What is life without the joy of reading? The excitement you feel surging inside as you turn a page. The heavenly aroma you inhale as you flip the pages of a newly bought book. The hatred you feel towards the author for ending the book the way she did and not the way you her wanted to.

As a child, the best part of your day would be when your parents mentioned a trip to the bookstore. You would spend the duration of the car ride pondering how many books mommy would allow you to buy this time. You already had enough to create your own mini library at home, but you always needed more.

You would walk through the bookstore marvelling at how many new books had arrived since the last time you visited. One glance at the bookshelves that were stacked so high that not even daddy could reach them was enough to make you chipper. You walk along the pathway looking for your favourite section. You reach it and are excited to see your favourite genres stacked neatly waiting to be bought. You pick up many different books and inspect it one by one to see if it would be one you would enjoy reading. What should you buy this time? An adventure book maybe? You already have loads of that, perhaps you should get a romance novel for once? You browse through the shelves making sure to pick up each title that catches your eye. Once you’ve found a few you’re satisfied with, you run looking for your parents to buy them.

As you’re on your way back home, you clutch the newly bought bag of books to your chest, eager to start reading them. You thank your parents and tell them they’re the best parents in the world for doing what should be considered as a simple favour, but in reality it means the world to you. You now have three more books to add to your already large collection. You didn’t want action figures or video games like your friends did, books were more than enough to make you happy.

It all seems rather silly now. For a child to have an obsession with books and not toys. But even as a teenager, I am no different. My weekly trip to the bookstore after a long week of school is always the highlight of my day.

Flipping the pages and inhaling the mesmerizing smell of a new book never fails to give me the tingling sensations I felt as a child. It’s amazing really, how you travel to places one can only dream of and meet people from countries you never knew existed, without ever having to leave home. The many different emotions you can feel for a fictional character makes you forget they are fictional sometimes. A good book and a comfortable chair to sit on is all I need to make me happy at the moment. It’s an addiction really. An addiction I’m sure lots of you would admit you have. It’s nothing to be embarrassed about though. This is an addiction which should be embraced and passed on to many others.