As a young boy, I was particularly entranced by the harry potter franchise as a series. It all started when I was very young, as every night my father would read a chapter or two to me, as I curled up in some blankets on the couch. Spoiler alert: the reading session usually ended with me asleep on the couch, and my father would carry me up to bed. This was our nightly routine, and I adored it. Sitting back, laughing as he used funny voices to make each and every one of the characters come to life in my mind. I started learning that characters each had their own personalities and side stories. But of course, we eventually ran out of books (some had not been released yet), and I got older and older, so the nighttime stories ceased.
I became reintroduced to the Harry Potter series around fifth grade, and progressively read all of the books in the series by myself over time. It was like going back to a house that you used to live in, or meeting up with old friends. I stayed up late, reading every page with the same voices my father used so long ago.
And then I reached the last book in the series, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, which my parents had never read (Perhaps that was why I found it so intriguing). My family became increasingly more busy as my father went back to school for his degree and my mother started working. This book was uncharted territory as far as my family was concerned, which made me want to read it even more.
So I did. I squeezed every last word and paragraph from that book like juice from a lemon. I chipped and chipped away at it until I had finally finished it. Of course, I felt on top of the world for accomplishing such a daunting task for me at that time, plus I could rub it in their faces that I knew how everything ends. I then went and proceeded to tell my parents exactly how it did. I felt accomplished with a slight dash of sentimental, as I realized now I was the one telling the story.
