Most intriguing is this statement from Cynthia Black, the co-founder of Beyond Words Publishing, which is responsible for the runaway blockbuster The Secret and which, according to the article, "operat[es] out of a Hillsboro strip mall":

There's this creative energy about Portland....I think it draws a certain kind of person that has an independent, creative spirit.

And the literary culture that was created by Powell's Books has drawn people who are interested in books. Those things coming together creates almost this safe haven for these works to emerge."

The legend goes like this:

Back in the dark days of the early '70s, when people could do little more but watch television and attend the cinema, Michael Powell strode into downtown Portland on horseback, strumming his lute and flashing a smile beneath his feather cap, and called forth to the masses from the decrepit corner of Burnside and 10th: "Gather ye round, ye bedraggled illiterates, and lay thine eyes upon this magical beacon of literary literature!"

And the people gathered, and they beheld the thing called a "book," and it was good.

And lo, Michael Powell opened a store and it encompassed one block of a city and it held many enchanted books, and they were good, and it was good.

Folks say, if you listen close on a wintry night during the season betwixt autumn and spring, you can still hear the clip clop clip clop of the horse that carried the man that wielded the book that forever changed Portland.

HAVE YOU SEEN TREVOR?
He is a 4-yr-old, gray, white and brown long-haired, wearing a blue collar with a red tag. He is a little chubby, very friendly and vocal. A generous reward will go to the noble do-gooder who returns him! Last seen around 16th and Main.

Trevor was pissed about "a little chubby."

No matter — the cats at once turned to the robin alighting on an adjacent fence draped in ivy.

"First of the season," Fup remarked. A glorious Saturday afternoon. With flowers in bloom came bees and birds and even one butterfly, ahead of its time.

"Hasn't missed many meals lately," Bear noted, squinting at the sun-drenched robin. Trevor wondered if this wasn't a sly knock at his weight.

"Meals..." Oreo swooned.

Trevor had torn the flyer from a telephone poll in front of Bangkok Kitchen. "I'll go home when I'm ready," he reminded the others, too late now. They'd moved on. Summer might be months away still, but winter was over. Officially. Trevor, he could do as he pleased. He had a perfectly good home not twenty blocks away.