Lessons by Ian McEwan -- BOOK BEGINNINGS

 

BOOK BEGINNINGS ON FRIDAYS

Lessons by Ian McEwan

Thank you for joining me this week for Book Beginnings on Fridays where participants share the opening sentence (or two) from the book they are reading. You can also share from a book you want to feature, even if you are not reading it at the moment. 

MY BOOK BEGINNING

This was insomniac memory, not a dream. It was the piano lesson again – an orange-tiled floor, one high window, a new upright in a bare room close to the sickbay.

-- from Lessons by Ian McEwan. McEwan is a must-read author for me but I've fallen behind with his more recent books. Lessons came out in 2022 and I am just now reading it. I love it and now wish I had made an effort to read it earlier. It's both the story of one man and how a confusing sexual experience changed the trajectory of his life, and a capsulized history, through his eyes, of England from WWII to the present. "Boomer Bio," yes. Sprawling, yes. But also intimate and engaging. 

YOUR BOOK BEGINNING

Please add the link to your book beginning post in the linky box below. If you participate or share on social media, please use the hashtag #bookbeginnings so other people can find your post.

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THE FRIDAY 56

The Friday 56 asks participants to share a two-sentence teaser from their book of the week. If your book is an ebook or audiobook, pick a teaser from the 56% point. 

Anna at My Head is Full of Books hosts The Friday 56, a natural tie-in with Book Beginnings on Fridays. Please visit My Head is Full of Books to leave the link to your post. 

MY FRIDAY 56

-- from Lessons:

Two days later Roland and his parents took the train from Liverpool Street to Ipswich. Outside the comatose Victorian station they waited for a number 202 bus, as instructed in a letter from the headmaster’s secretary.

FROM THE PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION

When the world is still counting the cost of the Second World War and the Iron Curtain has closed, eleven-year-old Roland Baines's life is turned upside down. Two thousand miles from his mother's protective love, stranded at an unusual boarding school, his vulnerability attracts piano teacher Miss Miriam Cornell, leaving scars as well as a memory of love that will never fade.

Now, when his wife vanishes, leaving him alone with his tiny son, Roland is forced to confront the reality of his restless existence. As the radiation from Chernobyl spreads across Europe, he begins a search for answers that looks deep into his family history and will last for the rest of his life.