Why I Don’t Reread: A Story in GIFs
One of my favorite things about summer as a kid was the summer reading lists we got for school. Yeah, I was one of those kids (and who of us wasn’t?).
One year, we had one of those summer reading assignments where you could choose a few books from a big list of choices. My favorite kind of summer reading!
One of the books I chose was Tuck Everlasting by Natalie Babbitt.
It was wonderful! I loved it!
And I thought that would be that. A happy book memory forever.
But poor naive little me was wrong.
A year or two later, in 6th grade English class, I saw Tuck Everlasting on our syllabus.
A book I’d already read and enjoyed! I thought it would be great.
But when we actually got to that unit, I was in for an unpleasant surprise.
I don’t know what did it. Was it because we read it at a snail’s pace? Because we dwelled on every little thing? Because I had to listen to fellow 11-year-olds read it out loud? But suddenly the book was not the loveliness I remembered it to be.
We also watched the 2002 movie adaptation. I was so done.
Why did this have to happen to a book I loved so much???
It was a low point in my young reading life.
I can count the books I’ve reread since then on one hand.
For the most part, I refuse. Because the fear is real, y’all.
Do you have any traumatic reread experiences? Let’s commiserate in the comments!
