Paperback edition. This is one-half of my previous book "The Funniest People in Books and Music: 500 Anecdotes." This book contains 250 anecdotes about authors and books, including this one: The first of the two most important events in Orville Prescott's life (the other was becoming daily book critic for "The New York Times" in 1942) occurred when he was six years old and his Grandmother Sherwin offered him a $5 gold piece if he would learn how to read. Although he didn't quite know what a $5 gold piece was, he knew that it was desirable, and therefore, a few days later, he read a few pages out of a first grade primer to his grandmother and received his rewards-the $5 gold piece and the discovery of the joy of reading.