About the library," he whispered. He took out the pencil stub from his pocket and poised it over the page. Will you write like Mr. Blake or like yourself?" I inquired. He wrote and whispered the words aloud as he did. "I am in the library. It smells like old stuff." It smells familiar," I suggested. "It smells like words." Because his left side was to me, I couldn't easily take his hand to write. Books are boring," James said as he wrote. They line the walls like a thousand leather doorways to be opened into worlds unknown," I offered. He thought about this and then wrote with a smile, "I hate books." From A Certain Slant of Light

— Laura Whitcomb

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