Favorite lines you've written

From my novel "Wrath of Atlantis: Paper is our Flesh"
https://amzn.to/2InYpyA

"It is not the individual alone who must express love. The world must also express love towards the individual. This is what bookshelves are: An expression of the love of the world towards its citizens, and, in turn, reading is the expression of their love towards it."

"Reading is love." I reformulated, somewhat bemused by this turn of the conversation.

"Reading is love Mr. Sherwood. And if you find yourself short of time, now you know why."

G.

Trying to get back into this WIP after life derailments, MC talking to her home health care worker:

[FONT=&quot]Give me my damned bottle.

[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Good for who? For you? I’m not a child, don’t mouth at me to be good. And I’m not afraid. Or sad. Or confused. Some moron with testicles bigger than his brain tells you women are angry to cover up being scared or sad and you believe him. Don’t be a dum dum. Men spout that crap so they don’t have to deal with whatever it is that they did or said to piss us off. Or admit that sometimes what we’re feeling has nothing to do with them at all. Yeah, they make it up, slap a big pink bow on top and offer it like a gift. Here you are honey, pearls of wisdom for you. Open it, say thank you, and swallow em one by one. You can take those pearls and stick em where the sun don’t shine, there won’t be any. Any. What’s that word, with the snotting and the leaking? Anyways, you won’t get any boo-hooing from me.

[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Oh please, there’s just a flake of tobacco stuck on my lip. If I spit at you, you’d know it. But if you want to think I did, go ahead and get afraid instead of angry, see where that gets you. Heh.[/FONT]

ap123 said:

Trying to get back into this WIP after life derailments, MC talking to her home health care worker:

Give me my damned bottle.


Good for who? For you? I’m not a child, don’t mouth at me to be good. And I’m not afraid. Or sad. Or confused. Some moron with testicles bigger than his brain tells you women are angry to cover up being scared or sad and you believe him. Don’t be a dum dum. Men spout that crap so they don’t have to deal with whatever it is that they did or said to piss us off. Or admit that sometimes what we’re feeling has nothing to do with them at all. Yeah, they make it up, slap a big pink bow on top and offer it like a gift. Here you are honey, pearls of wisdom for you. Open it, say thank you, and swallow em one by one. You can take those pearls and stick em where the sun don’t shine, there won’t be any. Any. What’s that word, with the snotting and the leaking? Anyways, you won’t get any boo-hooing from me.


Oh please, there’s just a flake of tobacco stuck on my lip. If I spit at you, you’d know it. But if you want to think I did, go ahead and get afraid instead of angry, see where that gets you. Heh.

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Love​. Furious!

Anna Spargo-Ryan said:

Love​. Furious!

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Thank you! Yup, she's furious and unapologetic

Re:

ap123 said:

Trying to get back into this WIP after life derailments, MC talking to her home health care worker:

Give me my damned bottle.

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I love that character, too. And I like the way you've structured the scene, with her responding to questions/comments we aren't privy to. It's an interesting way to do things. Refreshing. Puts the spotlight on your mc and trusts your readers to fill in the blanks.

ap123's little excerpt made me smile. It also brought to mind a chapter I was working on a couple of days ago. In this scene the MC's brother - he isn't really her brother (it's complicated) - was in the process of trying to rape her, in the stables, when his/their father interrupted him. She is hurrying back to the house, having to pass guards and workers along the way.


She bent her head and kept moving. Stop looking at me. Stop looking at me. It didn’t happen. The men’s pounding footsteps told her they too were headed for the stables. Everybody was going to know. Everybody was going to think he’d succeeded. How effing humiliating.

In these days, it was a woman’s bounden duty to die before allowing herself to be ravished. What the men who’d set that standard didn’t comprehend was that even if the victim was willing to sacrifice her life to save her vagina from invasion, it wouldn’t matter. A rapist didn’t want to kill her, certainly not before he was done with her. His intent was to rape, and since he had all the big guns, size, strength, weapons, and equipment, the woman was tough out of luck. What was a girl to do, strangle herself to death?

And on along the side of the house without meeting anyone else. Thank God the only people at the front were down by the gate. Inside, a busy maid never looked up from her table cleaning as Ralenna scurried past her to the courtroom.

Safe. Alone. Relief rushing over her, she sank down onto the nearest chair, and cocooned herself in Niall’s cloak. The shakes started. Next came guilt. Women forever felt themselves the responsible party when such things happened, but knowing that didn’t lessen the feeling that she was somehow in the wrong and was about to be blamed for Niall’s assault. After all, it was obvious she’d had nary a care for her chastity when she’d entered the stables and wantonly placed herself in her brother’s path. Only sheer luck had prevented his ruination. Chalk one up for the cavalry, she thought, they’d saved the poor boy.

kkbe said:

Re: I love that character, too. And I like the way you've structured the scene, with her responding to questions/comments we aren't privy to. It's an interesting way to do things. Refreshing. Puts the spotlight on your mc and trusts your readers to fill in the blanks.

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Thank you!

WriteMinded said:

ap123's little excerpt made me smile. It also brought to mind a chapter I was working on a couple of days ago. In this scene the MC's brother - he isn't really her brother (it's complicated) - was in the process of trying to rape her, in the stables, when his/their father interrupted him. She is hurrying back to the house, having to pass guards and workers along the way.


She bent her head and kept moving. Stop looking at me. Stop looking at me. It didn’t happen. The men’s pounding footsteps told her they too were headed for the stables. Everybody was going to know. Everybody was going to think he’d succeeded. How effing humiliating.

In these days, it was a woman’s bounden duty to die before allowing herself to be ravished. What the men who’d set that standard didn’t comprehend was that even if the victim was willing to sacrifice her life to save her vagina from invasion, it wouldn’t matter. A rapist didn’t want to kill her, certainly not before he was done with her. His intent was to rape, and since he had all the big guns, size, strength, weapons, and equipment, the woman was tough out of luck. What was a girl to do, strangle herself to death?

And on along the side of the house without meeting anyone else. Thank God the only people at the front were down by the gate. Inside, a busy maid never looked up from her table cleaning as Ralenna scurried past her to the courtroom.

Safe. Alone. Relief rushing over her, she sank down onto the nearest chair, and cocooned herself in Niall’s cloak. The shakes started. Next came guilt. Women forever felt themselves the responsible party when such things happened, but knowing that didn’t lessen the feeling that she was somehow in the wrong and was about to be blamed for Niall’s assault. After all, it was obvious she’d had nary a care for her chastity when she’d entered the stables and wantonly placed herself in her brother’s path. Only sheer luck had prevented his ruination. Chalk one up for the cavalry, she thought, they’d saved the poor boy.

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I like the voice here, a nice mix of resilience, shock, and fear.

Stopped in to see if anything new was posted and ended up rereading recent excerpts...

WriteMinded said:

Only sheer luck had prevented his ruination. Chalk one up for the cavalry, she thought, they’d saved the poor boy.

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Gaston said:

....This is what bookshelves are: An expression of the love of the world towards its citizens, and, in turn, reading is the expression of their love towards it."

"Reading is love." I reformulated, somewhat bemused by this turn of the conversation.

"Reading is love Mr. Sherwood. And if you find yourself short of time, now you know why."

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flowerburgers said:

My mother has died, and here is her ghost. /.../ I was coming after her with my heart full of flames.

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So good, you guys. Oy.

Later that evening, when the corridor lights were turned down to discourage visitors, I struggled to avoid eye contact with that same nurse, who was now attempting to relieve my bladder through a most unpleasant procedure. It was at the precise moment of release that I had an epiphany. I realized everything I, and presumably you, had ever heard about Elizabeth Strand was wrong.

Aelfinn gets called out for being patronizing:

****

He gives a snort of laughter. “You actually were trying to be kind, weren’t you?”

“Of course I was.”

“You have no idea. No idea at all.”

“About what?”

“About us. Definitely not about women. And most of all not about Lolo."

“Well, you can’t make an omelette, buddy…”


“Yes?”

“I just don’t think you’d be able to make an omelette.”

Not quite of my own words, but "adapted" in my novel: Regarding artificial intelligence:

"It was disappointing to see that, after all these thousands of years of advance, these machines were still not quite smart enough to be called stupid..."

Gaston

This might not go into the final work, but because it's from a POV I didn't intend to write from, but it's creepy and funny (if that's possible). BTW, Symbolizers are people who represent a color, animal, object, or abstract idea. The triplets' powers are like the ghosts' powers from A Christmas Carol. They can show people their past, present or future, but they can't interact with it.

It was 10:05 and drowsiness washed over Fable’s brain like a fog. She snuggled deeper into her pillow. After a hard day at the fruit orchid, she deserved a peaceful sleep.

“Mom? Dad?” A deep haunting voice, two-thirds boy and one-third girl, came from Fable’s and her husband’s doorway.

The lights turned on and Fable sat up, groaning. Her 13-year old triplets, Liezel, Perry, and Que, who just happened to be the powerful Symbolizers of the Past, Present, and Future, stood at the foot of her bed. Their hands were linked, and their eyeballs glowed like they had been replaced with luminous gold orbs that bathed the bedroom in yellow. From experience, she knew their heartbeats were in perfect unison, too.

Fable sighed. “Did you have another—”

“Mom, we’ve had a calling,” said the triplets. “Wake Dad.”

Fable sighed again and shook her husband. “Atticus. Wake up. The kids have had another calling.”

Atticus didn’t wake.

She looked helplessly at the triplets. They nodded their heads towards Atticus, prompting her to try again.

Fable knew waking her husband would take more effort. “Ooh, look, honey! It’s a bald eagle!”

Atticus, bolted up right and whipped his binoculars of the nightstand, before pressing them to his eyes. He slowly swiveled neck until he spotted the triplets. He groaned and flopped back onto the pillow. “Not again.”

“We have had a vision of the person in need of our powers,” the triplets said. “They live at 103 Barnacle Street. You need to drive us there.”

The triplets breezed out of Fable’s room as quietly as they had entered: Like a ghost. Fable couldn’t help it; she shivered.

"Compared to a hydrogen bomb it was negligible, but when one added the eight missiles the machine was carrying along with the two tons of auto-cannon rounds and the result was a rather impressive pyrotechnic display"

A little quote from my WIP:

“White-hot pain seared his body, his soul, his very essence. Calep screamed, dropping his sword and falling to his knees on the ground. No, he thought, desperate. I can’t die on my knees. I can’t...”

aryheron said:

A little quote from my WIP:

“White-hot pain seared his body, his soul, his very essence. Calep screamed, dropping his sword and falling to his knees on the ground. No, he thought, desperate. I can’t die on my knees. I can’t...”

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I like this. It really shows a strong personality.

"At least I've never done anything that monumentally stupid. Except this one bartender in Reno."
"Not the sharpest tool in the shed?"
"I don't think he had any tools... well, just the one. Or a shed."

Guilt resurfaced, but he was used to drowning it.

Deepthought said:

Guilt resurfaced, but he was used to drowning it.

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Nice.

A little context: The character (Caspar, a fencing master) is about to fight the student of another master (Crosseby) in a prize play (students testing for rank in a guild of defense) when some joker (Guarin) in the stands decides to have some fun at his expense after an earlier incident...

And before [Crosseby's] hand could drop something fell out of the stands and plopped down onto the stage between the two combatants. Caspar’s throat tightened at the sight of the cow’s ear lying at his feet.

Laughter erupted from the spectators, and Caspar swept his eyes across the crowd in an effort to determine whence it came. Guarin, he realized, had moved from his perch high up on the scaffolding to a place nearer the platform, and smiled ear-to-ear at him. Caspar tightened his hands around his practice sword until his knuckles turned white. The Grand Master’s features were livid, Crosseby colored in embarrassment, and de Ain struggled to contain his amusement at the interruption.

His Lordship’s restraint failed him once that first ear was followed by a rain of others from the stands, and it seemed everyone but his own students flung them down onto the platform. Ears of all sorts: cows’ ears, sheep’s ears, ass’ ears, dogs’ ears, pigs’ ears. As if every butcher in Ain had been secreting them away all year long for just this occasion. More came from the streets below, until the whole platform was covered in them like gruesome paving stones. Laughter, cheers, and jeers echoed across the market square.

The world was on fire; turbulent orange and yellow clouds boiled high above, as vermilion flames rose from the earth to consume the sky. A large animal screamed in agony as it ran through a maze of exploding pine trees, leaving behind a trail of dark smoke and the pungent smell of burning fur. The creature’s panicked shrieks could not dispel its torment; there is no escaping ourselves.

There’s a feeling of winding down, and it’s strange to see the end of a tunnel – look square into it – that has no light waiting there.

indianroads said:

...there is no escaping ourselves.

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If only. . .

Really good lines, you guys.

Wrote this funny quote today.

Mrs. Elouise glanced around her. “I didn’t hit anything did I?”

Mr. Thomas jabbed his thumb over his shoulder. “Well, back there you almost hit me and Barney, and another guy. Oh, and my car and the pest control van. And you’re on the line.”

Mrs. Elouise’ face lit up. “Dang, I swerved around all of that? I’m getting good at this. So, what are you guys, doing here? I think I left my wallet here last night.”


And this one.

Barney collapsed onto his knees. “Noooo! I’m going to be shrunken forever! I-I’m going get squashed by a shoe and I’m going to have a tiny, little coffin, and only bugs are going to show up to my funeral. And after the funeral, they’re not even going to bury me. They’re going to eat my corpse! Noooo!” Barney crawled to Mr. Thomas and clung onto his legs. “Don’t let the bugs eat my corpse, Mr. Thomas. Don’t let them eat me!”

... no one ever wins a staring contest against a hologram.