Writer's Block: Once upon a time…

[astralis]

[Error: unknown template qotd]

Harriet Vane sat at her writing-table and stared out into Mecklenburg Square.

Arry opened the door to call the cats.

The year Janet started at Blackstock College, the Office of Residential Life had spent the summer removing from all the dormitories the old wooden bookcases that, once filled with books, fell over unless wedged.

Roger, aged seven and no longer the youngest of the family, ran in wide zigzags, to and fro, across the steep field that sloped up from the lake to Holly Howe, the farm where they were staying for part of the summer holidays.


.... I have multiple favourite books. And I have memorised their first lines. (I can do the whole first paragraph of Tam Lin, because I'm a geek like that.)

Comments

[lilac-spring.livejournal.com]

What is "Tam Lin" about? (I should google this, but I thought it'd be handy to ask you first. :) )

[http://users.livejournal.com/_astralis/]

It's a fantasy novel based on an old Scottish ballad (you don't have to be familiar with the ballad to read the book. I wasn't, and it's printed in the back anyway). It's set in the 70s and focuses on a girl called Janet who goes to a small liberal arts college as an English major and is friends with a bunch of people, some of them fairly strange and mysterious, who all quote Shakespeare and Classical writers at the drop of a hat.

It bores some people to tears, and I was an English minor who never encountered anyone who talks like Janet and her friends. The fantasy bit sort of increases over the book. I love it, though, especially picking out quotes from other books (Gaudy Night, which is one of the other first lines I included, Alice in Wonderland, Hamlet...).

It took me a while to get my hands on a copy here, but it's recently been reissued so it may be easier to find second hand if you're interested. The author is Pamela Dean.