One of Leroy’s (and Kraft’s) themes is the circular or reciprocal relationship between writing and reading, writer and reader, a circle dance for three: the writer, the reader, and the book.  If—or when—I get around to writing The Topical Autobiography of Mark Dorset, I could use as an epigraph this description of that three-part harmony:

Reader, loe here [is] a well-meaning Booke. . . . I desire therein to be delineated in mine owne genuine, simple and ordinary fashion, without contention, art or study; for it is myselfe I pourtray. . . .  Thus, gentle Reader, myselfe am the groundworke of my book: it is then no reason thou shouldest employ thy time about so frivolous and vaine a subject.

Montaigne
“That We Should Not Judge of Our Happiness Until After Our Death”

See:
“What the Author Is Up To”:  like most people who read books, I began to want to write one of my own
Little Follies, “The Fox and the Clam”: When I opened the book, it released into the kitchen a rich, earthy, damp odor that I have ever since associated with reading
Little Follies, “The Fox and the Clam”: I wondered how Mr. Beaker had gotten so long a story out of that one picture
Little Follies, “The Fox and the Clam”: I can already read

See also:
Herb ’n’ Lorna: “Professor” Alonzo Clapp’s bookselling business
Herb ’n’ Lorna: No home should be without books.
Reservations Recommended: His reviews appear in Boston Biweekly, “Home of the Free-Ranging Critics,” a large-format publication on slick paper that reviews everything from books to restaurants, with most of the space going to music and movies, and prides itself on giving critics “their head,” as long as they have “a distinctive voice” and their work is “interesting to read.”
Little Follies, “The Fox and the Clam”: I had read and reread the Big Book so often as a child that I could recite most of the stories in it, and the memory of the fable of the fox and the clam returned to me with such clarity and force that I was sure it had been one of the stories I had memorized from the Big Book.
Little Follies, “The Fox and the Clam”: when he asked me to try to read, I would return to the pictures, to my memory of the story as he had read it, and to whatever popped into my head, and I would improvise
Where Do You Stop?: It was called Elementary Introductory Physics Made Easy for Beginners (Book One). I tried to read it. I really did. My problem was that I understood only a portion of what I read, and the portion I understood was not the portion that conveyed most of the meaning.

A Topical Guide to the Complete Peter Leroy (so far) is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, dialogues, settings, and businesses portrayed in it are products of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. 

All rights reserved. No part of this guide may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the author. 

Portions of A Topical Guide to the Complete Peter Leroy (so far) were first published by Voyager, Inc., as part of The Complete Peter Leroy (so far).

The illustration at the top of the page is an adaptation of an illustration by Stewart Rouse that first appeared on the cover of the August 1931 issue of Modern Mechanics and Inventions. The boy at the controls of the aerocycle doesn’t particularly resemble Peter Leroy—except, perhaps, for the smile.