Where are my car keys? Oh, let me show them to you… in a handful of dust = English Teacher:) I should have been a pair of ragged claws… There are all sorts of fun references to literature and mythology throughout Juniper Hill, but you know what the real test is? If a character offers to show another character anything in a handful of dust, the writer is an English teacher. But I knew this had to be true just from reading the book before I read his bio. Kozlowsky was an English teacher before he became a writer. She squeezed one tangle and it leaked water into her hand.īy the way, as we’ll learn on Thursday, M.P.

His hair felt like thick strands of yarn or, Juniper preferred, waterlogged caterpillars.

Still, until then, his fun descriptions carry us through all on their own: Kozlowsky knows this and he introduces his real hook before the reader wonders off and un-pauses his Xbox. Kozlowsky has my attention for a chapter or two-but he’s on thin ice. Kitty is a funny name for a dog and Juniper Berry is a funny name for a girl. Kozlowsky’s style is perfect for a book like this and as I read the first chapter I was put at ease knowing the entire story would be told in his sardonic voice that plays with the reader. This first sentence is punchy, it’s fun, and it genuinely makes me want to read the book that follows. THE HOUSE WAS A MANSION, the lake was a pool, Kitty was a dog, and Juniper Berry was an eleven-year-old girl. Probably it stems from my own insecurities about my writing style that I don’t imagine anyone can be hooked unless I tell the reader today is the day the protagonist's life will be forever changed.īut M.P. It’s harder for me to believe in a reader being hooked by an author’s style. It’s easy for me to see a reader being hooked when the story opens with a character discovering his mother is really a man or the character has just swallowed poison and has the length of the story to find the antidote. These writing books claim a reader can be hooked immediately by a situation or a question or an author’s writing style. To be fair, I try not to repeat myself too often, so a book may have a great opening and I may not mention it if I spent the whole of the previous week’s review discussing openings. I accept this and it’s the reason why of all the things I notice in each week’s book, I’m so often reporting here whether or not it has a great opening and a great hook to make sure the reader leaves the library with the book under their arm. Can I confess something? I read books upon books and articles about how to write a great opening for a book, and every last one of them claims you need a hook.

Juniper berry by mp kozlowsky