Saturday, February 23, 2008

Goosed by the Grasshopper


Our favorite fiction writer, Kathleen Maher (aka grasshopper), has memed me (duck, duck, duck, goose) for “go to a page in the nearest book.” The rules are this:

• look up page 123 in the nearest book
• look for the fifth sentence
• then post the three sentences that follow that fifth sentence on page 123.

“Looming over the town, La Rocca appears a suitable home for the giants that are said to have been the first inhabitants of Sicily. It was here that the Arabs built their citadel until the Norman conquest in 1063 brought the people down from the mountain to the port below. This dramatic backdrop combined with the narrow Moorish streets has made Cefalu a popular film set, most notably for Cinema Paradiso.”

From Lonely Planet: Sicily

One great winter indoor activity is planning a trip to a sunny clime. And that’s what finds the travel guide to Sicily within reach.

So what that I was trapped in the subway for 45 minutes this morning, as the little bit of city snow threw the system into existential madness: the local train went express after 72 Street, bypassing my stop at 50th street. I calmly got out at 42 Street and crossed over to the uptown local, which went express back to 72 Street. Who can live like this?

But I will not be discouraged. My head is in the Sicilian clouds, near the great Greek ruins at Selinunte. Where my body will later be.

Congratulations, Kathleen, in being named a semi-finalist in the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award contest! Go pop over to Kathleen’s Diary of a Heretic and follow the Amazon link to read her piece and comment. Very exciting.

3 comments:

Unknown said...

Thanks, M.A. I never had an inkling that giants might have first inhabited Sicily.
Someday, I'm going to travel the world like you. I'll need more determination and focus than I can muster right now, and of course a little luck. But anything's possible. Or so I tell myself.

Peteski said...

That was a good read.


ps. (sentence six - ps. 123 Careless Love: The Unmaking of Elvis Presley)

To the Colonel the movies were just one more plum in the pudding, a promotional tool which could sell the music and which the music in turn could sell.

Guralnick writes in really long sentences. I'm not going to take up any more space here.

Mapeel said...

Kathleen, no one is more surprised than I at the travel I have done.

Peteski, I have not read Guralnick's great biographies. Maybe this summer.