Showing posts with label quotes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label quotes. Show all posts
Saturday, May 16, 2015
It has been said that the setting of a book is almost like another character. That is certainly true for many of my favorite novels, in which the setting evokes vivid images as well as intimate familiarity. It's like I am living the story along with the characters; I can see, hear and feel everything around me--the trickle of a stream, the soggy heat of a summer day, or the first burst of light as the sun rises. Reading a book by authors skilled at creating rich, organic environments is a treat for the senses and one of my favorite luxuries.
Below are five books that blew me away with their solid use of setting:
1. The Harry Potter Series (JK Rowling)
Well. You knew it had to be on the list. I mean, Hogwarts and Diagon Alley? Platform Nine and Three Quarters and the Room of Requirement? Obviously, JK Rowling is a master at this. While setting is typically a large part of fantasy novels, the Harry Potter books went above and beyond in this category.
"The hundreds of faces staring at them looked like pale lanterns in the flickering candlelight. Dotted here and there among the students, the ghosts shone misty silver...Harry looked upward and saw a velvety black ceiling dotted with stars."
"The hundreds of faces staring at them looked like pale lanterns in the flickering candlelight. Dotted here and there among the students, the ghosts shone misty silver...Harry looked upward and saw a velvety black ceiling dotted with stars."
-Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
2. Stolen (Lucy Christopher)
I blogged about this book last July and thinking about it still leaves me with goosebumps. The story takes place in the vast desert of the Australian Outback--a place full of venomous snakes and frantic windstorms, wild camels and open skies. This was her debut novel, yet Christopher nailed the stark beauty of the setting like a pro.
"You said you knew the perfect place to run to. A place that was empty of people, and buildings, and far, far away. A place covered in blood-red earth and sleeping life. A place longing to come alive again. It's a place for disappearing, you'd said, a place for getting lost...and for getting found."
3. The Raven Boys Series (Maggie Stiefvater)
"You said you knew the perfect place to run to. A place that was empty of people, and buildings, and far, far away. A place covered in blood-red earth and sleeping life. A place longing to come alive again. It's a place for disappearing, you'd said, a place for getting lost...and for getting found."
-Stolen: A Letter to my Captor
3. The Raven Boys Series (Maggie Stiefvater)
Small, rural Henrietta, Virginia is no longer just a speck on the map. Now, thanks to Stiefvater, it is alive with caves and farms and forests and magic. It is filled with pretentious prep school boys and psychic families and quirky, lovable characters. But always, it is the pulse of Henrietta that binds them all together."It didn't escape Blue that his slightly accented voice was as nice as his looks. It was all Henrietta sunset: hot front-porch swings and cold ice-tea glasses, cicadas louder than your thoughts."
-The Raven Boys
4. Like Mandarin (Kirsten Hubbard)
Rural Washokey, Wyoming shrugs to life in this coming-of-age novel about the allure of 'bad girl' Mandarin and her affect on 14-year-old Grace. Describing the wind-whipped landscape of Wyoming, there is much to appreciate in Hubbard's lyrical, atmospheric writing."I'd wandered through the Washokey Badlands Basin so many times I'd memorized the feeling. The forlorn boom of the wind. A sky big enough to scare an atheist into prayer. No wonder cowboys sang about being lonesome."
-Like Mandarin
5. The Twilight Saga (Stephenie Meyer)
The setting of Meyer's popular novels--rain-soaked Forks, Washington--has become so famous that it is now a real-life Twilight tourist destination. That speaks volumes about how Meyer brought this region to fame in her best-selling vampire love story."We drove south out of town. The dirt road wove in and out of the forest--sometimes there was nothing but trees, and then there would suddenly be a breathtaking glimpse of the Pacific Ocean, reaching to the horizon, dark gray under the clouds."
-New Moon
Whether done through personification or a smattering of sensory details, creating an alluring setting in any novel is a skill to be treasured. What are some of your favorite settings in books?
Saturday, March 14, 2015
Back in the early days of our blog, we posted about the importance of the first lines of a book. They serve a pretty major purpose, after all: to intrigue, draw you into the world, and (hopefully) hook you with their brilliance and lyricism.
But what about those famous -- or just really awesome -- last words? The ones that stay with you for hours, or even weeks following the end of the story. The ones that give you the flutters in your belly. Like Henry David Thoreau's from Walden: "The sun is but a morning star." Or the way Dickens ended A Tale of Two Cities: "It is a far, far better thing that I do than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known."
In the spirit of honoring all authors and all the wonderful last lines out there, I've put together a fun little quiz. I'll provide the last line and you provide the name of the book/author. (Hint: Most of these are YA books, but not all!)
List as many answers as you know (without googling them) in the comments section and you'll be entered to win your choice of one of the following two books:
THE WAY WE BARED OUR SOULS by Willa Strayhorn
As Jeff Probst would say, "Worth playing for?" Okay, let's get to it...
1. "Don't ever tell anybody anything. If you do, you start missing everybody."
2. "All was well."
3. "I squared my shoulders and walked forward to meet my fate, with my destiny solidly at my side."
4. "I wasn't sure what I could give, not just yet. But I knew when I told her about the comet, years from now, I would know. And I would lean close to her ear, saying the words no one else could hear, explaining it all. The language of solace, and comets, and the girls we all become, in the end."
5. "Isn't it pretty to think so?"
6. "Because love, it never dies, it never goes away, it never fades, so long as you hang onto it. Love can make you immortal."
7. A last note from your narrator: "I am haunted by humans"
That's it ~ have fun!
Thursday, January 30, 2014
Markus Zusak was just named the 2014 winner of the Margaret A. Edwards Award. Established in 1988, the award honors an author for significant and lasting contributions to young adult literature. Zusak's novels include FIGHTING RUBEN WOLFE, GETTING THE GIRL, I AM THE MESSENGER and, of course, THE BOOK THIEF.
Kristan’s recent post about the movie adaptation of THE BOOK THIEF inspired me to move this novel to the
top of my TBR pile. And ever since I popped into Barnes and Noble and bought a copy of it a couple of weeks ago, I have been entrenched in a series of obsessive reading
sessions that begin around midnight and last into the wee morning hours. Which
makes me think of Liesel Meminger and her papa. Which makes me smile. It’s sort
of undeniable: This is a book begging to be read by candlelight.
In my case, I settled for the dim glow of a cell phone.
There is too much to say about how good and heart-wrenching
this story is—the blog post would never end—so, like Liesel, I’m simply going to focus on the
words. Below are some of the passages I starred as I read. If you haven’t cracked open
THE BOOK THIEF yet, perhaps these lines will entice you...
When the train pulled
into the Bahnhof in Munich, the
passengers slid out as if from a torn package…p. 25
In Liesel’s mind, the
moon was sewn into the sky that night. Clouds were stitched around it...p. 57
Trust me, though, the
words were on their way, and when they arrived, Liesel would hold them in her
hands like the clouds, and she would wring them out like the rain…p. 80
It was a Monday, and
they walked on a tightrope to the sun…p. 249
The leaf was dry and
hard, like toasted bread, and there were hills and valleys all over its skin…
p. 323
The last thing I
wanted was to look down at the stranded face of my teenager. A pretty girl. Her
whole death was now ahead of her…p. 337
Outside the sirens
howled at the houses, and the people came running, hobbling, and recoiling as
they exited their homes. Night watched. Some people watched it back, trying to
find the tin-can planes as they drove across the sky…p. 372
And, finally, the line that inspired sobs:
Liesel came out. They
hugged and cried and fell to the floor…p. 548
Man, this book wrecked me. But in a good way. It’s the second
book in a year that I’ve felt compelled to hug. Except that in the case of THE
BOOK THIEF, I didn’t hug the book so much as cradle it in my arms.
How did you feel
after reading THE BOOK THIEF? We'd love it if you shared some of your favorite lines and moments, or
ideas and characters from this novel...or from any of the ALA award winners.
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Stephanie, Ingrid, Sarah & Kristan — we read, write, discuss and celebrate Young Adult lit.
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