Author Neil Gaiman once wrote of libraries, "It is obviously in my interest for people to read, for them to read fiction, for libraries and librarians to exist and help foster a love of reading and places in which reading can occur. So I’m biased as a writer. But I am much, much more biased as a reader." It is that same spirit that motivated author Pat LaMarche and illustrator Bonnie Tweedy-Shaw to go to the Fulton Country Library McConnellsburg branch on December 9th to present sets of the now fully completed Priscilla, Princess of the Park book series. Pat explained in her talk to community members attending the presentation ceremony, "I wanted to write a book about homelessness that wasn't as hard to swallow as the first [the non-fiction Still Left Out in America]." She also explains in the epilogue of the final book, Priscilla's Picnic with the President that, "Pretty much everything you read about in the books happened in one form or another. In most cases, the names were changed or re-arranged to protect the privacy of folks experiencing homelessness...One thing that isn't real. And it causes me great pain to tell you this. The 'lie' of the book is the happy ending." Hopefully, by making these books available to more and more schools and libraries, another valuable benefit of reading shared by Neil Gaiman will become true; "Prose fiction is something you build up from 26 letters and a handful of punctuation marks, and you, and you alone, using your imagination, create a world and people it and look out through other eyes. You get to feel things, visit places and worlds you would never otherwise know. You learn that everyone else out there is a me, as well. You’re being someone else, and when you return to your own world, you’re going to be slightly changed. Empathy is a tool for building people into groups, for allowing us to function as more than self-obsessed individuals. You’re also finding out something as you read vitally important for making your way in the world. And it’s this: The world doesn’t have to be like this. Things can be different." If you would like to donate a set of the Priscilla books to your favorite public or school library, please use the link below to designate a donation to the library of your choice.