Ooooh, I like it. I read an article the other day about TV series cliff-hangers, and non-ending endings (?). I shall have to get my thinking cap on. Great question, Cyn.

Nancy.

The P's. of P. comes to mind, my dad talked about these.

Annette

Perils of Pauline certainly used the cliffhanger device!

Since tomorrow is St. Patrick's Day, I probably should have asked something relating to the auld sod. Our author/poet who wrote the novel leading to the phrase cliffhanger was English. For some reason, I have this little fear that he has been an answer to another question I asked in the past.

Anyway, this was his third novel, but the first to bear his name. It is a bit obscure and not one of his famous novels.

I will be back with more clues later...hang on!

Cynthia

Probably Dudley Do-Right. No? Most likely well before his time, I suppose. So the question is about the term cliffhanger, and not the dramatic device itself. Heck, maybe it was Dudley Do-Right. :-)

TM

Yes, TM, it is about the term. The device itself was used by Homer. It also was the technique Scheherazade used to avoid being killed.

The term, however, resulted from a serialized novel.

There has been a huge soccer thing (not sure if it is a camp or tournament) up the street at the high school. No frenzied crowd, but lots and lots of traffic. Sigh.

Cynthia

Are we talking about the PP's ?

Annette who seems to be stuck on the letter P this morning LOL.

OK, nothing is clicking yet, but there's still time.

TM

Although our house is actually far from that madding crowd, we do suffer the traffic. I was watching the ACC basketball tournament finals. My dad is grinning somewhere now that the University of Virginia won. Now, listening to the Beatles. Hey Jude is playing. Definitely not obscure.

Cynthia

I doubt this is correct but the idea of cliffhanger makes me think of Sherlock Holmes and his tumble to death. Fans held their metaphorical and collective breath as they waited to see if Doyle would give Sherlock an escape and continue the series.

In this minor novel, A Pair of Blue Eyes (1873), the author draws on his courtship of his first wife. His ashes are buried in Westminster Abbey, but his heart is buried next to her.

Cynthia

I think I have the author if I interpreted the clues correctly because I read the misquote info from the link Nancy included in yesterday's answer.

I'm trying a slow cooker recipe for ribs for dinner. We hardly ever have ribs as they take too long and need too much time for me to cook them on the grill.

I have a feeling that there are some great clues there if I were only smart enough to pick up on them.

TM

Mmmmmm, ribs. Comfort food. I made fried chicken last night and had some cold for dinner.
I was thinking Hitch, but that's not right. Is Annette right about the P? That does make me think about about someone whose initials are like soap company. Or I may be all washed up.

Nancy.

You should get it, TM as hale and hardy as you are!

Are you a Julie Christie fan? I am pretty sure she starred in the screen adaptation of one of my clue films.

Let's see...Madding Crowd...Jude the Obscure...and a lass named Tess..and a Mayor of Casterbridge.

Cynthia, who already knows she won't need to get up for school in the morning, so you won't have to wait all day tomorrow. It is snowing and is supposed to keep up until mid-afernoon tomorrow. Ahem...where is spring? It has until Thursday to show up.

Mmmmmm, ribs. Comfort food. I made fried chicken last night and had some cold for dinner.
I was thinking Hitch, but that's not right. Is Annette right about the P? That does make me think about about someone whose initials are like soap company. Or I may be all washed up.

Nancy.

Mmmmmm, ribs. Comfort food. I made fried chicken last night and had some cold for dinner.
I was thinking Hitch, but that's not right. Is Annette right about the P? That does make me think about about someone whose initials are like soap company. Or I may be all washed up.

Nancy.

I read the Tess book in or shortly after college. Also saw the PBS production some years ago.

Thanks, Cynthia. I think you pretty much gave it to me with hale and hardy. He and I share a first name. Although I got some of the titles from your hints, I really had no idea who wrote them or when. I don't think I've ever read him.

I deserve maybe one star, if that. :-)

TM

Four stars for Bobbie and TM. Thomas Hardy was the author who actually did place a character hanging off a cliff in the serialized novel, A Pair of Blue Eyes (sure wish I could underline book titles on this tablet).

From Wikipedia:

In 1873, A Pair of Blue Eyes, a novel drawing on Hardy's courtship of his first wife, was published under his own name. The term "cliffhanger" is considered to have originated with the serialised version of this story (which was published in Tinsley's Magazine between September 1872 and July 1873) in which Henry Knight, one of the protagonists, is left literally hanging off a cliff.

Am I right that I have asked a question on Hardy before? We read Return of the Native in high school and I loved it. TM, maybe he is one of those authors whose stories or style doesn't attract male readers as much. Not sure.

So, in recognition of St. Pat's, here are your 'stars!'

Great choice of shamrocks. Happy St. Pat's to all.

Way more than I deserve, but thank you anyway. Cool shamrocks!

Thanks for the fun, Cynthia. I'm wondering if you have a snow day today. I heard that the D.C schools are all closed.

TM

I was way off on left base with this one, great question tho :).
Happy St. Patricks Day everyone.

Annette

Yes, TM, We have our 1,674th snow day this year. At least that is what it seems like We woke up t seven inches of snow. So pretty. it was 70 degrees on Saturday and is supposed to be in the 60s on Thursday. Happy Spring!

Annette, your Perils of Pauline would have been my guess, too, had I not come across this.

Have a good week, all.

I guess I was all washed up - lol. Sorry about the multiple posts. I think it is when l'm on with this tablet and get impatient. I will endeavour not to hit enter multiple times.

Thanks for the fun Cynthia.

Nancy.