Hemingway's Suitcase

 Visit Rose City Reader to see the opening lines of books and post yours! Mine is from Hemingway's Suitcase by MacDonald Harris.

"1: The Trouble With People

There was a crowd at the Rotonde but they found a table inside looking out through the windows at the terasse and the boulevard. It was five o'clock and already dark."

This book combines fact and fiction to weave a tale about  a lost suitcase containing all of Hemingway's writing at the age of 22. The opening pages appear to be the author's imagining of one of the stories from the suitcase.

From there? I must read on!

: : : : : : :

Turning to page 56 to share at Freda's Voice, we find:

"As you got older, you were no doubt stricken with all sorts of thoughts that you were never again going to do this or that or the other thing again."

: : : : : : :

Would you read on?

Transatlantic

So I started a new book yesterday and only got to page 12. Not an auspicious beginning! The book is Transatlantic by Colum McCann with my teaser from page 12.

"They didn't want to remember the bombs that had dudded out, or the crash and burn, or the cellblocks they had been locked into, or what species of abyss they had seen in the dark."

I'm thinking the author is describing the depths before we see the heights. Hope so!

The opening paragraph is more appealing to me with the elemental power and beauty of nature:

"The cottage sat at the end of the lough. She could hear the wind and rain whipping across the expanse of open water: it hit the trees and muscled its way to the grass."

I had to consult the dictionary for the exact meaning of "lough" beyond what I surmised from the context.

lough:
1 chiefly Irish : lake

2

chiefly Irish : a bay or inlet of the sea

And there we have our vocabulary development for the day. Wonder if I'll be learning many "chiefly Irish" words in this book.

The question is: Would you continue reading?