#First100Words
LightNews LightNews
upstart-english.bsky.social
When faced with the unfamiliar, we’re programmed to compare it to what we DO know.

Issue Fifteen features the first truly 'cold' reading of the series, with the senses of embarrassment, vulnerability, but also of excitement which come with that!

buff.ly/Gzfomxh

#First100Words #WorldLiterature
November 6, 2026 at 7:11 PM
upstart-english.bsky.social
‘Is this gothic, or just really, really grim?’

Issue Fourteen of First 100 Words takes a closer look at the unsettling beginning of Toni Morrison’s 1987 classic, ‘Beloved’.

buff.ly/d8IqYMT

#ToniMorrison #First100Words #Literature #ALevelEnglishLit #EnglishTutor
October 30, 2026 at 7:11 PM
upstart-english.bsky.social
one is it?

Browse the series here:

buff.ly/r439ffO


#CloseReading #First100Words #Literature #ALevelEnglishLit #EnglishTutor
100 Words – A-Level English Lit
What can the first 100 words of a novel tell us? Quite a lot, if we read them slowly and carefully. Each post takes exactly 100 words from the opening of a literary text and looks closely at wh…
buff.ly
October 29, 2026 at 7:11 PM
upstart-english.bsky.social
Slowing down, noticing smell, colour, movement, temperature, perhaps touch? It’s as mindful a first sentence as you could ever wish for.

But …

Why do I feel like Oscar Wilde’s classic is trying to hypnotise me?

buff.ly/HtBEr5c

#Literature #CloseReading #First100Words #ALevelEnglishLiterature
October 23, 2026 at 6:11 PM
upstart-english.bsky.social
resisting, and wondering why.

Issue Thirteen of First 100 Words lands tomorrow evening.
But which classic am I looking at?



buff.ly/Z2vmYk9

#Literature #CloseReading #First100Words #ALevelEnglishLiterature #EnglishTuition
100 Words – A-Level English Lit
What can the first 100 words of a novel tell us? Quite a lot, if we read them slowly and carefully. Each post takes exactly 100 words from the opening of a literary text and looks closely at wh…
buff.ly
October 22, 2026 at 1:37 PM
upstart-english.bsky.social
Issue Twelve of First 100 Words - a close reading of the opening of Ian McEwan’s ‘Atonement’.

buff.ly/HPihwrz

She’s precocious, energetic, intelligent, driven even. But I think I could only take Briony in pretty small doses.

#IanMcEwan #First100Words #EnglishLiterature #ALevelEnglishLiterature
October 16, 2026 at 6:11 PM
upstart-english.bsky.social
There are moments in books where I have to stop for a moment, to take in what I’ve just read. It happened here, in under 50 words.

buff.ly/V5L77L7

#First100Words #VirginiaWoolf #ModernistLiterature #ALevelEnglishLit #EnglishTutor
October 9, 2026 at 6:11 PM
upstart-english.bsky.social
and tune in tomorrow evening to see if you're right — and then, to see gif you agree with what I've found in those first 100 words.

#First100Words #EnglishLiterature #CloseReading #ALevelEnglishLIterature #EnglishTutor
September 24, 2026 at 3:43 PM
upstart-english.bsky.social
“Sometimes the more people speak, the less they actually say. What aren’t we being told here, and why not?”

Issue Eight of First 100 Words tackles a book that made me cry at the end. How well was I able to ‘cold read’ it? You’re the judge.

buff.ly/XItJo8m
#First100Words #ALevelEnglishLit
September 11, 2026 at 6:12 PM
upstart-english.bsky.social
tease the narrator?



#First100Words #ALevelEnglishLit #Literature #CloseReading #EnglishTutor
September 10, 2026 at 11:00 AM
upstart-english.bsky.social
I hear sirens, in both senses of the word …
I think he’s expecting a girl.
What he’s going to meet?
A WOMAN.

Issue Seven of First 100 Words? It’s highly uncomfortable territory all round: Angela Carter’s ‘The Bloody Chamber’.


buff.ly/zVDjk6v

#First100Words #ALevelEnglishLiterature
September 4, 2026 at 6:12 PM
upstart-english.bsky.social
Number Six in the First 100 Words series ...

"It's not screaming 'meet the heroine' at me.
My main question?
How am I supposed to feel about this person?"

buff.ly/3QyWreS

#First100Words #CloseReading #ALevelEnglishLit #EnglishLiterature #JaneEyre
August 28, 2026 at 5:11 PM
upstart-english.bsky.social
First 100 Words: Close Reading every Friday.

buff.ly/CbfAW0g

#First100Words #CloseReading #ALevelEnglishLit #EnglishLiterature #LiteraryAnalysis
August 27, 2026 at 5:31 PM
upstart-english.bsky.social
I feel like I’ve gone to the doctor to hear my test results, and they're sitting opposite me with an expression you only usually see undertakers wearing.

a-levelenglishlit.uk/2026/08/21/f...

#First100Words #CloseReading #ALevelEnglishLit #HandmaidsTale #MargaretAtwood
August 21, 2026 at 6:11 PM
upstart-english.bsky.social
‘This stinks of grief, and of being haunted by something we thought would last forever. But what? What has died?’

I got that feeling within the first 100 words of a novel.

Find out which one tomorrow evening.
First 100 Words: Close Reading every Friday.
buff.ly/CbfAW0g

#First100Words
August 20, 2026 at 1:59 PM
upstart-english.bsky.social
He's playing his cards remarkably close to his chest.

Can I be honest? I'm slightly irritated by it.

buff.ly/8mgV6b1

#First100Words #TheGreatGatsby #FScottFitzgerald #CloseReading #EnglishLiterature #ALevelEnglishLit #OpeningAnalysis #EnglishTutor #EnglishTuition
August 7, 2026 at 6:12 PM
upstart-english.bsky.social
It’s England, but not as we know it. And I don't much like what they’ve done with the place.

Issue Two of First 100 Words looks at the opening of George Orwell’s ‘Nineteen Eighty-Four’.

buff.ly/TGyMGyn

#First100Words #NineteenEightyFour #Orwell #CloseReading #EnglishLiterature #ALevelEnglishLit
July 31, 2026 at 6:11 PM
upstart-english.bsky.social
The temperature’s dropped, storm clouds have suddenly covered the sun, and .. are those wolves I can hear in the background? We’ve entered classic Gothic territory, and this is going to be intense. How does du Maurier manage this in just 100 words?

buff.ly/7yUkgpA

#First100Words #Rebecca
July 24, 2026 at 6:26 PM
tenishabernal.bsky.social
Upcoming Book Signing at the B&N Brentwood
#author #authorevent #barnesandnoble #bn #littleartists #first100words #kidlit #kidlitauthor #kidlitartist #kidlitart #bayarea
February 25, 2025 at 6:22 AM