Of course she learned to read…she lives in Lubbock! What else does she have to do? 
One of my mother’s favorite stories is the one about taking me to the hairdresser with her, ca. 18 months, and me startling the other mother in the waiting room by standing up on Mom’s lap and reading, unprompted, from the AIR CONDITIONING sign across the room. My parents also tell me that they got worried I had no interest in learning how to sit up or walk because I spent so much time on my belly, propped up on my elbows, turning the pages of a book on the floor in front of me. Obviously I wasn’t reading the whole time, but I must have picked it up at some point considerably before school, because I can’t remember there ever being a time where I didn’t know what the marks said.
I learned French with relative ease starting at 14, when most people begin to struggle with second languages; I’m a dedicated polyglot and linguist today. I just assumed that being particularly well-wired for language was a quirk of mine. I was the first child for both of my parents, so they were actually more confused when my sister turned out to be mildly dyslexic.
Reading at 17 months seems to be unusual, but not nearly the fantastically rare feat that the reporter thinks it is.
Is she really reading? Maybe she’s picking up subtle clues from her parents, like that horse that people thought could talk. Or something. I think I’m a little confused.
MC Frontalot: Bizarro Genius Baby
Ok that’s too cute. Definately a candidate for the wedding reception montage. Hey, it’s never to early to plan ahead. 
A talking horse?
I was one of the last of my class to read in the early years of school, yet consistently topped the entire grade in English in high school.
In Year 5, we had a series of reading cards that were comprised of a short story or article on the front with questions on the back. There were about ten colour-coded levels - I was reading at Orange, which was one level above “Short bus” red. The very smartest kids read the turquoise cards. Sometimes, the teacher asked me to go and get the box of cards from the storage room. I used to pass the time on the long walk back by speed reading the turquoise cards. Only in adulthood did it occur to me, "Y’know, maybe I should have put my hand up and said, “Sir! I’ve finished with the orange cards now!”
I never did. I think some kids never think to.
Erm, it’s entirely possible I’m being whooshed, but if not, I believe **Auto **was referring to Clever Hans. That’s what sprang to my mind when I read his comment anyway, though I remembered it as a horse that was able to do simple math. Apparently, according to wikipedia:
Investigations revealed that Clever Hans (I love that name for a horse) was in fact reading people’s body language:
I remember those! I have a vague recollection of being put in a room by myself to read the box and I have no idea why. 
That’s highly disappointing. I’m familiar with Clever Hans, but if someone introduces a talking horse into the conversation, by God I want a talking horse!
I may have told this story before, so tell me to shuddup if you’ve heard it!
I had four kids in the space of 9 years or so. Kid/s 1 and 2 and then to a slightly lesser extent kid 3 (time and energy constraints and all), I was diligent and religious in my bedtime stories and play-reading with them, encouraging them every step of the way into early literacy and love for reading. They all ended up quite average at the end of the day. Only kid 1 and 2 are voluntary readers, but they are voracious ones. None of them can spell to save their lives however. 
By the time kid 4 came along there was bugger-all time or energy to devote to his reading development. I just hoped to Og that school would manage to bring him up to par and rectify the results of my earlier inattention to his literacy needs.
Yet before school started, I noticed that he was chugging along with the books that I DID occasionally read to him, and he knew the words (I thought) by rote.
One day his older sister (aged 9) was doing her homework and yelled out to ask me the spelling of a word…which the little fella’ (then 3 yrs old) promptly answered with the correct spelling, and even added a ‘Duh, you’re dumb’ to big sis for good measure. 
I was intrigued at this point, so I got some kids books off the shelf and ordered him to READ. He did, without a mistake. So I tried some slightly more sophisticated literature, and he rattled it off perfectly.
THEN I grabbed one of my sociology tomes from Uni, full of big words and lots of jargon. After three paragraphs (with only the word ‘ethnocentric’ stumbled over) I was convinced.
Sixteen years later, and the only thing the little shit will read is the Gig Guide and the new entries on his MySpace page.
Heh. Something about the way she is relaxing, holding the book. As if she’s been reading for many years.