First Chapter, First Paragraph, First Lightship

Every Tuesday Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea hosts First Chapter First Paragraph Tuesday Intros, where you can share the first paragraph, or a few, of a book you are reading or thinking about reading soon. #begorrathon16

Blinded By The Light. “Ancient Light” by John Banville

As with much of Banville, there is fine attention to the feel and smell of things; “the sullen, bitter reek” of whiskey; and he has the gift of fully conjuring people, places and events with a few deft strokes.

Top Ten Tuesday: Top Ten Books I’d Give To Readers Who Have Never Read John Banville

He is a master craftsman who writes shimmering prose, but his protagonists are the sorts that you would probably wish to avoid in real life: self-obsessed, self-deluded, duplicitous and amoral men with shameful secrets to hide.

Banville in the Borders

Years ago he signed my copy of Mefisto, and I see his distinctive handwriting hasn’t changed. Are there any graphologists out there who would care to decipher his personality from his elegant copperplate?

The Fluff Is Raging

Flufferings on Arts, Culture and the Perpetual Allure of Uma Thurman by an Irish ex-pat currently at large in Canada

Wexford

First Chapter, First Paragraph, First Lightship

Blinded By The Light. “Ancient Light” by John Banville

Top Ten Tuesday: Top Ten Books I’d Give To Readers Who Have Never Read John Banville

Banville in the Borders