“Monsieur Chabot was longing to smoke, but he didn’t dare ask if he might. Nor had he the courage to look at his son. All he did, therefore, was stand still and keep quiet, and he looked the picture of embarrassment, like an indigent patient in a fashionable doctor’s waiting room.”
-Georges Simenon
“It seemed that the fire went north away from the road, then whipped back down toward us.
It teased like a living, malevolent thing, intent on causing pain and terror. It drove us before it like dogs chasing a rabbit. Yet it didn’t eat us. It could have, but it didn’t.”
-Octavia Butler
“Work keys jangling like sleigh bells, the Court officers march into the chambers like a two-by-two wagonless team of crew-cut Clydesdales harnessed together by a love of God and country.”
-Paul Beatty
“Her closed eyelids are like two eggshells.”
-Vi Khi Nao
“When they pulled up to the house, she followed her father, who insisted on carrying her suitcase, to the front door. She stepped inside after him and suddenly stopped. The house felt different, smelled different even, as if it were a living organism whose basic chemistry had changed.”
-Brit Bennett
“She came whizzing down the stairs, thrown like a dart.”
-Margaret Atwood
