Book Beginnings: Full-Rip 9.0: The Next Big Earthquake in the Pacific Northwest by Sandi Doughton

Please join me every Friday to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading, along with your initial thoughts about the sentence, impressions of the book, or anything else the opener inspires. Please remember to include the title of the book and the author's name.

TWITTER, ETC: If you are on Twitter, Google+, or other social media, please post using the hash tag #BookBeginnings. I am trying to follow all Book Beginning participants on whatever interweb sites you are on, so please let me know if I have missed any and I will catch up.

MR. LINKY: Please leave a link to your post below. If you don't have a blog, but want to participate, please leave a comment with your Book Beginning.



MY BOOK BEGINNING

Stories passed down from that night don't tell us if dogs howled a warning. Huddled together in the cold, the animals might have sensed the first, faint vibrations while the people still slept.

 -- from the author's Introduction to Full-Rip 9.0: The Next Big Earthquake in the Pacific Northwest by Sandi Doughton, published by Sasquatch Books.

On a misty morning in October 2011, the Satsop nuclear plant's cooling towers floated like twin mirages above Washington's Chehalis valley.

-- from Chapter One, "An Odd Duck."

Doughton is the science writer for the Seattle Times.  She writes with a clear and captivating style that make this explanation of why Seattle, Portland, and Vancouver are the urban centers of a "mega-quake" terrifying but impossible to stop reading.

Used Book Love

I can think of dozens of reasons I buy used books, including the availability of out-of-print titles, price, and the happy feeling I get from knowing a book is being "reused" instead of recycled.

What about you? Do you buy used books? Why do you? Or don't you?

For fanciers of used and rare books lucky enough to be in Portland this weekend, try to stop by the Rose City Used Book Fair, where 40+ dealers will offer a treasure trove of cool books and ephemera. 

If you need further encouragement, check out this spify "info-graphic" the folks at Thriftbooks came up with and asked me to post.  

Review: A Prefect's Uncle by P. G. Wodehouse

A Prefect's Uncle is P. G. Wodehouse's second published book. Like his first, The Pothunters, it is set in an English boarding school for boys. Except in the long passages describing cricket matches, it is a charming and funny book that hints at the hilarious style Wodehouse later perfected.

The initial gag about the Prefect's uncle arriving at the school provides the title and is quite funny. But that storyline peters out and the main plot involving a poetry contest is not as clever.

The big weakness of the book is Wodehouse's unrelenting concentration on cricket. He describes cricket matches play by play and devotes pages to cricket strategy and other bits of cricket minutia.

Diehard Wodehouse completists may be willing to skim over the cricket passages to glean the funny bits. But those new to Wodehouse should start with one of his later, more popular books.


OTHER REVIEWS

If you would like your review of this book listed here, please leave a comment with a link and I will add it.

NOTES

A Prefect's Uncle was one of my books for the MT. TBR CHALLENGE (hosted by Bev on My Reader's Block) and the OFF THE SHELF CHALLENGE (hosted by Bonnie on Bookish Ardour). 

Teaser Tuesday: Tales of St. Austin's by P. G. Wodehouse

The qualities which in later years rendered Frederick Wackerbath Bradshaw so conspicuous a figure in connection with the now celebrated affair of the European, African, and Asiatic Pork Pie and Ham Sandwich Supply Company frauds, were sufficiently in evidence during his school career to make his masters prophesy gloomily concerning his future. The boy was in every detail the father of the man.

-- Tales of St. Austin's by P. G. Wodehouse, from "Bradshaw's Little Story."

I had to read it through twice, but that is the funniest thing I've read in a long time.  Such a brilliant construction and tone of mock-historic epic.

Teaser Tuesdays is hosted by Should Be Reading, where you can find the official rules for this weekly event. 

Mailbox Monday

Thanks for joining me for Mailbox Monday this holiday weekend! MM was created by Marcia, who graciously hosted it for a long, long time, before turning it into a touring event (details here).

Dolce Bellezza is hosting in June, where she also just launched the seventh Japanese Literature Challenge.  Be sure to visit her elegant and inspiring blog.

While I was in Davenport, Iowa for work last week, I went to the local library where they had a Friends of the Library sale shelf.  I found several, including and M.F.K. Fisher I've been looking for for a while.

The Oasis by Mary McCarthy (I want to read more of her books)

 

The A. B. C. Murders by Agatha Christie (I'm on a roll)

 

Revenge of the Middle-Aged Woman by Elizabeth Buchan (looked like a fun book for summer)

 

All That Work and Still No Boys by Kathryn Ma (winner of the Iowa Short Fiction Award)

 

Sister Age by M. F. K. Fisher (essays on growing old)