Book 'em

This corporate lawyer quit her job and began a quest to give books to poor kids. She's found wild success. Her group, First Book, has handed out 20 million books since 2001.

Kyle Zimmer, 43, was once a "type triple-A" corporate Washington lawyer. But while tutoring a boy at a D.C. soup kitchen, she was struck by the fact that he, and most of the other children there, didn't own a book. Research shows 80% of child-care centers for disadvantaged children have no age-appropriate books. So in 1992, Zimmer helped found First Book, which provides free new books to children in need -- 20 million volumes in just the past three years. Zimmer, who now devotes herself full time to the cause, believes books can change lives. "Once you see that light in a kid's eye, whether it's your own child or someone else's," she says, "you never go back."

You were a very successful lawyer. Why did you make this turn in your professional life?
I was always challenged, and I was tremendously fortunate in my career, but I seem to have a very special form of schizophrenia: a private-sector head and a public-sector heart. I was wholly engaged with my brain and not wholly engaged with my heart. It's a rare good fortune to find a place where you can apply both completely, comprehensively.

How serious is the need for books?
There's a presumption that everyone's got books in their home. There's not a tremendous amount of data, but [a significant number] of low-income families don't have a single age-appropriate book for their kids. In the early years of First Book, one of the teachers in a little program that we serve called us and said: "I want to thank you guys. Before First Book, I asked my kids to bring a book from home, because I have no books at my day care. Three of the kids brought the phone book." You can't teach a kid to love books and read books without books.

What keeps you going?
The work we do means bedtime stories and laughter. It translates into very real experiences for very real families. That's tremendously motivating.

So that hour a week of volunteering ultimately turned around your entire vision of your life?
It's powerful. But I want to be careful not to send the message that [quitting your day job] is the only thing that can be transformative. Not everybody can do this. At the end of the day, the thing that will change our country is everybody doing a little bit. It starts with holding the door open to the person behind you and goes all the way up to making a bigger commitment of your time or resources.

How does working for First Book compare with your work as a lawyer?
I have had unbelievably great experiences professionally. I'm not somebody who was bitter and stomped out of the private sector. Nonetheless, my experiences there never fully satisfied a part of me. I am now exhausted. Every day feels like you're playing four sets of tennis in the hot sun, but you go home feeling like you've played a great game.

By Hannah Storm, anchor, "The Early Show" on CBS
To learn more about First Book, visit firstbook.org.

CBS and USA WEEKEND join forces to do good
"The Early Show" is the official on-air partner for USA WEEKEND Magazine's Make A Difference Day 2004, the nation's largest day of service. Each week, the show introduces you -- on-air and in the magazine -- to a different leader in the volunteer world. Anchor Hannah Storm kicks off the series on this page; she'll be followed by anchors Harry Smith, Julie Chen and Rene Syler and weatherman Dave Price. Tune in each Friday through October for these special Make A Difference Day reports.