People of the Book

A celebration of the written word, a dictionary, and my mom's legacy

The Random House Compact Dictionary Unabridged Special Second Edition, cradled on a Drexel Heritage mahogany desktop bookstand on my editing table.

About twenty-five or so years ago my mom gave me a marvelous birthday gift: The Random House Compact Dictionary Unabridged Special Second Edition. Its pages are whisper thin, squeezing in a whopping 315,000+…