1. Take five books off your bookshelf.
2. Book #1 — first sentence
3. Book #2 — last sentence on page fifty
4. Book #3 — second sentence on page one hundred
5. Book #4 — next to the last sentence on page one hundred fifty
6. Book #5 — final sentence of the book
7. Make the five sentences into a paragraph:
The clock on the south-western tower of St Paul’s cathedral appeared to have stopped. “I don’t want medicine. I want a cow.” Now it was packed out every mealtime and had just been named the Good Food Guide’s restaurant of the year for Dorset, but they still did burgers and they still did chips with everything, and I thought that was just wonderful. “What, my old friend Stephen? he cried. “Are there any bears abroad to-night?” And before they went to bed, they put the crumbs out on the windowsill, for the birds.
Life on Air by David Attenborough
Independent People by Halldór Laxness
Notes from a Small Island by Bill Bryson
I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith
Lyra’s Oxford by Philip Pullman
