I don't like to tag bloggers to do memes, but I decided I wanted to do this one after being inspired by Dee of Red Dirt Ramblings and Elizabeth of Gardening While Intoxicated.
Here are the Rules: Grab the closest book at hand (no fair going out of your way to get something intellectual, just what’s within arm’s reach of your keyboard). Turn to page 56, go to the fifth sentence and post the results - include the sentences that follow to provide some sort of context. (The tagging of five other bloggers is the part I'm omitting. Call me a rebel.) The closest book to hand is the one I'm currently reading, Christopher Fowler's "Ten Second Staircase," a murder mystery. Here's from a different sort of police procedural:
'You told me the exhaust had fallen off.'
'It has.' Bryant looked at him blankly. 'What of it?'
'You can't drive it like that. It must sound like a Lancaster Bomber.'
'That's right, I have to turn my hearing aid off while I'm driving, but at least people know I'm coming. I made a vicar jump into a hedge this morning. I was in Vauxhall visiting my psychochiropodist,' he explained. 'She reads feet. Apparently I'm about to have an unexpected brush with death. Either that or I've got a bunion.'
The rules ended up yielding an accurate sample of the wackiness that pervades this series, which I find so appealing. (I have a finely tuned sense of the absurd.) They're also good mysteries. I've finished two others of these and I have yet to guess the villain. I love books, I love good mysteries, and I love interesting characters. Feel free to join in or not. In any event, read a book!