“It happened, via Anna Sewall’s Black Beauty, in Mrs. Adams’ homeroom, P.S. 53 in Indianapolis Indiana, a low flat brick building with big windows and corn fields in the distance. As fifth grader, we had a special homeroom class where we were allowed to just–read. I was a bookish introverted terrified girl–and books were not only my solace, but my only friends. I powered through them, one after the other, not stopping, devouring the stories. And then–I remember it perfectly, I read Black Beauty. I finished the book, crying of course, closed the cover, and put the book back into my desk. I pulled out the next book on the list, whatever it was, opened to page one–and stopped. Black Beauty was still living in my imagination. I couldn’t focus on anything else. And I remember thinking–wait. There’s more to this than a story. It’s about more than a horse! (Remember, I was 10 or so.) Could this be–I wondered–what Mrs. Adams meant by “theme”?

I understood, in that moment, there could be more to a book than the story–that a book could change lives and change minds and open us to new ways of thinking and to new worlds.

My very first reading thrill happened in Mrs. Adams’ homeroom via Anna Sewall’s Black Beauty. And my reading life has never been the same.”

-Award-winning Author Hank Phillippi Ryan’s books include”The Other Woman,” “Drive Time,” and “Prime Time.”  Learn more about her work at www.hankphillippiryan.com.

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