Author Archives: sandradan1

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About sandradan1

Novelist. I blog about writing, reading and everything to do with books and writing them at http://www.sandradanby.com/. Come and visit me!

Great Opening Paragraph 36… ‘The Bell Jar’ #amreading #FirstPara

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“It was a queer, sultry summer, the summer they electrocuted the Rosenbergs, and I didn’t know what I was doing in New York. I’m stupid about executions. The idea of being electrocuted makes me sick, and that’s all there was to read about in the papers – goggle-eyed headlines staring up at me on every street corner and at the fusty, peanut-selling mouth of every subway. It had nothing to do with me, but I couldn’t help wondering what it would be like, being burned alive all along your nerves.”
Sylvia PlathFrom ‘The Bell Jar’ by Sylvia Plath

Try one of these #FirstParas & discover a new author:-
‘Freedom’ by Jonathan Franzen
‘The Secret Agent’ by Joseph Conrad
‘After You’d Gone’ by Maggie O’Farrell

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#Books #FirstPara THE BELL JAR by Sylvia Plath https://wp.me/p5gEM4-n1 via @SandraDanby

Great Opening Paragraph… 36

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sylvia plath - the bell jar 10-6-13“It was a queer, sultry summer, the summer they electrocuted the Rosenbergs, and I didn’t know what I was doing in New York. I’m stupid about executions. The idea of being electrocuted makes me sick, and that’s all there was to read about in the papers – goggle-eyed headlines staring up at me on every street corner and at the fusty, peanut-selling mouth of every subway. It had nothing to do with me, but I couldn’t help wondering what it would be like, being burned alive all along your nerves.”
‘The Bell Jar’ by Sylvia Plath

#BookReview ‘The Quarry’ by Iain Banks #contemporary #death

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I started reading The Quarry with my emotions running high, knowing Iain Banks had completed it so near to death. But I determined to be fair, not to like it just because he died. But I did like it. A lot. The story is full of imagery: the quarry, the actual hole in the ground is the unknown faced by the two key characters: Guy, who is facing death; and his son Kit, who faces life without his father. Both stand on the edge of emptiness. Iain BanksKit is the key narrator. Described as ‘a bit odd’ and ‘socially disabled’, I liked him straight away. As often with a young narrator, the author puts words of wisdom into the words of an innocent. Perhaps Kit has more self-awareness than his elders. He is certainly an innocent who is learning quickly. The action takes place over one weekend, the limited timespan and setting in the house and edge of quarry give it the feeling of a stage play at times.
A group of friends gathers at Guy’s house, to spend time with him as he dies. But there is always a feeling that the adults want something from Kit, that no-one is being honest , that they are looking for something. This leads Kit into the quarry, the brooding threat there all the time outside the house. As they wonder whether the hole of the quarry stretches beneath the house’s foundations, and if the house will fall into it, we learn about Kit’s disputed identity. Who is his mother? The assumptions he made as a child are now being challenged, the certainty of his childhood is dug from beneath his feet just as the rock in the quarry has been extracted.
It’s impossible to read Guy’s bitterness about his own mortality and not think of Banks’s illness. But this is a tightly-written novel that I defy anyone coming to it not knowing the author to guess that the author was dying. There was only one scene where the editor’s hand was needed, Kit’s climb down into the quarry does go on a bit. But this is a minor gripe.
A fitting finale to an illustrious bibliography.

If you like this, try:-
‘Etta and Otto and Russell and James’ by Emma Hooper
‘The Last Days of Rabbit Hayes’ by Anna McPartlin
‘Blow Your House Down’ by Pat Barker

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview THE QUARRY by Iain Banks https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-4b2 via @SandraDanby 

Great Opening Paragraph 35… ‘Room’ #amreading #FirstPara

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“Today I’m five. I was four last night going to sleep in Wardrobe, but when I wake up in Bed in the dark I’m changed to five, abracadabra. Before that I was three, then two, then one, then zero. ‘Was I minus numbers?’”
Emma Donoghue From ‘Room’ by Emma Donoghue 

Read my reviews of these other novels by Emma Donoghue:-
AKIN
FROG MUSIC
THE PULL OF THE STARS
THE WONDER

Try one of these #FirstParas & discover a new author:-
‘The Heart is a Lonely Hunter’ by Carson McCullers
‘Family Album’ by Penelope Lively
‘These Foolish Things’ by Deborah Moggach

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#Books #FirstPara ROOM by Emma Donoghue https://wp.me/p5gEM4-kw via @SandraDanby

Great Opening Paragraph….35

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room - GOP 5-6-13
“Today I’m five. I was four last night going to sleep in Wardrobe, but when I wake up in Bed in the dark I’m changed to five, abracadabra. Before that I was three, then two, then one, then zero. ‘Was I minus numbers?’ “
‘Room’ by Emma Donoghue

Great Opening Paragraph 34… ‘Lolita’ #amreading #FirstPara

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“Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta.”
Vladimir NabokovFrom ‘Lolita’ by Vladimir Nabokov

Try one of these #FirstParas & discover a new author:-
‘The Inheritance of Loss’ by Kiran Desai
‘Notes on a Scandal’ by Zoe Heller
‘Bel Canto’ by Ann Patchett

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#Books #FirstPara LOLITA by Vladimir Nabokov https://wp.me/p5gEM4-kO via @SandraDanby

Great Opening Paragraph 34

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Lolita by vladimir nabokov 5-6-13“Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta.”
‘Lolita’ by Vladimir Nabokov

#BookReview ‘Natural Flights of the Human Mind’ by Clare Morrall #contemporary

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Natural Flights of the Human Mind by Clare Morrall is an original story about two outsiders who are brought together by circumstance and who, unknowingly, help each other to come to terms with their past. They are both scratchy characters, secretive, who do not invite gestures of friendship. Despite this, I liked both of them. Clare MorrallLike all Morrall’s books, this is a gentle build, gradually unveiling the hidden goodness of people who on the outside seem unattractive and possibly irredeemable. Pete Straker lives in a lighthouse which threatens to collapse, a symbol of his life since he caused the death of 78 people 24 years earlier. He talks to no-one, the only sign of his caring nature is his nurturing of his two cats. Imogen Doody, a school caretaker whose husband walked out one day and never returned, inherits a wild, uninhabited cottage, covered with dense undergrowth, a symbol of her life. These two outsiders meet and, despite Straker’s silence and Doody’s anger, come to understand each other’s turmoil.
With numerous references to Biggles, the discovery of a Tiger Moth in a barn, and much DIY, this is a story about how lives can be rebuilt no matter what happened before.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE ABOUT THIS BOOK

Read my review of these other novels by Clare Morrall:-
AFTER THE BOMBING
THE LANGUAGE OF OTHERS
THE LAST OF THE GREENWOODS
THE MAN WHO DISAPPEARED
THE ROUNDABOUT MAN

Read the first paragraph of ASTONISHING SPLASHES OF COLOUR here.

If you like this, try:-
‘Something to Hide’ by Deborah Moggach
‘Summertime’ by Vanessa Lafaye
‘Elizabeth is Missing’ by Emma Healey

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview NATURAL FLIGHTS OF THE HUMAN MIND by Clare Morrall https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-4aS via @SandraDanby 

Great opening paragraph 33… ‘The Sense of an Ending’ #amreading #FirstPara

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“I remember, in no particular order:
– a shiny inner wrist;
– steam rising from a wet sink as a hot frying pan is laughingly tossed into it;
– gouts of sperm circling a plughole before being sluiced own the full length of a tall house;
– a river rushing nonsensically upstream, its wave and wash lit by half a dozen chasing torchbeams;
– another river, broad and grey, the direction of its flow disguised by a stiff wind exciting the surface;
– bathwater long gone cold behind a locked door.
This last isn’t something I actually saw, but what you end up remembering isn’t always the same as what you have witnessed.”
Julian BarnesFrom ‘The Sense of an Ending’ by Julian Barnes

Read my reviews of these other novels by Julian Barnes:-
THE NOISE OF TIME
THE ONLY STORY

Try one of these #FirstParas & discover a new author:-
‘Super-Cannes’ by JG Ballard
‘Bridget Jones’ Diary’ by Helen Fielding
‘In Cold Blood’ by Truman Capote

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#Books #FirstPara THE SENSE OF AN ENDING by Julian Barnes https://wp.me/p5gEM4-nE via @SandraDanby

Great opening paragraph…33

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julian barnes - the sense of an ending 30-4-13“I remember, in no particular order:
– a shiny inner wrist;
– steam rising from a wet sink as a hot frying pan is laughingly tossed into it;
– gouts of sperm circling a plughole before being sluiced own the full length of a tall house;
– a river rushing nonsensically upstream, its wave and wash lit by half a dozen chasing torchbeams;
– another river, broad and grey, the direction of its flow disguised by a stiff wind exciting the surface;
– bathwater long gone cold behind a locked door.
This last isn’t something I actually saw, but what you end up remembering isn’t always the same as what you have witnessed.”
‘The Sense of an Ending’ by Julian Barnes