I got hooked on the stuff pretty early. I was just a kid at the time. Saw it on tv, PBS of all places. Take a look, it's in a book, reading rainbow. LaVar Burton on the screen, hawking some picture books. So I got curious, like George. Went to my local library. Checked out a book or two. It's just a book, I told myself, What's the harm in one little picture book? How naive I was. Just one book and it was Goodnight, Moon. Before I knew it I was reading five, six, seven picture books a day. I was tearing through them like a hungry caterpillar. I couldn't get enough. Pretty soon a prescription from Dr Seuss just wasn't cutting it anymore, I started hitting the harder stuff; chapter books. Soon I was scrounging together loose change just to pay off my dealers at the Scholastic Book Fair. They always had these wild new strains with crazy names like "Animorphs" and "Goosebumps". Reader beware, you're in for a scare. Yeah. Learned that the hard way. Believe it or not I actually got clean for a while. Managed to sit in front of a tv for long enough to detox with cartoons. Then, must I have been my 11th or 12th birthday. Some maniac gave me a copy of Treasure Island. Do you have any idea what a pirate adventure does to a preteen boy's brain? Didn't help that PBS was flaunting that cute little Jack Russell terrier called Wishbone. Gave me a taste for the classics. Frankenstein, the Three Musketeers, The Count of Monte Cristo, Gulliver's Travels. School tried to help, they made us popcorn read Romeo and Juliet. You'd think that'd break anyone of the Hobbit, But it was too late, I was already reading at a sixth grade level. I'd tell myself I could quit anytime I wanted. But who was I kidding, I'd pick up a book and I couldn't put it down, always chasing the next narrative climax like a white whale. It was too late for me, I was hooked on phonics.