As a kid books changed how I looked at the world and helped me understand things. Books still deepen me and open my heart.

[He] had the soul of a poet, and because of this, he liked very much to consider questions that had no answers.

... every time you look at the world and the people in it closely, lovingly, imaginatively, it changes you. The world, under the microscope of your attention, opens up like a beautiful, strange flower and gives itself back to you in ways you could never imagine.

And so he was reading the story as if it were a spell and the words of it, spoken aloud, could make magic happen.

Rats have a sense of humor. Rats, in fact think the world is very funny. And they are right, dear reader. They are right.

Love is in all of the books, and that's the connective tissue between them. There's a lot of hope in me; I can feel it. These stories are balls of light for me.

As a kid books changed how I looked at the world and helped me understand things. Books still deepen me and open my heart.