Tuesday, November 15, 2022

Here Goes Nothing by Steve Toltz

Toltz's prose style is stunning. I stopped turning over page corners to mark especially pungent sentences, as there were too many. Fatalistic, funny, unswerving look at mortality and its alternatives.

The way I saw it, faith in the Lord was like walking around in a suit of gold that looks fancy but weighs you down. [27]

Congratulations, bitches. It's an arranged marriage, and you arranged it. [33]

My mind was a tour de force of what the fuck. [68]

Like a secret tradition on the road to the road to perdition/
To think and talk in mediocrities/
Fake philosopher, you are bluffing, "I know I know nothing"
Fool, ignorance doesn't make you Socrates. [114]

Whenever I hear someone reciting a poem, I also hear the hours of practice they put into memorizing it just for the occasion of saying it to you. It's excruciating. [114]

Gracie went downstairs and knocked at the front door from the inside. Who is to say this is not how summon ghosts? [166]

"Now raise your glasses. That was a joke. Put your glasses down. Who toasts a baby? What are you, alcoholics?" [227]

Being born is okay for personal growth, but aside from that, what's it good for? [227]

Tears and laughter are the only common language between all people on earth. [227]

'He who does not answer the questions has passed the test.' - Franz Kafka [249]

Take it from me-- when you get sad enough, you'll vote for the precipitous over the slow decline every time. [255]

It had occurred to me that all my self-criticisms were innuendo and hearsay, everything I'd ever pretended to be was for someone else's benefit, and if people were ever looking at you, it was actually to see if you were looking at them, and if they were paying you attention, it was only to gauge your level of attention. [364]

"Notions of beauty are socially constructed, to be sure, but ugly is ugly." [369]

Gracie put her head down on the bar, muttering, 'I didn't want to be more sinned against than sinning. I wanted to sin too.' [369]

"You're playing God."
"God isn't. Someone has to." [371]



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