How I became a reader.

I owe my love of reading to my mother and indirectily to my step father. My mother used to read to me when I was a child, and then when I started elementary school and began to learn to read, she would give me enough money (ususally fifty cents) to order books through the classroom.

From classroom books, I gradually switched over to comic books in the late fifties, reading such gems as Superman, The Green Lantern, Flash, Justice League of America, and Batman. In late 1961, something unusual happened that would change the course of comic book history. MC comics came out with The Fantastic Four, followed by the Hulk, Spiderman, Daredevil, Thor, Ant Man, and Iron Man. My allegiance shifted from DC comics to Marvel comics. That was also the year I started reading books without pictures or drawings in them, starting with the Tarzan and John Carter of Mars series by Edgar Rice Burroughs. Man, those books took me to other worlds. For years I believed John Carter actually lived on Mars and if I thought hard enough, I could transport myself there to help him save Barsoom. In time, however, I switched over to the Doc Savage series by Kenneth Robertson, and then to reading science fiction and some horror by other authors.

The next break-through came with James Bond. From Russia With Love did it. I saw the trailers for the movie and then wanted to read the novels. Of course, I went from wanting to be Tarzan or John Carter, to wanting to be James Bond. And, this is where my step father came in. For all of his faults, he helped to merge this shift for me because he owned all of the Bond novels in paperback and hardcover. Now my step father worked for the government. We were always moving. In Mobile, Alabama, I was reading From Russia With Love in study hall, and the teacher literally grabbed the paperback out of my hand and took me to the principal's office for daring to read pornography in school. Pornography! The principal called my step father and he came to school from work to get me. Now, I was sitting outside the principal's office when he talked to my step father, and I think this was the first and only time my step father ever took up for me. I could him shouting at the principal, calling him a small-minded fool and a biget against reading. He told the principal that President John F. Kennedy was a big fan of Ian Fleming and the Bond novels, and that if they were good enough for the President of the United States, they were good enough for me to read. He then told my teacher that if he ever touched me again, he would personally come down to the school and kick his ass from one end of the hall to the other. I believed him, too. When we got home, my step father told me to read whatever I was interested in and not to worry about what others thought. For that moment and that moment only, he was a real-life hero to me. I still ahere to that policy and read whatever I choose without worrying about what others think.

Later I shifted over to the "Sam Durell" series by Edward S. Aarons and the "Matt Helm" series by Donald Hamilton. John D. MacDonald soon followed with his "Travis McGee" books. I would buy these, and then my step father would read them.

The next hit came down the road a ways when I was in high school and living in North Carolina. I worked part-time in the library and it sold new paperbacks for raise money for special events. One on the authors they carried was Alistair MacLean. I read Where Eagles Dare and just about flipped out. Needless to say, I became an immediate fan of the author and went back and read The Guns of Navarrone and anything else I could find by him. I stayed a fan of his for almost fifteen years.

The next big hit came in college when I read The Eiger Sanction by Trevanian and The Quiller Memorandum by Adam Hall. Trevanian didn't write much. He did The Loo Sanction and then Shibumi years later. Adam Hall (aka Eliston Trevor--I might be misspelling this) wrote a new "Quiller" novel every year or two. There was also the "Modesty Blaze" series. I can't remember the author of that at the moment, but Angelina Jolie would've been perfect for that role.

The really next big hit came during my student teaching at East Carolina University when I found The Scarlotti Inheritance by Robert Ludlum in the paperback racks of the local bookstore. I quickly became a Ludlum fan, and then a John Le Carre fan.

The book, however, that would change my life forever came in 1976 with the publication of Salem's Lot in paperback. I've never been the same sense that moment in time. Stephen King changed the whole univere for me and for millions of others as well. He also opened the door for such talented writers as Peter Straub (Ghost Story and Floating Dragon are my two favorites) and Robert R. McCammon (Baal, Bethany's Sin, They Thirst, are just a few of his early bestsellers--Subterranean Press is republishing these in limited edtions), Dan Simmons and others.

It wasn't until the early ninties that I had my next hit when a bookstore manager at Waldenbooks here in Vegas (his name was Mark) turned me on to James Lee Burke, Greg Rucka, Dennis Lehane, and Robert Crais. Then, in 2001, I read The Bottoms by Joe R. Lansdale. That book blew me away. I said then and many times since then that The Bottoms was worthly of a Pulitzer Prize, it was that damn good. I then met John Connolly here in Vegas. He's the talented author of the "Charlie Parker" series. John came over to my place and we had a beer and talked books. When he saw The Bottoms on my bookshelf, he asked if I'd read the "Hap/Leonard" series by Joe Lansdale. I told him no. He ordered me to buy them. I'm glad he did because I'm now a die-hard fan of the boys and have been for a decade. See my reviews of Devil Red and Hyenas.

Anyway, that's a very brief look at my reading career with regards to modern fiction. While reading novels, I was also reading history (Ancient, Middle Ages, European, Russian, World War I and II) and philosohy books and books on Oriental history, Eastern Philosohy, martial arts, psychology, self help, and others. Thanks to my mom, I have a large interest in reading material, though I primarily stick to fiction now. If I still had all the books I've owned over the years, they would be enough to fill the walls of a medium-sized house. One last thing, I hate moving books. I just moved three-and-a-weeks ago and had fifteen big boxes of books to move with my other stuff. As Danny Glover says in Lethal Weapon, I'm getting too old for this shit. Now, I don't have a bookcase to put the books on. They're stacked up in the boxes against the wall between the couch and the stove. It's tiny apartment. Oh, well. Give me some time, and I'll them unpacked and on a nice looking bookcase. First, I have to my computer back!