Essay: By the Book

Not long ago, when I was in a looking-back mood, I realized that the books I read when I was a child and teenager had an outsize part in shaping who and what I would become as a writer. As was true of many writers, the course of my literary life was being mapped before I knew I would have such a life. I learned to read in the last three months of second grade, after my teacher sent a note home saying I was reading so far below grade level that I was in danger of failing.
My mother got hold of a