Hello once again!  This week, we return to the randomness of unplanned blog topics.  Joy!  Though, I guess technically this one was kind of planned.  A few weeks ago, my friend, Roxanne, asked me if my tastes in manga (Japanese comic books) had changed over the years and, if so, how.  We were talking mostly about shoujo (manga aimed specifically at a female audience).  My answer was a resounding “yes, my tastes have definitely changed and grown over the years.”  Here, I think I’ll expand the topic to books in general, which is a little more hazy on just how much I’ve changed.

 First, I suppose I should explain how my taste in manga has grown.  The thing is, I’m not entirely sure things have changed as much as I’ve just become more willing to admit when I don’t like things.  I spent years reading all of the things my friends suggested and I admit the stories were usually fun, but I never really identified with the characters.  I wasn’t the type of girl who idealized males and gave out free passes for inappropriate behavior just because the guy was hot (both super common tropes in shoujo manga), so the whole concept of “romance” (this applies to both manga and the genre of romance) never really appealed to me.  Now, I basically avoid stories like that.  I guess I’ve become more selective over the years.

As far as books go, I’ve grown in the opposite direction.  Used to, I’d only read horror and fantasy.  Up until Stonecoast, I had only read the Twilight series (hated it, but read it anyway) and whatever I had to read for school outside of my preferred genres.  Now, I have friends and mentors who write across all genres, so I don’t really have the luxury of being picky.  I’m not going to tell someone I won’t read something just because I don’t usually care for their genre.  Not only is that rude, it’s also limiting yourself.  You’ll never know if you like something if you’re not even willing to try it.

For instance, I normally never would’ve read the book pictured above if it hadn’t been written by a friend of mine.  It’s one of those things where I simply wouldn’t have even thought to look for it, but now I have people to recommend books outside of my comfort zone.  I guess that’s the reason my tastes have changed in such different ways between manga and books.  I always had different people recommending manga across all genres that I eventually had to stop and whittle away the stuff I didn’t like, but with books, I’ve always had such narrow interests that it was time to expand.

 So, what does all of this mean?  Basically, tastes are strange things indeed.  If they’re not narrowing, they’re expanding.  Either way, they’re always changing.  What about your tastes in reading materials?  Have you noticed any changes over the last few years?

Until next week!