A person listening to a story is in the company of the storyteller; even somebody reading a story aloud shares this companionship. The reader of a novel, however, is isolated, more so than any other reader. In this solitude, readers of novels seize upon their material more jealously than anyone else. They are ready to make it completely their own, to devour it, as it were. Indeed, they destroy and swallow up the material presented to them as a fire devours logs in a fireplace. The suspense that permeates a good novel is akin to the draft that fans the flame in the fireplace and enlivens its play.