Try this? When you finish a book

[hermetic]

go back and reread the first paragraph. Look for the ways in which it predicted the rest of the text or, in the most skillful cases, taught us to read it. This is the advice from an article called A Close Reading of the Best Opening Paragraph of All Time.

That paragraph is from Shirley Jackson’s We Have Always Lived in the Castle.

My name is Mary Katherine Blackwood. I am eighteen years old, and I live with my sister Constance. I have often thought that with any luck at all I could have been born a werewolf, because the two middle fingers on both my hands are the same length, but I have had to be content with what I had. I dislike washing myself, and dogs, and noise. I like my sister Constance, and Richard Plantagenet, and Amanita phalloides, the death-cup mushroom. Everyone else in my family is dead.

I’m not sure I agree it’s the best paragraph ever but I did read that book over 50 years ago and still remember that I thought it was great (the book).

Anyway, I found this to be an interesting article about reading so I wanted to share it with you.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/a-close-reading-of-the-best-opening-paragraph-of-all-time?utm_source=pocket-newtab