“We should turn back,” Gared urged as the woods began to grow dark around them.
**
A Game of Thrones**
My sister has urged me to begin this series, and so I have.
A pompous little steward stopped us from walking the Borzois through tourist.
Zany Afternoons, by Bruce McCall
“At the age of 4, Paul Erdos remarked to his mother, ‘If you subtract 250 from 100, you get 150 below zero’.”
The Penguin Dictionary of Curious and Interesting Numbers
“Man”’ said Terl, “is an endangered species”.
Battlefield Earth, by L. Ron Hubbard. Rhiannon8404 snagged a free copy at the ALA convention a couple weeks ago
“Her name is Melanie.” - The Girl With All the Gifts. M.R. Carey.
From the preface:
*My purpose is to record and contemplate the origin, growth, maturity, and decline of Greek civilization from the oldest remains of Crete and Troy to the conquest of Greece by Rome. *
Will Durant, The Life of Greece, vol 2 of The Story of Civilization.
“He was born with the rank of Detective-Inspector, CID, on a very wet Saturday afternoon in a basement flat off Sloane Square, in London. The year was 1931.”
Preface from a Ngaio Marsh omnibus, in which she explains the origin of her fictional detective, Roderick Alleyn.
Since these are novellas, I’ll fudge a bit and give the first sentence from the second in the collection:
" ‘You stole my story,’ the man on the doorstep said."
– Secret Window, Secret Garden
Having noticed that this thread is still running, I may as well note that the novel I’m currently reading is perhaps the one most famous for its opening sentence. Sure, the likes of Ulysses and Nineteen Eighty-Four have famous opening sentences, but that’s surely not the most famous thing about them.
One word: “catamite”.
Earthly Powers by Anthony Burgess. Very much a readable blast so far.
“The opening story about the wolves may seem like a bit of dark humor, but a cold reality runs deep in the punch line.”
Brace For Impact by Michael Marks
(good book, gets you thinking about today’s safety in life)
“Yashim flicked a speck of dust on his cuff.”
The Janissary Tree by Jason Goodwin. Kind of a disappointing read so far; a fair amount of action but damn few surprises for something that’s supposed to be a mystery. More of an historical novel, which is fine as far as it goes, but not what I was hoping for.
The town of Gros Ventre was so far from anywhere that you had to take a bus to catch a bus.
“Last Bus to Wisdom”–the final book by outstanding Western writer Ivan Doig
“I have a painting in the hallway of my house in Berwick-upon-Tweed, by the Scottish artist Duncan Mackellar.”
Eric Lomax, The Railway Man.
“Then slowly the night would open and the miracle unfold.” – The Dark Bride by Laura Restrepo.
“How far do heredity and environment, respectively, mould character and foreshadow a career?”
B. H. Liddell Hart. *Sherman: Soldier, Realist, American *
Inspired by the preservers of Confederate Monuments in the news of late.
“Teddy Xanakis would have to steal the painting.”
X
Sue Grafton
In the spring of her twenty-second year, Sumire fell in love for the first time in her life.
Could be any romance novel, but actually an English translation of future Nobel winner Haruki Murakami’s Sputnik Sweetheart.
No doubt the following narrative will be received with entire incredulity, but I think it well that the public should be put in possession of the facts narrated in “An Antarctic Mystery.” - An Antarctic Mystery, by Jules Verne, trans by Mrs. Cashel Hoey, 1899, subtitled A Sequel to Edgar Allan Poe’s The Narrative of A. Gordon Pym
There’a little too much narration up front (see above), and the OCR needed some decent proofreading, but a pretty good adventure story.
And now the third novella in Four Past Midnight.
[/QUOTE]
:
“Everything, Sam Peebles decided later, was the fault of the goddamned acrobat.”
The Library Policeman, by Stephen King
“According to Genesis, it took as few as four people to make the planet too crowded to stand, and the first murder was a fratricide.” - ‘Dead Beat’, Jim Butcher
“First of all, it was October, a rare month for boys.” - ‘Something Wicked This Way Comes’, Ray Bradbury