A Writer's Woes

The Grand Opening

Here is it; the first paragraph of my novel. The question is, after reading the first paragraph, would you keep reading? Have I whet your appetite enough?

Susanna Manchester closed her hand around the gold pocket watch that had been in her family for generations. She ran her thumb over the intricate engraving, feeling the shallow, winding fissures weave into a design as familiar to her as her own skin. She didn't need to see the elaborate etching to know what it was: the single, newly budded rose, two swords crossed over its thorned stem, the whole wreathed by ivy. The cool, crisp edges transported her to another place, another time. She could still see the dust motes dancing in the sunbeams flitting through her father's study. She could see her father, a large, imposing man with a great fondness for his only daughter, sitting behind his huge mahogany desk, pouring over Whispering Willows's ledgers. She was perched on his lap, intently studying the intricacies of the very same timepiece, the simple but compelling artistry on the outside, the enchanting mechanism that marked time on the inside. It held mechanical mysteries her young mind wasn't yet privy to, and secrets that her father told her would come to her with age. Whatever those secrets might have been, they had long since gone to the grave with him. Now, this precious pocket watch held nothing but the bleak procession of time marching forward towards an uncertain future. It was but a small comfort when everything else that was safe and familiar in her life had vanished.

posted by chrmisha @ 11:23 AM