"How to create a library" is not a manual of instructions, but rather a narrative about curiosity, imagination, and perseverance. It is also about the need to visit places where diversity reigns and where books are within everyone’s reach. Inês Fonseca Santos and André Letria envisioned a book about how to reach that magical place where books accumulate so that we can keep them close, even when some tend to slip away
from us.

How to create a library, in the writer’s words:

I grew up among libraries: the school library, the one in the place where I lived, and the many homes I inhabited—the one of my mother, the one of my father, and the one of my grandparents. Books were always within my reach, and I had the freedom to choose what to read, when and where I wanted.
No one controlled me because the policy in our house (in all our houses) was one of discovery and stimulation of the imagination. Perhaps I read some books at the wrong time, but the joy of reconnecting with a story means experiencing it with new tools and new knowledge. Inspired by all this, I wrote "How to create a library", as an exercise in the contamination of a habit that André Letria and I share. We fine-tuned and discussed aspects typical of those who love libraries.
And perhaps that was the greatest joy in creating this book. It’s not just about accumulating books; it’s about dreaming of the possibility of one day reading all those that make up our libraries. Because, as the wise Portuguese writer Manuel António Pina said, books are also for having. Especially now, in times poor in imagination and thought.
We must find the treasure.