Hi - Josh Abbate

Hey everyone, I'm Josh. I am an English major in my junior year. I've just transferred to Fredonia from a community college. I'm from Silver Creek which is about 20 minutes away and live within a 5 minute walk of Lake Erie. I've worked for a carnival which travels around the New York area for seven years now and it affords me a lot of time to read during the summer. Between regular operation and rainy days I'm able to get a lot of books read. I would have to say the first story that influenced my life is The Phantom Tollbooth because it showed me at a young age that reading could be fun and all the interesting ways you could use words. However a close second would be Where the Wild Things Are. Unfortunately neither of the film adaptations were up to par for these books. In High school I had an excellent teacher who got me to like Hamlet, which would probably be one of the first times I really enjoyed complex literature. Today my favorite books include Kafka on the Shore, Catch-22 (which also has a horrible film adaptation), House of Leaves and The Book Thief.