23 April 2025

Rate!

These days we are customarily invited to rate a plethora of things from clothes we have bought to restaurants we have visited and from our electricity suppliers to our holidays. Well, I thought it was about time we brought this rating trend into blogging. I invite you to rate the following opening to a novel I have written specially for this blogpost.

⦿

Howard Boreham opened his curtains. They were the beige ones he had purchased at "Dunelm" ten years earlier. He seemed to recall they were reduced by 50% and that he had paid for them with his Halifax bankcard. He could still remember his old card number: 4452 9431 6000 5139. That was before he moved his current account to Santander.

Outside it was pretty gloomy. The sky above was grey. His bedroom window overlooked an abandoned factory car park where a pair of scavenging crows were pecking at some litter. On the main road, the Number 81 bus trundled by on its way to the sprawling suburb of Dore.

Howard was wearing his striped pyjamas - the ones he had inherited from his late father. He scratched his bottom and headed for the bathroom where he brushed his teeth with "Signal" toothpaste and combed his hair with the black comb. He preferred it to the red one. As it was Saturday, he did not fancy having a shower.

Back in the bedroom, he got dressed. He picked his favourite grey polo shirt, his black "Lee" jeans, black socks and his "Umbro" trainers. Then he looked in the wardrobe mirror and smiled approvingly at himself before heading downstairs for his breakfast. 

As usual, he ate a bowl of "Bran Flakes" and drank a cup of weak tea before heading out to the street. It was bound to be another action-packed day in the life of Howard Boreham.

⦿

So yes. Now it's time to rate this story opening using the Yorkshire Pudding scale of boredom. Where would you place it with "0" meaning not boring at all and in fact  I would very much like to read on to "10" meaning exceptionally boring and I was pretty much bored to tears.

39 comments:

  1. I'll just wait for the movie to come out.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You will be waiting until Hell freezes over.

      Delete
  2. Not as boring as some, but not that interesting either
    5/10

    ReplyDelete
  3. Replies
    1. No need to be sorry Bruce. I would have given the same score.

      Delete
  4. I expect Howard to be a super spy in disguise. His very ordinary-looking life can only mask an action-packed life of one adventure after the other. The seemingly boring beginning only serves to make the reader think nothing is going to happen, and then WHAM-BANG-BOOM all hell will break lose.
    Therefore, my rating is a solid 5 until I know what's going to happen next.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. In Chapter Two, Howard is on holiday in Ludwigsburg, Germany with nowhere to sleep for the night until he meets a tall bespectacled businesswoman hurrying home from the railway station. What then follows is WHAM-BANG-BOOM!

      Delete
  5. I am withholding judgement so far despite your so far successful conspicuous tedium.

    Still waters could still run deep.

    Doing the best I can, the scratched bottom (I was a bit shocked by this detail) might mean haemorrhoids requiring a colonoscopy leading to Symphony-Fantastique-worthy drug-induced fantasies.

    Though if by "bottom" you less-shockingly meant "buttock" the seed of that particular narrative possibility has yet to be planted.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You are right to reserve your judgement Marcie. Howard might be you in disguise.

      Delete
  6. I give it a 5. Rather too much detail.....I don't care what colour his comb is, or what toothpaste he used.....but I would read on to find out if his life gets any more interesting.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. In Chapter Two, Howard's old Fiat Panda car breaks down in Harpenden where he sees a mature but elegant woman walking a yapping little dog. This is the very beginning of their love affair.

      Delete
    2. You are right about the yappy little dog, not so sure about the elegant bit though!. Made me laugh!

      Delete
  7. Well, I have just compared his life to mine and would rate this opening as not boring at all.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Oh, I forgot to mention that Howard is the secretary of the local crown green bowling club.

      Delete
  8. Oops, I fell asleep before I finished reading it and can't be bothered to find out where I left off! However I might try again just before I turn off the light tonight - it might just bore me to a good night's sleep! I just hope that Meike isn't right and I'm awake half the night following Howard's thrilling adventures.....

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. In Chapter Three, Howard travels to Spain where he meets an attractive English "senora" in a cafe. She invites him back to her house to look at her etchings. Coincidentally, she is called Carol.

      Delete
  9. As this is clearly a thinly veiled memoir of blogger YP, I give it a 2.5. Memoirs are not novels!! tsk tsk

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Your 2.5 score is typically generous! Thank you Jenny.

      Delete
    2. Crud - I misread the scale - I meant to give a low score! And now you've preemptively made me feel bad for doing so - lol

      Delete
  10. I would be in the red, though I often mark with a five star because I hate being mean. But I wouldn't read the story any further because of the advertising. Also you didn't brand the tea - Yorkshire or English Breakfast?

    ReplyDelete
  11. For a first chapter the sleepy-looking emoji No 4 on your scale looks about right. It's not an introduction that would tempt me buy or download the book, but if (for some very obsucre reason) I already had it, I might read just another page or two to check if there might be a turn of events waiting around the corner.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. In Chapter Four, Howard visits Sweden to catch up with a woman with whom he has been a penfriend for fifty years. They fall in love and live happily ever after.

      Delete
    2. I suppose she did not read the first three chapters, then!!! (lol)

      Delete
  12. Why would anyone drink tea?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I drink a pint of tea every morning because it is delicious, refreshing and traditional. Screw coffee!

      Delete
  13. I have asked my solicitors to commence legal proceedings. You will be hearing from them shortly.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Everybody knows that "Tasker Dunham" is just a pseudonym Howard!

      Delete
  14. If, when he opens his front door, he finds a dead body whose blood has leaked out of multiple unexplained wounds, you might be able to pick it up a bit.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Good God Mary! You have an imagination like Frida Kahlo!

      Delete
    2. THAT would certainly fit my idea of WHAM-BANG-BOOM!

      Delete
  15. You certainly give us a lot of details.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I could give you more if you think that is necessary Ellen. He visited Illinois in 1978 and had a steamy summer affair with an attractive young woman who also happened to have been called Ellen!

      Delete
  16. I don't want to upset you, so I'll pass.

    ReplyDelete
  17. i thought you might have at least gone to the trouble of installing a "rating" widget or a polling option..... lazy blogging.... pull yer finger out muchacho

    ReplyDelete
  18. I would give it an 8 but if chapter 2 was very much the same I would chuck the book in the donation bin.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. In Chapter Two Howard flies to Adelaide, Australia to meet a mature woman he has met through blogging. Co-incidentally she is also called Elsie and she dons a pretty pink dress, giving Howard a twirl in the romantic Italian restaurant they had booked.

      Delete
  19. Everyone needs encouragement, so I would never be cruel enough to give a poor rating to someone's writing. A few pointers to improvement might help, but I'll leave that to others.

    ReplyDelete

Mr Pudding welcomes all genuine comments - even those with which he disagrees. However, puerile or abusive comments from anonymous contributors will continue to be given the short shrift they deserve. Any spam comments that get through Google/Blogger defences will also be quickly deleted.

Most Visits