Aspie Women and Reading

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The things I favor are critical theory, how-to books, science, cultural studies, and other forms of nonfiction. Renaissance paraphilosophy - Giordano Bruno, alchemist John Dee, astrologer Marsilio Ficino and such are a special interest hence 'esoteric research'. I'm also a big fan of economics classics - everything from Keynes to von Mises. Fiction is all right, but it isn't my forte. I liked fantasy as a kid but it fell into disfavor as I grew older (Hitchhikers, Ringworld, Dune, New Sun, Mars, and Phil K. Dick at least were early faves). For maybe 10 years or so I did not have time to read much that wasn't super necessary.

Actually, now that you bring it up, I am considering reading the Aegypt series by John Crowley. Anyone here a fan?

Yes I have heard of the 'only book you need is the Bible' thing. It's a pretty big and interesting book, and the psalms are good to memorize. But it is never too late to catch up if you would like to read many more books. Your biblical foundations will be of great help in understanding the structure of many books particularly earlier ones.

I have been indulging my aspie obsession of asperger's/autism.

I just read Running With Scissors, and Look Me In The Eye, and am currently reading Raising Cubby. After Cubby, I will be reading Atypical.

Grew up reading all the time (parents were book people), though in adulthood I have no taste for fantasy nor the classics.
What I've read has been mostly behavioral economics, social sciences, relationship analysis stuff-non fiction.

I used to read books but my social life has become so atrophied that I have to shift focus outward instead.
Now I still read all the time, but it's on message boards/blogs/email, rather than proper "books", alas.

Always been fond of books. if I wasn't being accused of being a book-worm and 'showing off ' my narrative skills, I was typing up some random poetry or story for the next big literature class read.
I was onto text books and grammar exercises when I was about 7 I would guess .

As a kid, one summer I bought reading comprehension workbooks to use-for fun ! They occupied my time & made me feel smart.
Learning has been lifelong craving for me, the academic stuff was (at the time) what I liked about school.

As you can probably guess from my username I'm a reader too. I was reading before I started school - an early memory is of being irritated at the slow halting reading of a circle of children followed by them being annoyed at me reading so quickly. I hated school because they stopped me reading as much as I wanted to. I nearly always had a book under the desk or inside the textbook (which I had also read cover to cover of course).

Science fiction and fantasy but also the classics have been my mainstay, and I enjoy literary fiction. I hate poor writing and too many Americanisms - when something is behind something write behind -not ''in back of' for instance. The language is English, not American!!

I couldn't say when I started reading but I was reading novels by the summer before I started kindergarten. That's when I first read "Stranger in a Strange Land" and got hooked on Heinlein. As a child I especially liked science-fiction, science coffee table books, philosophy, nature guides, and math books for reading material.

As an adult I like books on science, particularly physics and astrophysics, evolution, biology, and biochemistry. I also enjoy sci-fi and fantasy in large quantities. I like to have at least a couple dozen books on my eBook reader (which I've had for over a decade) so I don't have to re-fill it every few days. I usually read a book or more a day but series are my weakness. I've accidentally devoured entire fantasy and sci-fi series in a day or two. I just read twelve of the Harry Dresden series by Jim Butcher last weekend. I think I like how I don't need to spend pages getting to know a new character and I can just get down to the story.

I wish I could make books last longer. It's hard to find enough and it can get expensive. Fortunately, I can re-read books sometimes, but I mainly do it only when I'm very sick, sort of for comfort. I'm glad eBooks finally became popular so they are easier to get and I can check them out of the library, too.

I think I started reading very early as I don't remember learning although I remember being too small to see over the chest freezer in the basement and climbing up and standing on a chair beside it while my mom was defrosting it with an ice pick so I could ask her what the meaning of the word "fatigue" was. She had to help me get the dictionary down to find the definition because I was too little. I also remember hiding in the bottom of a lighted China cabinet and reading the first of the Boxcar Children series. I no longer fit inside it by kindergarten.

I think I read early in part because of an ability to focus on a single thing intensely but also because, prior to the 1960s, children were taught to read text a lot earlier so my mom taught me as she had been taught back in the forties. Picture books were pretty much done with by the time a child was old enough to not to try to eat them anymore when she was growing up.

I like to read but hate it when a good book i'm enjoying has to end. If only books could be longer sometimes. They don't last long enough.

I like to read but hate it when a good book i'm enjoying has to end. If only books could be longer sometimes. They don't last long enough.

I could read at 3. I love all kinds of books, fiction and non. I do remember being quite surprised when my reading comprehension scores on my ACT were lower than all of my other scores. That didn't make any sense for someone who had been reading since three! Now it does.

I definitely use reading as an escape, and I read quickly and voraciously. I read the Harry Potter series in two weeks, and the Twilight series in a few days. I loved Game of Thrones so much because they took FOREVER to read! It was amazing to stay with a series for so long. (Hurry up and finish, GRRM!)

Right now I'm just reading a lot of books on Aspergers, as I've recently self-diagnosed and EVERYTHING MAKES SENSE NOW.

Right here...when bored, I have been known to read an encyclopedia, either by volume, or end to end...

Add me to early- and voracious-reader lists. When I was 4, Mom signed for me to get my own library card, and also signed for me to get higher level books as appropriate. I read (and keep) most of my novels, as well as National Geographics (my collection of those goes back to the 1960s). Hubby and I have gotten into arguments over my book collection, which, at the moment, is packed away in about 20 storage tubs....I had my first full-blown melt down over that, which has helped lead to a self-diagnosis in my 40s.

During school, I would often finish before other students, so I would pull out a book until they "caught up" and it was time to move on....this kept me out of trouble, and during times when other kids would tend to tease (recess, lunch, study hall) books allowed an escape.

Most of my escapist reading is sci fi/fantasy, but I also have quite a bit of "how does that work" books....I am always trying to figure things out, and hate to leave a puzzle unresolved. (Except for math, that is--that is my weakness!). If I am truly bored, and have nothing else to read, say in the bathroom, I will catch myself reading the backs of toiletries....gotta keep that busy brain occupied, I guess!

Bunny

My mom gave me a set of medical encyclopedias when I was little. I LOOOOOOOOVED THEM! I read them cover to cover, several times. Sometimes I would just open them and read whatever topic was on that page. SO FASCINATING. I learned about tapeworms and all kinds of different diseases. I was probably 10 or so.

Now I can easily fall down the rabbit hole of Wikipedia for hours...

My mom gave me a set of medical encyclopedias when I was little. I LOOOOOOOOVED THEM! I read them cover to cover, several times. Sometimes I would just open them and read whatever topic was on that page. SO FASCINATING. I learned about tapeworms and all kinds of different diseases. I was probably 10 or so.

Now I can easily fall down the rabbit hole of Wikipedia for hours.

I will also read any written material close at hand, like backs of cereal boxes, etc.

I have always been a voracious reader. Bookworm. 5 books per week as a kid and 1-2 books per week as an adult.

I read a lot as a kid and honestly, got out of reading for years...
I really like Christian fiction (Karen Kingsbury is an author I like, books about 'Amish fiction). I just got a new eReader today, I had problems with my Kobo and got a new Kobo Glo and love it already! I also started into the Harry Potter series last year, was never into it when it was popular.

So now I'm back into reading but my problem is reading too many books at once, lol. I am probably a slow reader...

I'm 27 now and was diagnosed when I was 21, I had a time then with books and movies, remembering what I read, etc. but I'm doing much better now. Just need something that interests me, and a good book I can't put down.

We go to vacation every year to Cuba and I read MORE there, I read tons everyday without the distractions of Facebook and such. I petsit for people so I take books to their houses now.

I started reading at an early age and read Charles Dickens, Jane Austen, and the Bronte sisters before I was a teenager. Plus Robert Louis Stevenson, and at the other end of the spectrum, Enid Blyton. As a child, I used to be banished to my room as a punishment for some misdemeanour, which was great as I got out of doing family stuff and could read uninterrupted for three hours or so. I was also a dictionary and encyclopaedia reader.

These days I read a mixture of classics, crime fiction, biography and history. I was heavily into Nordic Noir last year which has led me to the Icelandic Sagas and I'm really excited to have just received the 1997 translation of The Complete Sagas of Icelanders in five volumes. I had to order them from Iceland and they were quite expensive but so worth it - beautiful dark blue leather binding with creamy paper that smells great.

Now I'm running out of shelf space in my house, I tend to separate books into 'books to read' and 'books to experience'. 'Books to read' I get as epubs for my Nook, and 'books to experience' are those that I need to hold in my hand; those where the physical sensation of holding the book and turning the pages is part of the reading enjoyment.

If I'm into a good book I'll set my alarm for an hour early to fit in reading time and I try to never finish a book at bedtime because I lie awake thinking about it. So if I really can't put a book down and finish it late at night, I have to start a new one and read a few chapters before turning out the light.