I feel like I'm in a film about a struggling artist who keeps getting up at all hours of the night to look at his big, blank empty canvas. And in a way I am. Except that i'm not struggling. I'm Hector Kipling. I might be getting up at all hours of th...
There were certain moments upon which the whole of the future course of one's life might turn. And almost inevitably they popped out at one without any warning at all, leaving one with no time to consider or engage in a reasoned debate with oneself. ...
Because God is full of life, I imagine each morning Almighty God says to the sun, "Do it again"; and every evening to the moon and the stars, "Do it again"; and every springtime to the daisies, "Do it again"; and every time a child is born into the w...
It was so unlikely that she should be there, standing on the far side of the ballroom, and yet there she was. Unlikely Lucy, gleaming, a jade flame burning bright in a sea of mere diamonds. Polished and disheveled at the same time, her fitted, elegan...
All this ferment was public, we might almost say tranquil. The imminent insurrection gathered its storm calmly in the face of the government. No singularity was lacking in this crisis, still subterranean, but already perceptible. The middle class tal...
On my solemn oath, Edmund, I'd gladly face not having an acre of land to call my own, nor a penny in the bank, I'd be willing to have no home but the poorhouse in my old age, if I could look back now on having been the fine artist I might have been.
Where are we going? It’s not an issue of here or there. And if you ever feel you can’t take another step, imagine how you might feel to arrive, if not wiser, a little more aware how to inhabit the middle ground between misery and joy. Trudge on. ...
Somewhere, the imaginary little shoulder angel and devil were having a conversation on their respective sides, the angel offering a gentle warning that this might not be a good idea, given all the drama, the complications. But the little devil, with ...
The "word" did not "offer itself" in a take-it-or-leave-it fashion, any more than Caesar's heralds would have said, "If you'd like a new kind of imperial experience, you might like to try giving allegiance to the new emperor.
Love makes sense to me in the same way that this statement might make sense to you: Parakeets flock like sheep flock like wool covers your eyes like a bald kidnap victim willingly locked in the trunk of an elephant wants to start growing dandelion fl...
Dain kept his gaze on his plate and concentrated on swallowing the morsel he'd just very nearly choked on. She was possessive... about him. The beautiful, mad creature - or blind and deaf creature, or whatever she was - coolly announced it as one mig...
I don't suppose you told the woman you're arse over teakettle in love with her?" "I did. [...] I went about it all wrong." "There's a wrong way to tell a woman you love her?" "Nearly shouting it at her when she's angry and frightened and looking for ...
... he couldn't, as a respectable master in an English public school, have taken us to a brothel. Yet how I wish he had! His introduction to sexual experience would, I feel sure, have been a masterpiece of tact; it might well have speeded up our deve...
Nor was her love for Udayan recognizable or intact. Anger was always mounted to it, zigzagging through her like some helplessly mating pair of insects. Anger at him for dying when he might have lived. For bringing her happiness, and then taking it aw...
Anybody have any money?” Frank checked his pockets. “Three denarii from Camp Jupiter. Five dollars Canadian.” Hedge patted his gym shorts and pulled out what he found. “Three quarters, two dimes, a rubber band and—score! A piece of celery.�...
I used to dream about escaping my ordinary life, but my life was never ordinary. I had simply failed to notice how extraordinary it was. Likewise, I never imagined that home might be something I would miss.
First there were the Gamemakers, making me their star and then scrambling to recover from that handful of poisonous berries. Then President Snow, trying to use me to put out the flames of rebellion, only to have my every move become inflammatory. Nex...
Dovepaw made a mess of the hunting, true. But she ran to help a Clanmate in trouble when she had no idea what danger she would have to face on the other side of that bramble thicket. And when we couldn't get Icecloud out of the hole, she was quick to...
Whatever one of us asked the other to do - it was assumed the asker would weigh all the consequences - the other would do. Thus one might wake the other in the night and ask for a cup of water; and the other would peacefully (and sleepily) fetch it. ...
I just meant that a guy who's guarded his heart for so long might not be in the best position to judge." "Ouch." "Sorry." She reached across the cab of the truck and caressed his arm. "I promise to take the sting out of that owie remark as soon as I ...
She looked so disappointed, so grieved and desperate that Clem longed to comfort her, only he couldn't think of thing to say that she hadn't heard a hundred times from Dad and Dr. Snow and Mrs. Mack: how things would get better in time, though no one...
