I just read this great quote by Junot Diaz, he was talking about true intimacy, and he was saying that it was the willingness to be vulnerable and to be found out. That’s what I felt that YA did. It wasn't pretentious, and it wasn’t hiding its he...
As Donilon [President Obama's security advisor] would tell me, Obama said: "Here's the deal. I want this hunt for Osama bin Laden and al-Zawahiri to come to the front of the line. I worry that the trail has gone cold. This has to be our top priority ...
I remember a man, a very lonely man, coming up to me at the end of a reading and looking into my face and saying, 'I feel as if I have looked down a corridor and seen into your soul.' And I looked at him and said, 'You haven't.' You know, Here's the ...
If we bear in mind the inherent shortcomings of the genre, it may fairly be said of Ms Lewis-Foster that she possesses a rare art: the art of making a bad story plausible. She even has a few good lines—one day I shall plagiarise "wine-warmed smile"...
...Daisy doesn't even go to his funeral, Nick and Jordan part ways, and Daisy ends up sticking with racist Tom... you can tell Fitzgerald never took the time to look up at clouds during sunset, because there's no silver lining at the end of that book...
Sometimes when I'm having a boring interview on the telephone, and I'm trying to think about something else because the questions are too boring, and I start looking around the room where I work, you know, full of books piled up to the sky, all diffe...
I personally find that having a couple of projects going at once can be an aid to focus, refreshing my brain as I go back and forth between them – a book review and a novel at the same time, for example. But I’ve seen that writers who are startin...
O guide my judgment and my taste, Sweet Spirit, author of the book Of wonders, told in language chaste And plainness, not to be mistook. O let me muse, and yet at sight The page admire, the page believe; "Let there be light, and there was light, Let ...
Kandinski looked up. 'Do you read science fiction?' he asked matter-of-factly. 'Not as a rule,' Ward admitted. When Kandinski said nothing he went on: 'Perhaps I’m too skeptical, but I can’t take it too seriously.' Kandinski pulled at a blister o...
Like many others who have gone into prisons and jails with us, Chuck and Carol Middlekauff demonstrate what our ministry is all about. We train Christian ‘teammates’ to share the good news and love of Christ with ‘the least of these’ so they ...
YA stories feature a young adult protagonist or protagonists and usually focus on that character’s journey toward maturity (the tradition of the Bildungsroman.). Learning about love / relationships is an important part of that stage in our lives, s...
I was Juliet and Quinn was Romeo, and the lines weren't dead black-and-white words on a page but somehow alive, as natural and real as the argument we'd had about the spider and the fly. The rows of empty seats were gone, and we were in a candlelit b...
This time Elizabeth Ann didn't answer, because she herself didn't know what the matter was. But I do, and I'll tell you. The matter was that never before had she known what she was doing in school. She had always thought she was there to pass from on...
Jasper Sitwell: Zola'a algorithm is a program for choosing Insight's targets. Steve Rogers: What targets? Jasper Sitwell: You! A TV anchor in Cairo, the Under Secretary of Defense, a high school valedictorian in Iowa City, Bruce Banner, Stephen Stran...
Henry Barthes: How are you to imagine anything if the images are always provided for you? Henry Barthes: Doublethink. To deliberately believe in lies, while knowing they're false. Henry Barthes: Examples of this in everyday life: "Oh, I need to be pr...
Roy Walker: And she turned from the masked bandit and she said... Nurse Evelyn: [in the story, as Sister Evelyn] May I be frank with you? Blue Bandit: Of course. Nurse Evelyn: Although I've dedicated my life to God and His goodness, I secretly love t...
[watching Searles practice with his bayonet] Sgt. Mulcahy: Oh, what do we have here? Bonnie Prince Charley and his toy bayonet! You're not reading your books now. Stab me. Cpl. Thomas Searles: What? Sgt. Mulcahy: Stab-me. [Searles comes at him ginger...
Balin: It's just the usual; summary of out-of-pocket expenses, time required, remuneration, funeral arrangements, so forth. Bilbo Baggins: Funeral arrangements? [reads contract] Bilbo Baggins: Oh, up to but not exceeding one fourteenth total profit i...
Tex: Boy oh boy, you picked a bad time to fly, Billy. They're guerrillas all over the place blowing up planes and all. They hit four planes in four days. But I guess you young people don't read the news anymore. That, and with our people back home ki...
[the 15th and final round of the fight has ended; reporters climb into the ring for interviews] Fight Announcer: [interviews Rocky] It was chaos. Rocky, you went the distance. You went the 15 rounds. How do you feel? Rocky: All right! Fight Announcer...
Penny Escher: [sitting on bench under an umbrella] May I ask what we're doing out here? Kay Eiffel: [sitting next to Penny without an umbrella] We're imagining car wrecks. Penny Escher: I see. And we can't imagine car wrecks inside? Kay Eiffel: No. D...
