Because the dozens of other unread books in my house didn't fit my mood and I NEEDED something for the beach tomorrow.

My 12 year old niece has been reading the Lord of the Rings and is completely enthralled.

We think about mortality so little, these days, except to flail hysterically at it with trendy forms of exercise and high-fiber cereals and nicotine patches.

"Don't you want to be alive before you die?"