How Pamela Dean changed (and also saved) my life.

[seanan_mcguire]

(I thought a lot about whether this needed a trigger warning, and decided that it was better to err on the side of caution. So...TW: very oblique and carefully worded mention of a suicide attempt.)

I don't think it's any secret that I am a voracious reader. I read constantly. My friend Michelle has commented on more than one occasion that she,

Comments

[anderyn]

I grew up too early for this book to be there when I was a teenager, but I, too, recognize the voracious reader and escaper into books. I didn't often get to a library (my father disliked them) but I had a few books, and I reread them a lot (until my father made me burn them all when I was in high school -- a few escaped the fire due to being at my great-grandparents' house, but... yeah). My house now is covered in books, and I love Pamela Dean.

And, yeah, thank god that you had a good friend and a way to ask for help. I've lost a few friends to that black dog, and I'm happy you escaped.

[morningapproach]

oh my gosh, your father made you burn them? That is horrible!

[anderyn]

Yes, he caught me reading Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five, and he was livid. He marched me out to the trash can (it was allowable to burn your trash at the time) and made me put all of my books in and then light the match and watch them all burn. He also bitched out the principal and the librarian and my teacher for allowing me to order that kind of trash from the school book order (this was when I was in high school).

[siege]

Gads. Were I that teacher, librarian, or principal, I'd have bitched right back at him and written to the local paper about the predictable results of censorship of books and knowledge.

[dormouse_in_tea]

.......

Are there any books you lost that you haven't been able to replace? Maybe we can help, if so.

[anderyn]

Awww. Thanks for the offer. Alas, it's forty years ago now, and I don't recall everything that I had in my admittedly small stash.

[seanan_mcguire]

...I want to hit your father with a stick. Is that bad? That's probably bad. I still want to.

PEOPLE.

[anderyn]

I'd tell you it was okay, but beating a several-years-dead corpse is probably not all that satisfying. Or useful.

But. Yeah. Even writing about it forty years later gives me the cold willies.