Transforming and Evolving

My writing evolved from books. It is something that I always realized. Being a bookworm is an inherited trait from my mother’s side of the family. My mom, grandmother, and I can sit eerily silent in the same room where the only sounds will be the turning of pages and our reactions to parts of the book. I learned to read earlier than others, and I spent most of preschool and kindergarten in a corner with a book perched in my hand; unless my crush wanted to play (because you can’t deny your crush). My favorite and first chapter books were Mary Pope Osborne’s “Magic Tree House” series. That series began my writing journey, because everytime I read a new book I was transported into whatever world the main character explored. My sense of imagination was strongly encouraged by those books and I hold them dear to me. It only grew through elementary school when Detroit Public Schools had the “Library on Wheels” stop by and I quickly switched to reading R.L. Stine’s “Goosebumps”.

By second grade, I was writing short stories and handing them out to teachers and classmates. They always told me I had talent. My stories always revolved around the themes of whatever genre I was into at that age. Adventure, mystery, and suspense were the main writing theme of my younger self through elementary. I learned to world build, create plot twists and vividly describe scenery. By the time I was a middle schooler, I got my hands on Lisi Harrison’s “The Clique” series, and my writing switched into more realistic fiction. I learned how to describe characters, create friendships and personalities, and make it feel like you actually knew my characters. High school, I was obsessed with dystopian style books like Veronica Roth’s “Divergent” series. As I grow older, I adapt more and more genres and find myself cultivating my writing in that way. The books I love have sculpted and shaped my writing into what can actually be defined as mine. I have my own style that is a mix of other styles, and it constantly transforms and evolves with passing time. In another five years, who knows what great lesson a book will teach me, and what it will add to what is utterly me.