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Old 04-01-2009, 06:03 AM   #1 (permalink)
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Best Book Opening Lines

Post your favourite book opening lines here!

For me, the best book opening of all time is from Willam Gibson's Count Zero:

Quote:
THEY set a slamhound on Turner's trail in New Delhi, slotted it to his pheromones and the color of his hair. It caught up with him on a street called Chandni Chauk and came scrambling for his rented BMW through a forest of bare brown legs and pedicab tires. Its core was a kilogram of recrystallized hexogene and flaked TNT.
what is yours?
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Old 04-01-2009, 06:36 AM   #2 (permalink)
 
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a screaming comes across the sky.

thomas pynchon: gravity's rainbow
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a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
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it make you sick.

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Old 04-01-2009, 07:02 AM   #3 (permalink)
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"I've watched through his eyes, I've listened through his ears, and tell you he's the one. Or at least as close as we're going to get."

Ender's Game
Orson Scott Card
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Old 04-01-2009, 07:03 AM   #4 (permalink)
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Too many to choose from, but here's one of my many favourites—Henry James, The Europeans:
A narrow grave-yard in the heart of a bustling, indifferent city, seen from the windows of a gloomy-looking inn, is at no time an object of enlivening suggestion; and the spectacle is not at its best when the mouldy tombstones and funereal umbrage have received the ineffectual refreshment of a dull, moist snow-fall. If, while the air is thickened by this frosty drizzle, the calendar should happen to indicate that the blessed vernal season is already six weeks old, it will be admitted that no depressing influence is absent from the scene.
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—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot
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Old 04-01-2009, 08:41 AM   #5 (permalink)
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The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed
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Old 04-01-2009, 09:11 AM   #6 (permalink)
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There are so many, I can't pick just one.


"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair. " - from A Tale of Two Cities by Dickens


"Stately, plump Buck Mulligan came from the stairhead, bearing a bowl of lather on which a mirror and a razor lay crossed." - from Ulysses by James Joyce

.
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Old 04-01-2009, 09:18 AM   #7 (permalink)
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"In the beginning the universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and has been widely regarded as a bad move."

Adams - Restaurant at the End of the Universe.
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Old 04-01-2009, 09:34 AM   #8 (permalink)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Crack View Post
"I've watched through his eyes, I've listened through his ears, and tell you he's the one. Or at least as close as we're going to get."

Ender's Game
Orson Scott Card
I <3 Ender's Game.

As far as the first line of a book.. I'll have to quote my favorite when I get home, because I can't find it online.
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Old 04-01-2009, 10:33 AM   #9 (permalink)
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In the great green room
there was a telephone
and a red balloon
and a picture of...

Ingrained in my memory as a new father.
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Old 04-01-2009, 11:41 AM   #10 (permalink)
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"Testing, testing, one, two, three.
One more time, you're listening to the flight recorder on flight 2039.
And at this altitude, listen, and at this speed, with the plane empty, this is my story. And my story won't get bashed into a zillion bloody shreds and then burned with a thousand tons of burning jet. And after the plane wrecks, people will hunt down the flight recorder. And my story will survive.

And, I will live on forever."

Survivor- Chuck Palahniuk
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Old 04-01-2009, 12:06 PM   #11 (permalink)
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It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.
--Orwell, 1984

I left the following out at first because it's somewhat more than a line, but I just can't ignore it. If you pay close attention to this opening passage, the ground will dissolve below your feet.

To the as-yet-unborn, to all innocent wisps of undifferentiated nothingness: Watch out for life.
I have caught life. I have come down with life. I was a wisp of undifferentiated nothingness, and then a little peephole opened quite suddenly. Light and sound poured in. Voices began to describe me and my surroundings. Nothing they said could be appealed. They said I was a boy named Rudolph Waltz, and that was that. They said the year was 1932, and that was that. They said I was in Midland City, Ohio, and that was that.
They never shut up. Year after year they piled detail upon detail. They do it still. You know what they say now? They say the year is 1982, and that I am fifty years old.
Blah blah blah.

--Kurt Vonnegut, Deadeye Dick

Last edited by ratbastid; 04-01-2009 at 12:12 PM..
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Old 04-01-2009, 01:27 PM   #12 (permalink)
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-The False Mirror, Alan Dean Foster
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Old 04-01-2009, 01:47 PM   #13 (permalink)
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"Why is the measure of love loss..You said, 'I love you.' Why is it that the most unoriginal thing we can say to one another is still the thing we long to hear? 'I love you' is always a quotation. You did not say it first and neither did I, yet when you say it and I say it we speak like savages who have found three words and worship them. I did worship them but now I am alone on a rock hewn out of my own body."

Written on the Body - Jeanette Winterson
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Old 04-01-2009, 02:00 PM   #14 (permalink)
 
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"A green hunting cap squeezed the top of the fleshy balloon of a head."

Ignatius J. Reilly

Confederacy Of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
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Old 04-01-2009, 03:43 PM   #15 (permalink)
Life's short, gotta hurry...
 
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No one has mentioned "Call me Ishmael".........
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Old 04-02-2009, 10:10 PM   #16 (permalink)
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"The West Indies squadron lay off Bridgetown, sheltered from the north-east tradewind and basking in the brilliant sun. It was a diminished squadron, consisting of little more than the ancient Irresistible, wearing the flag of Sir William Pellew, red at the fore, and two or three battered, worn-out, unmanned sloops..."
The Reverse of the Medal - Patrick O'Brian

These lines are perhaps not as strikingly bold as those of Dickens or Orson Scott Card. However, they give me such a delicious sense of tall ships anchored in the sun-dazzled waters of Barbados, words of unpretentious jargon rumbling on about their business like fat, lazy bees, and the promise of exciting naval battles to come that I cannot escape sighing with anticipatory contentment. Aaaaahhh. In a time of term papers and final exams, it's like the apple of knowledge, the holy grail, and k.d. lang all rolled into one.... I cannot WAIT to read that book!!!
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Old 04-03-2009, 09:56 AM   #17 (permalink)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Grancey View Post
No one has mentioned "Call me Ishmael".........
Shit, that was what I was gonna say. Can't think of one thats better....

I picked up the book that is sitting on top of my PC right now.

"Dog carcass in alley this morning, tire thread on burst stomach. This city is afraid of me. I have seen its true face"
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Last edited by Strange Famous; 04-03-2009 at 09:59 AM..
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Old 04-03-2009, 10:03 AM   #18 (permalink)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Grancey View Post
No one has mentioned "Call me Ishmael".........
I must say I haven't read it. But that line is striking in its simplicity.

A few more:

Although the thread asks of "books," I'm going to take the liberty of assuming it's okay to use opening lines of poems as well....

"The Waste Land" T. S. Eliot
APRIL is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.
Winter kept us warm, covering
Earth in forgetful snow, feeding
A little life with dried tubers.
Summer surprised us, coming over the Starnbergersee
With a shower of rain; we stopped in the colonnade,
And went on in sunlight, into the Hofgarten,
And drank coffee, and talked for an hour.
"Howl" Allen Ginsberg
I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by
madness, starving hysterical naked,
dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn
looking for an angry fix,
angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly
connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night [...]
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Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot

Last edited by Baraka_Guru; 04-03-2009 at 10:12 AM..
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Old 04-03-2009, 12:07 PM   #19 (permalink)
follower of the child's crusade?
 
if you include Poems, you cant be "this be the verse" by Larkin

"They fuck you up, your mum and dad..."
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Old 04-03-2009, 03:14 PM   #20 (permalink)
Life's short, gotta hurry...
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Baraka_Guru View Post

"The Waste Land" T. S. Eliot
APRIL is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.
Winter kept us warm, covering
Earth in forgetful snow, feeding
A little life with dried tubers.
Summer surprised us, coming over the Starnbergersee
With a shower of rain; we stopped in the colonnade,
And went on in sunlight, into the Hofgarten,
And drank coffee, and talked for an hour.
This is my favorite opening line of poetry. Unfortunately, it has proven to be quite accurate.
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Old 04-03-2009, 03:39 PM   #21 (permalink)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Grancey View Post
"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair. " - from A Tale of Two Cities by Dickens
I was gonna go with that too, but here's more from Dickens:

Quote:
Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show.
from David Copperfield

And of course, what has become a cliche but which was once considered a great opening line:

Quote:
It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents, except at occasional intervals, when it was checked by a violent gust of wind which swept up the streets (for it is in London that our scene lies), rattling along the housetops, and fiercely agitating the scanty flame of the lamps that struggled against the darkness.
Edward-Bulwer Lytton, from Paul Clifford
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Old 04-03-2009, 04:51 PM   #22 (permalink)
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Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice:
It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.
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Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot
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Old 04-03-2009, 05:15 PM   #23 (permalink)
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John Varley is a sci-fi author that has always had great books with a multitude of different themes. I have yet to read a book of his that is not a page-turner.

I thought I remembered "Millenium" as having a great opening line...but I found that I no longer have the book. Browsing through his other works that I *do* still have, I found this one. It is crass compared to the other offerings here, but dammit now I have to read this book again:

Quote:
"In five years, the penis will be obsolete," said the salesman.
- Steel Beach by John Varley
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Old 04-03-2009, 05:16 PM   #24 (permalink)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Baraka_Guru View Post
Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice:
It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.
My favorite.

Seriously, when I read it, my heart starts pumping.
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Old 04-03-2009, 05:37 PM   #25 (permalink)
bad craziness
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Xazy View Post
The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed
The Winner.

Although another favorite of mine would be

Quote:
We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold.
From Hunter S. Thompsons classic Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.
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Old 04-06-2009, 10:57 PM   #26 (permalink)
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you beat me to it, but I am glad that someone remembered it...... 67 was enough for him, but perhaps not enough for us.....
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Old 04-07-2009, 03:17 AM   #27 (permalink)
 
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two others that i like:

I CALL our world Flatland, not because we call it so, but to make its nature clearer to you, my happy readers, who are privileged to live in Space.

edward abbott: flatlands, a romance in many dimensions.

It is a long trip. We are the only riders. So that is how we have come to know each other so well that the sound of his voice and image flickering over the tape recorder are as familiar to meas the movement of my intestines the sound of my breathing the beating of my heart.

william s. burroughs: the ticket that exploded

personally, i think the opening line to gravity's rainbow is the finest one ever, all the more now for having read alternatives--though i like many of the alternatives.

on moby dick: it's a great book, but there's a sense in which had ishmael just had sex with the harpoonist, it wouldn't have gotten out of the first chapter.

on jane austen: i don't get it. maybe because it seemed logical after reading her to read george eliot's middlemarch, which was interminable. a super-vivid account of a hellishly small english town. it reminded me of new hampshire. i couldn't get out of there fast enough.
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Old 04-07-2009, 03:43 AM   #28 (permalink)
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Many of the real quality openings that came to my mind have already been mentioned.

Here are a couple that I enjoy. They're nowhere near the grandiose level of, say, Dickens, but I do enjoy the way they caught my attention and thrust me into the book.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Requiem for a Dream
Harry locked his mother in the closet.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Rules of Attraction
and it's a story that might bore you but you don't have to listen, she told me, because she always knew it was going to be like that, and it was, she thinks, her first year, or, actually weekend, really a Friday, in September, at Camden, and this was three or four years ago, and she got so drunk that she ended up in bed, lost her virginity (late, she was eighteen) in Lorna Slavin's room, because she was a freshman and had a roommate and Lorna was, she remembers, a Senior or a Junior and usually sometimes at her boyfriend's place off-campus, to who she thought was a sophomore ceramics major but who was actually either some guy from N.Y.U., a film student, and up in New Hampshire just for the Dressed To Get Screwed party, or a townie.
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Old 04-07-2009, 03:58 AM   #29 (permalink)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by roachboy View Post
[...] it seemed logical after reading her to read george eliot's middlemarch, which was interminable. a super-vivid account of a hellishly small english town. it reminded me of new hampshire. i couldn't get out of there fast enough.
I tromping through it now.

Middlemarch, that is...not New Hampshire.
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Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot
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Old 04-07-2009, 07:15 AM   #30 (permalink)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Baraka_Guru View Post
I tromping through it now.

Middlemarch, that is...not New Hampshire.
Middlemarch is a slog. Wear good boots.
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Old 04-07-2009, 07:17 AM   #31 (permalink)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by snowy View Post
Middlemarch is a slog. Wear good boots.
I'm just over halfway through it.

I want to hire a coach to London.
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Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot
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Old 06-16-2009, 11:02 AM   #32 (permalink)
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Paul Auster, City of Glass:
It was a wrong number that started it, the telephone ringing three times in the dead of night, and the voice on the other end asking for someone he was not.
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Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot
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Old 06-16-2009, 11:17 AM   #33 (permalink)
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"He kept doing things without letting himself think about them. Safer that way. It was like having a circuit breaker in his head, and it thumped into place every time a part of him tried to ask: But why are you doing this?"

- Stephen King's Roadwork
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Old 06-16-2009, 01:54 PM   #34 (permalink)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Punk.of.Ages View Post
"Testing, testing, one, two, three.
One more time, you're listening to the flight recorder on flight 2039.
And at this altitude, listen, and at this speed, with the plane empty, this is my story. And my story won't get bashed into a zillion bloody shreds and then burned with a thousand tons of burning jet. And after the plane wrecks, people will hunt down the flight recorder. And my story will survive.

And, I will live on forever."

Survivor- Chuck Palahniuk
Punk beat me to it, best start I can think of that's not listed.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Baraka_Guru View Post
In my own personal experience---this is just anecdotal, mind you---I have found that there is always room to be found between boobs.
Vice-President of the CinnamonGirl Fan Club - The Meat of the Zombiesquirrel and CinnamonGirl Sandwich
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Old 06-16-2009, 02:03 PM   #35 (permalink)
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Location: ....a state of pure inebriation.
It's my favorite book ever...

The start gives me chills.
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Old 06-16-2009, 02:10 PM   #36 (permalink)
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I think Survivor trumps Fight Club any day of the week. It ranks in my top three books of all time.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Baraka_Guru View Post
In my own personal experience---this is just anecdotal, mind you---I have found that there is always room to be found between boobs.
Vice-President of the CinnamonGirl Fan Club - The Meat of the Zombiesquirrel and CinnamonGirl Sandwich
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Old 06-16-2009, 02:15 PM   #37 (permalink)
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Location: ....a state of pure inebriation.
Most definitely. Fight Club is a great book, but I'll take Survivor or Choke over it anytime.
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Old 06-16-2009, 05:27 PM   #38 (permalink)
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Iain Banks, The Wasp Factory: "I had been making the rounds of the Sacrifice Poles the day we heard my brother had escaped."
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Old 06-16-2009, 05:51 PM   #39 (permalink)
part of the problem
 
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"He was born with the gift of laughter and a sense that the world was mad."

scaramouche by raphael sabatini

there are many others, some that have already been mentioned. this is one that hasn't been mentioned that i like.
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Old 06-16-2009, 07:24 PM   #40 (permalink)
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Location: in the grave next to yours.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Bret Easton Ellis
ABANDON ALL HOPE YE WHO ENTER HERE is scrawled in blood red lettering on the side of the Chemical Bank near the corner of Eleventh and First and is in print large enough to be seen from the backseat of the cab as it lurches forward in the traffic leaving Wall Street and just as Timothy Price notices the words a bus pulls up, the advertisement for Les Miserables on its side blocking his view, but Price who is with Pierce & Pierce and twenty-six doesn't seem to care because he tells the driver he will give him five dollars to turn up the radio, "Be My Baby" on WYNN, and the driver, black, not American, does so.
~American Psycho


or a more fairly obvious choice i havn't seen mentioned:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ayn Rand
Who is John Galt?
~Atlas Shrugged
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