My mother never was one to tell me I couldn't read anything. She always said she taught me right and wrong and trusted me to know the difference. Summers found me at our local library devouring books from the likes of Judy Blume, Beverly Cleary, and the Childhood of Famous Americans series.
One of my favorite authors of all time at the ripe old age of sixteen was Dr. Seuss. I loved the lesser known book I can Lick 30 Tigers Today. I checked it out of the library quite often when I was younger, and I would giggle while curled up to my mother listening to her reading that some of the tigers' fingernails weren't very clean. As with some of his books, there were other stories included. I loved the Glunk that Got Thunk, and growing up in poor Appalachia, I felt sorry for the family who the Glunk was overtaking their phone line. I would remind myself it was just a for-fun-fiction story, and get back to the rhyme. (That's how I always remembered fiction and non-fiction. Written "for fun" starts with the letter F.) And I loved King Louis Katz that was the last of the stories in that book.
