I remember the two postcollege years I spent in New York as one long day in a windowless room. I shared an office with four other people and a printer that emitted heat like a radiator. I decorated the space above my desk with little quotes and scraps from glossy magazines, reminders of the life I wasn’t living. Each day when I arrived at work, I’d place the novel I was currently reading at the corner of my desk—it was my beacon of light, my reward. Books were how I measured my days and how I endured them.