While most little girls would go ga-ga over Malibu Barbie or a Laura Ashley party dress, Michelle Williams says the best gift she ever received was a set of classic books. You don't expect the sultry femme fatale of "Dawson's Creek" to wile away her hours over Dostoyevski or Fitzgerald. But Williams remembers: "There was a huge box under the Christmas tree and I was shaking it around for days. I was 8 or something. It was huge box full of all the classic books," she says. "On top was 'Fahrenheit 451,' a little Ray Bradbury book. But it's what got me started loving reading and subsequently reading all these classics from an early age. Books have shaped me, changed me and made my life full of joy and understanding." That sure doesn't sound like your typical 18-year-old starlet who just co-starred in the rollicking new comedy, "Dick." Williams plays a giddy teenager who inadvertently gets involved with White House skulduggery when she and her best friend (Kirsten Dunst) stumble on the conspirators at the Watergate Hotel. But Williams is a far cry from your average 18-year-old -- starlet or not. She finished high school at 15 and left home in San Diego for a solo try at acting in Los Angeles. "From the time I was really, really, really small I had a incessant need to be independent," she says. "I think children are born with a few innate qualities within you... My sister and I grew up in the same home, same parents, same schools, everything and could not be more opposite people. But since birth we had certain traits, and one of mine was a need to explore on my own." Though she wasn't old enough to drive, she braved the big city because she was determined to act. Williams' early flight was hard on her mother, she says. "We've since become much better friends and much closer because of the time apart," she says, "because no 15-year-old-girl likes her mom that much. So we spent a few years apart and I came back with a huge appreciation for the role my mother played. I think that's the most commendable, noble job in the world, to raise children, to be responsible for giving and sustaining a human life. That's astounding to me." Williams says her hardest time was her first year in L.A., moving from one "crummy" apartment to the next. "I worked in an ice cream booth at the county fair. I did that for a few months and picked up a little money and went on a lot of auditions. I would work once every three months and that would be just enough to tide me over till the next thing came around. It was very sporadic." But she was learning. She snagged a role in her first movie, "Lassie," and managed to charm the casting directors of "Dawson's Creek." To her, that tryout was no different from any other audition. "I'd done a couple of pilots before that had never been picked up. I expected the same thing here, though I thought the material was leaps and bounds ahead of what I was used to reading," she says. "I didn't expect anything because I didn't know to expect anything." High on the success of "Dawson's Creek," Williams could have done anything this summer vacation -- a movie-of-the-week, a leading role in a feature. Instead, she chose an obscure off-Broadway play, "Killer Joe," in which she played the abused Dottie. "My boyfriend says I talk in my sleep at night and all I've been saying the past couple of weeks is 'Where's Dottie? I miss Dottie.' I miss her so much," she sighs. Her boyfriend is a director, but Williams refuses to give his name. She worries about her fame coloring others' lives. "Suddenly your family's scrutinized and not really safe anymore and left vulnerable," she says. "My sister goes to high school now and has to deal with the fact that her sister plays Jen, the drunken slut on 'Dawson's Creek.' That cannot be fun. It has a huge impact on my family and on my friends."