“Why don’t you borrow this one from the library and I’ll buy you
a different book?” he said.

The boy mumbled something I didn’t catch but I’m guessing was
some variation of, “I want this book.”

I figured that Dad was seeing the book as an object, and feeling it would
be wrong to have book #3 sitting on the shelf without
#1 and #2. The boy was seeing the book as a story he wanted
to get into his head. He had already loaded books #1 and #2 into
his head and he didn’t much care how #3 got there.

E-books have made a lot of people think about whether they want
books or stories. Because you can get stories
cheaply and efficiently in e-book form, but you can’t put them on your
bookshelf. You can’t gaze lovingly over your collection, or hold
them in your hands and feel the paper speak to you.

Really, though, it’s only the latest manifestation of an old dilemma. There
have always been people who have treated books with reverence,
laminating their covers, turning their pages with care, and never
cracking their spines. And there have been people like me.

I don’t set out to destroy my favorite books. They just wind up that way. And
while I have no problem with people who take care of their books,
I have to admit I don’t quite get it. Sometimes people bring me a book
to be signed and they apologize because the book is dog-eared and
crumpled. I love seeing that. Those books have been loved. Hard.

P.S. The boy got his book. I saw him walking out with it.