The intellectual equivalent of a ham sandwich.

Posts tagged ‘book’

Quotes of the Day!

My buddy Katie, over at hereiamstillintact.blogspot.com did a pretty fun book review where she talked about a few books she just read. Wellllll, inspired by Miss Katie I decided to throw in a little ‘review’ section for this book.

The book? Fight Club. You know … like that movie, Fight Club. Honestly, if you’ve seen the flick, you’re set. That said, I enjoy the movie and there are some interesting differences in the book … but overall I’d say the book is VERY similar. There are a few good lines (of the snarky, darkish variety) which weren’t in the movie, so I’ve got them here for you …

Fight Club (Novel) Quotes

Now, according to the ancient Chinese custom we all learned from television, Tyler is responsible for Marla, forever, because Tyler saved Marla’s life.

Besides, I’m enlightened now. You know, only Buddha-style behavior. Spider chrysanthemums. The Diamond Sutra and the Blue Cliff Record. Hari Rama, you know, Krishna, Krishna. You know, Enlightened.

Tyler lies back and asks, “If Marilyn Monroe was alive right now, what would she be doing?”
I say, goodnight.
The headliner hangs down in shreds from the ceiling, and Tyler says, “Clawing at the lid of her coffin.”

The door to my boss’s office is always closed now, and we haven’t traded more than two words any day since he found the fight club rules in the copy machine and I maybe implied I might gut him with a shotgun blast. Just me clowning around, again.

I look at God behind his desk, taking notes on a pad, but God’s got this all wrong.
We are not special.
We are not crap or trash, either.
We just are.
We just are, and what happens just happens.
And God says, “No, that’s not right.”
Yeah. Well. Whatever. You can’t teach God anything.

***

The BEST part of the book, to me (and maybe I was having a downer-day), was the afterword (written in 2005). In it the author talks about what inspired Fight Club and his attempts to get it published. Sometimes I enjoy the story of, say, Dr. Seuss being rejected 27 times before being published, kind of story.

Also, it’s just fun to see how someone thinks. Especially if that someone has managed to entertain you through written word.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fight_Club_%28film%29

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Quotes of the Day!

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Quotes of the Day!

“Read almost half.

Just didn’t like”

This was written on the title page of my (used) copy of One Hundred Years of Solitude.

I have to say, I agree with the quote. HOWEVER, I pushed on, and while the book was at times confusing and rambly and long-winded (remind you of anyone?) there were some lovely quotes. Without further ado …

 

One Hundred Years of Solitude Quotes

In several desperate efforts of concentration he willed her to appear but Remedios did not respond. He looked for her in her sisters’ shop, behind the window shades in her house, in her father’s office, but he found her only in the image that saturated his private and terrible solitude.

 

whose head covered with patent leather curls aroused in women an irrepressible need to sigh

 

He wept one whole afternoon in Ursula’s lap and she would have sold her soul in order to comfort him.

 

He became lost in misty byways, in times reserved for oblivion, in labyrinths of disappointment.

 

so many times postponed, putting her resignation aside and shitting on everything once and for all and drawing out of her heart the infinite stacks of bad words that she had been forced to swallow over a century of conformity.
“Shit!” she shouted.

 

“If you hadn’t come,” he said, “you never would have seen me again.”
Meme felt the weight of his hand on her knee and she knew that they were both arriving at the other side of abandonment at that instant.
“What shocks me about you,” she said smiling, “is that you always say exactly what you shouldn’t be saying.”

 

he realized that his wife’s determination had been provoked by a nostalgic mirage

 

the scientific possibility of seeing the future showing through in time as one sees what is written on the back of a sheet of paper through the light

***

While I would not recommend this book, it still had its moments for me. And lines like, in particular, the last one, bring pictures of new stories to my mind. For that reason I’m happy I read the book (and not just so I can stop feeling guilty for having bought it and not read it).

Buy it here.

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