I'm such a morbid fuck.
When I was a kid, I was a complete bookworm. I used to read three or four books simultaneously. I wish I still had the attention span for that.
One of the books I picked out for myself when I was nine was The Midnight Club by Christopher Pike. For those of you who don't know, he writes (wrote?) young adult thrillers that were just porny enough to keep adolescents coming back for more. This particular one was about a group of teenagers in a hospice. Yeah.
One of my favorite memories in retrospect was when I was reading the book during silent reading time in fourth grade and I came across a word I was unfamiliar with... so I asked my teacher earnestly, innocently, and publically what an orgasm was.
She cracked up and told me to ask my parents.
I knew it was something physical, so I asked my grandfather (who was a doctor) what it was. He explained it beautifully -- he said it was a burst of energy.
I've spent a lot of time looking for this book. I finally found it at the Goodwill near my house.
It's so horrible. I couldn't finish it. All these kids were dying and some were in denial and it was ripping my heart out. Then I started thinking some terrible thoughts that have been plaguing me and I ended up throwing the book into the closet and sobbing for a while.
I guess when you're a kid you don't understand the full implications of things. That why kids love scary books. The stories are scary, to be sure, but the concepts are distant and abstract. They have no idea how real some of these things are.
Knowledge is pain.
When I was a kid, I was a complete bookworm. I used to read three or four books simultaneously. I wish I still had the attention span for that.
One of the books I picked out for myself when I was nine was The Midnight Club by Christopher Pike. For those of you who don't know, he writes (wrote?) young adult thrillers that were just porny enough to keep adolescents coming back for more. This particular one was about a group of teenagers in a hospice. Yeah.
One of my favorite memories in retrospect was when I was reading the book during silent reading time in fourth grade and I came across a word I was unfamiliar with... so I asked my teacher earnestly, innocently, and publically what an orgasm was.
She cracked up and told me to ask my parents.
I knew it was something physical, so I asked my grandfather (who was a doctor) what it was. He explained it beautifully -- he said it was a burst of energy.
I've spent a lot of time looking for this book. I finally found it at the Goodwill near my house.
It's so horrible. I couldn't finish it. All these kids were dying and some were in denial and it was ripping my heart out. Then I started thinking some terrible thoughts that have been plaguing me and I ended up throwing the book into the closet and sobbing for a while.
I guess when you're a kid you don't understand the full implications of things. That why kids love scary books. The stories are scary, to be sure, but the concepts are distant and abstract. They have no idea how real some of these things are.
Knowledge is pain.
VIEW 4 of 4 COMMENTS
inkcasualty:
gotta like a "juvie author" who takes his name from a Star Trek captain. I still enjoy reading his books for a laugh as my daughter loved them after she "graduated" from the Goosebumps series
inkcasualty:
definate writing name