"Casterly Rock was hers now, and all the power of House Lannister."
-A Feast for Crows
-George R.R. Martin, A Clash of Kings
"The gate stood open, but the court was empty."
--"Shadows in Zamboula," as published in Conan the Wanderer
Well, at least it's not in passive voice.
"The capture of Nicaea marked the high point of Greco-Frankish cooperation during the First Crusade"
-Thomas Asbridge, The Crusades: The Authoritative History of the War for the Holy Land
-George R.R. Martin, A Storm of Swords
Other males threw daggers at the target on the wall with a blithe disregard for the safety of those standing near their mark.
Dissolution, Richard Baker
*waits for the REH fans to send their death threats*
I hope you won't be disappointed if instead I reiterate my opinion that the only Conan stories worth reading are the ones written by Roy Thomas for Marvel's comic book lines. ;)
Don't worry, KJ, REH has already threatened that CH will be gotten.
"Dunworthy waited pointedly for the porter to finish arranging the garland and write the number of the call box down, which he finally did, scribbling it on the lid of a box of ornaments."
--Connie Willis, The Doomsday Book
"What else was in there?"
-- Tad Williams, The War of the Flowers
"When confronted with a dangerous enemy, it often turns invisible and either attacks a less threatening enemy or flees, allowing its allies to do the fighting."
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"The man turns General Staffs to pudding, for God's sake."
--Lois McMaster Bujold, The Warrior's Apprentice
"Upon hearing this, absolutely nobody was enlightened. Primarily because nobody could understand Chinese."
~ Principia Discordia
"'I didn't be thinkin' it was time for trickin' an' treatin' so soon,'" said Spam."
Harvard Lampoon's Bored of the Rings which is nowhere near as good as the end of the chapter which reads:
"Already it was beginning to work its slow change upon him, the transformation of which Dildo had warned. He was constipated."
Hee hee!
"Open a newspaper, today or any day for the rest of your life, and you will witness failures of human cooperation, great and small, announced from every corner of the world."
Sam Harris, The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values
"'I didn't be thinkin' it was time for trickin' an' treatin' so soon,'" said Spam."
Harvard Lampoon's Bored of the Rings which is nowhere near as good as the end of the chapter which reads:
"Already it was beginning to work its slow change upon him, the transformation of which Dildo had warned. He was constipated."
Hee hee!
You know, I have to say, that as far as ironic social commentary from the edgy Gonzo Culture of the late 'sixties is concerned, BotR stands out as perhaps the most brainless turd ever to be vomited forth. It has to be the most idiotic, humorless, and, ironically, boring piece of failed parody I've ever had the displeasure of reading.
Understand, I can lampoon LotR with the best of them. I adore Tolkien, but that doesn't blind me to what is also unintentionally humorous about his work. And I can also overlook the dated nature of something from 1969. Being a child of the counter culture movement, I had plenty of old issues of MAD, High Times, National Lampoon, you name it, sitting around for me to get historical with.
But Bored of the Rings fails on every single level. It is obvious, unfunny, uninspired, dated, and insipid. I nearly puked from boredom reading it. It reminds me of Bruunwald's First Rule of Bad Movie Making: never include scenes from a better movie in your own crappy movie (for instance, never show your protagonists watching Casablanca on TV just before their awkward first kiss scene). Likewise, never include the word "bored" in the title of your effort to lampoon something boring to you, if you are yourselves incapable of anything but the most boring, insipid crap.
And yes, I know the "authors" went on to found National Lampoon (still the more edgy but far less funny little brother of MAD - I'm talking MAD from its glory days of the 'sixties into the early 'eighties), but that can hardly be a measure of their talent. When you've got people ranging from P. J. O'Rourke to Gahan Wilson, to Richard Belzer on your payroll, you're going to be successful. Give them the credit.
Okay, you are all now released from my rant.
Can't hate that book enough.
stuff
Yeah, it's not very good. But it was only 50 cents at the library sale and it serves to cleanse the pallette between heavy and heady doses of Charles Robert Maturin and Connie Willis.
Also, it's funnier if you're high.
"Clockwork leviathans are 25 feet long and weigh just over 3 tons."
Bestiary 3, Jason Bulmahn, et. al.
"I had long ago decided that I should never open that book, and nothing on earth could have persuaded me to buy it."
~ The King in Yellow by Robert W. Chambers
"This cloud was in motion; it rotated, and as it whirled it contracted."
"She returned to her own dais, because that was at least more dignified for a queen than grovelling on the floor at the feet of a sorcerer, and eyed him apprehensively, expecting reprisals."
REH. "The People of the Black Circle" is on page 55 of both Conan the Adventurer and The Bloody Crown of Conan, respectively.
"The flail snails attacked with gusto."
from All Things Mighty by S. Wintergreen.
.
"'He would be pleased, of course, to see the cult of Set exalted and that of Mitra cast down.'"
Talking about Thoth-Amon, Conan the Buccaneer by L. Sprague deCamp and Lin Carter.
"He even insisted on and helped design new uniforms that would abolish the old distinction between gentleman and commoner officers."
Talking about Louis XVI, Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution by Simon Schama. Vive le Galt!
"The Solidarnosc leadership is under pressure from their most responsible members, as well as sympathetic intellectuals and bureaucrats, to come up with some positive program to get out of the economic crisis."
Talking about Lech Walesa, "Solidarity Leaders Against Planned Economy--'Market Socialism' Is Anti-Socialist, article in the pamphlet Solidarnosc: Polish Company Union for CIA and Bankers republished in third bound volume of Spartacist, theoretical organ of the International Communust League (Fourth Internationalist). Vive le Galt!!
"She starts, sensibly enough, by Googling herself: She goes to www.google.com and types in her full name."
Born Digital, John Palfrey and Urs Gasser
"But that would only make the evil part of him angrier in the end -- unless it could be conquered. Unless it could be cured."
J.R.R. Tolkien, Lord of the Rings, 50th anniversary edition
Gary McBride
Fire Mountain Games
"'Oh, of course: common sense is what you're both bound to base your argument on, whichever way you argue.'"
The Glimpses of the Moon by Edith Wharton, but check this out:
If you take out the spoiler, it could be about trolling!!
Not the fifth sentence on page fifty-five, but:
"'By Frigga's teats and Shaitan's fiery member!'"
'I don't need my throat any longer.'
Fletcher to the Jaffe
The Great and Secret Show -- Clive Barker --
Since the story I'm currently reading only goes up to page 42, going with half of 55, thus the 5th sentence on page 27 reads:
"They were, he declared later in his manuscript, the most terrible objective entities he ever saw in his life, either in K’n-yan or in the outer world."
~ The Mound by H. P. Lovecraft and Zelia Bishop
Ai! Ai! Ai!
"You know."
Machine Man, by Max Barry
"The thing bent down, picked up the dart by its tip, and with a deep chuckle casually flung it back the way it had come."
Throwing darts, even poisoned ones, at daemons is rarely effective. Gary Gygax, City of Hawks
"A constitution had to be drawn up."
--J.M. Thompson, Robespierre and the French Revolution
Vive le Galt!!
Leon Trotsky's The Rhythm of Struggle didn't have 55 pages, unfortunately.
"A jungle of tall trees and unique plants occupies most of central and eastern Sametia." NeoExodus: A House Divided Campaign Setting
This game would be so much cooler if we did Predicate-Nominative. :)
For example... from the previous two...
"Hands slightly trembling, he occupies most of central and eastern Sametia."
I don't get it.
Mix the sentences... =)