On Becoming a Reader

I decided I wanted to be a writer when I was eleven years old. I was no stranger to stories (I watched Sky King and Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, after all) and spent a great amount of time inventing my own, just for something to do. (“Me Time” we had in abundance before 24/7 TV and TikTok.) My epiphany came when I invented a story so amazing, so thrilling, and so unique that I had to write it down.

It involved a man who crashes his plane into the jungle. Then a second man, coming to rescu...