It's Friday . . . time to share book excerpts with:
Book Beginnings on Fridays hosted by Rose City Reader,
where bloggers share the first sentence or more of a current read, as
well as initial thoughts about the sentence(s), impressions of the book,
or anything else that the opening inspires.
The Friday 56 hosted by Freda's Voice,
where you grab a book and turn to page 56 (or 56% of an ebook), find
one or more interesting sentences (no spoilers), and post them.
Today I'm featuring Bright Lines by Tanwi Nandini Islam. My copy is an advance uncorrected proof, which was provided by the publisher, Penguin.
Beginning: Part I
GIRLS ON THE MOVE
Brooklyn
1
Girls, everywhere. Anwar Saleem stared brazenly at the flock that strode down Atlantic Avenue. He wondered if they noticed him sucking in his paunch, as he stroked the last ribbon of lavender paint across the awning of his apothecary.
********************* Page 56: "'She had a similar relationship with the book. She'd kept it until it was several months overdue. The library fine had gone up to ninety dollars, the maximum amount before they made students buy the book. She ended up paying twenty-five to keep it."
*********************
My thoughts: Although I'm only a few chapters in, this debut novel is an interesting look into the lives of Bangladeshi families living in Brooklyn, New York.
**********************
From Goodreads: For as long as she can
remember, Ella has longed to feel at home. Orphaned as a child after her
parents’ murder, and afflicted with hallucinations at dusk, she’s
always felt more at ease in nature than with people. She traveled from
Bangladesh to Brooklyn to live with the Saleems: her uncle Anwar, aunt
Hashi, and their beautiful daughter, Charu, her complete opposite. One
summer, when Ella returns home from college, she discovers Charu’s
friend Maya—an Islamic cleric’s runaway daughter—asleep in her bedroom.
As the girls have a summer of clandestine adventure and sexual
awakenings, Anwar—owner of a popular botanical apothecary—has his own
secrets, threatening his thirty-year marriage. But when tragedy strikes,
the Saleems find themselves blamed. To keep his family from unraveling,
Anwar takes them on a fated trip to Bangladesh, to reckon with the
past, their extended family, and each other.
Which book are you reading now or about to start?
Friday Focus: The Friday 56 & Book Beginnings #90 was originally published by
Catherine for bookclublibrarian.com. This post cannot be
republished without attribution. Retweeting and sharing on Google+ are encouraged and appreciated.
Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly feature of the Breaking the Spine blog. It's a great way to share informationabout
forthcoming books with other readers. Today I'm featuring November 9, the forthcoming novel from author Colleen Hoover.
Publisher: Atria Books
Publication Date: November 10, 2015
Frombarnesandnoble.com: Beloved #1 New York Times bestselling author Colleen Hoover returns with an unforgettable love story between a writer and his unexpected muse.
Fallon
meets Ben, an aspiring novelist, the day before her scheduled
cross-country move. Their untimely attraction leads them to spend
Fallon’s last day in L.A. together, and her eventful life becomes the
creative inspiration Ben has always sought for his novel. Over time and
amidst the various relationships and tribulations of their own separate
lives, they continue to meet on the same date every year. Until one day
Fallon becomes unsure if Ben has been telling her the truth or
fabricating a perfect reality for the sake of the ultimate plot twist.
Can Ben’s relationship with Fallon—and simultaneously his novel—be considered a love story if it ends in heartbreak?
Which book are you waiting for?
...Will you add this one to your list of must-reads?
Waiting on Wednesday: November 9 by Colleen Hoover was originally published by
Catherine for bookclublibrarian.com. This post cannot be republished
without attribution. (Retweeting and sharing on Google+ are encouraged.)
NEW YORK TIMES bestselling author Jeff Lindsay mastered suspense with his wildly addictive DEXTER series. Before that, however, there was former cop and current burnout Billy Knight. When a hostage situation turns deadly, Billy loses everything—his wife, his daughter, and his career. Devastated, he heads to Key West to put down his gun and pick up a rod and reel as a fishing boat captain. But former co-worker Roscoe McAuley isn't ready to let Billy rest.
When Roscoe tells Billy that someone murdered his son, Billy sends him away. When Roscoe himself turns up dead a few weeks later, however, Billy can't keep from getting sucked back into Los Angeles, and the streets that took so much from him.
Billy's investigations into the death of a former cop, and his son, will take him up to the highest echelons of the LAPD, finding corruption at every level. It puts him on a collision course with the law, with his past, with his former fellow officers, and with the dark aftermath of the Civil Rights Movement. Jeff Lindsay's considerable storytelling gifts are on full display, drawing the reader in with a mesmerizing style and a case with more dangerous blind curves than Mulholland Drive.
Book Details:
Genre: Thriller, Suspense, Police Procedural
Published by: Diversion Books
Publication Date: August 25, 2015 (Re-Release)
Number of Pages: 256
ISBN: 2940151536677
Series: Billy Knight Thrillers, Book 1
Purchase Links:
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Read an excerpt:
Somebody once said Los Angeles isn’t really a city but a hundred suburbs looking for a city. Every suburb has a different flavor to it, and every Angeleno thinks he knows all about you when he knows which one you live in. But that’s mostly important because of the freeways.
Life in L.A. is centered on the freeway system. Which freeway you live nearest is crucial to your whole life. It determines where you can work, eat, shop, what dentist you go to, and who you can be seen with.
I needed a freeway that could take me between the two murder sites, get me downtown fast, or up to the Hollywood substation to see Ed Beasley.
I’d been thinking about the Hollywood Freeway. It went everywhere I needed to go, and it was centrally located, which meant it connected to a lot of other freeways. Besides, I knew a hotel just a block off the freeway that was cheap and within walking distance of the World News, where Roscoe had been cut down. I wanted to look at the spot where it happened. I was pretty sure I wouldn’t learn anything, but it was a starting place.
And sometimes just looking at the place where a murder happened can give you ideas about it; cops are probably a little more levelheaded than average, but most of them will agree there’s something around a murder scene that, if they weren’t cops, they would call vibes.
So Hollywood it was. I flagged down one of the vans that take you to the rental car offices.
By the time I got fitted out with a brand new matchbox—no, thank you, I did not want a special this-week-only deal on a Cadillac convertible; that’s right, cash, I didn’t like credit cards; no, thank you, I did not want an upgrade of any kind for only a few dollars more; no, thank you, I didn’t want the extra insurance—it was dark and I was tired. I drove north on the San Diego Freeway slowly, slowly enough to have at least one maniac per mile yell obscenities at me. Imagine the nerve of me, going only sixty in a fifty-five zone.
The traffic was light. Pretty soon I made my turn east on the Santa Monica. I was getting used to being in L.A. again, getting back into the rhythm of the freeways. I felt a twinge of dread as I passed the exit for Sepulveda Boulevard, but I left it behind with the lights of Westwood.
The city always looks like quiet countryside from the Santa Monica Freeway. Once you are beyond Santa Monica and Westwood, you hit a stretch that is isolated from the areas it passes through. You could be driving through inner-city neighborhoods or country-club suburbs, but you’ll never know from the freeway.
That all changes as you approach downtown. Suddenly there is a skyline of tall buildings, and if you time it just right, there are two moons in the sky. The second one is only a round and brightly lit corporate logo on a skyscraper, but if it’s your first time through you can pass some anxious moments before you figure that out. After all, if any city in the world had two moons, wouldn’t it be L.A.?
And suddenly you are in one of the greatest driving nightmares of all recorded history. As you arc down a slow curve through the buildings and join the Harbor Freeway you are flung into the legendary Four-Level. The name is misleading, a slight understatement. It really seems like a lot more than four levels.
The closest thing to driving the Four-Level is flying a balloon through a vicious dogfight with the Red Baron’s Flying Circus. The bad guys—and they are all bad guys in the Four-Level—the bad guys come at you from all possible angles, always at speeds just slightly faster than the traffic is moving, and if you do not have every move planned out hours in advance you’ll be stuck in the wrong lane looking for a sign you’ve already missed and before you know it you will find yourself in Altadena, wondering what happened.
I got over into the right lane in plenty of time and made the swoop under several hundred tons of concrete overpass, and I was on the Hollywood Freeway. Traffic started to pick up after two or three exits, and in ten minutes I was coming off the Gower Street ramp and onto Franklin.
There’s a large hotel right there on Franklin at Gower. I’ve never figured out how they break even. They’re always at least two-thirds empty. They don’t even ask if you have a reservation. They are so stunned that you’ve found their hotel they are even polite for the first few days. There’s also a really lousy coffee shop right on the premises, which is convenient if you keep a cop’s schedule. I guessed I was probably going to do that this trip.
A young Chinese guy named Allan showed me up to my room. It was on the fifth floor and looked down into the city, onto Hollywood Boulevard just two blocks away. I left the curtain open. The room was a little bit bigger than a gas station rest room, but the decor wasn’t quite as nice.
It was way past my bedtime back home, but I couldn’t sleep. I left my bag untouched on top of the bed and went out.
The neighborhood at Franklin and Gower is schizophrenic. Two blocks up the hill, towards the famous Hollywood sign, the real estate gets pretty close to seven figures. Two blocks down the hill and it’s overpriced at three.
I walked straight down Gower, past a big brick church, and turned west. I waved hello to Manny, Moe, and Jack on the corner: it had been a while. There was still a crowd moving along the street. Most of them were dressed like they were auditioning for the role of something your mother warned you against.
Some people have this picture of Hollywood Boulevard. They think it’s glamorous. They think if they can just get off the pig farm and leave Iowa for the big city, all they have to do is get to Hollywood Boulevard and magic will happen. They’ll be discovered.
The funny thing is, they’re right. The guys that do the discovering are almost always waiting in the Greyhound station. If you’re young and alone, they’ll discover you. The magic they make happen might not be what you had in mind, but you won’t care about that for more than a week. After that you’ll be so eager to please you’ll gladly do things you’d never even had a name for until you got discovered. And a few years later when you die of disease or overdose or failure to please the magic-makers, your own mother won’t recognize you. And that’s the real magic of Hollywood. They take innocence and turn it into money and broken lives.
I stopped for a hot dog, hoping my sour mood would pass. It didn’t. I got mustard on my shirt. I watched a transvestite hooker working on a young Marine. The jarhead was drunk enough not to know better. He couldn’t believe his luck. I guess the hooker felt the same way.
The hot dog started to taste like old regrets. I threw the remaining half into the trash and walked the last two blocks to Cahuenga.
The World News is open twenty-four hours a day, and there’s always a handful of people browsing. In a town like this there’s a lot of people who can’t sleep. I don’t figure it’s their conscience bothering them.
I stood on the sidewalk in front of the place. There were racks of specialty magazines for people interested in unlikely things. There were several rows of out-of-town newspapers. Down at the far end of the newsstand was an alley. Maybe three steps this side of it there was a faint rusty brown stain spread across the sidewalk and over the curb into the gutter. I stepped over it and walked into the alley.
The alley was dark, but that was no surprise. The only surprise was that I started to feel the old cop adrenaline starting up again, just walking down a dark alley late at night. Suddenly I really wanted this guy. I wanted to find whoever had killed Roscoe and put him in a small cell with a couple of very friendly body-builders.
The night air started to feel charged. It felt good to be doing cop work again, and that made me a little mad, but I nosed around for a minute anyway. I wasn’t expecting to find anything, and I didn’t. By getting down on one knee and squinting I did find the spot where the rusty stains started. There was a large splat, and then a trickle leading back out of the alley to the stain on the sidewalk.
I followed the trickle back to the big stain and stood over it, looking down.
Blood is hard to wash out. But sooner or later the rain, the sun, and the passing feet wear away the stains. This stain was just about all that was left of Roscoe McAuley and when it was gone there would be nothing left of him at all except a piece of rock with his name on it and a couple of loose memories. What he was, what he did, what he thought and cared about—that was already gone. All that was hosed away a lot easier than blood stains—a lot quicker, too.
“I’m sorry, Roscoe,” I said to the stain. It didn’t answer. I walked back up the hill and climbed into a bed that was too soft and smelled of mothballs and cigarettes.
Author Bio:
Jeff Lindsay is the award-winning author of the seven New York Times bestselling Dexter novels upon which the international hit TV show Dexter is based. His books appear in more than 30 languages and have sold millions of copies around the world. Jeff is a graduate of Middlebury College, Celebration Mime Clown School, and has a double MFA from Carnegie Mellon. Although a full-time writer now, he has worked as an actor, comic, director, MC, DJ, singer, songwriter, composer, musician, story analyst, script doctor, and screenwriter.
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Giveaway:
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First Chapter First Paragraph Tuesday Intros hosted by Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea, where bloggers post the first paragraph(s) of a book they are currently reading or planning to read sometime soon.
Today I'm featuring my current read, Small Mercies by Eddie Joyce, which I borrowed from the library . . .
Gail wakes with a pierced heart, same as every day. Her mouth is dry. She reaches for the glass of water on her nightstand, but it has warmed in the night. Next to her, Michael gently snores away last night's fun.
What do you think? Would you continue reading?
Small Mercies explores the lives of the Amendola family members--from the beginning days of young romance and budding dreams to the aftermath of coping with tragic loss, the death of their loved one, a New York City firefighter killed in the 9/11 terrorist attack on the World Trade Center.
First Chapter ~ First Paragraph #118 was originally published by
Catherine for bookclublibrarian.com. This post cannot be republished
without attribution. Retweeting and sharing on Google+ encouraged.
Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly feature of the Breaking the Spine blog. It's a great way to share informationabout
forthcoming books with other readers. Today I'm featuring Gold Fame Citrus, the debut novel from Claire Vaye Watkins.
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Publication Date: September 29, 2015
From barnesandnoble.com: The much-anticipated first novel from a Story Prize-winning “5 Under 35” fiction writer.
In 2012, Claire Vaye Watkins’s story collection, Battleborn,
swept nearly every award for short fiction. Now this young writer,
widely heralded as a once-in-a-generation talent, returns with a first
novel that harnesses the sweeping vision and deep heart that made her
debut so arresting to a love story set in a devastatingly imagined near
future:
Unrelenting drought has transfigured Southern California
into a surreal, phantasmagoric landscape. With the Central Valley
barren, underground aquifer drained, and Sierra snowpack entirely
depleted, most “Mojavs,” prevented by both armed vigilantes and an
indifferent bureaucracy from freely crossing borders to lusher regions,
have allowed themselves to be evacuated to internment camps. In Los
Angeles’ Laurel Canyon, two young Mojavs—Luz, once a poster child for
the Bureau of Conservation and its enemies, and Ray, a veteran of the
“forever war” turned surfer—squat in a starlet’s abandoned mansion.
Holdouts, they subsist on rationed cola and whatever they can loot,
scavenge, and improvise.
The couple’s fragile love somehow blooms
in this arid place, and for the moment, it seems enough. But when they
cross paths with a mysterious child, the thirst for a better future
begins. They head east, a route strewn with danger: sinkholes and
patrolling authorities, bandits and the brutal, omnipresent sun.
Ghosting after them are rumors of a visionary dowser—a diviner for
water—and his followers, who whispers say have formed a colony at the
edge of a mysterious sea of dunes.
Immensely moving, profoundly disquieting, and mind-blowingly original,
Watkins’s novel explores the myths we believe about others and tell
about ourselves, the double-edged power of our most cherished
relationships, and the shape of hope in a precarious future that may be
our own.
Which book are you waiting for?
...Will you add this one to your list of must-reads?
Waiting on Wednesday: Gold Fame Citrus was originally published by
Catherine for bookclublibrarian.com. This post cannot be republished
without attribution. (Retweeting and sharing on Google+ are encouraged.)
First Chapter First Paragraph Tuesday Intros hosted by Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea, where bloggers post the first paragraph(s) of a book they are currently reading or planning to read sometime soon.
Today I'm featuring my current read, Summer Secrets by Jane Green, which I borrowed from the library . . .
Lord knows, most of the time, when I'm facing an evening on my own, I am absolutely fine. If anything, I relish that alone time, when my daughter is with her father; the luxury of eating whatever I want to eat, the relief at not having to provide a nutritious meal for a thirteen-year-old picky eater.
What do you think? Would you continue reading?
Jane Green's newest novel is set in London and Nantucket--perfect locations for armchair traveling.
First Chapter ~ First Paragraph #117 was originally published by
Catherine for bookclublibrarian.com. This post cannot be republished
without attribution. Retweeting and sharing on Google+ encouraged.
It's Friday . . . time to share book excerpts with:
Book Beginnings on Fridays hosted by Rose City Reader,
where bloggers share the first sentence or more of a current read, as
well as initial thoughts about the sentence(s), impressions of the book,
or anything else that the opening inspires.
The Friday 56 hosted by Freda's Voice,
where you grab a book and turn to page 56 (or 56% of an ebook), find
one or more interesting sentences (no spoilers), and post them.
Today I'm featuring Old Filth by Jane Gardam, which I borrowed from the library.
Beginning: Part One
Scene: Inner Temple
The Benchers' luncheon-room of the Inner Temple. Light pours through the long windows upon polished table, silver, glass. A number of Judges and Benchers finishing lunch. One chair has recently been vacated and the Benchers are looking at it.
********************* Page 56: "'On sped the car. When they reached main roads conversation ceased."
*********************
My thoughts: Sir Edward Feathers is the title character, Old Filth. His fascinating life and career unfold in the pages of this novel, which is the first book of a trilogy.
**********************
From Goodreads: Sir Edward Feathers has
had a brilliant career, from his early days as a lawyer in Southeast
Asia, where he earned the nickname Old Filth (FILTH being an acronym for
Failed In London Try Hong Kong) to his final working days as a
respected judge at the English bar. Yet through it all he has carried
with him the wounds of a difficult and emotionally hollow childhood. Now
an eighty-year-old widower living in comfortable seclusion in Dorset,
Feathers is finally free from the regimen of work and the sentimental
scaffolding that has sustained him throughout his life. He slips back
into the past with ever mounting frequency and intensity, and on the
tide of these vivid, lyrical musings, Feathers approaches a reckoning
with his own history. Not all the old filth, it seems, can be cleaned
away.
Borrowing from biography and history, Jane Gardam has written a literary masterpiece reminiscent of Rudyard Kipling's Baa Baa, Black Sheep
that retraces much of the twentieth century's torrid and momentous
history. Feathers' childhood in Malaya during the British Empire's
heyday, his schooling in pre-war England, his professional success in
Southeast Asia and his return to England toward the end of the
millennium, are vantage points from which the reader can observe the
march forward of an eventful era and the steady progress of that man,
Sir Edward Feathers, Old Filth himself, who embodies the century's fate.
Which book are you reading now or about to start?
Friday Focus: The Friday 56 & Book Beginnings #89 was originally published by
Catherine for bookclublibrarian.com. This post cannot be
republished without attribution. Retweeting and sharing on Google+ are encouraged and appreciated.
Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly feature of the Breaking the Spine blog. It's a great way to share informationabout
forthcoming books with other readers. Today I'm featuring After You by best-selling author Jojo Moyes, which is the sequel to Me After You.
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Publication Date: September 29, 2015
Posted on barnesandnoble.com:
A NOTE FROM JOJO MOYES ABOUT HER EXCITING NEW NOVEL, AFTER YOU:
Dear Reader,
I wasn't going to write a sequel to Me Before You.
But for years, readers kept asking and I kept wondering what Lou did
with her life. In the end the idea came, as they sometimes do, at 5:30
in the morning, leaving me sitting bolt upright in my bed and scrambling
for my pen.
It has been such a pleasure revisiting Lou and her
family, and the Traynors, and confronting them with a whole new set of
issues. As ever, they have made me laugh, and cry. I hope readers feel
the same way at meeting them—especially Lou—again. And I'm hoping that
those who love Will will find plenty to enjoy.
—Jojo Moyes
Which book are you waiting for?
...Will you add this one to your list of must-reads?
Waiting on Wednesday: New Jojo Moyes Novel was originally published by
Catherine for bookclublibrarian.com. This post cannot be republished
without attribution. (Retweeting and sharing on Google+ are encouraged.)
First Chapter First Paragraph Tuesday Intros hosted by Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea, where bloggers post the first paragraph(s) of a book they are currently reading or planning to read sometime soon.
Today I'm featuring the opening from my next read, a bookselected by one of my book clubs, which I borrowed from the library . . .
The old man's eyes struck me first. They rested deep in their sockets, and he seemed unable to take them off me. Granted, everyone in the teahouse was staring at me more or less unabashedly, but he was the most brazen. As if I were some exotic creature he'd never seen before.
What do you think? Would you continue reading?
I'm intrigued by the opening paragraph and its lyrical prose. Early feedback from club members is that this is an immediately engaging story.
First Chapter ~ First Paragraph #116 was originally published by
Catherine for bookclublibrarian.com. This post cannot be republished
without attribution. Retweeting and sharing on Google+ encouraged.
It's Friday . . . time to share book excerpts with:
Book Beginnings on Fridays hosted by Rose City Reader,
where bloggers share the first sentence or more of a current read, as
well as initial thoughts about the sentence(s), impressions of the book,
or anything else that the opening inspires.
The Friday 56 hosted by Freda's Voice,
where you grab a book and turn to page 56 (or 56% of an ebook), find
one or more interesting sentences (no spoilers), and post them.
Today I'm featuring Death in Brittany by Jean-Luc Bannalec which I borrowed from the library.
Beginning: The First Day
The seventh of July was a magnificent summer's day, one of those majestic Atlantic days that always lifted Commissaire Dupin's spirits. There was blue everywhere. By Breton standards, the air was already very warm for so early in the morning but it was a perfectly clear day. There was a distinct sharpness to everything. Just last night it had looked like the end of the world was nigh; heavy, low-lying clouds, ominously black and monstrous, had raced across the sky as the rain came down in torrents of biblical proportions.
********************* Page 56: "'Bonjour, Monsieur. Commissaire Dupin here. I'm investigating the murder of Pierre-Louis Pennec."
*********************
My thoughts: This international bestseller is the first in a new series. I am enjoying getting to know Commissaire Dupin in a historic setting along the French coast.
**********************
Frombarnesandnoble.com: Commissaire Georges Dupin, a Parisian-born caffeine junkie
recently relocated from the glamour of Paris to the remote (if
picturesque) Breton coast, is not happy when he is dragged from his
morning croissant and coffee to the scene of a curious murder. The local
village of Pont-Aven-a sleepy community by the sea where everyone knows
one other and nothing much seems to happen-is in shock. The legendary
ninety-one-year-old hotelier Pierre-Louis Pennec, owner of the Central
Hotel, has been found dead.
A picture-perfect seaside village
which played host to Gaugin in the 19th century, Pont-Aven is at the
height of its tourist season and is immediately thrown into uproar.
Dupin and his team identify five principal suspects, including a rising
political star, a longtime friend of the victim, and a wealthy art
historian. An obstinate detective whose unconventional methods include
good food, good wine, and taking in plenty of sea air, Dupin finds his
case further complicated when ongoing incidents compound the mystery. As
Dupin delves further into the lives of the victim and the suspects, he
uncovers a web of secrecy and silence that belies the village's quaint
image. A delectable read, Death in Brittany by Jean-Luc Bannalec
transports readers to the French coast where you can practically smell
the sea air and taste the perfectly cooked steak frites in an expertly
crafted, page-turning mystery.
Which book are you reading now or about to start?
Friday Focus: The Friday 56 & Book Beginnings #88 was originally published by
Catherine for bookclublibrarian.com. This post cannot be
republished without attribution. Retweeting and sharing on Google+ are encouraged and appreciated.
Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly feature of the Breaking the Spine blog. It's a great way to share informationabout
forthcoming books with other readers. Today I'm featuring The Lake House by best-selling author Kate Morton.
Publisher: Atria Books
Publication Date: October 20, 2015
From barnesandnoble.com: From the New York Times and internationally bestselling author of The Secret Keeper and The Distant Hours, an intricately plotted, spellbinding new novel of heartstopping suspense and uncovered secrets.
Living
on her family’s idyllic lakeside estate in Cornwall, England, Alice
Edevane is a bright, inquisitive, innocent, and precociously talented
sixteen-year-old who loves to write stories. But the mysteries she pens
are no match for the one her family is about to endure…
One
midsummer’s eve, after a beautiful party drawing hundreds of guests to
the estate has ended, the Edevanes discover that their youngest child,
eleven-month-old Theo, has vanished without a trace. What follows is a
tragedy that tears the family apart in ways they never imagined.
Decades
later, Alice is living in London, having enjoyed a long successful
career as an author. Theo’s case has never been solved, though Alice
still harbors a suspicion as to the culprit. Miles away, Sadie Sparrow, a
young detective in the London police force, is staying at her
grandfather’s house in Cornwall. While out walking one day, she stumbles
upon the old estate—now crumbling and covered with vines, clearly
abandoned long ago. Her curiosity is sparked, setting off a series of
events that will bring her and Alice together and reveal shocking truths
about a past long gone...yet more present than ever.
A lush,
atmospheric tale of intertwined destinies, this latest novel from a
masterful storyteller is an enthralling, thoroughly satisfying read.
Which book are you waiting for?
...Will you add this one to your list of must-reads?
Waiting on Wednesday: New Kate Morton Novel was originally published by
Catherine for bookclublibrarian.com. This post cannot be republished
without attribution. (Retweeting and sharing on Google+ are encouraged.)
First Chapter First Paragraph Tuesday Intros hosted by Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea, where bloggers post the first paragraph(s) of a book they are currently reading or planning to read sometime soon.
Today I'm featuring the opening from a bookI'm reading, which I borrowed from the library . . .
The last time she would ever go swimming, all of Seattle was baking beneath a sky of blameless blue. For two whole days, temperatures had soared while she begged her family for a quick trip to the lake. An hour? Thirty minutes?
But no one else cared about swimming. They seemed oblivious to the oppressive heat. Her parents were busy working, and her older sister had commandeered the coolest room in the house as her private rehearsal studio. Rachel was now glued to the piano bench, practicing that same concerto over and over, while Reggie was stranded with nothing to do. Her best friend had gone on a family vacation, and a long, lonely, humdrum summer loomed ahead.
So, if she wanted to go to the lake, she would have to take matters into her own hands. Any kid with a bike would have done the same thing.
What do you think? Would you continue reading?
Last month I read The Edge of Normal, the first book in the Reeve LeClaire series, and couldn't wait to start the next installment. Book two is just as compelling, and provides more character development and background information about Reeve (formerly Reggie), her family, and the circumstances that led to the abduction that took place in the first book. What Doesn't Kill Her can be read as a stand-alone, but for those of you who like to start a series from the beginning (as I do), you can quickly come up to speed.
Both books are fast-paced thrillers with a strong, independent protagonist who is putting her life back together after surviving a horrendous ordeal. Readers will find themselves rooting for Reeve as she confronts her demons and fights to bring her attacker to justice.
First Chapter ~ First Paragraph #115 was originally published by
Catherine for bookclublibrarian.com. This post cannot be republished
without attribution. Retweeting and sharing on Google+ encouraged.
Jeff Lindsay is the award-winning author of the seven New York Times bestselling Dexter novels upon which the international hit TV show Dexter is based. His books appear in more than 30 languages and have sold millions of copies around the world. Jeff is a graduate of Middlebury College, Celebration Mime Clown School, and has a double MFA from Carnegie Mellon. Although a full-time writer now, he has worked as an actor, comic, director, MC, DJ, singer, songwriter, composer, musician, story analyst, script doctor, and screenwriter.
