be doing other work. My teacher was always confiscating my books (and giving them back at the end of the day!)

Hugh,

You and I apparently are on the same page. I posted an entry to my own blog last night, announcing that, at least for 90 days, I would be Amazon-exclusive and my reasons for going into Kindle Unlimited. Amazing.

I’m still waiting for the Tolino outlets to clear my series stuff, but that should happen within a day or so, and those titles will then be in Select.

Here’s wishing us good luck, and here’s to our readers, too: enjoy the reads!

Michael

Thank you for producing excellent, error free work. The quality of your writing has me taking a closer look at self-publishing, which had been tarnished by a too-large share of really bad writing and editing.

As a kid I used to go to the library every Friday night. Mom and Dad would do their weekly shopping, and there was a small library attached to the mall, so they’d drop me and and my sister off and we’d spend that hour or so reading.

I always loved to read series, so my first love was Enid Blyton (The Famous Five), then later I discovered comic books, and later still Agatha Christie and other mystery writers. These days I still love series. I’m into the Women’s Murder Club series right now, and love it. Unfortunately where I live there’s no KU, otherwise I’d definitely be interested.

Thanks also for your thoughts on KU 2.0. It’s good to have a voice of reason in this debate. When I saw you take a vicious beating on kboards my heart bled. Not much fun to watch a mob scene in progress. It did remind me why I rarely post on forums these days. Too harmful for one’s mental health :).

I have the kindle app, the nook app, and a reader app on my iPad. When I talk to friends I have to admit that the ones with a real kindle, with the white paper, love it the best! I had never read a science fiction book until I happened upon the first Silo book for free. I was hooked and had to buy them all! Since then futuristic science fiction books are my favorite.

I’m glad to hear I’m not the only one who lived at the library as a kid. I made out like a bandit. Don’t enter me in your contest, Hugh. I’m already a KU subscriber.

I remember the delicious rush I felt entering the library when I was a kid- the magic power it gave me to go anywhere, anywhen.

Sometimes I still feel that giddiness when I take my kids to the library. Who knows what book one of them might discover tonight that will resonate with their personality so deeply they’ll remember it when they bring their children?

Many people still prefer the feel of a real book over sitting with an electronic device. I personally love my Kindle and how ebooks have allowed many indie authors to flourish over the last few years. This is actually the way I find new books, through recommendations by other indie authors, either through the website, newsletters, tweets, etc.
I first heard of Wool through an online messaging board. Through Kindle Worlds I found Jason Gurley, who has written many excellent stories outside of the Wool universe. I was then lead on to Michael Bunker and so it goes on and on. These are authors I would otherwise never have heard of or had the opportunity to read their stories.

My reading pattern has definitely also changed because of this. I now prefer serials and short stories over the huge tomes I used to buy (anyone ever read Steven Erikson’s Malazan Empire series? It’s great, but 10 enormous books would probably scare me off today). And when it’s usually less than a dollar a pop, then why not? If you sign up for newsletters from indie authors, they often send you free copies of books, anthologies, etc, so do it!).

I think KU will definitely push this movement along even further and bring to light even more authors, who may not have had the chance to go in front of a big audience and still scared of those, who think $0.99 is too much for a short story by a relatively unknown author.

I share your love of books and as a 7-year old, I regularly visited our local country library. I remember finding the science-fiction shelves, starting with the A’s and working my way down the shelf. But when I hit the “H’s” and Heinlein, I was smitten. Read them all, twice. I can remember going to the librarian and asking if there were any more Heinlein books she could get. She looked in some catalog listing and said, “No. He must be writing another one though.” The next week, I checked and there were no more Heinleins on the shelf so I moved on to the L’s. The week after that however, there were still no more Heinleins on the shelf. I asked again. The librarian smiled at me and explained that no, there were none coming yet. “So how long does it take him to write a book?” I asked in high dudgeon. How long indeed. It only took me a few hours to read it, surely two weeks was more than enough time to write it. As it turns out, it only took me another 30 years or so to read everything he ever wrote. The wonder was there right from the beginning and I still wish he wrote those books faster.

Nice! I’m expecting to publish my first novel by the end of the month and have been going back & forth on whether or not to give Kindle Select/KU a try (not big on the whole exclusivity thing). Your “vote of confidence” is a pretty good sign that it’s worth a try! (P.S. – I’ll recuse myself from your offer of a free 6-month membership to KU, so another, more voracious reader can have it!) As always – thanks Hugh, for all you do!

I remember as a kid sitting in my closet reading. I read everywhere actually and still do. Every table near me was stacked with books so I could have options. Every bag I carried weighed a thousand pounds because it was full of books. I read my family’s set of encyclopedias when new books were scarce and when I got tired of that I started writing my own.

I grew up in a town of 2000 people, and my weekly pilgrimage to the town library quickly resulted in me exhausting my favorite fiction genres of new stories. What a gift. It forced me to read all the other genres and expanded my world a thousand-fold. I wouldn’t trade those hours at the library reading by the window facing the river for anything.

When the Kindle first came out, I was not convinced. I loved the feel and smell of my books! I finally broke down a few years back and I love my Kindle now. I can read in the dark! While traveling I can bring hundreds of books in a small package. That’s a big improvement over the giant bag of books that I used to bring on car trips! I haven’t tried Kindle Unlimited, yet. I’ve contemplated using the one month free trial, but I still have so many e-books that I have checked out from the library to read! I do want to read “The End is Come” and that’s available on KU. :)

Hi Hugh! Thanks for this great offer!

I have a couple of stories about reading as a kid. I read a lot as a kid. A LOT. I loved the library too (still do). But I didn’t live near a library, so it was always a special trip to go. That being said, the school library was where I got most of my books. When I was in 5th grade, I had the privilege of getting to go over to the middle school library because as my dad put it “I had read all the books in the elementary library.” I had a wonderful teacher who recognized my advanced reading level and knew I needed higher level material. I remember thinking the middle school library was so big and had books I actually wanted to read. Flash forward to 7th grade and I was bored with the middle school library. I was raiding my parents’ books by this point, who are both avid readers. So in 7th grade, I was sitting in the library reading Stephen King’s “IT” when the librarian sent me to the principal’s office. I was baffled. Turns out she believed I was reading inappropriate material. The principal called my mom who confirmed that I had permission to read the book. Long story short, nothing really came of it other than I was asked not to bring outside books to the school library. I remember being dumbfounded that I got in trouble for reading! I still remember the librarian’s look of disdain.

Love your works, Hugh. And thanks again for offering the gift of reading to your fans!

I lived in a country town as a child, and we were poor. I figured out early on that reading would be the great equalizer. I looked forward to the once-a-week walks (when weather permitted) between my elementary school and the public library. (The school didn’t even have its own library!). The teacher would have to almost drag me out of the place. Over the years, I’ve tripped over more piles of books than I can count. Now I own a Kindle and delight in the fact that I can have new books as fast as I can read them, as long as I can afford them. I am currently in the middle of an 8 book series, but I don’t have as much time to read as I once did. So sad!

I just got my son a kindle paper white for his 9 th bday coming up. He is running through books very fast now.

The smell…ah, the smell of Rainy Day Bookstore! My Dad would take me in there at least once a week. The smell, the very atmosphere of the place was enough to create a sort of pre-nostalgia for me, like the potential of unlimited journeys and lives not lived. Of course, Dad was usually a little miffed, because I often wanted a “Choose Your Own Adventure” book. What can I say? I grew up in the Zork era. I think seeing my Dad’s passion for reading instilled one in me. Admittedly, I don’t make it into the bookstore as often as I once did. My Kindle has made it far to easy to download books. However, my kids do see me read nightly and I hope it helps to foster their own love of books. Perhaps it’s time to start a Rainy Day Books tradition with my own kids!

Books have been, and remain, my best friends. I had a grandmother who was a librarian and let me explore the world via the tomes in her library every summer, including learning who this Andrew Carnegie was that built the place. I continue to patronize my library heavily, though largely through e-book and audiobook downloads rather than physical volumes.

I was a reluctant adoptee of e-readers, but fairly wuickly realized that I was actually reading MORE and reading a greater diversity of subjects, genres and authors. My Kindle takes me back to childhood when I used to read under the blankets late into the night. My Paperwhite sure beats juggling a flashlight or leaving the overhead light on.

Kudos to you, Mr. Howey, for sharing the joy of reading! (I already have an Unlimited membership so will decline the prize if you pick this comment.)

My enthusiasm for reading books began with the monthly library bookmobile visits to our parochial school. I couldn’t believe you could check out books and read them for free! My primary interest was reading any book I could find about animals–dogs, horses, wolves, you name it. When summer vacation came, I would walk about a mile to the library bookmobile set up in town. When I quickly exhausted their stock I discovered you could fill out a card and request books by authors you liked. Score! I had to get creative about reading them once I got home with my selections. With six kids in the household we had to be outside playing–not “laying around” the house. So I would climb the large maple tree in the backyard and read my book in peace and quiet. ;-)

Nowadays, my husband and I love reading and sharing our Kindle books. And, thank goodness, I don’t have to climb any trees to read my books. I’m not convinced yet about the Kindle Unlimited but you make a strong case for considering it, Hugh!

I’ve always been a book geek and proud of it. Nothing better than getting absorbed in a new world and reading a day away (less opportunities for that now that I must be a responsible adult, but I digress). That’s my favorite thing about your books: you create a world and it FEELS LIKE YOU’RE THERE. I look up from time to time and am surprised that I’m not in a silo, or the top of a gigantic tree, or on the beach, or wandering around in the sand. Luckily, I’ve passed my love of reading to my daughter, and not much gives me more pleasure than seeing her absorbed in a book just like I was. She has a rare chromosomal abnormality, and we were told she may never be able to read. The fact that she is a bookworm at the age of 14 fills me with indescribable joy. It’s one of the greatest pleasures of my life.

Hi, my name is Cara and I have an addiction.

For as long as I can remember, I’ve always loved to read. One of the very first books I can recall reading by myself was a book with Yogi Bear, and I think there was something in it about aluminum spelled backwards and an alien. After that I went on to read Goosebumps, The Saddle Club, Babysitter’s Club, all of the YA novels by Christopher Pike, then I graduated on to Ender’s Game, the Dragonriders of Pern, the Valdemar series by Mercedes Lackey… by the time I got to high school, I was often carrying 4-5 reading books back and forth every day. Usually once a week I’d walk from the school to the public library and check out 20-30 books at a time, then walk the few miles home (often reading a book on the way).

I am so very thankful for Kindle – now I can bring a few hundred books with me anywhere I go, and I am not carrying more than a pound or so. I can even put my kindle in a ziplock bag and take it with me to the beach, I can read in the tub, etc., without worrying about damaging any of the books.

Reading has always been an escape for me, a way to avoid a pretty craptastic childhood. Even now as an adult, I spend 2-3 hours daily just reading books (so yes, Kindle Unlimited would be a huge help!). Now that I’m undergoing treatment for breast cancer, I likely spend more like 6-8 hours reading. Hurray for an all natural, no side effect pain management!

It gets very difficult feeding my addiction. Not only is there the cost associated with it (although I am deeply greatful to indie authors like you, Hugh, who price their novels at a dollar or so apiece), but it’s also getting increasingly difficult to find new books that I’m interested in and haven’t read a dozen times already!

I was the reader in my family and I, too, grew up in the library. My parents always seemed to be struggling financially, but I was never at a loss for reading material. My mom believed in reading to us from a very early age because she always said that was one thing that disappointed her about her own mom… My grandmother never read to her kids, because that was what school was for. So my mom was the opposite!
I remember in 3rd or 4th grade my mom and I had a reading contest to see who could read faster. We each read the same children’s book and timed ourselves. I won. I was given free reign at the library venturing into the sections for older kids and then adults. My choices weren’t always appropriate (I went through a horror phase at quite a young age), but I was enthralled by the idea that I could learn anything and go anywhere in the pages of a book.
I stepped through the doors of that enchanted wardrobe, I went down an uncharted river in the Amazon with Teddy Roosevelt, I joined Roland and his Ka-tet, I stared at the sky with Pi and wondered at the craziness of being lost at sea, I cried with a family who lost their father in the Cambodian genocide, I followed Juliette up and down the stairs of the silo (carefully, and without looking over the edge).
A perfectly crafted sentence thrills me. I rarely read paper books without a highlighter in hand. Some of my books are so worn they are barely holding themselves together. I will never lose the love of printed books and being able to grab a favorite and flip to a favorite spot. But once upon a time another author I was following mentioned a new sci-fi series by one Hugh Howey… and I got my first e-book on my Kindle app. And now a whole new world has become available!
Hugh, I have done the exact same thing as you: made a list of to-read books and shopped on Amazon choosing the lower priced ones to read first. I don’t think you can ever run out of room for books (and I’m working on proving it), but e-books have made my obsession cheaper and infinitely more accessible. I never subscribed to KU because I figured I’d spend the money on books that weren’t necessarily available there, but I’m pretty sure you’ve changed my mind.
It has been so fun to follow you, read the new stuff you are constantly putting out, and feel a real connection to what would have once been a dust-jacket image of a person I knew nothing about. Authors are my heroes. I haven’t had the inspiration to become one yet myself, but I am amazed at what is being produced.
Thanks, Hugh. From one 1975er to another: You are an inspiration!

Hmmm… I went to a Catholic elementary school, so our books selection was quite limited (a lot of non-fiction and Narnia). Outside of school it was all “Choose Your Own Adventures” and Hardy Boys. When I went to the public middle school (I actually volunteered to work in the library), but that is where a love of science fiction began.

My wife is a voracious reader, together we have 7 or 8 floor to ceiling bookcases of hardbacks. We try to collect first editions of our favorites (just added the Subterranean versions of the Silo Series and you sent Dust in my potluck!).

However, the best part of reading is watching my sons (6 and 11) pick up a book and not put it down for hours. My oldest used to fight us to read, we talked him into joining the boys bookclub in 3rd grade…. The Secret of Nimh was it… cover to cover and that began a nearly unstoppable love of reading. He just finished 5th grade and won his school’s Accelerated Reader award for earning nearly 300 points. I figure I’ll start him on Wool next.

The little one is already reading at a 4th grade level, so he’s not to far off!

Keep up the excellent work, Hugh! Engaging storytelling is a gift, and it’s wonderful that you share it (exceptionally inexpensively) with everyone! I’ve recommended your books nearly daily to folks.

As a side-note, I’d like to know how many other authors of your level of success reply personally to emails and facebook posts as consistently as you do?

The book I remember having the biggest impact on me as a child was “Winnie, my life in the institution” but I read anything I could get my hands on. Some things never change..

Your silo series has given me the worst book hangover literally I have trouble reading other book because i keep thinking back to what they are up too now !!! Six months of kindle unlimited just might be able to get me over my book hangover!!!!!

When I was a kid, we lived in the desert, where the soft-bellied horny toads were my friends, and I played cars in the dirt with my brothers. We lived too far from the library –and people — so I had no friends but I did have siblings and the occasional visiting cousins. But I adored music and books, and I remember mom and dad providing us with a reading library at home. I would spend many hours with my nose in books (literally, because I loved the smell of freshly printed pages), and still recall the volumes of Mother Goose and Life nature books, and every Trixie Belden and Nancy Drew book ever written. When I could, I would sneak paperbacks that some adult left laying around (and in the process caught up on how sex happened), and poured over those dusty pages too. Book fairs at school? Could never decide which to buy on my very limited budget (so many wonderful stories to choose from!), but treasured those like they were gold bars.

My first memory of becoming obsessed with reading came in fourth grade. I couldnt get enough of RL Stine’s Goosebump series. The problem was that I lived a very conservative family in a very small town of 500 people. Ghost stories were simply not allowed. At first, I just read them at school. Then I grew bolder, I would check them out of the library, and sneak them home in a backpack and read them with a flashlight whenever all my siblings and mom were asleep. That made up for some terrifying nights but I just couldn’t stop reading them. I got to where I would purposely get my name on the board so as to miss recess so I could read.

We didn’t have much money growing up, so books were a precious resource. They were my teachers. They were my escape. As an adult, because of hard work and a huge amount of luck, I can afford to pay for KU myself. Thank you, Hugh, for giving others a chance.

The first books I remember reading was the John Carter of Mars series (E.R.B.), then I blew through my dad’s Stephen King books, then graduated to libraries, then the stores that I could take all my paperbacks in… and trade them for new (to me) ones.

I wanted to be an author and did the research on how to do it… then promptly gave up.

Read WOOL and found out that it was self-published (was mostly surprised by the quality)… ran out, got more information about self-pubbing, then proceeded to start writing.

I’ve written 3 short stories and am now in the process of working on my second novel (all of which are or will be in Kindle Select). I absolutely love my Kindle and have also used it to let people read one of my short stories to get them hooked on my writing.

Hugh is my inspiration and the reason I call myself an author today.

My grandfather read with me. My parents weren’t in to doing things with their kids like taking them to the library–when they did, I’d check out the 25 book limit, and then they’d get really mad about having to make a trip to return them, it was just another thing they got mad about–so Poppy and I read the same books all the time, and on birthdays he’d get me a new one. We usually read The Real Mother Goose, and we always went through the book reading his favorites first, and then when I begged, went through it again reading everything. At the end, I’d tell him that his favorites were the best ones and he’d get this silly proud look. He had to buy a new copy because we wore out the first one and the cover fell off. I still have both. When I got to elementary school Poppy died and I was able to check out books from the school library, and made the goal of reading every book in it. I did. People didn’t believe me at first, but there was a reading program at our school where you took tests after and you accumulated points for the number of right answers, which served as proof. It was really exciting and I still remember it as the thing I was proudest of growing up. They asked me what I was going to do after I finished them all, and that was so silly to me because I did what I’d always done: I reread my favorites. I still reread books. It’s funny that so many people don’t. You find new stuff in them every time! Anyhow, we moved a lot (luckily? unluckily?) which meant new school libraries! :) That was always my one good thing about moving, the new school library. I still move around a lot as an adult, and always check out the libraries in a town first. Leaving Seattle was a bummer because the KCLS library system is the best and my new one is very…lacking. But! You can find treasures in any library system. I make it work.

This comment has made me realize that the reading habits I established as a child are still the same today. How funny! I don’t really know who I’d be if my grandfather hadn’t spent that time coming over and reading with me when I was little. I just don’t know how I’d have survived childhood if he hadn’t done that.
I still have the books he gave me, with his signature in the front. I try and give kids I know books for their birthdays now, and write notes in the front like he did. I figure it was the best thing anyone did for me as a kid, so I try to pass it on.

This comment got really long. But I dig the question. Reading the comments on this post is really neat, it’s great to see how other people became readers!

One of my favorite memories of my childhood was the year the ABA convention was held at Moscone Center in San Francisco. My mom took me, and we came home with five shopping bags of free books.

And I’ve also got to give a shout out to my 1st grade teachers, Mrs. Burns, who got me (and all my classmates) hooked on the Mister/Little Miss books….

When I was in 3rd grade our tv went on “vacation”. My parents felt we were watching too much tv and needed a break. At the time, we were horrified but truthfully it was one of the best things that ever happened to us. Weekly visits to the library opened up new worlds to lose myself in and I have never looked back. Poor TV, it turns out it didn’t really get to go vacation and was living in the trunk of my parents Ford Pinto. Not much of a vacation… I’d rather read a book.

My childhood allowence went to books. I read a lot of trade paperbacks that weren’t in libraries; Star Wars, Star Trek, Dragonlance. Every car trip, five minute pause between classes, anytime I was stationary, my nose was in one of those off yellow paperbacks that smelled like acid and pulp.

Sometimes I’ll pick up an old paperback and try to guess the age by the smell of the pages. My wife (and you, probably) think that’s a bit odd, but the smell reminds me of childhood.

I try to avoid black and white, all or nothing thinking, so for now, my wife, Gina Lake, and I still have some ebooks in KU and some available widely. This seems like the best of both worlds especially since we now have over 30 books for sale. We do not need 30 books in KU to take advantage of that program, nor do we need 30 books on iBooks to reach the people who shop more on there. And since some readers buy ebooks on more than one platform, even the ebooks that are not available on their preferred online store are still available to them if they search a little harder.

And my parents were educators and so for a while they paid me $0.10 for every book I read. It worked as I read a lot and even forgot after a while to ask for my $0.10. The only thing that ever slowed me down was when the library had a limit on the number of books you could check out at the same time :)

I was much like you with the library growing up! My family was very poor and my dad was in and out of the hospital since before I was born. We lived in a scary neighborhood and reading was my escape from all of it! My mom started taking me to the library when I was old enough to walk and we spent many hours bonding over books. It was really the only thing that we did together. She was always working to support us but readings we could do together any time!

When my friends chipped in a couple years ago to buy me a kindle, I literally cried. It has been to most amazing gift ever. Having so many books at your fingertips is a serious blessing! I discovered your books on there and I first bought them because they were so affordable! Who knew you would turn out to be one of my favorite authors and such an overall good guy?!

Thanks for the chance to win the kindle subscription, but bigger thanks for everything you have done for e-publishing and for being an amazing writer! You are an inspiration!

The responses here are heartwarming, a nice change over some message board responses I’ve seen over the past week or so.

I picked up a paperback copy of Stephen King’s “Pet Cemetery” in the airport way back when. I tried to finish the book that night, reading it on the flight, and eventually falling asleep on the couch in the middle of the night with about twenty pages left. When I woke the next morning, my golden retriever had eaten the back half of the book. Seriously. I finished it standing in the book section of the local supermarket.

I’m already a very happy Kindle Unlimited subscriber and love my Voyage, but had to share anyway.

Wool was one of the first books I read on my Kindle. I loved it so much, I’ve read every single thing you’ve written to date. I tell everyone about you!

Oh yeah, I forgot the most important thing. It’s all my mom’s fault I read. I didn’t realize until I was much older that all mothers didn’t have stacks of books lying around the house, and they didn’t all stay up all night reading. Love you mom!

Oh, another funny book thing… there was a little motel in the town where I grew up and the lady who worked there was addicted to Harlequin romances. When I got old enough to drive I would go back to where my grandmother lived and take her to the motel office where they had a “leave one, take one” policy. She’d drop off the Harlequins she had read and picked up an equal amount of new ones she hadn’t read. That was our Saturday ritual for a while.

I remember when my Conan paperbacks went from 2.95 to over 5.00 and I thought that was the end of the world. Got married had kids and went to bookstore and they where 9.95. Can’t tell you how many late fees I had from library. I would never trade the time I spent going through a card catalog. Now when I’m in line at Wal-Mart I get out my phone and read a page or two. Please pass me over for subscription. The 9.95 I spend each month for more books than I will ever read is the best money I have ever spent

Growing up an Army brat, overseas, and an only child (and we didn’t have a TV), the library quickly became my second home. At least once a week I was carrying home stacks of books.

30+ years later and a father of three, I can’t always afford to indulge, but I can certainly appreciate the idea of KU.

Growing up my parents encouraged me to read as they themselves were avid readers but for me there never was enough time in the day to read all my books. When I was probably between 5 and 8 years old every night my parents would allow me to read for 20 minutes before bed to get ready to go to sleep, a habit left over from them reading me to sleep, but then it was lights out. Lucky for me I had a timed night light and after my bedroom door was shut I would sneak over and grab a few other children’s books to read before the night light went out. I always thought I was so smart and sneaky doing that but found out years later that my parents knew because I never put the books away lol.

I still find that now even 20 years later that when I’m reading a good book that bedtimes becomes nonexistent. I know finishing up Dust I was awake until 4 am and even though I wad so tired in the morning it was worth it.

I already subscribe to Kindle Unlimited, but wanted to comment anyway. As a small child, I loved books. My mom used to tell the story of how I, at about age 4, would carry books around the house and beg anyone to “Show me how to read! Show me how to read right now!” I was reading shortly after that and have never stopped.

What I remember most about reading as a child is that I read anything and everything. I read cereal boxes, I read my father’s college textbooks when I was way too young for them, I read my mother’s psychology books, I read my uncle’s old reading textbooks from school (from the 1920s or so), and I read my own books over and over and over. I had one shelf–not a whole bookcase, just one shelf–full of books. I didn’t have easy access to a library and our local library did not have many good books for children. They were mostly all books written with a condescending tone like, “Sally needs a date for Friday and nobody has asked her! What will she do?” or “Johnny’s team lost the football game and it was his fault. Whatever will he do?”

When I was about 11 or 12, my father was doing some carpentry and brickwork for a family, and he used to take me along. The family had an older teenage daughter, and one day, for seemingly no reason at all, she came out and gave me a shoebox full of paperback books. She’d seen that I was always reading and just gave them to me to keep. I think she knew that I would appreciate her books, and I did. I still have these books now, more than 40 years later. I shared many of them with my own children when they were teens. I was so thrilled to have these books. They became my new go-to books which I read over and over and over. Many of them had a huge influence on me at the time and some of them for the rest of my life. I don’t know if she knew how much these books meant to me as I don’t believe I ever saw her again after that, but I idolized her at the time and even now in my mind, I see her has this sort of mythical figure in my life–a hero, a mentor, someone I admired and looked up to even though I barely knew her. (I invented this wonderful life for her, of course. I imbued her with all the best qualities of the characters in all the books she gave to me.)

I also named my daughter after a character in one of the books.

In junior high and high school, I traded books with friends and discovered the school library so my reading expanded even more. I miss trading books with friends as I would read anything and so often read books I probably wouldn’t have picked for myself. Even so, I wouldn’t give up my Kindle. :)

Happy reading.