My memories of reading as a young child are of Ladybird books with pretty creepy-looking illustrated covers and The Children of Lir, which, if I am honest slightly haunted me for years. I honestly thought I might be turned into a swan for an awful long time.
It’s only when I look back at them now compared to the books I read my own kids, I realise how screwed up some of the messages in those books were. I mean come on, the plot of Little Red Riding Hood is more the stuff of horror films when you’re four-years-old. Am I not right? And don’t even talk to me about The Emperors New Clothes, I am convinced all those naked-in-front-of-my-class dreams were a direct result of this very book!
But as weird as some of them were, they sparked an interest in quirky stories that would later see me relish Roald Dahl books and all their weirdness, followed by an unusual obsession with Stephen King as a teenager.
Mind you, I’m not sure if any of these weird tomes below ever came my way. I wonder what I would be reading today if they had…
1. The first part is true
2. Double trouble
3. Well, Polly’s artistic skills have really come on
4. Find out the blunt way
5. When dad gets banged-up. There’s a book for that
6. Keeping it real
7. How to explain the ‘birds & the bees’
