Favorite lines you've written

BenPanced · Nov 2, 2020

From this year's NaNo project:

"I'm surprised that whatever divine forces that guide the universe had us run into each other so soon. You'd think they would have waited a few more pages or at least until the next chapter for us to meet again."

No, he isn't being self-aware or meta in the very least. Why do you ask?

Ellis Clover · Nov 19, 2020

[FONT=&quot]There’d only be more of that as the evening wore on. Flowing alcohol, dying light, no inhibitions. Not that anyone else seemed to mind. A clearing in front of the band’s jerry-rigged tarp was filling up with swaying bodies, jiggling bodies, bodies thrilled to be near other bodies. Some primal part of her yearned to join them, even as she began to trudge up the hill towards the gate and the lane and her quiet motel room.[/FONT]

janeofalltrades · Nov 20, 2020

Latina Bunny said:
From a WIP with romantic elements. I may change the romance a bit, but I liked these really rough lines. Kind of cheesy/melodramatic, but she’s a dramatic sort of teen, so it fits her personality, hehe.

Excerpt:
I never meant to become a player; I was meant to be the kind and sweet tag-along girlfriend of a player.

The cheering cling-on accessory meant to support and comfort the (very nice and very cute) boyfriend as he achieved his goals.

But it was not to be, I guess.

I never realized how much I would love that game of his. Or that I would fall out of love with him soon after...

I love this!

micahkolding · Nov 26, 2020

I had to think on this one for a bit, but one of my favorite parts of my works-in-progress is as follows:

“Do you have any idea how stupid we look right now?”
“Ginny, I’m the creator of the universe. I always know exactly how stupid I look.”

Deepthought · Dec 7, 2020

His wrist felt smashed, like slivers of shattered needle splintered amongst shards, scraping at every shake.

ap123 · Dec 8, 2020

[FONT=&quot]Maybe you have to become a parent to miss childhood. She looks at her friend, remembers her going into labor with her daughter, gasping at the bar to tell her father to meet her and Laura at the hospital after last call while the regulars clamored for a free round in celebration. Maybe nostalgia is there all along, like eggs waiting to be fertilized, take root with a heartbeat, and then come out in a rush with trembling legs and amniotic fluid.[/FONT]

The Second Moon · Dec 8, 2020

micahkolding said:
I had to think on this one for a bit, but one of my favorite parts of my works-in-progress is as follows:

“Do you have any idea how stupid we look right now?”
“Ginny, I’m the creator of the universe. I always know exactly how stupid I look.”

I love this. So funny!

Muxy001 · Dec 9, 2020

I've got two favorites from my WIP:

"Evolution is commonplace. It is the human capacity to think creatively ... that makes our own evolution so exceptional"

And ...

"If science and religion BOTH seek the truth, eventually they MUST agree"

As I've progressed through the daunting process of learning to write, I've often pasted quotes of intrigue or inspiration on the wall above my desk. It's evolved over time to become an inspirational quotes page on my website that focuses on creativity and lateral thinking. It helps me sometimes.

First book: "We should NEVER have trusted the aliens"

The Second Moon · Dec 12, 2020

From my adult SF, Five.

“You look awful. Are you okay?” Five couldn’t rip his stare from the bags under Otto’s eyes. They were so dark they could make a racoon jealous.

Maryn · Dec 13, 2020

I've set my WIP aside for a little bit and am starting a short story already aspiring to be a novella.

After an interview that got me an offer, my look around [the job site] turned the prospect from Go to Go Home.

ap123 · Dec 14, 2020

Maryn said:
After an interview that got me an offer, my look around [the job site] turned the prospect from Go to Go Home.

Nice!

indianroads · Dec 15, 2020

Still just the first draft, but I kinda like this bit.

“You showed us that our enemy can be defeated, which makes this the beginning of their end.”
“They’ll hit back,” he stated.
“Let them. For every one of us they kill, three will join our cause.”
“Is it worth it though? Living with the tribes or on your own isn’t easy.”
She shook her head. “Only death is easy; life never will be.”

indianroads · Dec 19, 2020

Again, still the first draft, but I like the feel of this:

Eris sat on the edge of her lonely bed, staring blindly at the open bedroom door. Pale light drifted down the hallway from the living room, where wide windows looked out over the restless city. Her apartment at the MGM was unnaturally quiet but thick with the sickening peace that so often follows great tragedy.

The Second Moon · Dec 21, 2020

This is from a very rough first draft, but I really like it, so I thought I'd share. Sorry that's it's so long...

“Then let’s go!” Rosalie forced the spaceship to zip into the wormhole and strips of purple and green surrounded the vehicle like a tunnel. There were pastel shades such as lilac and mint locked in a chaotic waltz with deeper shades like eminence and olive. It was like a battle between the lighter hues and the darker ones. Quickly though, the darker colors seemed to win, as they became intenser and blended into brown. Eventually, they filled the spaceship with a rich chocolatey color that overpowered the ship’s standard white utility lights. Right when it seemed that the brownness would suck the color out everything inside the ship, the pastel stripes of mint and lilac radiated so strongly, Rosalie had to make a visor with her hand. Then she saw it. At the end of the tunnel was a silhouette of a sphere that she knew as Earth.

ldlago · Dec 27, 2020

Trees that only weeks before bathed the white colonial in shade, now swayed and creaked, their leafless branches bowing to a plume of chimney smoke.

ldlago · Dec 27, 2020

Bitter and disillusioned, he had ended his time in the service convinced that elements within his adoptive country's power structure had coerced its leadership into believing that anything less than total eradication of left wing ideology in Southeast Asia, however inconsistent with the nation's moral values and regard for human life, would be a catastrophic setback in its fight to rid the world of something sinister and dark.

Deepthought · Dec 28, 2020

[FONT=&quot]The fall had torn little he’d worn, and the fingers had met where skin had been shorn. They hadn’t stayed long, and soon they were gone, but his face felt a flush as though he’d been in a rush. Water kept running and splashed with a spray, until all the clay had been wiped clean away. The man lifted him up to wash the cut soles of his feet, then set him back down on a piece of clean sheet. It was nearer the mirror, away from the puddle, and the boy sat down in a shivering huddle.[/FONT]

SwallowFeather · Jan 3, 2021

Respect was in their eyes. Respect as flat and simple as a stone in a field, a stone the farmer plows around because he knows. Tug on it and you're pulling on the earth itself. It was the bedrock of their life. She helped one of us survive. She's one of us.

starrystorm · Jan 3, 2021

Vince grabbed my shoulders, nearly knocking me over. “Oh no, she’s remembering.”

“Remembering what?” I said, but my brain was already spitting things out like gunfire. Mother and Father. Setting a fire. Puppets screaming and running.

I tried to remember more. To try and glue the pieces together, but nothing came. I started to shake my head like a captured animal. Like I was going to start foaming from the mouth at any second. Nothing would come. But I had those memories. They were somewhere. I just couldn’t reach them.

ldlago · Jan 5, 2021

"Oh, I had other forms of entertainment. I played with Catholic kids in Derry, Protestant kids in Belfast. One thing they had in common, skill for making things explode. I watched and learned. Some said I had a gift, a God given gift."

ap123 · Jan 6, 2021

ldlago said:
"Oh, I had other forms of entertainment. I played with Catholic kids in Derry, Protestant kids in Belfast. One thing they had in common, skill for making things explode. I watched and learned. Some said I had a gift, a God given gift."

Well done!

From my current mess:

[FONT=&quot] Jane noted the creases from the bedding blended with the creases of age, until she couldn’t tell which were which and it seemed like a mouth of thin smeary lips had taken on its own life, spouting disembodied words from the mountain of flattened pillows. Her mother was 58, looked 78, and acted as if she were fourteen. In moments of panic Jane feared she would regress the same way. On good days, she remembered her mother had always been this way, same as she couldn’t remember herself feeling anything other than middle aged.[/FONT]

ldlago · Jan 6, 2021

ap123 said:
Well done!

From my current mess:

[FONT="] In moments of panic Jane feared she would regress the same way.

What an eloquent mess at that. Sometimes its better not to dwell on death, but to simply live.

The Second Moon · Jan 16, 2021

From a Upper MG WIP

“So we’re not going to turn him human again?” Barney asked, his stomach twisted.

Mr. Thomas clapped a hand on Barney’s shoulder. “Yep. Your bully is no more.”

“This doesn't feel right,” Barney said. “We should turn him back.”

Mr. Thomas groaned. “Why? I’ve got more reasons to keep him a ghost than to have him be human again. For starters, he’s not nice, he’s bossy, and he probably doesn't wear deodorant. Actually, scratch that. He definitely does not wear deodorant.” Mr. Thomas shrugged. “Either that or he rubs his pits with stink bugs in the morning. Anyways, I don’t think he deserves to be human again.”

starrystorm · Jan 17, 2021

Lewis looked up at me. “You want to call your guardian? That, uh, Tiffany lady?”

“No.” I squirmed. “I mean I want to. It’s just…”

"It’s hard.” He swallowed. “I want to call my parents but…what do I tell them? Hey, you’re son really was abducted by aliens and that your oldest isn’t a nutjob?”

ap123 · Jan 19, 2021

[FONT=&quot]She wished she hadn’t asked. The odds of his last words making her feel any better were slim. She wished she had cried when she found him, that she was able to cry now. But Jane’d learned long ago crying only gave her a snotty nose and headache. What she was left with instead was an arid gap in the rhythm of her heartbeat, a pause where there should have been a thub, that mostly left her a little extra quiet but sometimes, like now, was a burning pain that mushroomed from her chest, spread to her neck and limbs, and squeezed until she was lost in it, unsure if it would ever let go.[/FONT]

Favorite lines you've written

BenPanced

THE BLUEBERRY QUEEN OF HADES (he/him)

Ellis Clover

watching The Office again

janeofalltrades

micahkolding

Deepthought

Think hard, often

ap123

Twitching

The Second Moon

Muxy001

Muxy001

The Second Moon

Maryn

At Sea

ap123

Twitching

indianroads

Wherever I go, there I am.

indianroads

Wherever I go, there I am.

The Second Moon

ldlago

ldlago

Deepthought

Think hard, often

SwallowFeather

Oops I just swallowed a feather

starrystorm

ldlago

ap123

Twitching

ldlago

The Second Moon

starrystorm

ap123

Twitching