Hi! I am a book that was written by J.K. Rowling, you know the famous author who created the famous Harry Potter series and became a billionaire.

My name is Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. I am a really exciting book about wizards and witches, magic and spells, and of course He Who Must Not Be Named. After J.K. Rowling wrote me, I was sent to Bloomsbury Publishers. Editors there read me, loved me and I was sent for publication.

After they made millions of copies of me, I was shipped to bookshops around the world. I was a hardcover edition with a glistening cover and beautiful illustrations. There I stood on the shelves, gleaming under the spotlights waiting, for book lovers to come and buy me.

One day, a very rude, boisterous boy visited a bookshop and that, my friends, was the end of my good days. He flipped through my pages with dirty, gummy fingers and ripped few of my pages. I was horrified at his callous attitude. The shop keeper forced the boy’s mother to buy me, because no one would now buy a torn book.

As soon as I got to my new home, I was put aside carelessly. To my horror, a toddler crawled towards me, attracted by my red, shiny cover. Worse still, she was holding a sipping cup, half full of orange juice. First, she clutched me with wet fingers, and then she drooled all over me. To make matters worse, she spilled some juice on me, making me all wet and soggy. She even tried to chew a corner of my cover till her mother rescued me.

To my relief, I was left alone for some time until someone roller skated over me. Wizz! Ouch! I whimpered. It was that wretched boy again who zigzagged around me without a care in the world.

At bedtime, he decided to read me… while eating a chocolate cake. Now I was done for. He read a few pages, and used his fat, podgy finger to wipe chocolate cream off my pages. He got bored after reading just a few pages (imagine that) and flung me across the room. To my utter dismay, I landed in the laundry basket overflowing with his dirty, smelly clothes.

Next morning, the maid carried me off to somewhere. I couldn’t see anything because I was smothered by clothes. She tipped the whole basket over and I was in the washing machine, I was whirled and got tumbled about for an eternity. When the boy’s mother saw my tattered remains, she fished me out of soapy water and threw me aside in disgust. A crow sat on me and well… I never smelt the same again.

After I dried out, I was put alongside old newspapers and other books that seem to have gone through the same torture as myself. Clearly this was a household that had no love for books… not that I can be called a book any longer. In just under two days, I had been torn, ripped, drooled on, smeared with cake, flung about mercilessly and washed in a washing machine. Now I will be sold with old rubbish and maybe recycled.

And now I end my sad, little story with a request. Remember, friends, books are man’s best friends. You gain knowledge and learn about different cultures by reading books. You can visit and travel to far off places through books without leaving your home. Reading books helps you to communicate better and develop new ideas so take good care of us. Surely we deserve it!