I’m putting a different spin on the quote of the week today. I saw this game on Facebook a month or so ago and thought it would be fun to do here.
These are the rules: Grab the book nearest you right now. Turn to page 56. Find the 5th sentence. Post that sentence, along with the book’s title and author, as a comment. Don’t dig for your favorite book, the coolest or the most intellectual. Use the closest book.
“A movie begins to play in my head, with emotion pulsing underneath it, and I stare at it in a trancelike state, until words bounce around together and form a sentence.”
~ Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life, by Anne Lamott
Tags: quote
“I ached.”
The Lovely Bones
Wow, Mandy. Only two words, but that is such a great summary of that book. What a coincidence.
“Mira el espectro! Perhaps the ghost will pass right through these walls.”
The DaVinci Code by Dan Brown
Thanks, Sami!
But do not capitalize these derivations if they are used as integral elements of compound words having their own distinct meanings: chinese red (i.e., a specific shade of red); moroccan leather (i.e., a specific kind of leather)
The American Heritage Dictionary, Second College Edition
“I find that there is nothing barbarous and savage in this nation, by anything that I can gather, excepting, that every one gives the title of barbarism to everything that is not in use in his own country.”
Early American Writings
Giles Gunn, ed.
Knead lightly for 5 to 8 minutes until the dough smooth, satiny, elastic to the touch, and stiff enough that it will not stick to a clean board.
23rd Revision Practical Cookery
Department of Foods and Nutrition
College of Home Economics
Kansas State Universtiy
“The script gets the value for variable $month by tapping into one of PHP’s numerous built-in date function; date (“n”) returns a value equal to the numerical equivalent of the month as set in your server, such as 1 for January, 2 for February, and so on”
Beginning PHP5, Apache, MySQL Web Development
Elizabeth Naraore, Jason Gerner, Yann Le Scouranec, Jeremy Stolz and Michael K. Glass
This is how I go to sleep at night…
(Sorry, couldn’t resist…)
Love it, Keri! If I had been at the office, mine would have probably been from Grammar Girl or something.
Okay, Melissa, I had to read this post twice to be sure I understood. It’s been a long time since I was in school!
I assume we’re talking bread dough, Dixie. Right? I never thought about what wonderfully descriptive words can be found in cookbooks until reading this post.
Yikes, admin/Todd.
That’s a gem. I should borrow it for a little light reading.
“John says I mustn’t lose my strength, and has me take cod liver oil and lots of tonics and things, to say nothing of ale and wine and rare meat.”
The Yellow Wall-Paper. Charlotte Perkins Gilman
“And to himself: He began it without me.”
King Hereafter by Dorothy Dunnett
“He realized the balloon was now so high it had reached thin air, and he and Glaisher were not getting enough oxygen.”
the 1985 Childcraft Annual, entitled “Conquest of the Sky”; no authors credited
Many people read one word at a time in the mistaken belief that they must only move on to the next word when they have “understood” it.
Previous post from : Mind Games by Michael Powell
The Childcraft Annual! I haven’t thought about those books in years. My sister and I used those books to play school. Actually, my mom probably still has the 1985 annual. Thanks, Karen.
Ha, ha, David! This may have been me trying to read Melissa’s post – focusing on each word instead of the entire phrase or idea. Thanks.
“It was, in short, a thing of wonder and grandeur-the finest technological marvel in Des Moines aside from the atomic toilets at Bishop’s cafeteria, which obviously were in a league of their own.”
The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid by Bill Bryson
“Would I live to see the sunset tomorrow?”
With The Old Breed by E.B. Sledge
Love it – “atomic toilets.” I didn’t know you were reading this, too. It looks funny.
Wow, Kody. Just a few words can carry so much meaning.
[...] In all my reading this week, there wasn’t one sentence that seemed worthy of being named “quote of the week.” So I thought it would be fun to do another game. This one is similar to a quote game we played earlier in the month. [...]