As a child, I recall sneaking a flashlight into bed so I could finish reading under the covers a book from the school library before it had to be returned the following day. As a teen, my English teacher read Johnny Tremain by Ester Forbes having everyone in my class, including myself, mesmerized upon discovering how a fictional boy from the Revolutionary War is maimed for life following a tragic accident. I remember gasps by my classmates as the bandages were taken off Johnny's wounded hand and his discovery that his fingers had grown together. As I studied my own hand, imagining what it must...