Culture Commentary and Miscellaneous Musings
This category contains all my book reviews.
And I remembered looking back over my shoulder as we ran away, Eddie Glackin lying there alone, not a friend in sight to hold him as he bled out, and I thought what a lonely world it was for unlovable fucks like us.
page 126
As we walked arm in arm in this merry mood, wind brushed against our cheeks–a wind strong enough to lift bougainvillea blossoms off their branches. Did that mean we, too, were characters in a shojo romance?
page 129
But Lucy couldn’t bear to cut down her book collection. How could she when there were so many interesting novels to read in this world, and more coming out every year?
page 91, Chapter 9
I felt it sometimes when biting into a slice of garden-grown cucumber marinated in balsamic or diving into the ever-cool waters of the spring, how the state mounted a threat to our joy, how the state seemed increasingly to want to destroy it, and how we, therefore, guarded the joy more steadfastly.
page 6
“Yes, I have thought about it. In fact, I’ve thought about it a great deal. And I’ve asked others about it. But I don’t know if I have an answer either. Other than this. It might not make a lot of sense, but for anything to be good, truly good, there must be love in it. I’m not even sure I know fully what that means, but the older I get, the more I believe it.
There must be love for the gift itself, love for the subject being depicted or the story being told, and love for the audience. Whether the art is sculpture, farming, teaching, lawmaking, medicine, music, or raising a child, if love is not in it — at the very heart of it —it might be skillful, marketable, or popular but I doubt it is truly good. Nothing is what it’s supposed to be if love is not at the core.
page 119, Chapter 21