This riveting little excerpt from Chapter One of Ian McEwan's Atonement really stole my attention. It is talking about thirteen-year-old Briony, and her hobby, turned obsession, for writing.
Her efforts received encouragement. In fact, they were welcome as the Tallises began to understand that the baby of the family possessed a strange mind and a facility with words. The long afternoons she spent browsing though dictionary and thesaurus made for constructions that were inept, but hauntingly so: the coins a villain concealed in his pocket were 'esoteric', a hoodlum caught stealing a car wept in 'shameless auto-exculpation', the heroine on her thoroughbred stallion made a 'cursory' journey through the night, the king's furrowed brow was the 'hieroglyph' of his displeasure.
Ian McEwan. 2001. Atonement. p6.
There is definitely something hauntingly quirky and appropriate about this, like an invitation to search for deeper meaning in ordinary occurrences. It definitely gave me a little thrill to read.
So far, I am adoring this book. I'm up to page 156, and still gripped by the intrigue that tangled me up in the first sentences. I'm hoping that you might start to feel motivated to pick it up too!
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| Saoirse Ronan as Briony Tallis |
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