If I think about it, my life is just a history of the books I’ve read. The Summer of the Lord of the Rings. The summer after that when I read Inkheart, The Thief Lord, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and The Fog Diver all at once, drinking in every last gasp of words before heading off to school. The fall of my freshman college year will always be The Magic Thief, and then The Tombs of Atuan, sitting by myself reading at lunch under a tree. Watching the leaves fall (yes, so I sometimes wandered into class unwittingly with them in my hair), and the flowers bloom and petals fall on the open pages. And I can no longer think about that spring without the words of The Name of the Wind following me, waiting around every corner.

Books. My life is a story of books.

Lots of people say they love books. Sometimes–don’t be angry–I think they just really like them.

I cried over a movie trailer once because a favorite mythic hero was absolutely nothing like himself and everyone thought it was fine. A movie trailer.

I made a good friend through mutual book/movie ranting nobody else wanted to listen to. It’s rare if we talk long without books coming into conversation even today.

I’ll willingly fight anyone over them. Even if almost all other subjects leave me so disinterested I don’t even speak.

Sometimes I can’t respect someone who has only new books on their list of favorites–nothing more than five or six years old. How is that possible? Difficult as it is to pick a favorite, how can you neglect the hundreds upon thousands of glorious titles published in time ago? How do you know you’ll love it for a lifetime when it’s only been around you a few years? Haven’t you plunged into the musty pages? Gone exploring in the archaic words? Wouldn’t it be better to pick twenty titles, ten from new and ten from old? Fifty, even? More?

I quote book characters when the mood suits me–“Mo says that books…” or “Jacob Reckless was the one in the tavern, I remember now,” or “Bea would say that’s purple,” without warning people I’m talking about fictional things–because what’s the point?

I make a shopping list when I go to the library, and promptly forget to consult it twenty paces within the stacks, staring up at the shelves, eyes flicking across the titles, mouth open, drinking in the sight

of books.

Quite at home. And in love.