I’m not much of a TV person (I follow only three shows at the most, and those are currently Chuck, How I Met Your Mother and Glee), so I always read. Back in grade school, I always got into trouble because teachers constantly caught me reading under my desk. Sometimes, I stuck a paperback novel between the pages of my textbooks, but I was caught on a couple of occasions. The teachers probably knew, judging from my overly absorbed expression, that the subject matter couldn’t be that interesting so I was probably reading something else.

But don’t get me wrong; I never read anything contraband, especially not in school. I read mostly classic children’s literature (A Little Princess, Tom Sawyer and The Secret Garden were my favorites) and a lot of Nancy Drew–I finished the entire series by the time I was in the 5th grade, which kind of says a lot about how nerdy I was then.

Nancy was a carefree 18-year-old who didn't go to college and had a rich dad.

But she was smart and always had unlimited resources to solve cases. World unfair.

I also read a lot of Sweet Valley Twins/High and Archie comic books. One time, I left a copy of a Sweet Valley University book in my grandmother’s house, and my aunt happened to read it. The very next day, she went over to my mom’s house to discuss the inappropriate adult themes in the books that I read. Of course, I wasn’t allowed to read SVU after that; not in front of my family, anyway.

They had really cheesy covers back then

Sweet Valley aside, I never got into the trashy novel genre, although a lot of my high school friends brought paperbacks covered with gift wrap to school. I was admittedly curious, but reading a lot of classic books made me a literature snob when I was younger; I didn’t want to be seen with a book that featured a painting of a busty young woman making out with a virile man on the cover.
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