There is a certain joy in starting a new book. Or even starting an old favourite again.
Today's new book, now my middle daughter has read it, is Dan Brown's The Lost Symbol. The first line, of the intro, is: "The secret is how to die."
Quite different to Jane Austen's: "It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife." (Pride and Prejudice).
Or, from my childhood: "Alice was beginning to get very tired of sitting by her sister on the bank, and of having nothing to do: once or twice she had peeped into the book her sister was reading, but it had no pictures or conversations in it, 'and what is the use of a book,' thought Alice 'without pictures or conversation?' " Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.
And who could forget: "Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again." Daphne du Maurier, (Rebecca) .
And that Welsh wizard of words: "To begin at the beginning: It is spring, moonless night in the small town, starless and bible-black." Dylan Thomas, (Under Milk Wood).
I could never contemplate a world without books - surely that would be Hell?
