“The secret itself was still safe.”
When Worlds Collide, by Philip Wylie and Edwin Balmer
Good book – I’ve read it three or four times. Much better than the movie based on it.
“I am neither evil nor deranged.”
Unsolved by James Patterson and David Ellis
“On May 18, 1860, the day when the Republican Party would nominate its candidate for president, Abraham Lincoln was up early.”
Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln, by Doris Kearns Goodwin.
“I saw a balloon going 90 miles per hour.”
Allie Brosh, Solutions and Other Problems
(The new book by the author of Hyperbole and a Half.)
“Charlie Riggio stared at the cardboard box sitting beside the Dumpster.”
– Demolition Angel, by Robert Crais
“This is the story of a man who went away for a long time, just to play a game.”
Iain M Banks, The Player of Games
(Finally got round to reading this - been on the list for years!)
“I stare down at my shoes, watching as a fine layer of ash settles on the worn leather.”
Mockingjay, by Suzanne Collins
TNS Defender, flagship of BatDiv Ninety-Two, was forty light-months from anywhere in particular, loafing along under half drive and no more than four or five translations into alpha-space, when the atonal shriek of General Quarters howled through her iron bones.
The Apocalypse Troll, by David Weber
“I didn’t see it at the time–how many of us do?–but it all started back in January, a few days into the new year, when I felt compelled to sit down and take stock as, on occasion, I feel the need to do.”
Miss Julia’s Marvelous Makeover, by Ann B. Ross
“Gormenghast, that is, the main massing of the original stone, taken by itself would have displayed a certain ponderous architectural quality were it possible to ignore the circumfusion of those mean dwellings that swarmed like an epidemic around its outer walls.”
Titus Groan - Mervyn Peake. Possibly the best written book I’ve ever read. I can’t recommend it enough.
“Eurydice.”
The Alexander Inheritance - Eric Flint, Georg Huff and Paula Goodlett
“In his amazing adventures, cub reporter Jimmy Olsen has come across some astounding gadgets.”
…
(What? I’ve been going through my old boxes of comics…)
Title, author and year, digs?
“From Armsman Roic’s wrist com the gate guard’s voice reported laconically, ‘They’re in. Gate’s locked.’”
Winterfair Gifts by Lois McMaster Bujold
London, 12 September 1960
In the early afternoon an unmarked car drove along Great Portland Street on the eastern boundary of Fitzrovia, then still lined with showrooms for the women’s ragtrade.
Dead Doubles: The Extraordinary Worldwide Hunt for One of the Cold War’s Most Notorious Spy Rings, by Trevor Barnes
Let’s see… (I’m sitting at the kitchen counter reading it as we speak, trying for some escapism to a more optimistic era)
Superman’s Pal, Jimmy Olsen #66, cover date January, 1963.
Author and artist:
Generic silver-age “Supes team”
(probably Leo Dorfman and Kurt Schaffenberger)
Thanks!
“Everyone has predictions about her future when a baby girl is born, and my parents were no different.”
Poster Child: A Memoir, by Emily Rapp
“I haven’t really told you much about the other doctors in Northmont (Dr. Sam Hawthorne said as he took down the wine bottle and poured the traditional small libation for himself and his visitor), because when I arrived in 1922 I was the only one in town.”
Challenge the Impossible: The Final Problems of Dr. Sam Hawthorne, by Edward D. Hoch.
“The world of fiction writers is a collection of opposites: factions at odds in their beliefs, values, purpose, and way of writing.”
The Emotional Craft of Fiction, Donald Maass