First of all, how can I thank you for opening my eyes to so many worlds vaster than my own? Every single one of your stories is special, something that only some of the most powerful people in the world (aka authors) are able to communicate to us. Like Percy Jackson, you have courage and strength in abundance. Like Serafina di Merrovingia, you are heroic and loyal to the ones you trust and work hard to fight evil. Like Kaz Brekker, you come from hard lives that no one can make better for you unless you take some action.
I live in a bubble, where the most of my worries consist of studying for a huge exam or where I'm going to go for college. I hear about things happening around the world on the news, but I never was able to feel how people really felt, or understand the things they resorted to doing. But the few things that I can fully understand, that capture me into the setting as if I were going through it myself, are your lives, always interesting and never safe. Your feats make me rethink so many aspects of my life, cause me to step back and think about how lucky I am and never take anything for granted.
Some people may say that fiction is fiction, and you can never learn anything useful from it. How wrong they are because I have learned so much from your experiences. I have seen rejection, betrayal and unfairness play right before my eyes, and how you may falter, but never lose your will when the worst comes to pass. And when it comes to realistic fiction like the Firebird Series, I learn about other places and the history of the world, even scientific concepts.
Even after all this, there are people who frown upon reading and think it is stupid, and no one "with a life" would ever pick up a book and read. But reading has become a part of my life, and the characters like you are part of my life too. How amazing is it that people who I will never meet are some of the biggest role models I have today?
"A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies. The man who never reads lives only one." - George R. R. Martin
Because of you, I get to have thousands of points of view, and I know that no matter what situation I'm in, I'm not alone. Your hardships have taught me to be humble about what I have to do, and to pay more attention to things going on around me rather than myself.
So thank you. Thank you for all the things I've seen, for all the emotions you've felt, and for an outlet from my life to yours.
- Kashvi Mundra
