“I think they’re plotting to bump off Terence today,” Michael said.
The Falcon Always Wings Twice, Donna Andrews
A cold wind blew through the city, and the snow was piled in drifts near the Capitol, where gaslights flickered with a bluish light.
The Impeachers: The Trial of Andrew Johnson and the Dream of a Just Nation by Brenda Wineapple
“At university, I realised I couldn’t write and I couldn’t act.”
Balancing Acts: Behind the Scenes at London’s National Theatre, by Nicholas Hytner
“I hate the smell of this house. It’s the smell of Peter, the smell of our divorce and all the heartache that came with it.”
Smacked by Eilene Zimmerman
“Three hours after he’d broken camp, repacked, and pushed his horses higher into the mountain range, Wyoming game warden Joe Pickett paused on the lip of a wide hollow basin and dug in his saddlebag for his notebook.”
Nowhere to Run by C.J. Box. 10th book of the Joe Pickett series.
“Brae Hill Valley High School did not sit atop a hill.”
Adequate Yearly Progress by Roxanna Elden
“This is how I remember my life.”
Long Time Gone by David Crosby and Carl Gottlieb
“In 1948 my father was serving his second term as sheriff of Mercer County, Montana.”
Montana 1948 by Larry Watson
“A great rose–like great art, music, and literature–can stir the passions.”
Pink Ladies and Crimson Gents: Portraits and Legends of 50 Roses, by Molly and Don Glentzer
“His arrival in Philadelphia is one of the most famous scenes in autobiographical literature: the bedraggled 17-year-old runaway, cheeky yet with a pretense of humility, straggling off the boat and buying three puffy rolls as he wanders up Market Street.”
Benjamin Franklin: An American Life, by Walter Isaacson
" ‘Whoever said it never rained in Southern California lied,’ I said."
Robert B. Parker’s Angel Eyes, by Ace Atkins
“I clasp the flask between my hands even though the warmth from the tea has long since leached into the frozen air.”
Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins. Second novel in the Hunger Games series.
On the morning of Good Friday, April 15, 1927, Seguine Allen, the chief engineer of the Mississippi Levee Board in Greenville, Mississippi, woke up to the sound of running water.
Rising Tide: The Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 and How It Changed America , by John M Barry
“The big groundcar jerked to a stop centimeters from the vehicle ahead of it, and Armsman Pym, driving, swore under his breath.”
A Civil Campaign by Lois McMaster Bujold
“Thy fingers make early flowers of all things.”
100 Selected Poems, by e.e. cummings
“If you’d told me a week ago my problems would be resolved by some little green man leaving an indecipherable message, well, I am a betting man, which is what put me in the hole in the first place, but only a rank sucker would have wagered so much as an ace on that outcome.”
Footprints in the Stars, edited by Danielle Ackley-McPhail. (It’s an anthology. This is the first sentence from “Astral Odds” by Gorden Linzner.)
This is on my shelf waiting its turn. Are you enjoying it?
mmm
Dog carcass in an alley this morning, tire tread on burst stomach. This city is afraid of me. I have seen its true face.
– Watchmen (Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons, 1986).
Talk about a killer opening line!
I’m now also reading Nation, by Terry Pratchett:
HOW IMO MADE THE WORLD, IN THE TIME WHEN THINGS WERE OTHERWISE AND THE MOON WAS DIFFERENT
Imo set out one day to catch some fish, but there was no sea.
“It’s simply a matter of quantity versus quality.”
Spurious Correlations, by Tyler Vigen