pagesofjulia

Thanks to Rose City Reader for hosting this meme. To participate, share the first line or two of the book you are currently reading and, if you feel so moved, let us know what your first impressions were based on that first line.

I am listening to Nancy Horan’s Loving Frank on audio, and loving it. It is the fictionalized story of the real-life woman named Mamah Borthwick, who had an affair with Frank Lloyd Wright. Most of the book is in third person, but it begins with a rare piece of first-person narrative told in Mamah’s voice:

It was Edwin who wanted to build a new house. I didn’t mind the old Queen Anne on Oak Park Avenue.

…and that says quite a bit, I think. Oak Park Avenue, for me, evokes Hemingway, whose hometown was Oak Park, Illinois; he grew up a few years behind the beginning of FLW’s career and aware of his work around town, so with my past reading of multiple Hemingway biographies, I feel comfortable with the setting already. And saying that it was Edwin who wanted the new house – when we know that the speaker ended up having an illicit affair with the architect – is rather telling, don’t you think? I call those a weighty first two lines.

Hope your reading weekend is looking fine!

Filed under: book beginnings | Tagged: audio, historical fiction |