The New Orleans Times-Picayune writes the first sentence of a great Southern novel.

[substitute]

In the middle of a recap of the day's chaos in New Orleans, this gem:

As the sun set over a still-churning Lake Pontchartrain, the smoldering ruins of the Southern Yacht Club were still burning, and smoke streamed out over the lake. Nobody knew the cause of the fire because nobody could get anywhere near it to find out what happened.

Comments

[hotelsamurai.livejournal.com]

When I was about eight years old, my father's yacht club burned down under murky circumstances. It was a defining event of my young life.

Wow, yeah.

[substitute.livejournal.com]

Especially the murky circumstances.

[sachmet.livejournal.com]

As Belle stood on the shore, she thought about Jackson and how - or even if - he had survived the storm. Jackson's broad, rippling muscles caused her to think about him quite often, and that night on the Gulf coast still gave her goosebumps...

Oh, wait, you aren't talking about the Harlequin kind.

[sachmet.livejournal.com]

Wow, I just found the recap, and it goes from that gem to this:

"We were good until the canal busted," Sontag said. "First there was water on the street, then the sidewalk, then water in the house."

[vertamae.livejournal.com]

That is quite nice.

I've been seeing the video of that building on fire for a couple days now, but this is the first time I've known exactly what it is. No one has seemed to ask.