Tim, a friend from Princeton, phoned and said I should visit him in Cape Cod. We dated for three years, but in my senior year he broke it off. That summer we wrote to each other and I fell in love because of his writing. Then one night, as I was leaving his room, he asked if he could kiss me. At the end of my freshman year, his sister hired me to tutor him in French. I met Aaron while I was studying creative writing at Princeton University. He is a professor now and looked exactly like he did, only bigger. Out of the blue he emailed me, and I met him for coffee while I was on a book tour in LA. Years later I was asked about my first crush in an interview, and Kal saw it. He had a jungle gym in his basement and I used to play on it.

My first crush was Kal Raustiala in second grade. He fell in love with her at first sight and somehow convinced her that he was worth the risk. He met my mother, Jane, an A-grade student, because her sorority was teamed with his fraternity to work on a carnival. What I love is that he’s very silly in private, but when he worked he was one of the top three security analysts in the country, despite his grades being so bad that he had to go to night school at university. My father, Myron, is goofy and does an impeccable Donald Duck impression. After the war he moved with my grandmother to Long Island, where he lived to be 100. He also joined the army and served in World War II. He went to night school and got a degree in accounting.

Hal grew up poor in the Lower East Side of New York, where my great-grandfather was a presser, which meant he ironed the gowns of rich women. He was married to my grandmother, Bess Friend, which I just love. My maternal grandfather’s name was Hal Friend. Jodi Picoult: “My mother, though, was the reason I started reading at three years of age.” Credit: Kieran Kesner/Headpress

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