Something I wrote
Apr 18, 2020 0:31:38 GMT -5
Post by ✞~Spottedleaf ~✞ on Apr 18, 2020 0:31:38 GMT -5
I found an old composition book in my room. I flipped through it, and I found this journal entry that I had to write for a college class that I took two years ago. The prompt I had to answer was along the lines of "What is your favorite book and why?"
Be warned, it's quite long as I got carried away with it:
As a reader, it is hard for me to choose what my favorite book is. After thinking about it, I would probably have to choose the book that belongs to the series that has had the biggest impact on my life, even years after reading it. It is titled Into the Wild by Erin Hunter. Into the Wild is in a series called Warrior Cats. All the Warrior Cats books are in the Adventure genre. Into the Wild is the first book in that series, with its publication date being in 2003. The book Into the Wild tells a story about how an orange cat named Rusty who adventures out into the woods and meets with some wild cats who live together in a clan. Rusty ends up going to live with the clan, and the whole series builds up from there.
I first read this book when a friend who I have known practically since birth introduced it to me when we were about to enter seventh grade. I was looking for something to start reading at the time, and this is what my friend suggested. Being a huge cat person, I decided to give these books a try. Once I started, I was immediately hooked and read all twenty or so books that were out at the time before I started eighth grade. I loved them so much that I even reread some of the earlier books two or three times.
At the time, Warrior Cats was my favorite book series because it was something new that I had just gotten into, I loved cats, and I loved the whole adventure and survival aspect of them. Now, nearly eight years later, I have grown out of the books themselves because I have gotten into reading books that are more for young adults, rather than children. However, I think that it still stands as my favorite for several reasons. All the reasons have to do with how much they have impacted my life.
Firstly, because of Warrior Cats, I have become a much bigger reader than I ever was before I discovered them. Before I discovered them, I really disliked reading. I found it boring, and I could never find anything interesting. I still got by and found books that I could get through enough for reading class requirements, but nothing really intrigued me as much as Warrior Cats. After I read the series, I started reading way more books. I got into reading The Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket. I read those in middle school, and then when I got into high school I started reading The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, Divergent by Veronica Roth, The Maze Runner by James Dashner, I Am Number Four by Pittacus Lore, and The City of Bones by Cassandra Clare. Without the inspiration of Warrior Cats, I am not sure how much of a reader I would be today.
Secondly, thanks to Warrior Cats, I have made beautiful friendships. On August 9th, 2010, my first day of seventh grade, I met one of my best friends. Her name is Annabelle. I had just entered the classroom of my last class for the day when I saw a girl reading Midnight, the seventh book of the Warrior Cats series. Being an already big fan of the books, I sat down in front of her and commented about how much I liked them to her. From there, we introduced ourselves, and it was just like magic. We pretty much became instant best friends. Today, we might as well be sisters from different mothers because we are just that close with each other. Who knew that my decision to tell Annabelle that I loved the book she was reading would turn into a friendship of almost eight years and counting?
Then, on October 28th, 2011, I joined a Warrior Cats fan board called Warrior Cats Untold Tales. The website is based off a fan-made Warrior Cats video game, which is where the title “Warrior Cats Untold Tales” originated from. Still, the forum is a place where Warrior Cat-related conversations take place, no matter if it is about the game or the books. Anyway, about a year after I joined it, I started chatting to a girl via private messaging. On the forum, she goes by Dawnleaf, and I go by Spottedleaf, but we have been chatting long enough by now that we call each other by our real names, Megan and Abby. It might sound bad that I have developed this kind of friendship over the internet, and I would not recommend doing that with just anyone, but I feel like it is different with Megan. She and I talked through a private conversation on that forum, and we still do and have been since October 2012. An online friendship like that is rare and extremely hard to find, but it is a true blessing when it is with the right person. I am not exactly sure how to explain it without dragging it out, but in short, our online friendship is just about as close as we can get it. We text each other and chat in our 3,600-page private conversation daily, Skype occasionally, etc. She cares about me, and I care about her. She has my back, and I have hers. Ever since we started to become close, we have been determined to meet in person one day. Still to this day, we are determined to make that happen, and I have to believe that it will happen eventually. Thanks to Warrior Cats, I have been blessed with this one-of-a-kind friendship.
Finally, because of Warrior Cats, I have become a better writer. On the same forum where I met Megan, I got involved in what is called roleplaying. Roleplaying is where you create a fictional character, give them a name, an appearance, a personality, etc., and then you have to interact with other people’s characters with the character(s) you created. Since the forum is a Warrior Cats fan forum, the most common type of roleplaying on it is Warrior Cats-related. Generally, in a Warrior Cats roleplay, you play as a cat in a forest-type setting, or something along those lines if the creator decides to twist it up some. The cats in the roleplay live in a clan, just like the cats in the books do, and they have various ranks such as the leader, deputy, medicine cat, warriors, etc. The clan works together to survive against the odds of nature, risking their lives if it is necessary. Events that occur in the roleplay vary, depending on what the creator of it wants to do. In the previous paragraph, I mentioned joining the forum in late October of 2011. It was in mid-2012, I believe, when I first started to roleplay. At first, I normally only responded with short sentences that often hardly even contributed to the events of the roleplay. Roleplaying was a new concept to me at the time, so I was, understandably, not very great at it. Then, as I continued, I paid attention to how other people wrote much longer and more detailed posts, and I took notes of that. After a while, probably by 2013, I made improvements. Since then, I have stayed active in that activity, and I have come a long way. I went from writing short sentences to writing multiple paragraphs on certain occasions. I am still actively roleplaying there today, and over the years, I have posted there nearly 200,000 times! Not all of those posts are in roleplays, but it still shows how far I have come. This skill has come in handy outside of the website, as well. I have even had teachers make impressed compliments about my writing.
As you can see, the Warrior Cats series has impacted my life in multiple ways, in terms of reading and writing skills, and friendship. To sum everything up, it is because of everything I have gotten out of reading Warrior Cats that makes it my favorite series. It is less about the books themselves anymore and more about how it has changed my life that puts it at the top of the list out of everything I have read. There is not yet a Warrior Cats movie, unfortunately, but one is supposed to be in the making. I have not heard much news about it, but I know that it is supposed to happen. If, and when, the movie does come out, I will see it. Even if I am fifty years old by the time it is out, I am still going to see it because of how much of an impact the books have made on my life.
Be warned, it's quite long as I got carried away with it:
As a reader, it is hard for me to choose what my favorite book is. After thinking about it, I would probably have to choose the book that belongs to the series that has had the biggest impact on my life, even years after reading it. It is titled Into the Wild by Erin Hunter. Into the Wild is in a series called Warrior Cats. All the Warrior Cats books are in the Adventure genre. Into the Wild is the first book in that series, with its publication date being in 2003. The book Into the Wild tells a story about how an orange cat named Rusty who adventures out into the woods and meets with some wild cats who live together in a clan. Rusty ends up going to live with the clan, and the whole series builds up from there.
I first read this book when a friend who I have known practically since birth introduced it to me when we were about to enter seventh grade. I was looking for something to start reading at the time, and this is what my friend suggested. Being a huge cat person, I decided to give these books a try. Once I started, I was immediately hooked and read all twenty or so books that were out at the time before I started eighth grade. I loved them so much that I even reread some of the earlier books two or three times.
At the time, Warrior Cats was my favorite book series because it was something new that I had just gotten into, I loved cats, and I loved the whole adventure and survival aspect of them. Now, nearly eight years later, I have grown out of the books themselves because I have gotten into reading books that are more for young adults, rather than children. However, I think that it still stands as my favorite for several reasons. All the reasons have to do with how much they have impacted my life.
Firstly, because of Warrior Cats, I have become a much bigger reader than I ever was before I discovered them. Before I discovered them, I really disliked reading. I found it boring, and I could never find anything interesting. I still got by and found books that I could get through enough for reading class requirements, but nothing really intrigued me as much as Warrior Cats. After I read the series, I started reading way more books. I got into reading The Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket. I read those in middle school, and then when I got into high school I started reading The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, Divergent by Veronica Roth, The Maze Runner by James Dashner, I Am Number Four by Pittacus Lore, and The City of Bones by Cassandra Clare. Without the inspiration of Warrior Cats, I am not sure how much of a reader I would be today.
Secondly, thanks to Warrior Cats, I have made beautiful friendships. On August 9th, 2010, my first day of seventh grade, I met one of my best friends. Her name is Annabelle. I had just entered the classroom of my last class for the day when I saw a girl reading Midnight, the seventh book of the Warrior Cats series. Being an already big fan of the books, I sat down in front of her and commented about how much I liked them to her. From there, we introduced ourselves, and it was just like magic. We pretty much became instant best friends. Today, we might as well be sisters from different mothers because we are just that close with each other. Who knew that my decision to tell Annabelle that I loved the book she was reading would turn into a friendship of almost eight years and counting?
Then, on October 28th, 2011, I joined a Warrior Cats fan board called Warrior Cats Untold Tales. The website is based off a fan-made Warrior Cats video game, which is where the title “Warrior Cats Untold Tales” originated from. Still, the forum is a place where Warrior Cat-related conversations take place, no matter if it is about the game or the books. Anyway, about a year after I joined it, I started chatting to a girl via private messaging. On the forum, she goes by Dawnleaf, and I go by Spottedleaf, but we have been chatting long enough by now that we call each other by our real names, Megan and Abby. It might sound bad that I have developed this kind of friendship over the internet, and I would not recommend doing that with just anyone, but I feel like it is different with Megan. She and I talked through a private conversation on that forum, and we still do and have been since October 2012. An online friendship like that is rare and extremely hard to find, but it is a true blessing when it is with the right person. I am not exactly sure how to explain it without dragging it out, but in short, our online friendship is just about as close as we can get it. We text each other and chat in our 3,600-page private conversation daily, Skype occasionally, etc. She cares about me, and I care about her. She has my back, and I have hers. Ever since we started to become close, we have been determined to meet in person one day. Still to this day, we are determined to make that happen, and I have to believe that it will happen eventually. Thanks to Warrior Cats, I have been blessed with this one-of-a-kind friendship.
Finally, because of Warrior Cats, I have become a better writer. On the same forum where I met Megan, I got involved in what is called roleplaying. Roleplaying is where you create a fictional character, give them a name, an appearance, a personality, etc., and then you have to interact with other people’s characters with the character(s) you created. Since the forum is a Warrior Cats fan forum, the most common type of roleplaying on it is Warrior Cats-related. Generally, in a Warrior Cats roleplay, you play as a cat in a forest-type setting, or something along those lines if the creator decides to twist it up some. The cats in the roleplay live in a clan, just like the cats in the books do, and they have various ranks such as the leader, deputy, medicine cat, warriors, etc. The clan works together to survive against the odds of nature, risking their lives if it is necessary. Events that occur in the roleplay vary, depending on what the creator of it wants to do. In the previous paragraph, I mentioned joining the forum in late October of 2011. It was in mid-2012, I believe, when I first started to roleplay. At first, I normally only responded with short sentences that often hardly even contributed to the events of the roleplay. Roleplaying was a new concept to me at the time, so I was, understandably, not very great at it. Then, as I continued, I paid attention to how other people wrote much longer and more detailed posts, and I took notes of that. After a while, probably by 2013, I made improvements. Since then, I have stayed active in that activity, and I have come a long way. I went from writing short sentences to writing multiple paragraphs on certain occasions. I am still actively roleplaying there today, and over the years, I have posted there nearly 200,000 times! Not all of those posts are in roleplays, but it still shows how far I have come. This skill has come in handy outside of the website, as well. I have even had teachers make impressed compliments about my writing.
As you can see, the Warrior Cats series has impacted my life in multiple ways, in terms of reading and writing skills, and friendship. To sum everything up, it is because of everything I have gotten out of reading Warrior Cats that makes it my favorite series. It is less about the books themselves anymore and more about how it has changed my life that puts it at the top of the list out of everything I have read. There is not yet a Warrior Cats movie, unfortunately, but one is supposed to be in the making. I have not heard much news about it, but I know that it is supposed to happen. If, and when, the movie does come out, I will see it. Even if I am fifty years old by the time it is out, I am still going to see it because of how much of an impact the books have made on my life.
