Given that 12 is when I discovered Asimov, I agree with him entirely. (I don't think there's another sci-fi experience that has come close to the first time I encountered the Foundation series.)

I started reading with Asimov - at least, that's my memory (reading "The Martian Way" collection of short fiction at the age of 5...I may have had other things read to me by grandparents earlier, but I don't remember that.)

Foundation totally skewed my idea of "science fiction" - it all has to be space opera, or it just doesn't feel right. :)

My father read SF early on so his books were around the house and once I learned to read, I read everything I could get my hands on. So ... I started early. Unfortunately, all his books from before, oh 1949 or so, were burned ... in a house fire - not a book burning, mind you.

Unfortunately, all his books from before, oh 1949 or so, were burned ... in a house fire - not a book burning, mind you.

Oog. That's like a kick in the stomach. But yay early scifi!

I have to actually make up my mind if I'm going to pursue the Perry Rhodan stuff again; when I was a teenager, I found 5 of the later books (in the 140s), and though they're perfectly cheesy opera fluff, it's FUN. (And German, which tickles my Prussian fancy.)

But it's hundreds of books. I don't know if I could tolerate that.

I read a lot of fantasy as a child, but was put off sci-fi because I thought it was a boy thing - the boys in my school were always talking about Transformers and the like. Until, that is, I was twelve, and I saw 'The Search for Spock' on TV. I couldn't stop talking about it for months - I bored my parents silly, until one day I was talking about it as I passed a bookshop with my father. He bought me the first three 'Foundation' books and told me to go and enjoy. The rest is geekdom.

My mother always disapproved of my reading SF - it wasn't ladylike enough for her. I still remember when Analog published "Dune" as a serial - knocked my socks off.

I was reading SF almost as soon as I could read, but could never get into Foundation for some reason.

My dad had all the Analog magazines from 1950-1984. One day when I was around 12 and in one of my "There's nothing to read!!1!eleventy-woe" phases he pointed me to them and suggested there was plenty there to keep me busy.

Geekdom was a foregone conclusion.

"Dune" was totally transformative for me; my uncle John told me to read it when I was about 8; I did, and every year afterwards, thinking "I have until I'm 15 - Paul's age - to take over the world, or I'm a failure!"

Har har har!

My dad was a big influence in my SF reading habits. His bookshelf was always full of the greats, including Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke. Never would have discovered it without him. These days I'm more into the TV than the books (I'm sad to say - it just seems to work out like that) and I'm the one who introduces him to things.

I bought him the first season of Battlestar Galactica for his birthday last month. He appears to be enjoying it: he called me last night. "I'm afraid that Matt [his dog] is a Cylon." Why? I inquire. "Because we went to the Grange [assistance dog training centre] last month, and we met his brother. And they looked exactly alike."

Dad-level attempts at humour are the same the world over.