Book Beginnings and Friday 56 – The Buried Giant (Jan 8)

The book I have chosen for this week Friday meme combo is The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro. It’s one of the books I received at Christmas and I’m just starting to read it. The following is from the slipcover:

The Romans have long since departed, and Britain is steadily declining into ruin. But at least the wars that once ravaged the country have ceased.

The Buried Giant begins as a couple, Axl and Beatrice, set off across a troubled land of mist and rain in the hope of finding a son they have not seen for years. They expect to face many hazards—some strange and other-worldly—but they cannot yet foresee how their journey will reveal to them dark and forgotten corners of their love for one another.

Sometimes savage, often intensely moving, Kazuo Ishiguro’s first novel in a decade is about lost memories, love, revenge and war.

Now for this week’s excerpts:

Book Beginnings is hosted by Gilion at Rose City Reader, who invites anyone to join in, saying: ‘Please join me every Friday to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading, along with your initial thoughts about the sentence, impressions of the book, or anything else the opener inspires.  Please remember to include the title of the book and the author. Leave a link to your post.  If you don’t have a blog, but want to participate, please leave a comment with your Book Beginning.’

The beginning of The Buried Giant:

You would have searched a long time for the sort of winding lane or tranquil meadow for which England later became celebrated. There were instead miles of desolate, uncultivated land; here and there rough-hewn paths over craggy hills or bleak moorland. Most of the roads left by the Romans would by then have become broken or overgrown, often faded into wilderness.

This seems like a good set-up for what is to follow, although I don’t know that much about this book, other than it is Ishiguro’s first novel in about ten years, which is why I was keen to read it and put it on my Christmas wishlist.

The Friday 56 is a book meme hosted by Freda’s Voice and the rules are as follows:

*Grab a book, any book.
*Turn to page 56.
*Find any sentence, (or few, just don’t spoil it) that grabs you.
*Post it.
*Add your (url) post below in Linky. Add the post url, not your blog url.

It’s that simple.

From page 56 of The Buried Giant:

‘Let me speak with her alone, Axl. Help me take off this bundle and wait out here for me.’

‘Can’t I be with you, princess, even if I hardly understand this Saxon tongue?’

‘These are women’s matters, husband. Let me talk with her alone, and she’s saying she’ll examine my old body carefully.’

‘I’m sorry, princess, I wasn’t thinking clearly. Let me take your bundle from you and I’ll be waiting here as long as you wish.’

I’m not that sure what is happening here, but I like that the book seems to have strong characters. I’ll hopefully get into the book more this weekend, although I might not have the time for reading too much. We’re planning to finally see the new Star Wars movie tomorrow. Also, the final round of renovations starts on Monday and we have to clear out a couple of rooms for this, so we have a fair bit of furniture and stuff to move around. This work should only take about a couple of weeks to complete and then we can finally unpack our boxes.