I know that thousands and millions of kids out there are always hating on the books we were forced to read in school right now. Some of them are not the best books but some of them are, and as a bookworm from a young age, there were so many books I actually loved that I read in primary school. I’ll be doing another post to babble about books I loved in high school too.
Let’s Go Back in Time
A throwback to when mini Truffles was 10, having just moved to Australia 3-4 months before, and barely speaking English. I wasn’t confident in English, I was shy and anti-social cause nearly everyone was always asking me “Are you new?” – well, no shit dawg I’m wearing jeans, it’s my first day, you think I want to wear green and yellow checkered on purpose yet?
Anyway, the easiest thing and the most fun thing I could do was getting into books. I could sit in a corner and go in another world, and it dramatically improved my English and therefore my social skills, so I owe a lot to books, specifically, books in the class sets that just sat there for ages until someone either chose one or we were forced to pick one up. Back then, we didn’t have much internet or a disposable income to buy books so behold my first love: the library. If you’re Aussie, you’ll know those classic green shopping bags from Woolworths, and I used to bring home a bag full of those once a month and devour them so much my parents wanted me to stop reading and watch more TV at some point. Then as I got older in school, we got to read in class by ourselves instead of being read to while sitting cross-legged on the floor, my day went from boring to freaking awesome. So here are some of the books that I loved from primary school:
The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett
This is where my love for classics started. I loved this story and I loved hearing my favourite teacher read a little bit of it and reading it by myself in class. I want to get a copy someday and reread it because I just remember loving this book so much. I wish that I had more classics and that I read them more often because I do love them. I read a few when I was 11-12, like Little Women and my favourite classic of all, which is the next book on this list.
Anne of Green Gables L.M. Montgomery
To this day, I still have a copy of this gorgeous cute little book which was given to me as a present by my favourite teacher when I finished Grade 5. It’s in mint condition and I could read this so many times. Definitely my favourite classic so far in all the ones I’ve read. It’s just the sweetest story of a young girl growing up with all her ambitions and the drive to push her forward to do what she wants to do. For those thinking, no I don’t plan to watch any movies of that adaptation on Netflix, I want to keep this forever in my mind as content solely from the book.
Hovercar Racer by Matthew Reilly
This book was basically my introduction to sci-fi adventure and boy did I love this one. Not only was it a fat book but in my day (from what I remember), this book was the bomb. It had action and fast-paced scenes with 13-year-olds racing cars that hover. Like, idk about you but I was dreaming of doing that cause it sounded so fun.
Stormbreaker (Alex Rider #1) by Anthony Horowitz
Oh my gahd. I loved this series so much and I was so happy that I found it through school! This was obviously before I knew there was also a movie adaptation (where Jace Wayland Alex Pettyfer plays Alex Rider and is a rare character where the teen actually looks like a teen and is pulling all them amazing spy moves with gadgets and shit we only saw in Kim Possible on Saturdays and MI6 on weekdays at 4:30 pm after school). I fully remember reading at least the first 4 to 5 books before I lost interest and got into the paranormal scene. I kinda hope that the spy theme will become a thing in YA cause spies are so fun, I mean we know mission impossible is actually possible. I truly enjoyed these books and if any of you guys have mini siblings to get them to read it because it’s just action, adventure, dangerous spy stuff that any kid would be a fan of.
So those are my favourite books that I read in school! I read a lot more, obviously, but these are the ones that I had to read at some point in my classes that I truly remember about, in other words, they were so good I’m able to remember them now. When I’m currently 20.
It has been a decade since my love for reading began and I’m so much more grateful and appreciative for it. Many people around the world and even in Australia, cannot read, and encouraging young kids to learn to read and read for fun is how we can all help create a better and more educated world, but also future fanboys and fangirls for your best friends writing to be authors right now. I think I’ve babbled enough for tonight now. Do you remember any of your favourite school books in primary school (or elementary school)? What were they and would you reread them now?
Until next time,
xx Tracy
