 Hey guys, it's Tilly and today I am back with another video. This one is slightly heavier than the ones that I'm used to doing mostly because I have been wanting to talk about this for a while and today I was kind of feeling lost and a little down so why not talk about my journey of reading and how it has helped me so much throughout my teenage years and what books mean the most to me and how reading them just at the right time just seemed to make the entire world a brighter place. So I have loved reading for a very long time as a kid my nana used to read to me and my mum loved reading so of course I picked up on the habit too and I read like you know a series of unfortunate events and tomorrow when the war began and I absolutely love those series and especially like Big Book Attachee if any of you guys have read that that was like my jam back in primary school and then pretty much as I got older I still read a few books like The Pretty Little Wires and everything like that but it wasn't until I got to high school that books kind of went away for a while. I can't even tell you why I like stopped reading or when or how exactly but I just think it might have been like excess schoolwork and then I just completely didn't bother picking up a book at all after that. In 2011 that was the dark year for me so I hadn't reading books for about two years before that and then in 2011 it seemed to be the year that death seemed to stroll into my life and just touch some of the people that I love the most and so many of my animals. It was like a really really really tough yeah um and it was just really hard because I'm the kind of person that prefers to be on their own and so I isolated myself from my friends and my family and so I pretty much just sat in my room binge watching tv series in the dark with a blanket over my head and pretty much I had depression for about two years um after that and it was only when I started to read again that I started to come out of this dark room that I had locked myself into. I remember the first book that I read that brought me back into reading was Fallen by Lauren Kate and the entire series wasn't out yet so I just remember the excitement of finishing this book and wanting more and so that ensued with my huge paranormal love relationship and pretty much that just kept the fire burning inside of me for months and months because I just completely devoured all these paranormal books. And then some stranger at the bookstore recommended to me a fantasy series and I can't remember exactly which book it was that they recommended to me but fantasy absolutely changed my life because I read these books and I could go to a complete new world with these amazing characters and it was just the best way to escape like life and reality gave me more strength to know that I could deal with problems that I had to face when these characters could like totally kick everyone's butts during the war. However I did stay away from contemporary for quite a while but if you guys know me you guys would know that I read a ton of contemporary now and I think that that genre is one that I tend to binge read more than anything because there are a lot of heavy, heavy contemporary books out there like All the Bright Places. For me the Sidekicks is a little bit heavy, Lovelace to the Dead. Those are just like a few books that completely are just heartbreaking and shattering and eye-opening all at the same time but it was those books that have truly helped me to overcome a lot of things that happened to me during my depression and like I can honestly say now that I wouldn't have recovered as well as I have if it wasn't for those books. So back in 2011 one of my friends ended up passing away and that's something that I had never really been able to look back on without struggling to breathe and everything like that and it wasn't until I read Wilka Stakas's The Sidekicks which features a story of three friends who all had the same best friend and their best friend ended up passing away and after I read this book it kind of opened my mind a little bit more and I found myself looking back at memories of my friend and actually smiling at them and feeling okay rather than the heavy weight on my chest that I used to feel and for me that was just one of the greatest things that I have had the pleasure of getting because of reading and I'm just so thankful for books and reading and the book community and all the friends that I have made through books because I just haven't felt more myself and more comfortable than I have since I have started to read more and blog about books and just meet more wonderful book people and I can say that it's definitely one of the best parts about my life is reading these are you know happy emotions don't take it the wrong way I'm just overwhelmed because this isn't something that I actually um talk about a lot or say out loud which is the weird part because you know really I'm just talking to myself in front of a camera I've just kind of learned that whenever I'm feeling alone that I'm never truly alone because these books are all lives that I've lived and when I read them as the character and they have these amazing friends I have those friends and people who are there that care and it's just yeah books are just great guys like they have completely saved me. It wasn't until I read The Book Thief by Marcus Zuzek which many of you guys will know is my favorite book of all time was the moment that I realized my life is going to be centered around books I am forever going to be reading and on top of that I'm always going to be writing with the life goal that one day I want to have a book published one is going to be such a place in my heart as much as the book thief is uh so that is why reading is so important to me um it has just made my life better even though some people will watch this and think how can a 400 page book change your life well you just have to read them and find out because they truly are life-changing like they may be fictional but the stories behind them and the meanings they're not and they really take root in your heart and change you to be a better person and that's what books have done for me and they're always going to be part of my life literally and figuratively um I will always have a library and a book in my bag and pretty much I will love them forever so thank you for watching and kind of traveling with me on that rollercoaster ride there um I shall be back again with another video so yeah don't forget to like subscribe and turnly talk to me um on my blog and my other social media sites or just comment below and we can have a good old chat so little me and pipa say bye-bye bye-bye