“He—for there could be no doubt of his sex, though the fashion of the time did something to disguise it—was in the act of slicing at the head of a Moor which swung from the rafters.”
- Orlando, Virigina Woolf
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Pynchon, eh? I’ll see your Gravity’s Rainbow, and raise you Mason & Dixon:
Snow-Balls have flown their Arcs, starr’d the Sides of Outbuildings, as of Cousins, carried Hats away into the brisk Wind off Delaware, - the Sleds are brought in and their Runners carefully dried and greased, shoes deposited in the back Hall, a stocking’d-foot Descent made upon the great Kitchen, in a purposeful Dither since Morning, punctuated by the ringing Lids of various Boilers and Stewing-Pots, fragrant with Pie-Spices, peel’d Fruits, Suet, heated Sugar, - the Children, having all upon the Fly, among rhythmic slaps of Batter and Spoon, coax’d and stolen what they might, proceed, as upon each afternoon all this snowy Advent, to a comfortable Room at the rear of the House, years since given over to their carefree Assaults.
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I opened my eyes to see the rat take a piss in my coffee mug. It was a
huge brown bastard; had a body like a turd with legs and beady black
eyes full of secret rat knowledge. Making a smug huffing sound, it threw
itself from the table to the floor, and scuttled back into the hole in
the wall where it had spent the last three months planning new ways to
screw me around. I’d tried nailing wood over the gap in the wainscot,
but it gnawed through it and spat the pieces into my shoes. After that, I
spiked bait with warfarin, but the poison seemed to somehow cause it to
evolve and become a super-rat. I nailed it across the eyes once with a
lucky shot with the butt of my gun, but it got up again and shat in my
telephone.
Warren Ellis: Crooked little vein.
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From a little after two oclock until almost sundown of the long still
hot weary dead September afternoon they sat in what Miss Coldfield still
called the office because her father had called it that — a dim hot
airless room with the blinds all closed and fastened for forty-three
summers because when she was a girl someone had believed that light and
moving air carried heat and that dark was always cooler, and which (as
the sun shone fuller and fuller on that side of the house) became
latticed with yellow slashes full of dust motes which Quentin thought of
as being flecks of the dead old dried paint itself blown inward from
the scaling blinds as wind might have blown them.
Absalom! Absalom! by William Faulkner
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I think that Leyner is severely underrated. His stories are inspired and his prose is often exquisite. Most critiques rely upon dismissing his style as being some sort of gimmick, rather than getting into the details of his writing. I will definitely check out this Kirkus review.
“I’m going to die,” said Jones.
The statuesque tattoo artist paused between the lotuses she was applying to the arm of the space case lolling half-conscious in the chair. “What, again?”
“Don’t laugh at me, Gator.” Jones ran a skeletal hand through his nervous-breakdown hair.
“Who’s laughing? Do you see me laughing?” She shifted on her high stool and held her subject’s arm closer to the lamp. The lotus job was especially difficult, as it had to merge into a preexisting design, and her eyes were already strained from a full night’s work. “I don’t laugh at anyone who dies as often as you do. You know, someday your adrenal system is gonna tell you to fuck off, and you won’t be back. Maybe someday real soon.”
“Just as well.” Jones turned from the skull-and-roses design he’d been looking at pinned to the wall of the tent. “Keely’s gone.”
Gator lifted the needle and dabbed at the decorated flesh, frowning. The cases on the Mimosa generally had terrible skin, but they were docile enough to make a good filing system, considering you could usually find them wherever you left them - they didn’t usually move around much on their own, and unlike other kinds of hardcopy, they seldom got stolen. “What did you expect? Living with someone who keeps dying on you is bound to strain any relationship.” She looked at him with large green eyes. “Get help, Jones. You’re an addict.”
from Pat Cadigan’s Synners
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