1547. Book worm

(The closing sentence for this story was suggested by Chris Nelson of chrisnelson61. If you want to join in the fun of suggesting a future closing sentence for these stories, click here for a peek as to what’s what. Try not to read the closing sentence until you’ve read the story!)

Raymond had three children, two boys and a girl. He was immensely proud of his two sons. They had done so well at school, especially on the sports field. Now that they were old enough to leave school they were as keen as mustard to get jobs. In fact, Jared had already been accepted for a job on the railways.

The daughter, Annette, was another kettle of fish altogether. She was a book worm. “Get your head out of those books and start doing something useful. Reading books won’t earn you money.” It was Raymond’s favourite axe to grind.

“That lazy girl is not going to go far living in fantasyland in her books. This morning I had to physically force her to slam the book shut and start peeling the potatoes for tonight’s dinner. We’ve got a house to run.”

And indeed, Annette had been engrossed in the book. She had only a few pages to go. Ellen, the narrator, had moved to Wuthering Heights soon after Lockwood had left to replace the housekeeper who had departed. In March, Hareton had had an accident and been confined to the farmhouse. During this time, a friendship had developed between Cathy and Hareton. This continues into April when Heathcliff begins to act very strangely, seeing visions of Catherine. After not eating for four days, he is…

Annette left her novel to peel the potatoes. Why was her father so demanding; almost to the point of cruelity? Why couldn’t he let her finish when she was almost at the end?

After half an hour of dinner preparation, Annette returned to her novel. Only then did she notice that the last page was missing.

1301. Don’t judge a book by its cover

Today’s story marks a departure in all directions at once. It is a book review; which is something never attempted by this blogger before. Secondly, the reviewer has still to read the book – but that’s not unusual. And finally, the book hasn’t been written yet.

It doesn’t have a title as such but I thoroughly recommend it. Here is a good reason not to judge a book by its cover. This epic trilogy is basically a whodunit. It is full of interesting suspects.

Philomena Gettysburg gets herself murdered. A whole string of people possibly done it. There’s the butler, Ned, who has cerebral palsy, but that wouldn’t stop him from shaking a fist at Philomena. There’s Myrtle the village transsexual, who has every reason to dislike the philandering Philomena. There’s Mervyn, the loner, who threatened not only to burn down the local church, but declared his abhorrence of everyone, including Philomena, who attended. Dyslexic Murray doesn’t know his right hand from his left, but Philomena possibly could’ve been stabbed by a knife in either. The list goes on.

If you don’t want a spoiler, stop reading. Who done it then? Here lies the author’s originality. After three volumes of spell-binding insinuations, the murderer is revealed. It was no one in the book. Isn’t that exciting? Who would have thought it? It was almost impossible to guess.

This then is an ideal book to take to the beach if you don’t want sand in your swimming trunks.

1266. My greatest achievement (thus far)

It is possibly my greatest achievement; certainly the thing I have done in life that makes me most proud. And yet, it was such a simple thing; a nothing really. It does one good to do something decent once in a while.

It was just a holiday job, working in the library at a university in Dublin where I was studying for a degree in mechanical engineering. My main task was to shelve the returned books. I suspect they hired me because I’d be more than useful fixing the squeaky wheels on the book trolleys! I was desperate to get the job because of this good catholic girl who worked in the library part-time.

Anyway, we were a bit behind in the re-shelving so we stayed longer after closing time, and me and Cassandra were just having our third coffee when this thief appeared. Students steal books like they’re going out of fashion. He had a stolen book under his arm, and I was lucky enough to be able to wrench the book from him and smash him over the head with it. The book was wrecked (it fell into a hundred pieces) but I stopped the thief and saved the day. Anyway, what’s one book in a library of tens of thousands? I was amazed how the book fell apart; disintegrated. Publishing standards these days have certainly slipped. The Book of Kells or something.