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

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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.