THE READER

Parkersburg, West Virginia, where I grew up, sits on land that was once home to the Shawnee and later belonged to George Washington. After killing Alexander Hamilton in 1804, Aaron Burr holed up at a mansion a mile away on Blennerhassett Island, embracing a mission to commit high treason or liberate Mexico, depending on how you bake the facts. A century later, Mother Jones was jailed in town. For the first years of my childhood, it seemed like nothing important had happened in the decades since, except maybe my parents’ divorce. Lucky for me, I was an introvert and a reader. But there were never enough books.

I learned that there were people who would pick you up by your hair or hit you with a belt without warning.

My earliest memories