The first story I ever wrote, in third grade, was a story of children who stumbled into a world of talking horses, where they helped the rightful horse king defeat an evil usurper. Was I reading the Chronicles of Narnia then? Why yes, I was.

I didn't write much else until high school, when I started trying to write the kind of books I'd read in middle school--your standard high school romances. "Sweet Dreams," I think the books were called. My versions were always set in marching band, and all my heroines were Mary Sues.

What I actually read in high school were Regency trads (largely at first because unlike other romances they didn't have bodice-ripper covers, and therefore I could read them without having to hide them or endure flak from my mother, but then I got hooked on the era), assorted historical fiction, and the Sunfire historical romances for teenagers. I loved those books so much, because they were about girls my age, but with higher stakes--surviving the Oregon Trail or the aftermath of the Civil War or the Titanic was more interesting than finding a date for the prom, and the heroines ended the books engaged, so again, higher stakes than in the non-historical teen romances.

The last thing I wrote before college was a dark, disturbing story about a teenaged girl who has an affair with her best friend's divorced father. Looking back, it was how I was working through and talking myself out of a schoolgirl crush on an older man, but it still kinda sends a chill down my spine to think that my 17-year-old self, the same girl who'd been writing all those happy bland little marching band romances, wrote that thing.

Not that I actually finished any of those stories, except the first one with the talking horses.

In elementary school, we had lot of assignment where we were reading a book and had to either write another chapter to the book or write a diary entry as if we were one of the main characters or write a newspaper article about something that had happened in the book or something like that. I distinctly remember in fifth grade the first time when, on one of the "write another chapter" assignments, it occured to me to try to mimic the style of the original book. (I didn't use the phrase "mimic the style," of course; I think I just thought of it as trying to write it like the original author did.)

The first "book" I remember writing was in first grade or so. It was about a princess who wasn't allowed to go outside or have any friends, because it was too dangerous for a princess outside the palace grounds, and so she was lonely. Nothing really happened except her wandering around the palace, lonely. I remember my sister telling me that a prince should come rescue her, and I said that, if there wasn't any safe way for the princess to get out, then there certainly wouldn't be any way for a prince to get it.

I remember that, usually, when I was reading something, I'd practically devour the book -- race through it, wanting to find out what happened next. The first time I read The Secret Garden was the first time I didn't do that. I went back and reread parts before going on -- it usually wasn't plotty parts, but the descriptions of the house and the gardens. I think I filled an entire sketchpad with pictures of those places.

One small anecdote about The Disastrous Dino War:

Up until the night before the deadline, the title was The Disasterous Dino War. I think it was the night before the deadline when I discovered I'd misspelled it. I had to redo the entire cover and title page and the pages with chapter headings and it was pretty traumatic. I think that must have been the root of my obsession with spelling things correctly and copy-editing on sight.

I remember that, usually, when I was reading something, I'd practically devour the book -- race through it, wanting to find out what happened next. The first time I read The Secret Garden was the first time I didn't do that. I went back and reread parts before going on -- it usually wasn't plotty parts, but the descriptions of the house and the gardens. I think I filled an entire sketchpad with pictures of those places.

One of only a handful of childrens' books I actually picked up and read as a child, and I did precisely what you did: remember Dickon's breaking open the twig from the not-quite-dead tree, and showing her the green inside? I went back and read that about thirty times.

In reading the takes the writers in this thread have posted up about this so far - P-C's dino thing (which made me happy), and Susan's talking horse, and Hil's "can't go out" story - I'm absorbing an impression that creative people tell themselves the "immediate or daily impact on their lives" stories as kids, and then those transmute into our later stories. Secret Garden was one of those books for me - the ghostly hidden touches of Colin, crying unseen somewhere in the house, had a lot of resonance with a kid who was in and out of a hospital bed with extreme illnesses, and when at home at her aunt and uncle's ranch in Canada, had the basement room. I wasn't a weeper, but had I been, no one would have heard me.

I wonder what else creeps in, for writers? Because for me, certainly those touches - the terrifying encounter with the god Pan in Wind in the Willows, the dislocation and making the world her own and deep visceral descriptions in The Secret Garden, the incredible power implied to me by the little boy, dancing on the rim of the world, fearless and not even comprehending that he should be scared - had an effect on how and what I write.

Sorry. I didn't mean the discussion we've segued into. I was referring more to the more lit. evaluation type discussion that was happening earlier. I actually was hoping to avoid you feeling like you didn't want to be here, Deb, since I know that that conversation isn't your favorite. I must have misread.

In reading the takes the writers in this thread have posted up about this so far - P-C's dino thing (which made me happy), and Susan's talking horse, and Hil's "can't go out" story - I'm absorbing an impression that creative people tell themselves the "immediate or daily impact on their lives" stories as kids, and then those transmute into our later stories.

I think I get what you're saying here, but I'm not seeing the "immediate or daily impact" on my life in my horse stories except that I was generally horse-mad and had at the time I wrote that story specifically fallen in love with a fantasy world featuring Talking Beasts.

When I was a kid, I got bucketloads of "You couldn't have written this." because I was a little blonde girl in a wheelchair and should have drowned looking up in a rainstorm like a turkey, right? And then, as now, I imitated people talking and stuff I read all the time.And a lot of times the stuff I caught, wasn't really stuff people liked to see, not from me, at any rate.
Only then, it was even "worse" because that thought hadn't really entered my head yet, I was just on my own little Harriet the Spy trip, and I'm a mimic, so I hadn't even considered people not being ready for a story from a fourth grader where somebody gets irritated and says "God bless it!" so they don't curse. Then, my special program got attention for my going to "Young Author's" and stuff so they were all behind me after that.(I would have paced myself had I known that was gonna happen two million more times.)

ETA: Susan, I still love the occasional talking beast story. I plan to see "Racing Stripes" for instance. Not for critical reasons.

Kristin, I am totally with you on the "let's not decronstruct" stuff in here. So very much with you.

Hil, you were horse-mad, and couldn't have one. You wrote stories about horses - you didn't suddenly decide to tell stories based on exploration of deep space. I know it sounds obvious, but I'm processing the variances between the stuff that interested us as children versus the stuff that we wrote or told stories about as children versus what we produce as adults.

(eta - not the impact of your stories on your everday life - the impact of your everyday life on your stories, as a kid.)

because I was a little blonde girl in a wheelchair and should have drowned looking up in a rainstorm like a turkey, right?

How much do I love this line?

Ah, that makes sense.

And I've often thought that almost everything about who I am as a reader and writer falls into place if you know the books I adored and re-read to tatters as a child were the Little House and Narnia books. What do I prefer to read? Historical fiction of any genre, and fantasy. What do I write? Historical romance, with a few ideas for straight historical fiction and saga fantasy percolating in the back of my head.

So, maybe the whole thing that passes for my professional life may just exist because "They said he couldn't do it. He did it anyway. Ooh, he's in so much trouble." And I thought I was deep. (And of course, the Wambaugh-with-mother's-milk connection cannot be ruled out.) It added to my "Such a *strange* little girl!" thing, pretty much. That, and expecting to grow up and go to jail for my convictions. ETA: Thanks, Deb. Growing up, it's no wonder I liked comics because, well, it felt like having a secret identity just being in the grocery store. Most people didn't know who I was.