The End

Sweethearts, I know some of you write blogs with hope in your hearts that a publisher will instruct his editors to ignore the slush pile and pounce on your talent.  Without delay.

Do not give up that hope. It happens.

However, and let me tell you this in my capacity as a reader: If you can’t write THE END  leaving the reader either saturated or bereft, wanting more, then don’t even start your first sentence.

The last two nights I had a fantastic read. Guess what: As so often the closer I came to the end the weaker the plot. It just fizzled out like a bottle of champagne: Flat in the morning.  After the last page I felt like flinging the book into a corner. Since I don’t throw things I didn’t. What I did do was lovingly scan some of my bookshelves, cosseting old friends. Those whose talent is not just devising a fantastic plot but bringing it to a satisfying climax. More, more, more …

U

Start at the beginning

Sweethearts, the nights get longer – a bit like earlobes do (according to Phil) as time passes on. Since I have long hair I shall worry about that once my hair starts falling out. In the meantime my main ambition is to not get long in the tooth.

In the absence of anything better to do I have (no, not lit a fire) looked through a stack of  books, forlorn and neglected in a corner. And came across an author I find so incomprehensible I will give him away. Our twain will never meet. Want to know the name? Just ask. Not that he is the only one. I will give any print a try – well, no, not any, but most – yet, by Jove, one’s patience may be tested.

Talking of which, and please do tell me now: Leaving non-fiction aside since with non-fiction it doesn’t matter on which page you open the book: Are any of you that most awful of creatures who reads the end first? If you are please don’t tell me because you will go down the greasy pole of my esteem before you can say ‘rock bottom’.

It’s no joke. There is a book I’d love to give to two long distant friends of mine. Bought the copies for them years ago. It’s a brilliant read. It encompasses all both of them are interested in. Not least food. Yet, I can’t bring myself to send it to them. Why? Because I know them. They’ll flick through it, read the last page and spoil the whole surprise. Which makes the whole exercise pointless.

U

One night stand

Sweethearts, before I answer your excellent comments to my last post (I’ll have to think them over first) let me just squeeze this one in:

The world is turning. And getting smaller. Where once we had libraries we now have Kindle. Well, you might. I don’t. I will go to my grave without ever ever ever having read a book on Kindle. Unless I find myself in prison and they’ll only allow me to read on Kindle. In which case I might relent. But happy I will not be.

I am a tactile person. So page turning is paramount to me. And what of the smell of a book? I like books physically flying around me. There is such pleasure, such comfort derived from being able to pull a book, an old friend,  off your shelf and, just for a moment, flick through it again. Or even reacquaint yourself.  I arouse my curiosity when, in passing, I see a book on my shelves spiked with little yellow post it notes wondering what it was that so caught my interest, my imagination.

In comparison Kindle is sterile. It’s reading with a condom on.

Hugs and kisses,

U