I'm surprised few people have mentioned Ursula Le Guin in this thread. Start with A Wizard of Earthsea and go from there. Rocannon's World is another great starting point in her books.
I would second the Jules Verne. But I think the biggest influence on my reading when I was a child was the fact that my parents told us the "TV was broken and we're not getting a new one" when I was 7. We got our news from NPR and the New York Times and the local paper. There was no world wide web back then, so we read books. Lots of them. Mysteries, P.G. Wodehouse, Sci-Fi, Fantasy, childrens' fiction (Bridge to Terebithia, etc.).
Madeline L'Engle is great for that age as well. My advice: chuck the TV, hide the video games. The kids will read books, play board games or go play outside. All probably better for them, IMO, than the alternatives. After all, that's how most generations grew up and they all seem to have turned out ok.
Well, it's GOTTA be better than Alienware's customer support and support policies, which are absolutely the worst I've ever encountered. I thought that Dell buying Alienware would actually improve ym support as Dell seems to at least want to keep customers. But then I read the bit how Alienware would still founction as an independent subsidiary.
So...SOL. Alienware will continue to run a scam of a business.
First time I heard "woot" was a long time before I ever saw it in text. Back in 1996/7, I began to hear people saying "woot!" and it seemed to be associated with or copied/imitated from the hooting in a popular hip-hop song at the time (since I didn't really care for the song at the time, I can't remember the name of the song off hand). In any case, the sound was basically associated with excitement or anticipation of excitement, and tons of people were using "woot!" in the city of Boston back in 1996/7. As we all know, this was well before Dibalo 2 was released and well before EQ was even in beta.
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I'm surprised few people have mentioned Ursula Le Guin in this thread. Start with A Wizard of Earthsea and go from there. Rocannon's World is another great starting point in her books. I would second the Jules Verne. But I think the biggest influence on my reading when I was a child was the fact that my parents told us the "TV was broken and we're not getting a new one" when I was 7. We got our news from NPR and the New York Times and the local paper. There was no world wide web back then, so we read books. Lots of them. Mysteries, P.G. Wodehouse, Sci-Fi, Fantasy, childrens' fiction (Bridge to Terebithia, etc.). Madeline L'Engle is great for that age as well. My advice: chuck the TV, hide the video games. The kids will read books, play board games or go play outside. All probably better for them, IMO, than the alternatives. After all, that's how most generations grew up and they all seem to have turned out ok.
Well, it's GOTTA be better than Alienware's customer support and support policies, which are absolutely the worst I've ever encountered. I thought that Dell buying Alienware would actually improve ym support as Dell seems to at least want to keep customers. But then I read the bit how Alienware would still founction as an independent subsidiary. So...SOL. Alienware will continue to run a scam of a business.
First time I heard "woot" was a long time before I ever saw it in text. Back in 1996/7, I began to hear people saying "woot!" and it seemed to be associated with or copied/imitated from the hooting in a popular hip-hop song at the time (since I didn't really care for the song at the time, I can't remember the name of the song off hand). In any case, the sound was basically associated with excitement or anticipation of excitement, and tons of people were using "woot!" in the city of Boston back in 1996/7. As we all know, this was well before Dibalo 2 was released and well before EQ was even in beta.