Decline and Fall by Evelyn Waugh -- BOOK BEGINNINGS

 

BOOK BEGINNINGS ON FRIDAYS

What are you reading this week? Please share the opening sentence (or so) with us here on Book Beginnings on Fridays. You can also share from a book that caught your fancy or you want to highlight, even if you are not reading it at the moment. 

MY BOOK BEGINNING

"Sent down for indecent behavior, eh?" said Paul Pennyfeather's guardian.

-- From Decline and Fall by Evelyn Waugh. This is Waugh's first novel, published in 1928, well before Brideshead Revisited. It is a satire of boarding school life in Britain between the wars. I just started it and it is very funny, more farce than satire so far, almost slapstick. 

YOUR BOOK BEGINNINGS

Please add the link to your Book Beginnings post in the Linky box below. If you share on social media, please use the #bookbeginnings hashtag. 

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THE FRIDAY 56

Another weekly teaser event is The Friday 56, hosted by Freda at Freda's Voice where you can find details and add a link to your post. The idea is to share a two-sentence teaser from page 56 of the book you are featuring. You can also find a teaser from 56% of the way through your ebook or audiobook.

MY FRIDAY 56

From Decline and Fall:

"Oh, sir," came a chorus of reproach, "you've hurt his feelings. He's very sensitive; it's his Welsh blood, you know: it makes people very emotional." 

FROM THE PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION

Sent down from Oxford after a wild, drunken party, Paul Pennyfeather is oddly surprised to find himself qualifying for the position of schoolmaster at a boys' private school in Wales. His colleagues are an assortment of misfits, rascals and fools, including Prendy (plagued by doubts) and Captain Grimes, who is always in the soup (or just plain drunk). Then Sports Day arrives, and with it the delectable Margot Beste-Chetwynde, floating on a scented breeze. As the farce unfolds in Evelyn Waugh's dazzling debut as a novelist, the young run riot and no one is safe, least of all Paul.