Book Quote of the Day

“The jagged, saw-edge teeth of the Lunar craters stood up sharply against the light of the sun but what Olga had screamed at was the globe of the Earth, swimming there huge and green in the light from that sun embedded in the black curtain of space.

But now its greenness was tarnished. Ugly fiery streaks coursed around the globe. Dense clouds drifted around the disc, giving the whole sphere a ghastly glowing penumbra. The red cracks grew as they watched and so fiery were they that even the thick masses of cloud did not obscure their fierceness.”

- When The Earth Died, by Karl Mannheim

Book Quote of the Day (my World Book Night special!)

“Beech, buche or bok, as it was called in Old High German, was the standard material for writing on. Even when wood was finally overtaken by the new-fangled invention of parchment, the Germans kept the name, and so did the English. Bok became boc became book.”

- The Etymologicon, by Mark Forsyth

Book Quote of the Day

“Ear-hair grows from a place medically known as the tragus because tragos was Greek for goat, and ear-hair resembles a goat’s beard. Ancient Athenian actors used to wear goatskin when they acted in serious plays, which is why the plays came to be known the songs of the goat, or tragedies.”

- The Etymologicon by Mark Forsyth

(Totally random, but fascinating to learn where the word “tragedy” came from!)

Book Quote of the Day

“You could run from someone you feared, you could try to fight someone you hated. All my reactions were geared toward those kinds of killers – the monsters, the enemies. When you loved the one who was killing you, it left you no options. How could you run, how could you fight, when doing so would hurt that beloved one? If your life was all you had to give your beloved, how could you not give it? If it was someone you truly loved?” 
― Stephenie Meyer, Breaking Dawn

Book Quote of the Day

“Happiness. Simple as a glass of chocolate or tortuous as the heart. Bitter. Sweet. Alive.”
― Joanne Harris, Chocolat

Book Quote of the Day

“Listen to th’ wind wutherin’ round the house,” she said. “You could bare stand up on the moor if you was out on it tonight.”
Mary did not know what “wutherin’” meant until she listened, and then she understood. It must mean that hollow shuddering sort of roar which rushed round and round the house, as if the giant no one could see were buffeting it and beating at the walls and windows to try to break in. But one knew he could not get in, and somehow it made one feel very safe and warm inside a room with a red coal fire.” 
― Frances Hodgson Burnett, The Secret Garden

Book Quote of the Day

Alice came to a fork in the road. ‘Which road do I take?’ she asked.
‘Where do you want to go?’ responded the Cheshire Cat.
‘I don’t know,’ Alice answered.
‘Then,’ said the Cat, ‘it doesn’t matter.” 
― Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland

Book Quote of the Day

“I can’t go back to yesterday because I was a different person then.” 
― Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland