Book Beginnings #13, The Friday 56 #14 & Book Blogger Hop #2: Tigana

Book Beginnings is hosted by Rose City Reader. The weekly post goes up every Thursday and bloggers can add their links all week.

My book this week is the fantasy novel Tigana by Guy Gavriel Kay. This is not my first book by him; I tried The Lions of Al-Rassan and didn’t like it, but so far I like this one much better.

There are some quotes at the beginning: 

All that you held most dear you will put by 

and leave behind you; and this is the arrow 

the longbow of your exile first lets fly. 

You will come to know how bitter as salt and stone 

is the bread of others, how hard the way that goes 

up and down stairs that never are your own. 

Dante, The Paradiso 

What can a flame remember? If it remembers a little less than is necessary, it goes out; if it remembers a little more than is necessary, it goes out. If only it could teach us, while it burns, to remember correctly. 

George Seferis, “Stratis the Sailor Describes a Man”

The prologue: 

Both moons were high, dimming the light of all but the brightest stars. The campfires burned on either side of the river, stretching away into the night. 

The first chapter: 

In the autumn season of the wine, word went forth from among the cypresses and olives and the laden vines of his country that Sandre, Duke of Astibar, once ruled of that city and its province, had drawn the last bitter breath of his exile and age and died. 

I am halfway through and not sure that the prologue was really necessary. I like the first chapter, though.

The Friday 56 is hosted by Freda’s Voice For the Friday 56, here is page 56: Autumn was very definitely upon them, with the Ember Days approaching fast. It would not be long, a matter of days, before the first frost touched those last few precious grapes that had been left on chosen vines to become — if all fell rightly — the icy blue clear wine that was the pride of Astibar. hosted by Billy @ Coffee Addicted Writer Q: What’s the oldest work (by publication date) you’ve read? A: According to GoodReads, it is The Iliad, -890 B.C.E.