There was a poem one of her college professors used to quote from Emily Dickinson about telling the truth but telling it slant. Her mother told a slant and called it the truth. But fiction could be true in its feelings, in its themes, in its relatability. And the books that people related to were the ones they crowded around here, books that guaranteed a happy ending so long as the reader was ready to stick it out through all the obstacles the characters faced to earn that ending. Earned endings. That was it. That was what she had loved about reading when she was younger. For so long now, her
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