Hello. Im new here.........obviou sly.
I have never met another aniphan....period, even when I was reading them and they first came out, though they were vastly popular. Which brings me to a question (this maybe should be another thread but Im gonna put it here, a mod can move it if they see fit), how old are you guys? I saw that one of you was 22 (my age exactly) and lives in texas (my state), and another said 11, though I havent looked into a lot of the posts here.
I ask because I havent read these books since 7th grade. I was obssessed with them from 5th through 7th grade, and since finishing the series, havent picked one up since. I got bored and started looking up nostalgic things from the past and thought of this book series. Meant the world to me when I was a kid. I read all the books and side books, though never saw the TV show. The themes were very deep for a child that age. I was surprised to see that they were rated for 3rd through 5th graders. I know a kid that age certainly can read and enjoy the books, the vocab isnt hard, but the story and mature themes seemed a little older to me. I mean, the characters themselves were 13 or so when it started and jake was 16 when it was over (I think), so I guess I always pictured the books for middle schoolers, or kids the age or close to the age of the characters in the book. I know I grew up and aged with the books over the two or three years they came out, along with the characters themselves.
I recently bought a lot of the complete series, side books and all, off of ebay for 110 bucks. I bought them to hold on to a nostalgic peice of my childhood, but mostly to hold for my children, should I ever have any. I havent decided for sure if im going to try and read them again, I would feel childish at this age if I did, but there is much I cant remember, and much more that I would like to. I just worry that reading it now would ruin the picturesque ideal I have in my head of what the books use to mean to me, which at the time I was reading them, was a lot. Revisting certain things, like old shows or cartoons from those day, has indeed shattered my old ideas of what exactly it was, and what it meant to me at the time, and lead to a general disenchantment of the memories I carried. I wouldnt want to do that with this series. Anyway, so yeah, ages anyone? Am I alone on memory lane?