Friday, August 11, 2023

First Line Friday #99-Dear Enemy

Happy Friday, my bookish friends! I hope you all have a great Friday and weekend! First Line Friday is hosted by Carrie at Reading is My SuperPower!!  I am also linking up with Gilion on Rose City Reader for Book Beginnings. This is where you share the beginning of the book that you are reading. This week am reading Dear Enemy by Jean Webster.

Your letter is here. 

Book Beginnings:

December
Stone Gate, Worcester, Massachusetts,
December 27.
Dear Judy:

Your letter is here. I have read it twice, and with amazement. Do I understand that Jervis has given you, for a Christmas present, the making over of the John Grier Home into a model institution, and that you have chosen me to disburse the money? Me-I, Sallie McBride, the head of an orphan asylum! My poor people, ave  you lost your senses, or have you become addicted to the use of opium, and is this the raving of two fevered imaginations? I am exactly as well fitted to take care of one hundred children as to become the curator of a zoo.

 Synopsis (Goodreads):

Dear Enemy is the sequel to Jean Webster's novel Daddy-Long-Legs. First published in 1915, it was among the top ten best sellers in the US in 1916. The story is presented in a series of letters written by Sallie McBride, Judy Abbott's classmate and best friend in Daddy-Long-Legs. Among the recipients of the letters are Judy; Jervis Pendleton, Judy's husband and the president of the orphanage where Sallie is filling in until a new superintendent can be installed; Gordon Hallock, a wealthy Congressman and Sallie's later fiancé; and the orphanage's doctor, embittered Scotsman Robin 'Sandy' MacRae (to whom Sallie addresses her letters: "Dear Enemy"). Webster employs the epistolary structure to good effect; Sallie's choices of what to recount to each of her correspondents reveal a lot about her relationships with them.

Your turn! Grab the current book you are reading and post the first line (or your link) in the comments! Then, click on the icons below and join the fun there too!

 

14 comments:

  1. So, this book was actually written over 100 years ago, or that is the schtick?

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    1. Anne, no, it was written in 1915, it's the sequel to Daddy-Long-Legs, which I loved.

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  2. Great beginning. Grabs your interest right away.

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  3. "I am exactly as well fitted to take care of one hundred children as to become the curator of a zoo." Funny! This is a new-to-me classic.

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    1. Deb, I highly recommend reading Daddy-Long-Legs and then this one! I love the humor in them!

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  4. What a great beginning! Thanks for sharing! Hope you have a wonderful weekend! :)

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