Of Reading and Writing by Konnie Enos

I’m sure I’ve mentioned before that my youngest, Royce, has stubbornly insisted he doesn’t know how to read. This was never helped by the fact that he was functioning well below grade level in reading throughout his school years. We could never convince him that below grade level didn’t mean he couldn’t read at all.

Nor could we convince him that his ability to navigate on his tech to watch his shows and play his games indicated that he could indeed read. Let alone that his fascination with tech including using and understanding it indicated he could indeed read.

Being from a reading family, I have tried multiple times to find him something other than what’s on his screen that he would read.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve gotten him a book on a subject he’d expressed fascination with only to have him not so much as crack it open. I mean I was trying to find what genre and style of book he would find interesting enough to read.

I know that everyone has different likes and dislikes and I have seen how finding the right genre of a book can get someone interested in reading.

Jerry is most into self-help and or spiritual-type books, so he isn’t likely to read fiction. May didn’t develop a love of reading until she found historical fiction. She particularly loves sagas that cover several generations of a family’s story. Which should have been a clue to her that the best subject for her to study would be genealogy. Once she found those classes she thrived in school and is so proud that she has been able to complete all requirements for her associate degree (this semester) and now plans to start working on her bachelor’s degree in the fall.

 Tony also will only read books in genres and on subjects that interest him.

But with Royce, I just could not seem to find the genre that would interest him.

I had noticed his fascination with anime shows, but I didn’t know how to convert that love into reading. Not even after he’d displayed his prowess at creating an entire world and tons of stories in a similar style (Grand Oracle). Now we just need to get him to write them so others can enjoy them too. But that still didn’t get him reading.

At least once I had a conversation with him about trying graphic novels, but he wasn’t receptive or otherwise didn’t act on that suggestion.

Then between sheer frustration at being unable to get him reading and just being overworked going back to school, I dropped the subject.

And maybe that’s all he needed.

Sometime after we’d discovered that he’d created the entire Grand Oracle world he started mentioning new stories he’d found and describing them to me much like he had with Grand Oracle and some of the anime shows he liked. I assumed these new ones were more anime shows.

I’m coming to realize his fascination with anime might be partly because he can find them on the internet, which he is also fascinated with.

Anyway, he’s telling me about these new shows and has even showed me a scene or two in a couple of them. I assumed they were stills from the shows he was watching.

Nope.

He either found a show he loved with only a season or two of episodes but did have online graphic novels continuing the story or he simply found such novels in a style he loved and got hooked, but now he is coming to me with “this new great story” and they aren’t shows! And he LOVES them.

The characters are drawn in the same style as anime are drawn and they tend to all be set in cultures with strong similarities to Japanese culture, where anime originated. Even the widely popular Pokémon is in the anime style. Even more interesting, the man who created Pokémon has autism. (Look him up. His name is Satoshi Tajiri.)

Anyway, Royce has now been sucked into the world of reading by his two biggest fascinations, anime, and the internet.

Having looked up some information on Pokémon, I’ve learned Satoshi Tajiri created it, but he had help from friends to transform it into the shows and games they have become. So now I’m thinking all Royce needs to get his stories out is someone to collaborate with him on creating them into graphic novel form.

So maybe after we convince him to use voice-to-text apps to get his story written out, we should work on finding an artist to help him transform it into a graphic novel.

Now back to finishing my last week of school.

Smile. Make the day a brighter day.