The Last Song by Nicholas Sparks

First sentence:

Staring out the bedroom window, Ronnie wondered whether Pastor Harris was already at the church.

My favorite book written by Nicholas Sparks is definitely "A Walk To Remember."  Actually, if you'd probe deeper, I'll tell you that I like the movie better than the book.  I've read the book once and watched the movie several times and never tire watching.

Since I started my quest last 2009 to not read two books by the same author - at least not consecutively or at such a short interval - I never looked for anything written by Nicholas.  But wandering at the bookstore before Christmas, I found this book on trade paperback and could not resist not to buy it, for such a cheap price of Php 75.00 (about a $1.50).  So, since I wasn't reading anything at that time, I immediately started as soon as I got home and got the chance.

What's on page 68:

Will stood in the well beneath the Ford Explorer in his uniform, watching the oil drain while simultaneously doing his best to ignore Scott, something easier said than done.  Scott had been haranguing him about the previous evening on and off since they'd arrived at work that morning.

"See, you were thinking about this all wrong," Scott continued, trying yet another tack.  He retrieved three cans of oil and set them on the shelf beside him.  "There's a difference between hooking up and getting back together."

Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift

The first sentence:

My father had a small state in Nottinghamshire:  I was the third of five sons.

Again, this is a random choice from a sea of eBooks.  I guess the title attracted me, too, because as a child, I saw bits and pieces of the story on tv, but never really sat down and watch it in its entirety.

All I know (as a kid) was that he was captured by these little people in the land called Liliput.  I could still remember Gulliver lying down with these little people climbing the stairs that was placed somewhere in his torso.  I do not recall hearing a line said by any of the characters though.  Probably because I was only half-attending to the tv at that time and that I really wasn't interested.

I told a reading friend what I was reading lately.  He is reading Paul Theraux.  He told me good luck on reading Gulliver and I don't really know what he meant.

I replied that I chose the book by random and was only filling the vacuum.  I was on page 58, and at that time, Gulliver had just escaped the land of little people.

I told my friend that I thought it was kid's stuff.  But I thought it wrong when I reached page 110.  It totally changed my thoughts about the book.  Yes, it could be for the young adult, but I guess I am really wrong in calling it kid's stuff.

What's on page 68:

The farmer, by this time, was convinced I must be a rational creature.  He spoke often to me, but the sound of his voice pierced my ears like that of a water-mill, yet his words were articulate enough.  I answered as loud as I could in several languages, and he often laid his ear within two yards of me:  but all in vain, for we were wholly unintelligible to each other.  He then sent his servants to their work, and taking his handkerchief out of his pocket, he doubled and spread it on his left hand, which he placed flat on the ground with the palm upward, making me a sign to step into it, as I could easily do, for it was not above a foot in thickness.  I thought it my part to obey, and for fear of falling, laid myself at full length upon the handkerchief, with the remainder of which he lapped me up to the head for further security, and in this manner carried me to home to his house.

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll

I have been reading using natural light for about a while now.  So, that meant I have most of my reading time in the afternoon when the sunlight is strong.

So, recently, when we have been having grey and gloomy days, I decided to use the computer so that I can read even if the lights are low.

Image copied here

I turned to Google Books to find an e-Book that I could start reading and I figured that I would not search or try to choose from a million books.  I'll just start reading the first book that I could lay my cursor into.  And this is what I found.

The first sentence:

Alice was beginning to get very tired of sitting by her sister on the bank, and of having nothing to do:  once or twice she peeped into the book her sister was reading, but it had no pictures or conversations in it, "and what is the use of a book, " thought Alice, "without the pictures or conversations."

For some, this was a reading requirement maybe in grade school, or a bedtime story that their parent(s) read to them.  But since I went into a public school here in our country, reading a novel was never a requirement - even if it was a book by a local writer.  So, part of my quest was to read these classical books that inspire children to read and write.  My parents never read to us during bedtime.  But it was never a problem for me.

It's a good thing that I got myself into reading even if it wasn't a requirement in school.  I guess it was my dad's persistence that I read his collection of Reader's Digest - a collection which he kept so that we, his children could have something to read on.

Anyway.

Since it's an eBook, I don't have an image that I took of myself.  This is the image cover that I took from the site where I downloaded the book itself.

Here's what's on page 68 of the book:

"He must have imitated somebody else's hand," said the King.  (The jury all brightened up again.) 

"Please, your Majesty," said the Knave, "I didn't write it, and they can't prove that I did: there's no name signed at the end." 

"If you didn't sign it," said the King, "that only makes the matter worse.  You must have meant some mishief, or else you'd have signed your name like an honest man."

Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon

The first sentence:

A screaming comes across the sky.

I bought this book back in 2009, when I was still in Dubai.  I read about the book from a high school classmate who is also into reading classic novels.  Somewhere in his journals, I read that he was already somewhere in the pages of the book and still couldn't understand a lot of things.  I'm afraid this is happening to me now.  I'm already a few pages on, and still, I couldn't seem to dig the author.

Apart from the many characters of the book, there are a lot of (what I call) insertions that distracts me from the plot of the story.  At least that's what it is to me.  I am close to putting it off and not finishing it when I decided to read the comments of the readers of the book from goodreads.com.  One of them gave several advises and one of the advises was to have a little patience, at least until you reach the second part.

I am still a long way from the second part (I am only on page 64 of 902 pages), and I am trying to gather all the patience I have in putting it off and not finishing it at all.  At these point, a lot of characters are being introduced and the only one I can remember was the psychologist (whose name I need to remember).  There's a guy named Mexico who at first I thought was the country.  And there's a girl in a relationship with one of the characters.  Again, I need to remember her name.

Still, one of the advises said that it would be better to read the V book first.  But I don't think I'd go through that.  I am in this reading quest where I am to read one classic book from one author and that's it.  I just need to experience the author, his style, the way he makes the story, and how the world looked like at the time he wrote the story.  That's just about it.  Now, if Thomas Pynchon wrote about the future, then I may have a little problem with that.  Because one of the reasons why I am reading classical novels is to read about the past.

I guess I may have bought the wrong book for my quest.  But I still have the patience to read it right now.

I don't know how further more my patience will take me.  But I do hope that it's all worth it.

What's on page 68:

Mind to mind, tonight up late at the window while he sleeps, lighting another precious cigarette from the coal of the last, filling it with a need to cry because she can see so plainly her limits, knows she can never protect him as much as she must - from what may come out of the sky, from what he couldn't confess that day (creaking snow lanes, arcades of the ice-bearded and bowing trees... the wind shook down crystals of snow:  purple and orange creatures blooming on her long lashes), and from, Mr. Pointsman, and from Pointman's... his... bleakness whenever she meets him.  Scientist-neutrality.  Hands that - she shivers.  There are many chances now for every shapes out of the snow and stillness.  She drops the blackout curtain.

* Please note that on this page 68-quote, I double-checked my typing and there are no errors.  It's just the author's style of writing.

The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson

The first sentence:

Mr. Utterson the lawyer was a stern and serious-looking man who seldom smiled.

This is the first time that I ever tried to read an illustrated classic.  And this will probably be the last.  It's not that it's no good.  It's just that it felt like it's a condensed version although I am not really sure.  The best thing to do to prove this wrong is to probably read it again and this time not the illustrated version.  That is aside from the fact that I felt like it's actually catered for children.

But anyway, the main reason why I tried the illustrated version is because of the price.  The second is that I just wanted to have an idea of the story.  When I bought this book, I was thinking that if I like this one, I'd probably  buy other titles on illustrated. But honestly, I did not enjoy it at all.  I have nothing against the edition.  I guess it's just probably me.

What's on page 68?

"Thank you, Sir." Poole said before quietly leading away the lawyer from the locked door.  He asked Mr. Utterson if the voice they heard belonged to Dr. Jekyll.   

"If it was, it changed a lot," Mr. Utterson said. 

But Poole was certain it was not his master's voice.  "I have been working twenty years for my master," Poole said.

The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger

First sentence:

If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you really want to know the truth.

This post is long overdue.  I was done with this book a few weeks ago already.  I got out of my writing mood and couldn't go back.  I couldn't even update my personal blog, let alone this book blog.

I started this book while I was at the hospital.  I brought the book just in case.  It was already my sixth cycle and I never brought one since the first.  But I guess I got a little more interested and started reading it instead of watching t.v.  I found out months back that this is one of the most controversial books in the U.S. although I've been looking for it since I was in Dubai.  It is my quest to explore classical authors that made me want to find the book.  It's actually the same with my previously-read book, "To Kill a Mockingbird."

What are the first five sentences on page 68?

She's all right.  You'd like her.  The only trouble is, she's a little too affectionate sometimes.  She's very emotional, for a child.  She really is.