I always enjoy reading people’s Booking Through Thursday entries, but I’ve never felt an overwhelming desire to answer one of the questions. Until I saw this week’s question.

When growing up did your family share your love of books? If so, did one person get you into reading? And, do you have any family-oriented memories with books and reading? (Family trips to bookstore, reading the same book as a sibling or parent, etc.)

My mom is a huge book reader as well, and she and I definitely bonded over books. When my sister was little, she read quite a bit as well (though never with the all-consuming passion I experienced), but now she doesn’t read all that much. My dad read a little but not like my mom did. Here’re my favourite family book-loving memories

+My mom and I read classics together before bedtime. Two most memorable? Little Women, which I took camping with us; the first night in the cabin is when a major character dies (I don’t want to spoil it). Will always remember where I was. The other one is Phantom of the Opera-I tried to read it by myself in 6th grade. I got to the chapter where Christine disappears behind the mirrors, and chucked it across the room in frustration. So, Mom and I read it together. Then, for me 12th birthday (the next year, when we had moved to England), we went and saw the musical at Her Majesty’s Theatre. I still have my sweatshirt, with the Phantom’s mask that glows in the dark.

+Every other week (in elementary school), my sister and I received a $4 allowance. However, if we wanted to buy a book with it, Mom would pay for half of the book (meaning, I could get two books!). My 2nd grade teacher had retired and opened a bookstore, so we’d all bike there (small town) and pick out our books.

+On a visit to my maternal grandparents when I was 10, Mom emerged from the basement with an old suitcase. Inside it were her Nancy Drew books (she had around 25 of them). She gave them all to me; I read The Secret of the Old Clock that day. After that, every Christmas for a long time I received 3-6 Nancy Drew books to add to the collection. I plan on bequething it my children.

+One of my earliest memories is a book memory. When I was 4, we took a family trip to Wales (we lived in England then). We stayed at this awesome bed and breakfast, and I found The Magic Far-Away Tree by Enid Blyton. I started reading it, but (obviously) didn’t finish before the end of the vacation. The nice B&B proprietress let me keep the book! I still have it, and I’m waiting for my niece to get a little older so that I can read it to her.

+Edited to add one last memory: when I was in third or fourth grade, we were only allowed to check one book out of the school library at a time. So, I picked the biggest one: an encyclopedia of North American mammals. And guess what? Mom and I read it as nighttime reading! That incident became a legend at my elementary school.

Well, those are just a few of my childhood book-family memories. As you can tell, I have an awesome mom who did everything possible to encourage my love of reading. We still trade book suggestions a lot; I got her addicted to Laurie King’s Mary Russell series, and while I was at college this past year, I would receive care packages with brownies or banana nut bread and the next one in the series. Sometimes, we’ll both just hang out quietly reading, and we like to go on trips to B&N together. Yep-reading has always been a family affair!