Sometimes I want an opening to slap me in the face; other times I’d rather it come on like a creepy hand across my shoulder. For a year, I thought that five-page opening was perfect. Now it wastes no time in opening the book with the right feeling –a mix of regret and menace and mystery. Lightning Rods is one of the most marvellous books about subterranean sexual forces in the modern era. Strangers were stared out of countenance by staring white houses, staring white walls, staring white streets, staring tracts of arid road, staring hills from which verdure was burnt away.

Source: The Guardian July 19, 2017 09:00 UTC