A longtime acquaintance whom I haven't seen in years wrote last week to say, "I was given your book by a friend as a birthday gift. I didn't tell him, but I secretly thought 'I'll never read it' since (a) I don't have much time for reading any more, and (b) if I do, it is 'books on tape' for long car trips. To boot, this was daunting, at some 600+ pages. About a week later, though, I took it to the restroom, and opened it to some middle pages. To my surprise, the story there was one I knew about. Another week, and a similar thing happened. Before you know it, I was hooked. I went back to the beginning and started fresh. It is not just the stories that hooked me; it is the exceptional writing. You and Ray have done an outstanding job, and I fully expect to finish the book. Thanks for doing such an ambitious and valuable history!"
We love to read such notes, obviously. Pretty good for engineers, huh? "exceptional writing!" I'm thinking it'd be great to pull my old English teacher out of the grave and have her chew on that one.
