First Chapter ~ First Paragraph

It's Tuesday . . . time for . . . 

. . . First Chapter ~ First Paragraph Tuesday Intros . . . now hosted by Yvonne at Socrates' Book Reviews, where bloggers share excerpts from a book they have read, are currently reading, or are planning to read.

 

Today I'm featuring Before the Ruins by Victoria Gosling. The excerpt shared is from a hardcover version borrowed from the library.

First Chapter:  Game

The year Peter went missing was the year of the floods. I was on my way home from a meeting in Paris when the call came. it was a Wednesday, late April, and as the train hurtled toward London night was coming on. The heavy clouds were darkest blue and great pools of water lay in the fields like molten silver. I was on my laptop, reading about the latest in a series of leaked financial papers. When I glanced up, the last light slipped away, and my reflection coalesced upon the window as though the darkness was developing fluid.

 

What do you think?  Would you continue reading? 

I like the setting and the descriptiveness of the first paragraph, and I'm curious about the chapter heading. Since I find stories with missing persons particularly intriguing, I'm looking forward to starting this debut novel.

 

This First Chapter~First Paragraph post was originally composed and/or compiled by Catherine for the Book Club Librarian blog. © 2021, Book Club Librarian All Rights Reserved. If you're reading this on a site other than Book Club Librarian without attribution, know that this post is being used without permission.

 

 

First Chapter ~ First Paragraph

It's Tuesday . . . time for . . . 

. . . First Chapter ~ First Paragraph Tuesday Intros . . . now hosted by Yvonne at Socrates' Book Reviews, where bloggers share excerpts from a book they have read, are currently reading, or are planning to read.

 

Today I'm featuring an upcoming read, The First to Lie by Hank Phillippi Ryan. The excerpt shared is from an eBook borrowed from the library.

First Chapter:  Nora

Lies have a complicated half-life. Nora--for now--tried to calculate the life span of her most recent one as she waited on the corner of Tremont and Union Park, the evening's first snowflakes beginning to accumulate on her new--to her--black cashmere coat. Boston was new to her too, with its treacherous weather and confusing streets and wary response from newcomers. They'd warned her, laughing, not to ask for directions. You can't get there from here, people told her.

What do you think?  Would you continue reading? 

The first paragraph drips with suspense--hinting at the lies the narrator is bringing to a new setting. My curiosity is definitely piqued, and I'll find out more when I finish my current read. 

 

This First Chapter~First Paragraph post was originally composed and/or compiled by Catherine for the Book Club Librarian blog. © 2021, Book Club Librarian All Rights Reserved. If you're reading this on a site other than Book Club Librarian without attribution, know that this post is being used without permission.

 

Friday Focus: The Friday 56 and Book Beginnings

 

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 an upcoming read, The Newcomer by Mary Kay Andrews. The excerpts shared are from a hardcover version borrowed from the library.

Beginning:  It was still dark when Letty pulled into the parking lot. The car bumped slowly over the rutted oyster-shell pavement and she turned around to check on Maya, grateful that the child was finally sleeping.. Her head slumped against the side of the car seat, her curls dampened with sweat, her rosebud lips pursed as she softly snored, and Ellie, her ever-present toy stuffed elephant, was clutched tightly to her chest.

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Page 56:  Every morning when she woke up in what she still thought of as Monica's apartment in Friends, Letty felt like she was living in a dream. She arose early, sipped coffee on the balcony, and planned her day.

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My thoughts:  The cover of this book screams beach read to me, and with the weather warming up around here, this novel will likely be my first read in preparation for summer 2021.

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From GoodReads:  Mary Kay Andrews, the New York Times bestselling author and Queen of the Beach Reads delivers her next page-turner for the summer with The Newcomer.

In trouble and on the run...

After she discovers her sister Tanya dead on the floor of her fashionable New York City townhouse, Letty Carnahan is certain she knows who did it: Tanya’s ex; sleazy real estate entrepreneur Evan Wingfield. Even in the grip of grief and panic Letty heeds her late sister’s warnings: “If anything bad happens to me—it’s Evan. Promise me you’ll take Maya and run. Promise me.”

With a trunkful of emotional baggage...

So Letty grabs her sister’s Mercedes and hits the road with her wailing four-year-old niece Maya. Letty is determined to out-run Evan and the law, but run to where? Tanya, a woman with a past shrouded in secrets, left behind a “go-bag” of cash and a big honking diamond ring—but only one clue: a faded magazine story about a sleepy mom-and-pop motel in a Florida beach town with the improbable name of Treasure Island. She sheds her old life and checks into an uncertain future at The Murmuring Surf Motel.

The No Vacancy sign is flashing & the sharks are circling...

And that’s the good news. Because The Surf, as the regulars call it, is the winter home of a close-knit flock of retirees and snowbirds who regard this odd-duck newcomer with suspicion and down-right hostility. As Letty settles into the motel’s former storage room, she tries to heal Maya’s heartache and unravel the key to her sister’s shady past, all while dodging the attention of the owner’s dangerously attractive son Joe, who just happens to be a local police detective. Can Letty find romance as well as a room at the inn—or will Joe betray her secrets and put her behind bars? With danger closing in, it’s a race to find the truth and right the wrongs of the past.

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This Friday Focus: The Friday 56 & Book Beginnings post was originally composed and/or compiled and published by Catherine for the blog, bookclublibrarian.com.  It cannot be republished without attribution. 

© 2021 Book Club Librarian All Rights Reserved. If you're reading this on a site other than Book Club Librarian without attribution, know that this post has been stolen and was used without permission.

First Chapter ~ First Paragraph

It's Tuesday . . . time for . . . 

. . . First Chapter ~ First Paragraph Tuesday Intros . . . now hosted by Yvonne at Socrates' Book Reviews, where bloggers share excerpts from a book they have read, are currently reading, or are planning to read.

 

Today I'm featuring a recent read, Local Woman Missing by Mary Kubica. Today is the book's publication day (May 18, 2021). The excerpts shared are from an advanced reader copy downloaded from NetGalley.

First Chapter:  Delilah

Now

I hear footsteps. They move across the ceiling above my head. My eyes follow the sound, but there ain't nothing to see 'cause it's just footsteps. That don't matter none, though, because the sound of them alone is enough to make my heart race, my legs shake, to make something inside my neck thump like a heartbeat.

 

What do you think?  Would you continue reading? 

Beginning with her debut novel, The Good Girl (2014) and in her subsequent five books, Mary Kubica has delivered fast-paced, thrilling suspense stories. This seventh novel continues her winning trend. Told in alternating chapters between the present day and eleven years ago, when two women and a young girl went missing, Kubica delivers another nail-biting page-turner.

 

This First Chapter~First Paragraph post was originally composed and/or compiled by Catherine for the Book Club Librarian blog. © 2021, Book Club Librarian All Rights Reserved. If you're reading this on a site other than Book Club Librarian without attribution, know that this post is being used without permission.

 

Friday Focus: The Friday 56 and Book Beginnings

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 an upcoming read, The Last Thing He Told Me by Laura Dave. The excerpts shared are from a hardcover version borrowed from the library.

 

Beginning: Prologue

Owen used to like to tease me about how I lost everything, about how, in my own way, I have raised losing things to an art form.

~~~~~

Part I

If You Answer the Door for Strangers . . .

You see it all the time on television. There's a knock at the front door. And, on the other side, someone is waiting to tell you the news that changes everything.

********************  

Page 56:  I need to make a stop first though at Owen's friend's house. It's a stop that I'm not particularly eager to make, but if anyone will have insight into what Owen is thinking, into what I might be missing, it's Carl.

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My thoughts:  There's buzz everywhere about this novel, which will probably be my next read. Hopefully, it lives up to all the hype. One thing I know for sure, I'll enjoy visiting the story's setting, Sausalto, which is one of my all-time favorite California locations.

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From GoodReads:  We all have stories we never tell. Before Owen Michaels disappears, he manages to smuggle a note to his beloved wife of one year: Protect her.

Despite her confusion and fear, Hannah Hall knows exactly to whom the note refers: Owen’s sixteen-year-old daughter, Bailey. Bailey, who lost her mother tragically as a child. Bailey, who wants absolutely nothing to do with her new stepmother.

As Hannah’s increasingly desperate calls to Owen go unanswered; as the FBI arrests Owen’s boss; as a US Marshal and FBI agents arrive at her Sausalito home unannounced, Hannah quickly realizes her husband isn’t who he said he was. And that Bailey just may hold the key to figuring out Owen’s true identity—and why he really disappeared.

Hannah and Bailey set out to discover the truth, together. But as they start putting together the pieces of Owen’s past, they soon realize they are also building a new future. One neither Hannah nor Bailey could have anticipated.

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This Friday Focus: The Friday 56 & Book Beginnings post was originally composed and/or compiled and published by Catherine for the blog, bookclublibrarian.com.  It cannot be republished without attribution. 

© 2021 Book Club Librarian All Rights Reserved. If you're reading this on a site other than Book Club Librarian without attribution, know that this post has been stolen and was used without permission.

 

First Chapter ~ First Paragraph

 

It's Tuesday . . . time for . . . 

. . . First Chapter ~ First Paragraph Tuesday Intros . . . now hosted by Yvonne at Socrates' Book Reviews, where bloggers share excerpts from a book they have read, are currently reading, or are planning to read.

 

Today I'm featuring a new thriller, Until We Are Lost by Leslie Archer. The excerpt shared is from a trade paperback edition borrowed from the library.

First Chapter:  New York City--Present Day

"It started the night Hickory was shot to death. Hickory, my dog." Tara looks forlornly at Dr. Christie Lind. "Like a, I don't know, a premonition of doom."

 

What do you think?  Would you continue reading? 

The last four words of the opening excerpt--a premonition of doom--are enough to keep me reading on.

 

This First Chapter~First Paragraph post was originally composed and/or compiled by Catherine for the Book Club Librarian blog. © 2021, Book Club Librarian All Rights Reserved. If you're reading this on a site other than Book Club Librarian without attribution, know that this post is being used without permission.

Friday Focus: The Friday 56 and Book Beginnings

 

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 a book that has long been in my reading pile, Deacon King Kong by James McBride. The excerpts shared are from a copy in my reading collection.

Beginning: Deacon Cuffy Lambkin of Five Ends Baptist Church became a walking dead man on a cloudy September afternoon in 1969.

********************  

Page 56: "Ah, but a fair-play mate he was. He never forgot a friend. A better man I never knew. He looked out for me in prison."

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My thoughts:  I heard so many good things about this book--and it was an Oprah pick. I'm hoping that shining some attention on it now will move the book further to the top of my reading pile.

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From GoodReads:  In September 1969, a fumbling, cranky old church deacon known as Sportcoat shuffles into the courtyard of the Cause Houses housing project in south Brooklyn, pulls a .38 from his pocket, and in front of everybody shoots the project's drug dealer at point-blank range.

In Deacon King Kong, McBride brings to vivid life the people affected by the shooting: the victim, the African-American and Latinx residents who witnessed it, the white neighbors, the local cops assigned to investigate, the members of the Five Ends Baptist Church where Sportcoat was deacon, the neighborhood's Italian mobsters, and Sportcoat himself.

As the story deepens, it becomes clear that the lives of the characters--caught in the tumultuous swirl of 1960s New York--overlap in unexpected ways. When the truth does emerge, McBride shows us that not all secrets are meant to be hidden, that the best way to grow is to face change without fear, and that the seeds of love lie in hope and compassion.

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This Friday Focus: The Friday 56 & Book Beginnings post was originally composed and/or compiled and published by Catherine for the blog, bookclublibrarian.com.  It cannot be republished without attribution. 

© 2021 Book Club Librarian All Rights Reserved. If you're reading this on a site other than Book Club Librarian without attribution, know that this post has been stolen and was used without permission.

First Chapter ~ First Paragraph

 

It's Tuesday . . . time for . . . 

. . . First Chapter ~ First Paragraph Tuesday Intros . . . now hosted by Yvonne at Socrates' Book Reviews, where bloggers share excerpts from a book they have read, are currently reading, or are planning to read.

 

Today I'm featuring an upcoming read. Redhead by the Side of the Road by Anne Tyler. The excerpt shared is from a hardcover version borrowed from the library.

First Chapter:  You have to wonder what goes through the mind of a man like Micah Mortimer. He lives alone; he keeps to himself; his routine is etched in stone. At seven fifteen every morning you see him set out on his run Along about ten or ten thirty he slaps the magnetic TECH HERMIT sign onto the roof of his Kia. The times he leaves on his calls will vary, but not a day seems to go by without several clients requiring his services. Afternoons he can be spotted working around the apartment building; he moonlights as the super. He'll be sweeping the walk or shaking out the mat or conferring with a plumber. Monday nights, before trash day, he hauls the garbage bins to the alley; Wednesday nights, the recycling bins. At ten p.m. or so the three squinty windows behind the foundation plantings go dark. (His apartment is in the basement. It is probably not very cheery.) 

 

What do you think?  Would you continue reading? 

The opening paragraph really gives a detailed picture of the main character, who by all appearances is a creature of habit operating on automatic pilot. It will be interesting to find out what Tyler has in store for one Micah Mortimer--more of the same, or something surprisingly different?

 

This First Chapter~First Paragraph post was originally composed and/or compiled by Catherine for the Book Club Librarian blog. © 2021, Book Club Librarian All Rights Reserved. If you're reading this on a site other than Book Club Librarian without attribution, know that this post is being used without permission.