How cool was Will Freeman? This cool: he had slept with a woman he didn't know very well in the last three months (five points). He had spent more than three hundred pounds on a jacket (five points). He had spent more than twenty pounds on a haircut (five points) (how was it possible to spend less than twenty pounds on a haircut in 1993?) He owned more than five hip-hop albums (five points). He had taken Ecstasy (five points), but in a club and not merely at home as a sociological exercise (five bonus points)...
I have to say that I didn't like this book very much but the film was excellent.
Guess the book and then post a quote of your own Posts: 148
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quote:The sweetness was turned to adamantine, heartless cruelty and the purity to voluptuous wantonness.
I like the last two words.
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Astromariner
Going the right way for a smacked bottom
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Dracula.
quote: "But, my dear Sebastian, you can't seriously believe it all." "Can't I?" "I mean about Christmas and the star and the three kings and the ox and the ass." "Oh yes, I believe that. It's a lovely idea." "But you can't believe things because they're a lovely idea." "But I do. That's how I believe."
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So, how cool was Will Freeman then? (I've got more than five Hip Hop albums but, er, that's the only one with a tick next to it.)
As for own choice of quote, not that I'm entitled to one, I'd say:
He started forward in a straight line, and the wall of officers before him parted like the Red Sea. Glancing neither left nor right he strode indomitably up to the steam counter and, in a clear, full-bodied voice that was gruff with age and resonant with ancient eminence and authority, said: "Gimme eat."Posts: 8467
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Astromariner
Going the right way for a smacked bottom
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Dang's is Catch 22. Louche's is too hard.
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Louche
Carved TMO on her clit just to make you feel bad
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It's not difficult at all when you consider it is me what has posted it.
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Astromariner
Going the right way for a smacked bottom
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Louche
Carved TMO on her clit just to make you feel bad
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Yes. From whence else would I get a line, as though plucked from air? Although, obviously, you weren't here to witness me cock my head to the left momentarily, pluck said line from the air, then make a complete and utter UBB hash of posting the fucker.
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Astromariner
Going the right way for a smacked bottom
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I did briefly wonder what a soxophonist was.
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Louche
Carved TMO on her clit just to make you feel bad
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Someone who plays with woollen footcoverings?
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Astromariner
Going the right way for a smacked bottom
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It's quite hard to recall quotes properly, innit? How about opening/closing scenes of novels?
I mean, I'm assuming this thread is going to continue. I really don't expect to have to spend the rest of my Friday afternoon "working."
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quote:'Filleted steak for two, and a bottle of Bass.' It was the bravest act of Theodore Racksole's life, and yet at more than one previous crisis a high courage had not been lacking to him.
quote:'Filleted steak for two, and a bottle of Bass.' It was the bravest act of Theodore Racksole's life, and yet at more than one previous crisis a high courage had not been lacking to him.
The Babylon Hotel innit?
"Crack the glass of her virginity, and make the rest malleable."
quote:Originally posted by Petite: How cool was Will Freeman? This cool: he had slept with a woman he didn't know very well in the last three months (five points). He had spent more than three hundred pounds on a jacket (five points). He had spent more than twenty pounds on a haircut (five points) (how was it possible to spend less than twenty pounds on a haircut in 1993?) He owned more than five hip-hop albums (five points). He had taken Ecstasy (five points), but in a club and not merely at home as a sociological exercise (five bonus points)...
How depressing. I've never even read any Nick Hornby and yet I guessed the extract was from one of his books before I was halfway through the second sentence.
Who 'reads' this shit? I challenge anyone to come up with a more cringe-inducing passage than the above.
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quote:Originally posted by Vogon Poetess: The end of Ben Elton's Stark, which was my sig for a while, surely beats the opening paragraph of About A Boy.
In furriness, by the final page of Stark, the reader's sensibilities are so well-reamed by the formica dingus of Elton's prose that the limp pop-shot of the pay-off hardly registers.
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quote:Originally posted by Astromariner: The Duchess of Malfi?
No, not this one either. At what point do i just cough up on the name of the play? That way the forum can get on with playing the game that was going quite well until I blundered in and ruined it for everyone. Sorry, everyone.
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"Kinda 6th Formy" = reminds me of something we read then.
I thought it might have been the suitors at the beginning of Lear, but Google tells me it is a Shakespeare I haven't read, so that's hardly fair.
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This is a paraquote, as my copy of this book is on its way back from S'pain!
quote:"This will count alongside all the other bad things you done." Seria Mau screamed, "Bad things I done? Bad things I done?" She fired up the engines. "Fuck off, Moire, and take some speaking lessons."
Sorry all your quotes are too highbrigh! Although I would have got Louche's NOT JUST BECAUSE IT WAS LOUCHE.
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quote:Originally posted by Petite: How cool was Will Freeman? This cool: he had slept with a woman he didn't know very well in the last three months (five points). He had spent more than three hundred pounds on a jacket (five points). He had spent more than twenty pounds on a haircut (five points) (how was it possible to spend less than twenty pounds on a haircut in 1993?) He owned more than five hip-hop albums (five points). He had taken Ecstasy (five points), but in a club and not merely at home as a sociological exercise (five bonus points)...
How depressing. I've never even read any Nick Hornby and yet I guessed the extract was from one of his books before I was halfway through the second sentence.
Who 'reads' this shit? I challenge anyone to come up with a more cringe-inducing passage than the above.
I did make it easy, so that people who had seen the film could also take part
The fact that you don't rate the books of an author whose books you've never read doesn't really interest me. It is, however, your loss, as High Fidelity is brilliantly funny and kick started a whole load of copy cat book, an entire genre, infact.
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quote:Originally posted by Petite: It is, however, your loss, as High Fidelity ...kick started a whole load of copy cat book, an entire genre, infact.
Hold on, that isn't any indicator of quality at all. Three objections:
1. and most fundamental, if you regret the existence of the genre that one book (arguably) kick-started -- I suppose you mean "lad-lit" -- then the responsibility of that book for a slurry of other, probably even worse novels of the same type is not going to endear it to you. QUITE THE REVERSE.
2. It would be a safer bet to say that Fever Pitch started the sub-genre of "lad-lit".
3. The above quotation isn't from High Fidelity.
And the bonus number 4: Ben is, I think, quite reasonable in finding it depressing that he can identify Hornby's list-style so quickly. I haven't read About A Boy either, but the paragraph above is groaningly similar to the opening of High Fidelity. I find that pretty lame myself.
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