Books have always been in my life. The walls of my father’s study were lined with them, and I can still remember how they smelled—along with his pipe tobacco. He spent his whole life writing a book that never got published, using a very old typewriter.

In the hallway there was a small bookshelf filled with encyclopedias. My older sister and I were too young to read, so we amused ourselves by pretending they were giant piano keys. What can I say? Barney videos hadn’t been invented yet.

Every Christmas we got a book. I remember them all. Charlotte’s Web, The Wolves of Willoughby Chase, Little Women, Anne of Green Gables, Nancy Drew.

We got toys too, but I don’t remember them. Except for the time some relative gave us Barbie dolls. My sister got the Barbie, I got the Ken. What kind of person gets a Ken doll for a little girl? I coveted my sister’s Barbie for years afterward. I could have become extremely bitter over that childhood trauma, but thankfully I didn’t.

One rainy summer I worked my way through the box of Harlequin romances my grandmother kept under her bed. That’s when I fell in love with happy endings. So now I make up my own.

Wading in the same gene pool has resulted in both my sister and I becoming authors. I guess you can’t fight your heritage. We get to work in our pajamas and experience the joy of bringing imaginary people to life. It doesn’t get much better than that.