Beginning:
Tay didn’t sleep well that night. He tossed in the old iron bed, and the coiled springs kept squeaking even after he lay still again, calling up humid dreams of black night and loud voices rolling him over and over again like debris caught in a flood.
56:
Emo had liked what they showed him: big mortar shells that blew tanks and big trucks to pieces; jagged steel flakes that exploded from the grenades; the way the flame thrower melted a rifle into a shapeless lumps. He understood them right away; he knew what they wanted. He was the best, they told him; some men didn’t like to feel the quiver of the man they were killing; some men got sick when they smelled the blood. But he was the best; he was one of them. The best. United States Army.
I don’t think i’ve read a paragraph with as many semi-colons as this one!
Fridays are for Book Beginnings on Rose City Reader, Friday 56 on Freda’s Voice
Real Life Reading 
Great excerpt! Thanks for sharing, and here’s mine: ”MY LOVELY WIFE”
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Chilling excerpt. I’m not sure this is a book I’d enjoy.
My Friday post features excerpts from Buffalo Gal.
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I understand that this book has a lot of critical acclaim. What do you think? Is it one of those tough books to read, but one you are glad you did? My review and quotes for VOICES
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This is on my Classics Club list. I read it in high school but I remember nothing about it.
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[…] #BookBeginnings #Friday56 -Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko […]
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A wonderful novel, I’ve just read three of her books in close proximity beginning with the wonderful memoir The Turquoise Ledge, then Ceremony and just recently, (reviewed today) The Delicacy and Strength of Lace, a slim collection of letters between Silko and the Pulitzer prize winning poet James Wright. Exquisite.
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