Librarians Show Quotes

He checked out his surrounding. More books. A drinking fountain. A poster showing a guy slam-dunking a basketball with one hand and holding a book in the other, urging kids to READ! Weird, thought Steve. How can he even see the hoop? ... You see, Steven, Librarians are the most elite, best trained secret force in the United States of America. Probably in the world." "No way." "Yes way." "What about the FBI?" "Featherweights." "The CIA?" Mackintosh snorted. "Don't make me laugh. Those guys can't even dunk a basketball andd read a book at the same time.

Perhaps that is the draw of books.” James put his hand over hers. “To show us the way even when we think the path is too dark to see.

One day, Belle, we will be able to reach back through the decades and claim you as one of our own. Your accomplishments will be part of history; they’ll show doubtful white people what colored people can do. Until that time, live your life proudly.

I’d like to take this opportunity to point out something important. Should a strange old man of questionable sanity show up at your door – suggesting that he is your grandfather and that you should accompany him upon some quest of mystical import – you should flatly refuse him. Don’t take his candy either.

I'm a librarian in town,' she began. 'You sure about that?' The words popped out before he could stop them. Annabelle raised her eyebrows. 'Fairly. It's my job and so far no one has told me to go away when I show up for work.' smooth, Stryker, he thought, very smooth. 'I was expecting someone wearing glasses. You know. Because librarians read a lot.' The raised eyebrows turned into a frown. 'You need to get out of the barn more.

Somhow those Ten Men -- at the time they were called Recruiters, of course -- discovered that Constance had been at the library. Most likely one of their informants saw her come out, because it was on that very day that the brutes showed up and threatened the librarians. Who told them nothing, incidentally.' 'The same thing happened in Holland,' Kate reflected. 'You'd think these guys would learn their lesson -- librarians know how to keep quiet.' 'It helps to ask politely,' said Mr. Benedict

History shows that erections happen at the worst possible times, and they stick around until someone else notices them. Often, it is either a librarian or an English teacher, like Mrs. Edith Mitchell.

A fantastic librarian can help you find what you are looking for, and not just if it is a book. A fantastic librarian can help you find a hobby or an occupation, a cure or a challenge, a quiet fact or a loud opinion, or a small town where you might hide for months. A fantastic librarian knows more about what you are looking for than you do, the way a cookie in a bakery knows you want to eat it before you even know it is out of the oven, and like a good cookie, a fantastic librarian doesn’t show off about it, just waits silently for you to open your mouth.

When I get nervous, I go to the library and hang around. The libraries are filled with people who are nervous. You can blend in with them there. You're bound to see someone more nervous than you are in a library. Sometimes the librarians themselves are more nervous than you are. I'll probably be a librarian for that reason. Then if I'm nervous on the job, it won't show. I'll just stamp books and look things up for people and run back and forth to the staff room sneaking smokes until I get hold of myself. A library is a great place to hid.

I just want to build the set for the show and be secretly in love with Ryan and not have to fight demons.

A person waiting for you somewhere is like a match you strike at night in the countryside. It may not be able to light up everything, but it does show you the way back home.

"Librarians and teachers saved me and my mind. Huck showed me it wasn’t only me, but Tom is who I wished I was." - April (does feral sometimes) Gavey

This school has a mission over and above the one of pure education: to convey a certain sense of normalcy to them, prevent them from becoming disheartened, and show them that life goes on.

I love to sketch but am too embarrassed to show anyone. I won a national championship my senior year, the Heisman when I was a junior. I’m actually . . . shy. Dwight Schrute from The Office makes me laugh until I cry. And recently, I’ve discovered I have an insatiable penchant for hot librarians.

After the jubilation of victory and the celebrations marking the end of the war, after the dances organized by the Allied forces and the pompous speeches, postwar reality shows itself for what it is: mute, harsh, and without fanfare... The reality behind peace is that in front of her is a country in ruins.

Mae Brussell began to study the pattern of Nazis coming to the United States after World War Two and patterns of murders identical to those in Nazi Germany. It was as if an early Lenny Bruce bit—on how a show-bit booking agency, MCA, chose Adolf Hitler as dictator—had actually been a satirical prophecy of the way Richard Nixon would rise to power. “How much violence was there in Nazi Germany,” Mae asks rhetorically, “before the old Germany, the center of theater, opera, philosophy, poetry, psychology and medicine, was destroyed? How many incidents took place that were not coincidental before it was called Fascism? What were the transitions? How many people? Was it when the first tailor disappeared? Or librarian? Or professor? Or when the first press was closed or the first song eliminated? Or when the first political science teacher was killed coming home on his bike? How many incidents happened there that were perfectly normal until people woke up and said, ‘Hey, we’re in a police state!

Books, however, are just one part of a library. A proper library has at least one fantastic librarian, preferably more than one, so if the fantastic librarian goes out to lunch or falls into a tar pit, there will be a spare. A fantastic librarian can help you find what you are looking for, and not just if it is a book. A fantastic librarian can help you find a hobby or an occupation, a cure or a challenge, a quiet fact or a loud opinion, or a small town where you might hide for months. A fantastic librarian knows more about what you are looking for than you do, the way a cookie in a bakery knows you want to eat it before you even know it is out of the oven, and like a good cookie, a fantastic librarian doesn't show off about it, just waits silently for you to open your mouth.

what else would you do with your life? Finish your book? Or, like most people, be content being babysat, left to watch and generally obsess about sports and entertainment stars? It’s all fluff. People waste their lives on fluff.” Nelson opened a view into his INU. “But you’re one of the bright ones, aren’t you? You follow politics and the news. Well, I have some news for you. It’s theatre. Sports heroes, film celebrities, rock stars, politicians, controversies of all sorts on the news, they’re all just different channels of the same show. Distract and keep happy.” “What

What’s stopping me is I’m a Dahlite, a heatsinker on Dahl. I don’t have the money to get an education and I can’t get the credits to get an education. A real education, I mean. All they taught me was to read and cipher and use a computer and then I knew enough to be a heatsinker. But I wanted more. So I taught myself.” “In some ways, that’s the best kind of teaching. How did you do that?” “I knew a librarian. She was willing to help me. She was a very nice woman and she showed me how to use computers for learning mathematics. And she set up a software system that would connect me with other libraries.

Miss Rudy, the former Harmony librarian, had single-handedly held off a siege of the town council bent on cutting her funds. She had locked the library doors and hid the only key in her bra, living on water from the toilet tank after the town had shut off water to the building to drive her out. She ate paste to keep up her strength. Oh, they had underestimated her. On the fourth day, the men of the council had capitulated, apologizing for cutting the funds, begging her to open the doors and come out. But she had stayed in the library an extra day, just to show them one could live on books, then marched out at noon on the fifth day, her head held high, and three pounds heavier. She had gained weight! When word got out, her picture made the cover of American Libraries magazine. Admiring letters poured in from librarians around the world – beaten down, beleaguered librarians who had drawn strength from her bravery. She answered each one in flowing, Palmer-method, handwritten script.

He liked how brave she was—that dauntless courage she’d had when she faced off against Gargoyle at the trials. The lack of hesitation to chase after Hawthorn or take out the Detonator. The bravery that veered just a bit toward recklessness. Sometimes he wished he could be more like her, always so confident in her own motivations that she didn’t mind bending the rules from time to time. That’s how Adrian felt when he was the Sentinel. His conviction that he knew what was right gave him the courage to act, even when he would have hesitated as Adrian or Sketch. But Nova never hesitated. Her compass never seemed to falter. He liked that she defied the rules of their society—refusing to bend for the Council, when so many others would have been falling over themselves to impress them. Refusing to apologize for their decision to go after the Librarian, despite the protocols, because she believed wholeheartedly that they made the right choice with the options they’d been given. He liked that she’d destroyed him at every one of those carnival games. He liked that she hadn’t flinched when he brought a dinosaur to life in the palm of her hand. He liked that she’d raced into the quarantine to help Max, despite having no clue what she was going to do when she got there, only that she had to do something. He liked that she showed compassion for Max, sometimes even indignation for the way his ability was being used—but never pity. He even liked the way she feigned enthusiasm for things like the Sidekick Olympics, when it was clear she would have rather been doing just about anything else. But no matter how long the growing list of things that attracted him to Nova McLain had become, he still found her feelings toward him to be a mystery, with an annoying shortage of evidence to support the theory that maybe, just maybe, she sort of liked him too. A smile here. A blush there. It was an infuriatingly short list. He was probably reading into things. It didn’t matter, he told himself again and again. He couldn’t risk getting too close to anyone right now.

I still felt a little bit sick for needing the help of a Librarian. It was frustrating. Terribly frustrating. In fact, I don’t think I can accurately—through text—show you just how frustrating it was. But because I love you, I’m going to try anyway. Let’s start by randomly capitalizing letters. “We cAn SenD fOr a draGOn to cArry us,” SinG saId As we burst oUt oF the stAirWeLL and ruSHED tHrough ThE roOm aBovE. “ThAT wILl taKe tOO Long,” BaStiLlE saiD. “We’Ll haVe To graB a VeHiCle oFf thE STrEet,” I sAid. (You know what, that’s not nearly frustrating enough. I’m going to have to start adding in random punctuation marks too.) We c! RoS-Sed thrOu? gH t% he Gra## ND e ` nt < Ry > WaY at “A” de-aD Ru) n. OnC $ e oUts/ iDE, I Co* Uld sEe T ^ haT the suN wa + S nEar to s = Ett = ING—it w.O.u.l.d Onl > y bE a co@ uPle of HoU[ rs unTi ^ L the tR} e} atY RATiF ~ iCATiON ha, pPenEd. We nEeDeD!! to bE QuicK?.? UnFOrTu() nAtelY, tHE! re weRe no C? arriA-ges on tHe rOa ^ D for U/ s to cOmMan > < dEer. Not a ON ~ e ~. THerE w + eRe pe/\ Ople wa | lK | Ing aBoUt, BU? t no caRr# iaGes. (Okay, you know what? That’s not frustrating enough either. Let’s start replacing some random vowels with the letter Q.) I lqOk-eD arO! qnD, dE# sPqrA# te, fRq? sTr/ Ated (like you, hopefully), anD aNn | qYeD. Jq! St eaR& lIer, tHqr ^ E hq.d BeeN DoZen! S of cq? RrIqgEs on The rQA! d! No-W tHqRe wA = Sn’t a SqnGl + e oN ^ q. “ThE_rQ!” I eXclai $ mqd, poIntIng. Mqv = Ing do ~ Wn th_e RqaD! a shoRt diStq + + nCe aWay < wAs > a sTrANgq gLaSs cqnTrAPtion. I waSN’t CqrTain What it wAs >, bUt It w! qs MoV? ing—aND s% qmewhat quIc: =) Kly. “LeT’s G_q gRA? b iT!

Although the Library of Congress contains a wonderful law library and major universities have rich law school collections, there is no comprehensive map that shows where legal materials are preserved for the long run. One problem is deciding who exactly is going to do the preservation—and determining whether that party is doing it properly. Another big problem that collaborators need to address is how to locate and provide access to materials in archives, large and small, across the country. Once located, librarians can focus on providing the context and service that they are so good at.

We can pick up the minimalist attitude to reading in early visual depictions of one of the heroes of Christian scholarship, St Jerome – who was by all accounts the supreme intellect of Christendom, who translated the Greek and Hebrew portions of the Bible into Latin, wrote a large number of commentaries on scripture and is now the patron saint of libraries and librarians. But despite all his scholarly efforts, when it came to showing where and how St Jerome worked, a detail stands out: there are almost no books in his famous study. Strikingly, the most intelligent and thoughtful intellectual of the early church seems to have read fewer things than an average modern eight year old.

Sadye Pryor is a pillar of the Pensacola Mt. Zion Baptist Church. I myself see the inside of a church only when there’s a funeral. Aunt Sadye wears glasses and frumpy sack dresses and looks studious. I was born dapper and will die dapper; I don’t wear the reading spectacles I need. She is a librarian who’s known for raising her eyebrows to get students to quiet down. I am a show producer known for raising my eyebrows to get kids to project louder. Yes, presidents of Motown PTAs have been known to question whether I am a fit example for our young ones, because I consort with show folk and gamblers and others associated with nightlife. Sadye Pryor maintains perfectly proper associates (fellow board members of the YWCA, members of the Eastern Star lodge she leads, fellow Sunday School teachers) and is lauded as an example of PTA-praiseworthy deportment. In Pensacola, indeed across Florida, and all around these United States. Sadye was born a virgin and by choice will likely die a virgin. Some folks call me the old reprobate.

You follow politics and the news. Well, I have some news for you. It’s theatre. Sports heroes, film celebrities, rock stars, politicians, controversies of all sorts on the news, they’re all just different channels of the same show. Distract and keep happy.

You think you’ll make it in the world, working as a deputy in a Podunk county? You don’t appreciate how cruel and unforgiving the world is.” Uncle Truman and Aunt Louise took Thomas in as always. Truman was Mom’s brother, and he’d worked as a prison guard in Auburn, New York, though the man’s sleepy eyes and easy going demeanor made him a better fit for a librarian job. “Don’t take it to heart,” Uncle Truman had told him, sitting beside Thomas on the twin mattress as Aunt Louise carried an armful of sheets and blankets from the house. “They love you.” “They have a funny way of showing it.” Truman sighed and patted Thomas’s knee as though he was still in grade school. “Your father

Any experienced librarian will tell you that much of what is found among their shelves defies classification. Most often by virtue of being many things at once. Sometimes those categories show only minimal overlap, and sometimes, as with “hero” and “villain,” they are almost entirely the same thing. Who Indexes the Indexers?, by M. L. K. Dewey

Nope. I’m a librarian. You’re the cop. It’s none of my damn business why people are here. I just show them how to access information and do good research.

You’ll have to have a sponge bath before we go on, Mr. Fairfax. There’s a question of infection here.” To her surprise, the recalcitrant visitor was looking at her in a different way—his hazel eyes were twinkling with weary mischief, and his voice was lower. Smoother. “How much does that cost? A sponge bath, I mean?” Emma frowned, puzzled. “Cost?” Fairfax smiled at her, showing that fine set of teeth Emma remembered from their earlier encounter. He looked rather like a gentleman when he did that, instead of a trail bum down on his luck. “You know.” Emma had no time to debate. “I’m sorry,” she said, on her way out the door. “I’m afraid I don’t.” She left the room again and came back soon after with a basin of hot water, soap, a washcloth and a towel. “You really are a great deal of trouble, Mr. Fairfax.” “Steven,” he corrected. Emma looked at him in confusion. “Steven.” “May I call you Emma?” “No,” Emma replied, uncomfortable with his familiarity. “You certainly may not. It wouldn’t be proper.” He grinned as though she’d said something funny. “Proper?” he repeated, and he chuckled. Emma lathered up the washcloth and set about cleaning him up as best she could. Of course, she wasn’t about to deal with any part of his anatomy besides his arms and chest. “There’s money over there, in the pocket of my coat,” he said, when Emma was rinsing away the soap. “Good,” Emma said disinterestedly. “You’ll want to buy yourself another set of clothes. I’d be glad to do that for you on my way home from the library tomorrow.” He watched her, his eyes dancing in his wan face. “How long have you been working here?” She wrung out the washcloth. “Working here? I don’t work here—I’m the town librarian. This is my home.” At that Steven gave a hoarse cough of laughter. “You’re a librarian? That’s a new one.” Emma was cutting a sheet into strips. “A new what?” “Listen, when you’re through with these bandages, I could use a little comforting.” She

The expression in Steven’s eyes showed both understanding and amusement, and he watched with undisguised interest as Emma hastily covered her still-pulsing bosom. “I know,” he sighed, with a crooked, teasing grin. “You’re not that kind of girl.” Emma knew her face was crimson with embarrassment and umbrage, and only then, when it was too late, did she think to do her buttoning with her back turned. “I most certainly am not!” “You liked it,” Steven said, settling back with a smug sigh. “And from now until the day I take you, you’re going to be wondering what else I might have made you feel.” “You are insufferably arrogant, Mr. Fairfax!” “But right, nonetheless,” he responded easily. And then he had the bald effrontery to yawn. “You’re all warm and wet, and certain parts of you are feeling downright disappointed, whether you’ll admit to the fact or not.” A lame protest died in her throat. Everything Steven said was true, and she couldn’t deny it because she knew he’d see through the lie. “Emma the librarian,” he said huskily. Then he chuckled as though he found her occupation extraordinarily humorous. Emma’s knees felt weak as noodles, and a soft whimper rose in her throat at the brazen truth of his words. She swallowed it. “You overestimate your appeal, Mr. Fairfax,” she said. And then she turned on one heel and left the room, slamming the door shut behind her. Only

Kestrel set her cup on its saucer. “I didn’t ask to see you,” she said. “Too bad.” Arin claimed the chair across from her table in the library in a manner unbearably familiar to her. It was as if the chair had always been his. He slouched in his seat, tipped his head back, and looked at her from beneath lowered lids. The morning light fired his profile. “Worried, Lady Kestrel?” He spoke in Valorian, his accent roughening his voice. He always pronounced his r’s too low in his throat, so that when he spoke in her tongue everything came across as a soft growl. “Dreading what I’ll say…or do?” He smiled a grim little smile. “No need. I’ll be the perfect gentleman.” He tugged at his cuffs. It was only then that Kestrel noticed that they came too short on his arms and showed his wrists. It pained her to see his self-consciousness, the way it had suddenly revealed itself. In this light, his gray eyes were too clear. His posture had been confident. His words had had an edge. But his eyes were uncertain. Arin fidgeted again with his cuffs as if there was something wrong with them--with him. No, she would have said. You’re perfect, she wanted to say. She imagined it: how she would reach out to touch Arin’s bare wrist. That could lead nowhere good. She was nervous, she was cold. Her stomach was a flurry of snow. She dropped her hands to her lap. “No one’s here anyway,” Arin said, “and the librarians are in the stacks. You’re safe enough.” It was too early for courtiers to be in the library. Kestrel had counted on this, and on the fact that if anyone did turn up and saw her with the Herrani minister of agriculture, such a meeting would excite little interest. One with Arin, however, was an entirely different story. It was frustrating: his uncanny ability to unsettle her plans--and her very sense of self. She said, “Pressing where you’re not invited seems to be a habit with you.” “And yours is to put people in their place. But people aren’t gaming pieces. You can’t arrange them to suit yourself.” A librarian coughed. “Lower your voice,” Kestrel hissed at Arin. “Stop being so--” “Inconvenient?” “Frankly, yes.” His smile came: quick, true, surprised by itself. Then changing, and slow. “I could be worse.” “I am sure.” “I could tell you how.” “Arin, how is it for you here, in the capital?” He held her gaze. “I would rather talk about what we were talking about.” “Arin, how is it for you here, in the capital?” He held her gaze. “I would rather talk about what we were talking about.” She arranged her fingers along the studs that pinned green leather to the tabletop. She felt each cool, small, hard nail. The silence inside her was like those nails. What it held down was something sheer: a feeling like fragile silk, billowing up at the sound of his voice. If she and Arin were to talk about what they had been talking about, that silk could tear free. It would float up. It would catch the light, and cast a colored shadow. What color would it be, Kestrel wondered, the silk of what she felt? What would it be like to let it go, let it canopy above her?

Modern art is a waste of time. When the zombies show up, you can't worry about art. Art is for people who aren't worried about zombies. Besides zombies and icebergs, there are other things that Soap has been thinking about. Tsunamis, earthquakes, Nazi dentists, killer bees, army ants, black plague, old people, divorce lawyers, sorority girls, Jimmy Carter, giant quids, rabid foxes, strange dogs, new anchors, child actors, fascists, narcissists, psychologists, ax murderers, unrequited love, footnotes, zeppelins, the Holy Ghost, Catholic priests, John Lennon, chemistry teachers, redheaded men with British accents, librarians, spiders, nature books with photographs of spiders in them, darkness, teachers, swimming pools, smart girls, pretty girls, rich girls, angry girls, tall girls, nice girls, girls with superpowers, giant lizards, blind dates who turn out to have narcolepsy, angry monkeys, feminine hygiene commercials, sitcoms about aliens, things under the bed, contact lenses, ninjas, performances artists, mummies, spontaneous combustion, Soap has been afraid of all of these things at one time or another, Ever since he went to prison, he's realized that he doesn't have to be afraid. All he has to do is come up with a plan. Be prepared. It's just like the Boy Scouts, except you have to be even more prepared. You have to prepare for everything that the Boy Scouts didn't prepare you for, which is pretty much everything.

Nik loved the library, but it went beyond the books; he enjoyed the solitude. In the library, nobody expected him to be strong, or brave, or daring. No need for wrestling to prove he was tougher, no showing teeth to keep other kids from thinking they could get the better of him.

In her country drives she had killed more chickens than a hotel kitchen. I had never been in a crowd this big. I felt like a grain of wheat in a box of rat droppings. “To my thinking, a great librarian must have a clear head, a strong hand and, above all, a great heart. And when I look into the future, I am inclined to think that most of the men who will achieve this greatness will be women.” About the best we could do was keep our heads down and our hopes small. I saw that it took a lady to show a boy how to be a gentleman. There wasn't a cloud in the summer sky and the corn was knee-high by the Fourth of July. It was like first morning of Creation. Pride strengthens a woman, but weakens a man.

A male who can show the strength of his heart and devotion without worrying about the outward appearance is worthy of admiration,

A warning: If you rip, tear, shred, bend, fold, deface, disfigure, smear, smudge, throw, drop, or in any other manner damage, mistreat, or show lack of respect towards this book, the consequences will be as awful as it is within my power to make them. - Irma Pince, Hogwarts Librarian

Another murder took place on September 17, 1898, when a young woman, Sarah Ware, suddenly disappeared. Two weeks later her mutilated, beheaded and badly decomposed body was found on Miles Lane, just northeast of the town center. In this case, a shop owner, William Treworgy, was arrested for the crime, but was never convicted. Over a century later, during the winter of 2008, Emeric Spooner, an amateur investigator and the author of In Search of Maine Urban Legends, with an interest in the paranormal, reopened the investigation. Being a librarian at the Buck Memorial Library, he had ready access to many of the original files regarding the case. What concerned him most was that no one was ever convicted of the gruesome crime and that what had happened to Sarah Ware was all but forgotten. What was left was just a faded headstone on a pauper’s grave. Searching through all of the available documents and news articles, Spooner pieced together the scraps representative of Sarah Ware’s life. He found a solitary photograph showing her with another woman and two children. He discovered that Ware had been a divorced mother with four children, who had worked hard for a local storeowner, named as none other than William Treworgy. Moreover, Spooner discovered that she had lent Mister Treworgy money out of her meager paycheck. What the court had ignored, Spooner found to be of interest and definite relevance. At the time of the murder, a detective from Lewiston and one from Bangor were called in to investigate the case. They discovered a bloody hammer engraved with the initials “W.T.T.” and a tarp with blood on it in Treworgy's wagon. Another man came forth and testified that Treworgy had paid him to move a body to a nearby swamp. Four years after the murder, the case finally was tried in court. By this time both the bloody hammer and the tarp were nowhere to be found and the man, who had claimed Treworgy had paid him to move a body, recanted. He asserted that a town selectman and some members of the citizens’ committee had originally pressured him to lie. More than 100 years later, Emeric Spooner continued his investigation and concluded that there were just too many things involving Treworgy. In so many words, he stated that if Treworgy didn't actually do it, he most likely helped move the body.

Most libraries show little understanding of their audiences, or of what those audiences might want; the libraries typically shout their announcements into the online void, with the assumption that the mere act of doing so should be good enough for people to want to care about them.

Dissidents are subjected to academic shunning. Their books and articles are not recommended for publication or are ignored if published, and are certainly not assigned to students. Many librarians not only will not order them, but will refuse to accept them as gifts. Such authors are not invited to participate in conferences or deliver guest lectures, are not awarded grants or academic appointments, and even their correspondence goes unanswered. . . This de facto blacklisting easily carries the day in newspapers and on television-radio talk shows, scooping out an ever widening chasm between popular opinion and science. It is a scenario that has been repeatedly played out in academia in the past. Galileo ultimately wins out over the Inquisition, but that can be a very lengthy process

Change your name to Miles, Dean, Serge, and /or Leonard, baby, she advised her reflection in the hall; light of that afternoon's vanity mirror. Either way, they'll call it paranoia. They. Either you have stumbled indeed, without the aid of LSD or other indole alkaloids, onto a secret richness and concealed density of dream; onto a network by which X number of Americans are truly communicating whilst reserving their lies, recitations of routine, arid betrayals of spiritual poverty, for the official government delivery system; maybe even onto a real alternative to the exitlessness, to the absence of surprise to life, that harrows the head of everybody American you know, and you too, sweetie. Or you are hallucinating it. Or a plot has been mounted against you, so expensive and elaborate, involving items like the forging of stamps and ancient books, constant surveillance of your movements, planting of post horn images all over San Francisco, bribing of librarians, hiring of professional actors and Pierce Inverarity only knows what-all besides, all financed out of the estate in a way either too secret or too involved for your non-legal mind to know about even though you are co-executor, so labyrinthine that it must have meaning beyond just a practical joke. Or you are fantasying some such plot, in which case you are a nut, Oedipa, out of your skull. Those, now that she was looking at them, she saw to be the alternatives. Those symmetrical four. She didn't like any of them, but hoped she was mentally ill; that that's all it was. That night she sat for hours, too numb even to drink, teaching herself to breathe in a vacuum. For this, oh God, was the void. There was nobody who could help her. Nobody in the world. They were all on something, mad, possible enemies, dead. Old fillings in her teeth began to bother her. She would spend nights staring at a ceiling lit by the pink glow of San Narciso's sky. Other nights she could sleep for eighteen drugged hours and wake, enervated, hardly able to stand. In conferences with the keen, fast-talking old man who was new counsel for the estate, her attention span could often be measured in seconds, and she laughed nervously more than she spoke. Waves of nausea, lasting five to ten minutes, would strike her at random, cause her deep misery, then vanish as if they had never been. There were headaches, nightmares, menstrual pains. One day she drove into L.A., picked a doctor at random from the phone book, went to her, told her she thought she was pregnant. They arranged for tests. Oedipa gave her name as Grace Bortz and didn't show up for her next appointment.

I don’t know the title, but the cover is blue.” “What’s it about? Do you know?” “Dystopian, I’m pretty sure. And it’s long, about nine hundred pages.” I show her The Passage by Justin Cronin. “Yes!” the woman practically screams. “I can’t believe you found it!” There is no higher high than winning the “cover is blue” contest.

Morgan sent a note to his librarian asking the whereabouts of a sculpture of Hercules, supposedly by Michelangelo. “This bronze bust is in your library,” came the reply, “and faces you when sitting in your chair. It has been there for about a year.” Morgan had evidently paid just as little heed to the art world’s excited chatter about Vermeer. When a dealer named G. S. Hellman showed him Vermeer’s A Lady Writing, Morgan asked, “Who is Vermeer?