Guilty Pleasures

[hfnuala]

When I was 10 to 15 years old I devoured everything by Andre Norton I could find. The first one of her books was bought for me from one of the english bookshops in Brussels - it was Tales of the Witch World and was a Daw paperback with a good and pulpy cover. I still have it, though it may be in storage. I've got rid of many bad teenage books[1

Comments

[halle]

My teenage guilty reading pleasures are all very, very guilty--God help, I read a whole bunch of awful VC Andrews books. Really horrible.

[hfnuala]

I read several of them too. But I don't still love them the way I do the Andre Nortons - I was thinking of the books we recognise as not exactly classic writing but love nonetheless, because they spoke to us at that vulnerable book devouring stage.

[halle]

Ah. I actually just a few months ago bought all of the Sunfire (American historical romance series) on eBay. All of the books are long out of print, but I collected them compulsively when I was about 12ish. I think I knew that they were crap at the time, and I certainly know it now, but I love them nonetheless. (Despite the fact that they are all the same: each a different historical time period, love triangle, girl ends up choosing The Boy Who Really Loves Her For Herself.) See, my guilty pleasure if still much less cool than yours.

[nwhyte]

Mine is Roger Zelazny. I still love his writing style, but I am wiser about the substance - casual macho males vs females who are either scheming or virginal. (I was particularly taken aback when I got hold of "The Illustrated Roger Zelazny" and found Gray Morrow's illustrations sexist rather than sensual.) And while the narrative depth was just right for me as a teenager, I now find him pretty shallow.

[hfnuala]

I got given the Fantasy Masterworks collected Amber books recently and found them impossible to read. Just so dated. But I suspect I would have eaten them up if exposed to them at the right age. I remember liking Lord of Light though I no longer remember anything about it.

[leedy]

I remember really enjoying the Amber books in my yoof, but even at the time I remember finding them dated.

And I too read a lot of Anne McCaffrey.

[hfnuala]

Did you know Anne McCaffrey invented feminist science fiction?

[lilitufire]

I loved, loved, loved Moon of Three Rings. I'm surprised they're all out of print, she was a favourite library author of mine.

I also had a big thing for Margaret Mahy when I was a pre teen. I wonder if the books would stand up on a reread...

Hmmm. Books fit through the postbox on the new house. And the nice Japanese post office has an English helpline. I kid you not.

Must.... resist....eBay....

:)

[batswing]

Margaret Mahy is still really popular with the teens, though I haven't read any...

[hfnuala]

You know, it never occured to me to try email for out of print books...

Gah, must forget I ever had that thought.

[lilitufire]

Quite a lot of the Hay booksearch people have websites and online forms. I probably shouldn't tell you that, though, should I?

:)

[elgoose]

I loved Andre Norton at that age, just loved her. My guilty pleasure from back then is Robert Heinlein, who I just find embarrassing now, for oh so many reasons.

[hfnuala]

I read some Heinlein in my late teens and was mostly very confused. I'm glad I never read Friday.

[surliminal]

I still do re-read Heinlein juveniles as light reading when I'm ill or something. they're great page turners and the sexual politics only becomes truely appalling in the adult ones (if you sort of try not to look..)

[armoire_man]

Yes - Heinlein juvies were heaven when I was about twelve. Of course, then I read "I Will Fear No Evil" and was probably warped for life.

[alltheleaves]

My friends and I went through a stage of reading Mills & Boon because it was just fabulously hilarious. And we read anything and everything by Jilly Cooper moving on to Jackie Collins and a book called Princess Daisy although I forget the writer. And we may have even delved into a few Danielle Steeles.

[hfnuala]

I used to be able to speed read M&Bs in half an hour in the local library because my parents would have freaked if I'd brought them home. I don't think I've ever read a non-romance book in which a woman wears her hair in a chignon. In fact, I'm not even sure I know what one of them is.

Princess Daisy was by Judith Krantz who also did Mistral. I prefered Mistral because it didn't have the creepy brother incest. I've also read a Daniel Steele - the hero owned a vineyard. In fact, I obviously read nothing good for years :)

[alltheleaves]

Oh I completely refused to read anything that would please my parents through my entire teenage years. My sister was a paragon of virtue when it came to reading good books and I couldn't possibly be like her so I read anything and everything that I was told not to. Especially Just 17.

On the other hand I read a lot of the stuff my sister read back then now and I know I'm getting more out of them than I would have done at that age. My parents went on and on about her having read Anna Karenina and I finally picked it up a couple of years ago and thought it was dreadful. I phoned up my Dad and asked him what he thought of it and he said he hadn't liked it either; far too sentimental. I then asked why they made such a song and dance about my sister reading it and it was pure snobbery about her reading Tolstoy at 17.

[hfnuala]

I let into my secret for the way to read AK and like it - skip all the Kitty and Levin chapters. Then it's a wonderful observation of a woman trapped by the society that excludes her but not her lover for the sin they shared and how it eventially drives her mad. But the rest is crap - I don't care how Tolstoy thinks a perfect marriage should be because he was obviously a loon.

I agree about not trying to plow through the classic as a teeenager. I just didn't understand enough about life to get much out of anything that wasn't a straight romance back then.