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4.
 Most of us grew up with what my mother called "a taste for the single book," but my oldest brother is still a set man. "Sets aren't what they used to be," he says, but he claims he has bought only one that was impossible to get through, "The Lives and Loves of Countess Someone."
 "I was ready to go hunting when the salesman came in, and I had to buy the set to get rid of him. I didn't want to alienate him," he explained.
 Once I got self- conscious about reading. It was when my eight grade teacher mapped me out a literary course. I started her list with "Quo Vadis." This was memorable because it was the first book I didn't like. "The trouble was," my sister said, "you read it with your mouth shut. You usually keep it wide open when you read."
 I gave up the list and opened my mouth again. I believe that was the winter when we were reading "The Little Colonel" books and Henry James.
 We all grew up with different tastes and different reading speeds. My sister, a psychologist, reads a book a night; I test them first by skimming from back to front and pass most of them up. She reads by paragraph or sentence; I read by word, and if it's something I really like I lip read it. I suppose you could say that I have a reading problem.
 I have heard my mother express only one theory about children's reading. "When they're sick, put them to bed and call the doctor, then read to them. Nothing brings down a child's fever faster than a book.
 I had dyptheria once with "Myths of Many Lands."